A summer off

Greetings and salutations!  I must admit that it has been rather a long time since my last post despite my best intentions.  So; what have we all been up to this summer?

I have been enjoying the fact that we’re actually having a summer this year.  I.E. – sunshine.  I've taken the opportunity of not working to busy myself hacking back the garden.  I knew there was a shed in there somewhere but since it seems that this year is the year that finally the bramble and the honeysuckle have declared all out war on each other, and are both intent on full domination of the garden, said shed took some unearthing!

I have been navigating the perils of ‘signing on’ for the first time.  That’s fun!  There is a distinct paucity of information readily available about what you can get, how you’re eligible for what and how long anything takes.  The entire system seems a bit of a mare but better minds than I have waxed lyrical on this subject many times so I won’t bang on about it.  It has meant I've had to go up into the city centre rather more often than I usually do with the side effect that I happened to go through the Exeter farmer’s market on a Thursday and take a look at what I spied:

 Razor clams! I have wanted to try these for a very long time.  Ever since I saw HFW extolling their virtues several years ago.  After that I came to realise they were one of things that people used to forage for and eat rather a lot more in decades past than currently.  That seems to be changing now though with the rise in popularity of foraging, and awareness of what local delicacies we have available without having to ship our food for miles.  I didn't purchase any yet; being out of employment they seemed a little unnecessary, but I spoke with the stall holder (from local fishmongers Gibson's Plaice) and he told me they have them most weeks bar the winter.  I shall save them for a treat.  J  In fact all of their produce looked very tempting, and beautifully fresh.

I have been making some crafty things.  Remember my purse I made that gets re-invented every time the cover is falling apart too much?  A friend had mentioned that she cannot find a card sized purse anywhere and as it was her birthday coming up I decided to make her one. 

I used some scraps in her favourite colours and stitched it up on a visit home to Ma (and her sewing machine) and she loved it.

I've also been doing waaay more baking than I ever normally have the time for - tried cheese and courgette scones - thoroughly lovely.  Useful to use up any excess courgettes from the garden or allotment.  Which brings me to the news that I am helping a friend with her allotment as she has virtually no experience at growing things.  In return I get to adopt the shed on the right  and get part of the plot to myself and we share the rest.  I've been loving getting back into the digging - it made me realise how much I missed the old plot.  Lots of plans going round my head for next season.

All of these things have made me rather wish I could make a living crafting things, and doing gardens, and baking, with perhaps some social media marketing and invoicing / IT thrown in for good measure.  I wonder if that’s possible...  Sadly something tells me I'm going to have to get a ‘real’ job.  It has been lovely having a several weeks to myself though, for which I am grateful, and it has given me time to re-evaluate quite drastically what I want from a job.  I have come to the conclusion that as long as I can pay the rent and bills and have enough for Zeke and I to live on then it is far more important to me now, to find something I am happy doing / can believe in.  It may take me some time to find this so in the time being I have been applying for casual type stuff/temping whilst I search.  Wish me luck in my quest!

First frost

First frost of this winter here today.  We're lucky down in the South West that we get a lot warmer climes most of the time than a lot of the rest of our wee island.  Today the river steamed gently in the morning sun on a truly beautiful morning as I wended my way to work.

The cold I can cope with but I do love it to be bright and sunny.  It's those grey dreary November days that get me down.  As I read recently 'November is like the Thursday of the year.'  And as the great Douglas Adams wrote in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy 'I never could get the hang of Thursdays...'

Pics, seaside and graffiti

Once more there’s been a little while between my last post and this one.  Here in the UK it’s hot hot hot at present.  I'm sure you’ll be well aware of that though so there’s really no point me utilising extraneous words to portray the nastiness of an office that’s 27⁰ at 8.30am and has climbed to 29+⁰ by lunchtime, or the unpleasant feeling when you get up and know your skirt has stuck to the backs of your legs in some sort of nasty take on the embarrassing tucking it into your knickers theme, or the constant watering needed of any plant in a pot or, or or…&c &c.

