Sand

It started bright and sunny. There was, however, a cool breeze. The plan for the day evolved based on the whims of a 4-year-old!

Loading up the buggy we walked into town. A skirt purchase yesterday was the wrong size, so the first stop was to get it changed. While Urban-Cub, Ellie, and Silver Vixen where in the shop, the Gorse Fox headed across to the Tourist Information office. He picked up a local map and spoke to the lady who ran the office. She was clearly a local, and had probably been in Exmouth for that last 150 years. This gave the Gorse Fox an idea. He explained that the Silver Vixen had lived here and went to school in the town. He explained where the Silver Vixen lived and that she remembered walking along some disused railway lines on the way to school. The lady emerged from her reverie and said “Oh yes, there used to be a short branch from the station down to the docks. That is now the route of a new road that was built, but here and there you can still see the rails.” This was a great relief as the Silver Vixen was wondering if she had misremembered. Clearly not.

We headed on down to the beach. The sun was playing hide and seek behind some clouds but, out the wind, it was quite pleasantly warm. We found a spot, sheltered by the sea wall and laid out our blankets. A brief trip to a shop saw the mandatory bucket and spade added to our inventory. We sat down to watch the world go by and count the waves as the tide came in.

Ellie started by playing with the sand but it was too dry and dusty. This meant that she needed to get some wetter sand from the water’s edge. In turn, this meant a further change of clothes and the Gorse Fox decided it was time to paddle. We went down the beach. The sun may have been shining but nobody had told the sea. It was bitterly cold. Any stray thoughts of putting on trunks and going for a swim rapidly receded - like the blood flow to his extremities.

Ellie played for a bit longer but declared she wanted lunch, and a swim in a pool, and to go back to the house, and to go the soft play centre. We took this as multiple choice opportunity with only one answer permitted. We went for lunch. We tried the pace where we ate yesterday, but they said there was an hour to wait for food. We politely declined and went round the corner to The Heavitree. This was a nice pub which had a good little menu. The. Silver Vixen had a cheddar and ham ploughman’s, Urban-Cub had a beef burger, Ellie had a ham sandwich (from which she extracted the ham and just ate some of the bread), and the Gorse Fox had a grilled chicken breast burger. It was very good and quite sheltered.

Leaving the pub we wandered down into the town. The Gorse Fox decided that the cool wind, by now better described as cold, was such that his light sweater was insufficient. A trip to Mountain Warehouse was needed. A little while later the Gorse Fox emerged with a warm zip-up fleecy sweater. We headed back to the house for a quiet hour or so before the Gorse Fox took Ellie back to the park for a last run around for the day.

Early-ish start planned for tomorrow.