Another Story… - Part 2
Obviously feeling delighted with the attention she was getting, Ellie ran back half way up the hill and repeated the exercise, stopping every now and then to receive a quick pat or stroke from her new found friends. The children’s giggles of pride at their very funny dog drifted up the cliffside as we trepidly fumbled our way down the hill.
Once down of course, we then had the mammoth task of getting up the other side, which was, I must admit quite a challenge. We achieved this by walking forwards, turning around and going up backwards and then sideways and lo and behold quite some time later we did mount the summit! A little hot, a little sweaty, a little out of breath, but also a little triumphant. For the children, at least, it was a great achievement.
It was also now that I announced we did not have to walk all the way back, we would have a swim and lunch at the beach, visit the village of Tyneham and then catch a bus or taxi back to Lulworth where we would enjoy a much deserved ice cream. This idea was greeted with much delight and we enjoyed an hour on the beach, cooling off in the sea and re-fueling with the picnic we had lugged all this way.
Even Ellie’s appalling behaviour, stealing a lick from the tin of tuna and sweetcorn sandwich filling as I turned to give Amber her lunch did not dampen the euphoria of a challenge well met.
The deserted village of Tyneham was fantastic – well worth a visit and really interesting. Nothing else there just a large car park with no attendant, and one long windy road that leads to and from it.
A slight nagging worry had started to creep over me at this point – no “You Are Here” maps, no authoritative figure to indicate the next bus due – actually no bus stop - full stop, no gift shop, no nothing really. I sneaked a look at my phone, whoops, no signal. Nev, with less subtlety looked at his – no signal either. I did have a terrible urge to laugh at this point – it was just like a Famous Five book – quite an adventure! But one look at Nev’s face told me to keep it straight “He’s gonna blow!” I thought. Unfortunately the thought of a million pieces of Nev exploding in the middle of a military range was too much and a fairly suppressed giggle did pop out – only for a moment though – that is, until he took both phones and continued to trek up and down hills, his arms waving high above his head searching for a signal, any signal on either of the phones. It really was quite amusing after all it could have been worse, it could have been raining!
So there we were 4 very tired people, one exhausted dog, no bus, no taxi, no phone signal, just the prospect of another 5 mile hike back to base. Not a joyous situation.
Until that is, some very kind people took pity on Nev and after showing him the map which meant a minimum 1.5 mile walk to the main road where there were no buses anyway, they offered to give him a lift back to Lulworth to collect the car.
We will be forever grateful to these kind kind people who would accept no money, just an appreciative thank you; but to whoever you are, where-ever you are we will always remember your gesture and will return that favour to someone we may meet in the future who may be in the same predicament as us.
So all was well that ended well. But the moral of the story is, plan a trip and check your info – or better still, just don’t take my word for it!
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