 In fact I like watering the plants as it enforces a little reflective time and the cool water in the warm evening is very pleasant when accidentally spilt on your feet.  J

Anyway, no particular thing to post but thought I’d share a few pics taken recently of things I found interesting.  Excuse the quality of some; they came from my (very old) 2mp phone.

Shortly after the last post I saw the cygnets out of the water, grazing up on the banks.  Here they are looking lovely.  They’re a fair bit bigger than this now!

Speaking about the plants (I was you know – do try and pay attention…) you can see our flourishing fig here, this was just a 3” high twig when we got this from the Eden project 2 years ago.  Not doing too badly huh?  You can see one of the chillies in the window behind.  We have 3 others in the plastic plant house thing out the back having cheated and got 4 plants from the food fest in April as we (I) were a bit late with the seed planting this year.  All this hot weather is doing them wonders too.

As the Chap has been working continuously it seems like – or all days, every evening and mostly all weekends, my friend took pity on me last Saturday and invited me along to the beach with her, her husband, his sister and her husband and their 2 kids.  We took the train to Teignmouth – a great piece of line that runs right along the sea, then the little ferry boat across the estuary to Shaldon on the opposite side.  I had a lovely paddle – here’s your proof!  This is looking back over to the ‘back beach’ at Teignmouth, with the harbour entrance on the right.  As previously mentioned, apols for the quality but I took this on my phone to send it to the Chap.  Show him what he was missing!  (Was that mean?)

Over the last few months I've noticed a rash of graffiti around that all seems to be done by the same hand.  Now I'm not averse to writings that make you pause for thought or well executed street art but this person is starting to annoy me.  You see their idealistic anarchy 'A' symbols all over the place including where it really does detract from the environs.  And I'm sorry my child, but anarchy would never work as unfortunately someone has to make sure the bins are emptied and the water keeps running &c.  

Anyway - see what you think of this little lot.  I'm not entirely sure what Brian Eno has to do with anything though...  :-)

The weather, again!

For the n-th time in the last few months it's torrential rain and the river's up over the paths again.

Seriously bored of all the water now.

Even this duck's had enough and is trying to keep his feet dry!

It's probably my fault for saying I wanted to do things in the garden next week.  *Sigh*

At least we're lacking the snow that's clobbered other areas round the country.  Stay warm and dry folks!

A different walk to work

It's very misty this morning, and cold.  A cold that chaps my face and makes my cheeks tingle.  It's also kind of magical and a little bit spooky too. 

 The familiar landmarks of my daily journey hide themselves, then briefly loom out of the enveloping mist to vanish again behind a few steps further on.

Soon the sun will burn it all away and the ethereal otherness will be gone; until the next time.

A feast for the birds

Now we have finally had a little of the promised snow I'm even more glad I got round to making these fat 'hangers' (for want of a better name) for the birds.  In case anyone wanted a peek here they are finished.

  I melted down some fat that I had been saving in the back of the fridge each time the Chap had a meat roast at the weekend.  A couple of small yoghurt pots were the ideal size.  Fill about 2/3 with mixed bird seed and pur fat over.  Stir to ensure the fat is all the way down the pot - any parts not covered will crumble off when you take them out of the mould.  If you have enough fat at the top you can put a little more seed in, just as long as they're properly covered with the fat.  I stuck them in the fridge to set.
Once they had set I heated a metal skewer over the gas ring.  Pushed it through the unmoulded lumps and then fed thin string through.  I used a couple of those wooden coffee stirrers and tied them on in a cross to make a little perching area.  Ta daa - hopefully they'll be a little help to our feathered visitors.  :-)

& the storms continue unabated...

