As we still had no minibus and we had a week's break between house sits, Nigel and I decided to take a break as mentioned briefly in the last post. We realised we had the freedom to go anywhere in the country we wanted which is quite liberating really, No ties, no responsibilities for a whole week, how lovely! After a long discussion, and again a lot of googling, we decided to head back down to North Yorkshire again as there were still places we wanted to see and hadn't on our last visit . We really like the area and it wasn't too far south to trek back up to Scotland for our next sit in Innerleithen near Peebles.

The BBC weather report had said it was going to be lovely so we took the plunge and purchased another tent smaller than before along with the extra bits and pieces we needed and found a lovely campsite on line a farm called Middlewood farm with electric hook up and Wi Fi access not too far from Whitby. A place called Fylingthorpe near Robin Hood's Bay.

The campsite was about 1/4 mile from the coast overlooking the sea on the cliff top. It was made up of 3 fields, one for caravans only, one for motor homes only and a mixed field which included tents. We had stopped over on a cheap night break from Booking.com we found in Thirsk so we only had about a 2hour journey that morning. The sun was shining and the journey across the north Yorkshire moors spectacular and exhilarating as we were going up and down hill's that were fairly steep 1 in 4. If you have ever seen one of those infinity pools which just seem to fall away, it was just like that with some of the hills. As you got to the brow the drop was so steep the other side that you thought you were going over a cliff and travelling at 40 and 50 miles an hour was like being on a roller coaster ride. We got to the campsite and set up our tent only to find our pitch did not have electric hook up as we had requested and our cable did not reach the nearest one. We hadn't looked when we arrived; it was only after we finished setting up the tent, which took an hour that we discovered it. It looked like we would have to take the tent down and reset up on another pitch the other side of the field. However, Nigel came to the rescue and went to see the reception who said he could rent a one of their cables which was double the size of ours. Whew! We were relieved. Now you might ask why we needed electric hook up. Well firstly our pump for inflating our air beds was electric and secondly, I needed to work so had to have access to my computer for the next few days to send emails and make internet calls for my customers. No electric meant no work. Anyway, problem solved. The BBC forecast was correct for once and for the next 3 days we enjoyed hot sunshine, clear skies and really gorgeous beach weather. In fact Nigel bared all and wore some shorts!

We enjoyed a barbeque, the first of the summer (barbequed peaches and courgettes are lovely) , We visited Whitby Abbey up on the cliff top just outside Whitby with commanding views of Whitby , the harbour , river and sea . We went on the open top bus tour so you could just buy one ticket which lasted all day and you could get on and off as many times as you wanted to see things. We also visited the Lavender Farm which was about an hour away further south to see how they grow lavender and distil the flowers to make lavender oil. A very easy process which you can do at home. Also nearby to the lavender farm was Eden Camp. This was one of the best museums I have ever visited. It commemorated the first and second world wars, talked about how the wars started and how people in Britain lived during the war, rationing, the Blitz and how they all coped. The camp was still intact from the Second World War and was used as a prisoner of war camp housing Italian and German prisoners. There were still watch tower, an exercise yard and all the Nissan huts were still in tact. In fact there were 29 Nissan huts in all with about 24 of them each having its own separate display and museum and you worked your way around the sit in number order. We saw air raid shelters, experienced prefab buildings where people lived after the bombings, felt the fear of what it was like for sailors in a submarine that had been torpedoed in life model reconstructions. They said allow 4-5 hours, we were there for 5 and still missed some displays. Fascinating (if you like that sort of stuff) even better than Flambards in Cornwall. The displays were set out so that children and adults of all ages could enjoy something.

We left Yorkshire on the Friday morning and headed back up country towards the Kielder Forest in Northumberland for 2 more nights camping. We wanted to see the area more and weren't due at our next house sit in Innerleithen until the Sunday afternoon. So a couple more days' rest we thought would be great.