We had a lovely lazy start to day – there were no ticketed or time-limited activities planned so we had the luxury of being able to take our time and relax.
I cooked up an order of fried eggs sunny side down for Genevieve’s breakfast, and James requested a second breakfast again. I swear the boy is half-Hobbit!
Uncle Ben’s had kindly left his Nerf Vortex earlier in the week. The kids spent a very happy timing throwing and attempting to catch the Vortex with Grandad Lawrie.
The throwing soon turned into a different game with Grandad Lawrie “bombing” James (with James squealing with delight). Great fun for all involved!
James then added new rules where he got a “point” for hitting the nearby tree. Grandad Lawrie took it too far though and got the Vortex stuck high up in the branches. James said “you lose a point Grandad”, and rightly so.
Grandad Lawrie couldn’t even see the Vortex to start with, but once I pointed it out he attempted to throw a broom up to dislodge it. After several failed attempts, the broom may have broken as it tumbled down to earth and Grandad Lawrie may have then been gently chastised by some site staff for doing so. Whoops! He promised to replace the broom though.
Luckily there was rope in the car boot, so the newly broken broom head was attached to the end of the line and swung up into the tree. After a few more attempts the Vortex was finally back in action.
It was only then that Grandma Lindsey noticed a giant freestanding ladder only three doors down from our cottage. If we’d seen it twenty minutes earlier we could have had the Vortex down in a few seconds (but it was far more fun watching Grandad Lawrie with his broom). Amazing!
We prepared a packed lunch, applied lashings of sun cream on the kids, and then headed off to Alum Bay. As we got close to Alum Bay the traffic came to a stand still. We though there had been an accident, but we then twigged that it was just a massive queue of cars waiting to get into the car park. We persevered and it actually moved a lot faster than we thought it would.
Sadly I was already flagging by this point so, rather than heading in for a bit and then trying to sleep in the car (which hadn’t worked at Blackgang Chine), I decided to decided to drop off Megan and kids with Grandma Lindsey and Grandad Lawrie and then went for a sleep back at the cottage.
In my absence the gang started by playing a game of Jurassic Adventure golf. They had lots of fun and both children were very animated when they told me about it later in the afternoon.
In line with the Jurassic theme, they then moved on to the Dinosaur Safari car driving next door. There was a lot of excitement from both children to start with – neither of them have done much driving before.
Genevieve set off confidently but James looked dismayed when he realised he was too small to drive the car by himself. He was less than happy sitting still whilst Genevieve whizzed around the track.
But as always, Megan soon came to the rescue and acted as James’s personal chauffeur. He was a very happy chappy with Mummy behind the wheel.
The gang then headed down to the beach via the archaic chair lift. I’m amazed it’s still in operation as it’s like something from the Victorian era. They started tucking into their lunch when I woke up back at the cottage. I jumped in the car and drove back to Alum Bay (and thankfully there was no queue to get in by that point).
I headed to the chair lift and started the perilous journey down to the beach. I saw the girl in front of me lose her hat on the way down, but that didn’t stop me taking pictures and selfies. Oh dear! I came over the brow of the cliff and quickly spotted everyone down on the beach. They spotted me too so there was a minute or so of frantic waving as I gracefully descended down to sea level.
I arrived on the beach to discover an ongoing battle with James about when it’s appropriate to throw stones (only ever into the sea when there’s definitely no one else nearby) and when it’s not (all other times). This resulted in a couple of meltdowns, but once he’d calmed down he was soon happily messing about in the sea again.
And once he’d worked out he could throw water instead of stones he was very content filling up his bucket and flinging the water back into the sea. Simple pleasures are often the best.
Genevieve and I built a sandcastle and moat using stones to shore up the boundary. It ended up looking rather, well, phallic but it was totally unintentional – Genevieve placed all of the stones with no outside guidance from me. I don’t think Megan believed me though as I received a knowing eyebrow raise.
On the theme of inappropriate geology, James found a stone with boobs. He was beside himself with glee at his discovery. Brilliant. Both kids also found many, many “special” stones but Grandma Lindsey drew a metaphorical line in the sand and decided she was already far too overloaded with stones to take any more for the children. They still filled their own pockets with them though. Oh well.
There was a bit of excitement when I spotted two giant birds gliding toward us from further up the coast. I’d never seen anything like them so I asked Grandad Lawrie who’s an ornithological expert. They turned out to be a pair of ravens – Grandad Lawrie was very happy as they’re quite a rare sight.
With such lovely scenery we just had to take a couple of family photos. It’s a truly beautiful place.
With the children occupied I went to find a Geocache with Grandma Lindsey. Megan took this as an opportunity to construct another stone stack while Grandad Lawrie kept the kids entertained.
All of a sudden the tide came in quickly so we packed up our belongings (including the special stones secreted in various pockets) and headed back to the stairlift.
The stairlift back up felt very exciting as I had Genevieve sat next to me and she was thrilled by the whole experience. We played a game of “spot the lost hat/shoe/bag” as we crested the top of the cliff – I was gobsmacked at all the dropped items. How are people so silly?
On the way back to the car we stopped at a viewpoint to find a quick Geocache. Sadly Genevieve bumped her head but it made for a brilliant selfie. One to bring out when she’s older!
Megan and I managed slightly happier selfie, too.
Grandma Lindsey signed the Geocache log and I returned it to its hiding place. While we were busy Megan and the kids had set off back to the car. On the way they paused by the Needles sign for a quick photo opportunity.
Safely back home I took the kids for a scoot while Megan made beans on toast for their dinner. The Grandparents arrived a little while later… with a brand new broom to replace the one broken earlier that morning. Hilarious!
Sadly I’d pushed it too much again and was broken while the kids ate dinner, so I went for a sleep while Megan and the Grandparents put the children to bed. It was so tricky finding the right balance – I didn’t want to miss out on the family holiday but equally I didn’t want to feel awful or leave the others with all the childcare duties. I guess there was no right answer.
When I woke up, Megan told me that she was still having issues with her new Garmin watch. In addition to it not syncing to the server, it also wasn’t counting her steps properly (which was linked to our life insurance so was really rather important). To test the step count I suggested we go for a thousand step walk to see how many were recorded on her watch (and to compare it to my watch’s tally). We walked in total silence as we tried to keep count, although Megan told me afterward that she’d lost count at 650 steps. Whoops! The result was inconclusive as the step count for that controlled experiment were reasonably accurate, but they were categorically wrong for the day (and the few days before). More investigation was needed!
Grandad Lawrie had whipped up homemade burgers and wedges for dinner. We quickly scoffed the lot before heading to bed early again – being on holiday is tiring!
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