Ok, ok, that isn't technically correct as we did have a day off (mostly) from the rain on Friday.  The river fell so you could nigh on see the paths, if not actually pass along them without dipping your toes in but yesterday was a return to form with heavy rains battering us along with some high winds and up went the water again.  Here's a daytime shot from about the same viewpoint as the night shot in the last post. 

The water's actually slightly higher this time. 

Anyone for a nice relaxing bike ride on a Sunday?  No??!  (Look at the size of that log!  If only we had a wood burner.  I'd be out after every flood scavenging the river banks for free fuel.)
'Welcome to soggy Exeter' that should perhaps read. 
I think this little chap is wondering where his home's gone.  Along with a lot of unfortunate people in these floods.  Sadly a woman also lost her life locally when a tree fell which in turn took a wall down on top of where she was living in a tent.  Another example that if we as a society could take better care of all members rather than worrying about sh-t like what we'll be sitting on come crapmas day we'd perhaps all be a little bit richer human beings.  (What is it with this pressure of supposedly needing a new sofa for chrimble?  Will my old one spontaneously give up the ghost in shame at it's non-newness?  I somehow doubt it - it's managed to tough it out each year so far.  Piss off ad-men.)
I didn't intend this to be a ranty post so excuse the slight tangent; though I am asking no excuses at all for the content.
Anyway - a whistle round blog-land this morning has appraised me of 2 things.  Firstly, in a slightly suspicious coincidental way Blogger has apparently told several of the blogs I perused that they've run out of space and would they like to pay for the privilege of uploading photos?  It just gave me this message too.  Now, I know that the finite space they give you will fill up but the fact that they've all gone at the same time makes me think it's a ploy.  Plus someone had put a comment somewhere saying it's Blogger wanting to shift us all to another provider or something.  :-(  Anyway, no, I do not want to pay, especially to an online company that can't tell I'm in the UK and would therefore use a corresponding unit of currency so I am using Flickr instead from now on and uploading from there.  Or at least I am if there are images in this post.  If it's a bit lacking on the image front then I evidently failed to get it to work!  Hmm - you seem to have to add it as html code otherwise if you use the 'share' to blogger option it makes it a new post.  Slightly more longwinded but I'll cope with it.

The second fact I quickly caught on to is that it's 'stir-up Sunday' - traditionally the day when chrimble puddings are made.  (Having just skim read the wiki article I've linked there it actually appears to be a religous thing that has become associated and overtaken by the pudding thing.  Shows how much of a heathen I am that I had no idea of that I guess!)  Now, being somewhat lackadaisical in some areas I have yet to make our chrimble cake (having been inspired to by both Being Penny Wise and Frugal Living UK's frugal based versions) so I figured that with a month to go perhaps I'd better worry about that first.  Although when I think about it I probably prefer a very small pud rather than cake.  Never made pud though and it strikes me as something one ought to have at least a little forward planning for so it shall have to wait for next year, or the year after, or...you get the picture.  I'm slightly alarmed by the reminder that both those blog authors soaked their fruit for a week - mine shall have overnight and be grateful for it I think. 

Given that I'm stealing some of the dying-from-man-flu (that I gave him) Chap's medicinal brandy to soak the fruit in, along with a mix of some in which he steeped spiced baked apple, a freebie single malt whisky and possibly some of this chrimble mead (though I'm not sure that at 13% it's up to the job.  Anyone?) I don't think I can really nick enough off him to last a full week! 

Anyway, in keeping with their Frugal theme but with a slightly different bent I decided to make my cake only utilising what is in the cupboards already.  IE no new purchases.  Hence the theft of the Chap's brandy and slightly idiosyncratic line up of ingredients / booze that will be utilised.  That's another post though - right now I really must get the fruit and brandy in the bowl before he finishes drinking it all.  If that comes to pass I'll have to sacrifice some of the sloe gin instead.....  Noooooooo.........  :-D

'Tis a little damp here in the south...

