Bayside Cafe, Stokes Bay

To avoid the frantic Christmas shopping traffic

- we headed to Stokes Bay

Not the best view of the Solent - but very wet and windy!

in Gosport today for brekkie.
We went to the renowned Bayside Cabin café, located by the beach.

Bayside Cabin Cafe

Very windy/rainy day - so hit by the strong winds off the Solent getting from the car to the café.
 Annoyingly you always have to pay for parking - 70p for 1 hour, but seems daft having to pay in the winter (and on Sundays) when it would be very rare to have a full car park for the beach. Usually a great view with the windsurfers out - but only the bravest dogwalker went past today.

Worth braving the elements. We were the first lot in when it opened at 0900. Very quick and polite service. All the breakfast items have a nautical name, like the 'dingy' (scrambled eggs on toast), or 'Gosport ferry' (cooked breakfast).

Margaret went for the waffles with bacon,

and I went for pancakes with bacon.

Both came with a large pot each of maple syrup, and huge bacon rashers. Pancakes homemade and yummy. With 2 coffees came to £14.

Yum Yum

Thoroughly worth it.

Both then headed off in different directions to deliver presents/local shopping, and met up again for an afternoon walk with Peggy, Jake and Jessie.

Peggy - who hates getting wet!

Brave old Jake getting stuck into paddling

Jessie posing

We were exceptionally lucky, as seemed to miss the wind and heavy rain completely. We headed for Warsash Common, which is a nice length walk (about a mile if you follow the walkways), and as gravel/wooden paths we guessed would be less wet (as Jan has a major wellie boot leak!!).

The 3 vagually looking in the right direction for once!

Uneventful walk, despite having to splash through a few puddles. Which is obviously a bit tougher on Jake and Jessie with their little legs!

Jake sticking his tougue out at Aunty Jan

Jessie being sensible and avoiding the puddle

Mega deep puddle for the little legs

Polly went for her weekly swim at Hydrotherapy, where one of the dogs of Natalie the owner was dressed as Santas Little Helper!

Dash, aka Santas Little Helper

Little Dash desperately wanted to jump in the pool with Polly, but was allowed to watch

Dash watching (and wriggling) for Polly's swim

(but was wriggling too much so didn't last long on my lap, and was banned to behind the gate!).

Poor Dash - shut away again

That's all folks,

(just applies to the dogs - obviously!)

but from all of us (2 x 2-legged, 4 x 4-legged), have a woofingly Merry Christmas,  keep well and happy and drive safely.

Have a 'Pawsome' Xmas - from Polly!

Have a Doggingly great Xmas - from Jake and Jessie!

Have a Purrfect Xmas - from Peggy!

Panini's of Parkgate

Today we decided to go local for our breakfast.  We went to Panini's at Parkgate.  We have been there before a long time ago, probably before we became bloggers, and we were well pleased again.

We both chose to have the cooked breakfast which was freshly cooked and nice and hot. The meals were £5.95 each and came with toast. We also had coffee which was extra.

Altogether very good value, and plenty enough to spare one sausage to take home for the doggies.  Well appreciated too. Although it is nice to go further afield sometimes, it is also good to stay local or you tend to forget what there is on your doorstep.

As usual we did a walk this afternoon with my two and Jan's Peggy. We went to the farm in Mill Lane Titchfield.  At the moment it is not being worked as it is for sale so we can walk around it.  It is a good walk for us, plenty of distance but quite easy underfoot for Jake. He managed a mile and a half today and even did a bit of running ahead, well done Jake!

Our Mums don't feed us, we have to eat dirt!!

Speedy Jessie

She's just showing off !!

Danger!  Maybe I won't risk it

Just for once Jakey is in front,  Hooray!!

Don't forget our good bye treat Auntie Jan !

And don't forget mine either !

Another Saturday jaunt over, look forward to next week when we will think of somewhere else to go.


Bye for now......
Margaret x 

New Forest Christmas Fair

Headed across to the New Forest this morning for the Christmas Fair held in New Park, Brockenhurst. After going to the magnificent Spring Fair back in... the spring! (see previous posts), we both got an email reminder from the New Forest/New Park events people about this weekend's show.