The torrential rain of the last 2 or 3 days has caused flooding and seemingly, travel chaos all over the region.  You'd think (and this from a nation of perennial weather moaners) we'd never had to deal with a bit of wet before!  Due to my interminable saga of leg related tedious monotony I am still catching the train for the short hop to and from the shuttle bus for my work.  When I got to the station on my way home last night mine was one of a whole 2 trains on the board that was actually running.  I was glad of that!  Felt for the poor souls in the 100+ strong queue across the front of the station waiting for a replacement bus though.  I think that's why it's like a ghost town here in work today.  Seems like everyone has stayed home and battened down the hatches.  Wish I could have!  The wind is howling and the rain is due to hammer it down some more.  No doubt the river will continue rising - this is it last night at about 6.30pm. 

There should be steps and paths down in that lot somewhere!  The water was absolutely heaving past, you really would not want to fall in when it's shifting like that.  It's always slightly sinister when it's so far from its normal self, I think.  Seems like a much more malevolent force than usual.

There's the odd ray of sunshine and patch of blue sky; or there was this morning anyway.  Autumn continues apace whether we like it or not.

It's 2 months today since I injured my leg and sad to say it seems to be infected again.  I'm back on antibiotics - of 2 kinds this time.  I shall get the results of a test tomorrow to determine which actual pathogen we are dealing with then perhaps I will be given something targeted and we can finally get rid of this thing once and for all!!  I hope so; thoroughly fed up with it now as is everyone around me I'm sure.  The Chap has been brilliant, doing all the cooking, washing up etc.  I'm itching to get back in the kitchen now after so long a forced abstinence but the Chap has dictated that I am not allowed at the moment.  I want to get my Random Recipe for this month done before the cut off date, I want to cook an idea I've been toying with in my head of  'Devon Dodgers' - I'm thinking a cross between these Devon flats I made before and a jammy dodger, primarily because there's 2 full jars of waitrose jam sat at work needing to be used up that I have permission to make something nice from.  I want to feel like I'm doing something for him for a change rather than the other way round too!  I want the house to smell of good things and be able to think 'I did that'.  I think it's the hibernation vibe kicking in; it's dark now in the morning when I get up and in the evening when I leave work, plus it's cold, wet and windy and the mournful wind makes it sound even worse.  And now I am truly wittering away.  I hope you are warm and dry wherever you may be, and that I get to do some cosy baking soon.  :-)

Pre-loved beauties, some bargain foods and post #300!

Well I'm safely ensconced back home now after finally being allowed out from the hospital last Monday after getting into theatre on the Sunday for my second op in the late afternoon.  Not much to report since then as necessity has dictated I have done very little as standing about is on the banned list which means most cooking / baking activities are curtailed.  I have been falling back in love with bulgar wheat though having got 4 x 500g bags of it in my latest Approved Food order for the princely sum of 99p.  What a bargain!!  And as it only requires soaking in boiling water for 30 mins I don't have to stand there cooking it when I want something to eat in the daytime and the Chap is out at work.  Incidentally if you haven't come across Approved Food in your frugal wanderings then check them out.  They sell discontinued, end of lines, change of packaging and out dated stock which changes constantly.  The postage can sound a little steep as it starts at £5.25 but that covers up to 25kgs of goods so it's the kind of place to shop when they have a whole bunch of items you'd like.  If there are items you can get in the case deals; as I did with the bulgar wheat, then all the better.  I also picked up a load of pasta, various sauces and indian meals, cat food, tofu, 12 pack case of cous cous (also 99p!), crisps etc etc and my favourite; 1.9kg of Bisto veggie gravy granules for £1.49 - that should keep me going for a while as it makes 25 litres!!!  This is just some of the items I got as I've already started using various things and packed away others but it gives you an idea.  My order came to £29.74 in total including the postage - I got a little discount on that as certain items carry a P+P discount.  Full price for these items is £87.52 so that represented a saving of just under £62!.  Not too shoddy at all.  :-)
Anyway, the point of this post was to show you some other bargains I got from our local charity shops on one of the few forays out of the house I've been allowed. 

 Cast iron griddle pan - I'm especially pleased with this as I've wanted one for a few years now but as I wouldn't use it overly often I can't really justify spending £20 or £30 on one so when I saw this in perfect nick for a mere fiver I snapped it up.  Coincidentally I've also been running an idea for a sandwich with griddled halloumi through my head in the last few days (as a possible entry for this months 'No Croutons Required') so this was a truly serendipitous find.
The gorgeously coloured glass vase is for my mother, it's truly beautiful made of a mixture of blue and green glass fused together and blown into this sort of swirled bauble shape.  This was a whole £3 and is perfect with nary a scratch or mark of any kind, not even on the base.  I thought I might see what pre-loved items I can spy for chrimble pressies for the family this year, in addition to home made goodies.  For the last few years we've had more of a home made / token gifting theme as we're all of the age now that we have houses full of stuff pretty much.  That said this piece obviously does fall into the 'stuff' category but my ma loves glass pieces like this so I immediately thought of her when my eyes alit upon it.

Finally some wool - yarn - whatever it is.  And needles.  Knitting ones.  Though they're the wrong size I've since discovered.  Tsk!  Being of a somewhat ambulatory challenged nature at the moment I felt that perhaps the time had finally come to learn how to knit, even if only in the most basic fashion.  I want to make myself a hat and for the last year or so have been gently getting around to it.  I spied 2 balls of this rather pretty graduated grey soft wool/yarn malarkey and equipped myself with these and what I erroneously thought were the correct size '8' needles indicated on the label.  Apparently not.  That referred to the 8mm size not a UK size 8 which is in fact 4mm.  Obviously.  (There's 3 sizing conventions commonly in use for knitting needles I've discovered so as a newbie what chance did I stand?)  Anyway that charity shop had a whole box full of different needles so I plan to visit again on the morrow on my way home from the latest doctors appointment and have a rummage for a bigger set.
Finally - the more observant amongst you may have noticed a certain alluding to the fact that this will be the 300th post on my blog.  It should be rather more by now for a blog that's over two and a half years old but I have been somewhat slacker at posting this year.  As we enter autumn and the nights are drawing in again I feel hopeful that this may change and I can shake off the edge of general malaise I have felt around my spirits for the last few months now.  As one who has been dragged rather deeper by that before I have no wish to revisit it so am doing my utmost to be resolved to do more, make more, bake more, plant more and last but very definitely not least, keep trying to change job as to quote my beloved Firefly, my current one is 'damaging my calm.'  So - a small pat on the back for post #300, and thanks for joining me here whether you've flitted past by accident or are one of my small band of followers.  And a cheering image taken on Saturday during one of the many downpours we've been having.  Pretty huh?

Ahoy there!

I must apologise for my apparent absence.  Much to my startlement it's already the 10th of the new year!  Been quite busy hiding under umbrellas and trying to not get washed or blown away!!

Work has also been fairly hurly burly with the new intake for January; students from hither and yon have been pitching up at my work!
I've also been putting the slow cooker to good use with a new batch of winter soups that I have yet to write up in full so there's that to look forward to and I think we're due a rugby round up on the Chiefs performance this season thus far.

New Years eve was blimmin close though...

Path passable, christmas comes, girly shock!

Water levels have dropped a bit now...  if only I had a wood burner there's plenty of fuel just needing drying out left behind.
Weather's still grotty but I shall venture forth into it later for one small item of giftedness followed by a chrimble catch up with a good friend.  Starting to actully feel a bit more festive now - hard to when you have to concentrate on work rather than being able to wind down.  Might even get the tree decorated tomorrow!  (Bought it last weekend!!)  Looking forward to the lovely coloured lights and my pretty things to hang on it.  Yup - I'm a bit of a girly at heart.  :-D

Delightful weather!