Got to the showground for 0930, but we were 30 minutes early so all the stall holders were still setting up. We had decided not to take the dogs as it was a bit nippy. It was a much smaller set up than the spring fair, probably as there was no horse/dog/animal show attached this time presumably due to the winter weather. After wondering around despondently for a while - we finally found the food tent

The coffee stall

- and felt more invigorated after a coffee and bacon/egg bap (which increased from £3 to £3.50 while we were waiting???) - both very nice.

Yummy Bacon and egg bap - watching the stall holders set up

Nice selection of various craft/Christmas/food stalls.


Stall selling 'floggies' - bizarre shoes

2 large tents full of stalls and then a variety of outside ones. It did not take too long to walk around.
Still a nice little morning out, and always a bonus that there is no parking charge and to have a nice drive through the forest.

New Forest ponies

But... not necessarily worthy of a long journey especially for this, unlike the Spring Fair at the New Park ground which definitely is.

Quiet afternoon in for Margaret, Jake and Jessie. Peggy and I headed off for a long walk by ourselves before Polly's hydrotherapy. We headed for a long trek around Barfoot's farm in Hook around the woods and fields.

Peg hunting - on a lovely sunny winters day

View across water reservoir on farm

The last 2 weeks Peg has found a deer's foot

The random deer's foot found

and an antler

The random fresh antler found

on separate walks in Whiteley, so now is on a mission to complete the jigsaw puzzle. Unfortunately for her we didn't see any live/deceased remains of any deer - so she resorted to checking out every badger sett instead,

Hunting down badger setts...

to no avail. Which is good news for the wildlife!

Pol in her coat after swimming

Jake has bounced back after his health scare 2 weeks ago (steroids are great!), so hopefully all dogs will be out at the same time next weekend.

See you next week....................

Maison Blanc

What a busy day we had on Saturday.  We went to Winchester to have breakfast and to explore the Christmas market.  First of all we went to Maison Blanc to eat. 

A bit posher than we usually go for, not your greasy spoon,  but it was lovely. We both went for the 'Eggs en Cocotte' 

We had two poached eggs, smoked ham covered with a cheese sauce. It was served with lightly toasted artisan bread and butter. All washed down with coffee.

The food cost £5.75 each.

It was very tasty and you don't come away feeling overly stuffed as you do with a fry up. As the day progressed it was quite lucky that we didn't eat too much for brekkie.

On the way out it is difficult to pass their counter without

 giving in to the lovely selection of cakes.  I did succumb

 to a meringue and Jan bought two little snowmen who

 looked too good to eat.

After brekkie we had a bit of a wander around the city and we came across one of Jan's ex Navy pals, Mike who has a mobile van selling the most delicious churros. It's called  South of the Border churros and coffee.
Of course we had to try them out, in fact we were treated as Jan is a friend and they were so lovely, I want to go back and have some more.

After all this indulging we headed off to the Christmas market to have a look round. It is set up in the grounds of Winchester's beautiful Cathedral and is well worth a visit

We were in Winchester by nine am so it was quite easy to get parked in the multi story but it filled up quickly. There are a few park and ride sites which are very good and the buses run constantly into the centre.

The market is also open in the evening when all the little shacks are lit up.  It seems to be very well supported.



There is also an ice rink for anyone brave enough.  We decided to pass on that this time.

After we had seen enough we headed back to collect our dogs and go for a nice walk around
 Warsash Common.  It is a good walk for us because you have a bit of everything, woods, open ground, board walk and lake.  The dogs love it and it is not too long for the oldies.

Wait for me!!

After all that we still had plans for the evening.  Jan and I went out with another two doggy friends, Barbara and Chris for a Carvery.  We went to the Inn by the Sea at Lee on Solent.

It was a very nice evening but I think I shall have to go into hibernation for a week and eat nothing at all.

That is about it for this week, we shall do it all again next Saturday, bye..../
Margaret x