In common with most of the rest of the UK we've been getting a bit clobbered by the weather this week.  Admittedly nothing like as bad as further north and Scotland have but we've had a wee bit of rain...

This morning we had a wee bit more...

Anyone want to take the riverside path?

No, I thought not!!

Frugal tip and unseasonal plant madness

Frugal tip of the week - Boots has Aquafresh toothpaste on half price at the mo - that makes it 52p rather than £1.05!  Even cheaper than their own brand which is 70p - not a bad deal so I thought I'd stock up and got 6 tubes.  :-)

We were in Dorset last weekend and I noticed that in my mothers garden these poppies were not only still blooming - they're bursting back into life with new buds!  It's been an odd 'Autumn' so far for the weather that's for sure.  How lovely they were.

February Witterings

As it seems to have been a fairly quiet week since the excitement of V Day on Monday [!] and I've been a busy bunny and therefore failing to cook anything interesting; certainly anything worth blogging about [I have to confess to making us pizza and hash browns on Tuesday :-O] I have very little to spiel on about. Oh no!! I'm sure I'll manage though as wittering is one of my fortes - why use one word when 12 will do?!

Firstly - a little expounding on our picnic setting as this really is a top spot. In Exeter there is a 'Green Circle Walk' - a walk of 12 miles that goes round the outskirts of the city and is split into 5 smaller sections. The viewpoint we visited is on one of these - it's in the Barley Valley Nature Reserve. I can recommend this walk - the Redhill's walk. As I mentioned we're going to return when it's a little more clement - and possible lighter [we slipped our way back across the muddy field pretty much in the dark] and will take some photos of the view then. Chap enjoyed his steak sandwiches and I my smoked salmon washed down with some rather nice champagne. I'm sure the lady walking her dogs thought we were nuts!
Secondly - the weather. Argh - I know it's still February but I'VE HAD ENOUGH NOW!!!! Please please can we have spring - warmth - sun - not raining... it'd be lovely. I'm sure I remember the sun - you know - that big yellow ball thing that hangs about in the sky trying to peek through the louring grey rain-sodden clouds from November to March solid. Or so it seems.That's the one - see those rays - aah bliss!

This weekend I'm hoping to get a fair bit done at the allotment - I need to finish digging over 2 of the 3 big beds and re-edge the smaller ones. I also need to make a decision about whether I dedicate a second of the smaller beds to fruit or not. I currently have one small bed with Rasps and Strawbs on and was tempted by a Tayberry bush in Poundstretcher for the princely sum of £2.49 the other day but I kinda think when it comes to fruit - unless you give a fair bit of land to multiple bushes it's not really worth it is it? I suppose I could pick a small handful now and then and save them up in the freezer until I have enough for a pie or crumble but this seems a bit counter intuitive to me. The other side of me though is the bit that causes me to have hundreds more packets of seeds than I have space to plant. It's the bit that wants to try different things out - the bit that snaps my head round in poundstretcher going 'look Ruth - you really NEEEEED that - a Tayberry - bet that'd be exciting, the Chap'd be impressed, it'd taste nice - pleeeease can we, can we, can we...'. That's the bit that gets me in trouble. [It's the reason why I have amongst other things; a toast rack that matches my salt and pepper set - which are admittedly pretty cool little metal wheely objects. I never use a toast rack though. It's a pet hate of mine if the toast isn't warm enough to melt the butter. Why would I need a toast rack? It's basically a cooling device for those deviants that like lukewarm toast. Of course the answer is I don't need one. But I saw it one time and it matched my S+P and that bit of me won that time. This was a few years back - I'm better now on most stuff but seeds / plants - not so good.] Anyway I managed to not succumb to the Tayberry and have been regretting it ever since. The thing is - if I give the third small bed over to fruit as well as the first one there'll be nowhere for the Jerusalem Artichokes which are currently hogging what tiny amount of space there is in the back garden each year. I want herbs in the back garden - to hand like, so the J'Arts need to be moved to the plot. Hmm - a quandry.

In case you're wondering, or are vaguely interested or are merely ploughing on through hoping to see the end in sight to this post some time soon... for info - my allotment is a half plot. 5 x 25m with 3 5x3.5m beds and 3 5x1m beds and space at the end where I will get round to building a shed. Or Chap may do it - being a buildery type bloke ['blokey bloke bloke' as Bill Bailey would say] he's fairly excited by the prospect I think. Anyway - promise I'll take a decent pic sometime vaguely soon and get it up here for y'all. In the meantime I think that is in fact it on the wittering front for today. Buenas Noches kittens.

Mid-winter weather turn?

It finally stopped raining - woo hoo!! This pic was taken yesterday morning and you can see the river has been up over the paths again with the volume of water that the skies have seen fit to chuck at us over the last week or so. You can also see that the sun is peeking shyly out though, preparing to drape us in golden radiance for the day. Come on sun!

What the clear skies mean by today though is a return of the cold. Frosty start to the morning and the river steaming on my way to work. Hey ho. It is mid-winter. We may have turned the corner. Maybe? Please?...

A favourite place

Whilst in Dorset at the weekend I wanted to show the Chap one of my favourite places there on the coast. If you drive through Corfe Castle, turn right and follow the road all the way up through Kingston, drive along the top of the ridge (admiring the view as you go) then turn right again you will end up in Worth Matravers. Park in the honesty car park and from here you can walk down past the strip lynchets (medieval terracing system) to the coast to join the SW coast path . (You can see the strip lynchets in this photo taken in January '09 on a much sunnier day. As I have to admit, several of the photos on this post were. The really grey ones are from this year!) Or you can do as we did and scramble down to see the sea at Seacombe. (On the far right of this map.) Now it was, to say the least; a tad windy whilst we were there and the tide was in so we couldn't get all the way round to where we used to spend many a happy hour as nippers dabbling in the rock pools, but we got to see the place, the Chap diced with the idea of being washed away and we had what I believe would be covered by the term 'bracing' walk before retiring back up the [very very muddy indeed] hill to the pub.

Ah the pub - the Square and Compass. This is my very favourite pub, quite possibly also fueled by many memories as a kid of reaching the refuge of it after a similarly bracing [although perhaps slightly more challenging sized 3 feet tall] walk along the cliff tops. It's an old low stone building with a stone roof that nestles into the top of the hillside in Worth Matravers looking down to the sea. It's been in the same family for over 100 years and has appeared in every single edition of the CAMRA Good Beer Guide. They have free range chickens running about and a stone carving festival in the summer. There's roaring fires and a chair made from driftwood and branches. There's a bar that's really just a hatch with barrels of real ales behind. There's a mini museum of fossils and local finds collected by the current landlord's father. [Sadly passed away now.] There's a pumpkin carving festival in autumn. There used to be a semi-tame Raven when I was small but it attacked me once so I'm quite happy that's not around any more. It did also stuff an inebriated man's fiver down a drainpipe one memorable New Years eve to our geat amusement though. There're tables made of massive slabs of rock in the garden and a lovely view to the sea. There's some of the freshest air I know and quite importantly there are pasties. Just pasties. Only pasties. As in - NO OTHER FOOD but pasties. You have to have a pasty when you go there. It's the law, or an old charter or something. Or it should be. Assuming you've done your bracing walk in the howling gale [did I mention it rained too] then you've earnt a nice hot pasty and a pint, whilst you steam gently by the side of the fire. They're scrummy pasties too; from memory and other's comments now. Served on a paper plate with a choice of sauces at the bar and a piece of kitchen towel for your fingers [though there is cutlery if you want it] this is the proper Square and Compass experience. They even have a veggie option these days so I too can have my pasty with my pint. Bliss.

Go there. Do it now.