A Baltic boating adventure TRIP REPORT COMPLETED 11/19 About This Page:

[chezp]

Originally Posted by DMA

I'll bet it was a weird feeling walking into your house so soon after leaving. But it's a good thing your plans allowed for the unexpected trip home!

It was exceptionally weird. I kept thinking "we shouldn't be here"... a

You had quite a full day!

We did and I'm glad, despite everything, we were still able to get back to the Isle of Wight.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by Belle*

Mental note should Chez ever come to visit... tell all local "chemists" to stock up as Chez will be making multiple trips during her visit! My goodness, between Mark's ear, his ankle, and your sunburn, you were quite the boon for local business.

I promise, we are not usually this bad! And usually we have a good supply of medication with us as well.. honestly!

[Cam22]

So beautiful as you all were heading back to the mainland, especially since the sun finally decided to shine. So good to now have your passports, too.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by Cam22

So beautiful as you all were heading back to the mainland, especially since the sun finally decided to shine. So good to now have your passports, too.

Oh that was such a relief!

[chezp]

Sunday 5 June – part one: this is a lot quieter than Friday night…

Considering we only went to bed around 10:40pm last night, I was not impressed when my body woke me up seven hours later, demanding use of the bathroom. At least I had slept like the proverbial log, which was a definite improvement from last night.

However, I couldn’t lie down any longer, as I was having problems breathing. I’d noticed this yesterday as well, and I was using a fair bit of Olbas Oil to clear my nose, so I decided to take the bigger bottle with us, rather than the one that was rapidly running out. I also took the opportunity to take a deodorant with me that seems to have more in it than the one I’d packed. Two bonus reasons to come home – oh and we’d never turned the heating down when we left, and the house was cooking now, so I did that as well. Another reason to come back.

Talking of the weather, we’ve totally changed what we’ll be wearing today, as the weather forecast last night suddenly changed, from it being sunnier, but colder today, to it would be in the mid 20s. Ok, I don’t think jeans are going to work for us today now… I think we’ll also take the suntan lotion with us as well…

We left the house not much after 7:30am, as I had suggested that we stop off at the services that we visited yesterday for breakfast at McDonald’s. My reasoning was there couldn’t be that much traffic early on a Sunday morning.

When we headed out, it was a beautiful morning…



It was forecast to reach the mid 70s today, a big change to the forecast just a couple of days earlier, which said it would be sunny, but not that warm. Well, that’s warm to me!

As we headed on to the motorway, there weren’t many cars…



… but there were literally hundreds of cows!



We headed back to the same services we’d stopped at just 36 hours earlier…



… and indulged in a McDonald’s breakfast…



Look how lovely and quiet it was in here!



We were soon on our way again, and despite the car’s GPS constantly trying to send us a different route, one we knew had roadworks on it, we stuck to our guns. We had our fair share of drama though, from a broken down car, just after a major tunnel, to two further breakdowns, and a cycle race, which was just chaos, as everyone was having to pull out into the second lane of a two lane road to give them enough space.



Soon we were heading past Portsmouth again, and the car GPS was just about having a fit, trying to take us off through Southampton. I don’t think so! We knew that would take much longer, so I called up Google Maps, and found a much quicker route instead. Soon we were arriving at this place…



I had said to Mark that we could go to the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, as I knew he was keen to go back, and I wanted him to do something today, given he’d had to do all the extra driving because of my stupidity, but when I mentioned this place, he went for it.

As soon as we arrived, I headed off to the restrooms to change into my contact lenses, as it was now really sunny, and to lather up with my factor 50 sunscreen, as I did not want any further burn after yesterday.

Then we paid our admission (£10.95 ($15.30)each) and headed inside. At first, I was wondering what we’d done, as we walked past a load of owls, and couldn’t really find any. I was thinking it was going to be one of those days.. but thankfully we found the otters, even if they were fast asleep…



We headed into the Greenhouse, which pretty much did what it said on the tin…



We weren’t lucking out on the animals in here, with nothing to be seen, but then a cute ferret (and seriously I never thought I’d put those two words in the same sentence ) poked his head out. Look, he’s really quite adorable…



Next: I wasn’t expecting to find this sunbathing here!

[cubfancolleen]

Glad you could find a few other reasons to make that trip back home! (and you reminded me I need to turn the thermostats up and put the system on hold as we hit the road shortly)
Hoping there are more animals to be seen than some sleeping otters and a single ferret!
It does look like great weather - and even better, low traffic - today. Hope that was the theme for the whole day for you.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by cubfancolleen

Glad you could find a few other reasons to make that trip back home! (and you reminded me I need to turn the thermostats up and put the system on hold as we hit the road shortly)

Glad I could help out and hope you have a great time!

Hoping there are more animals to be seen than some sleeping otters and a single ferret!

Thankfully there were!

It does look like great weather - and even better, low traffic - today. Hope that was the theme for the whole day for you.

Pretty much!

[Cam22]

That is the cutest, sweetest looking little ferret, and he even seems to be posing for you! He makes me smile.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by Cam22

That is the cutest, sweetest looking little ferret, and he even seems to be posing for you! He makes me smile.

He did seem to like the camera!

[chezp]

Sunday 5 June – part two: I wasn’t expecting to find this sunbathing here!

We were going to carry on walking, but when we’d walked in, you could either go right into this area, or left into the tropical butterfly house. I looked at the map, and realised we were going the right way to see the rest of the park, but it would mean missing the butterflies, and I didn’t want to do that, so we backtracked, and headed in there. Wow, the heat! I said to Mark I was glad we were coming in here early, and not later when it was supposed to be even hotter outside.

The first thing we saw was this guy…



Now I don’t know about you guys, but we tend not to have that much joy with butterfly houses. They always seem to be on the go, never settling, and it’s very different to get photographs of them. Well, nothing could be further from that today, with so many of them settled, and we got to witness them feeding, and just acting naturally. Perhaps it was the fact that we were the only ones in here at the time, or maybe it was the fact that it’s just very well laid out, and the butterflies feel really calm in here. Either way, we had a great time.



If some of the shots look blurred to you, it’s because the butterflies were moving in them. I did struggle to capture them properly. If I put the camera on a sports setting, then half the time it wouldn’t focus properly, but if I put it on a macro setting, then the movement looked blur, so I just did the best I could with them.

Eventually we dragged ourselves away, and back into the relative cold of the rest of the greenhouse, and we continued with our tour. The next section was the nocturnal area, but we couldn’t see anything, and at this point, didn’t have much of a clue what we were looking for…

We headed outside, and this is a beautifully landscaped park, filled with rhododendrons, which were just passing their best. It made for a spectacular sight, and I don’t doubt that people visiting at other times of the year probably look at all the trees and shrubs, don’t realise what they are and the magnificent show they give during the spring months…



We opted to walk past the deer encounter, as we didn’t really look at the map, and thought that’s all it was. We would realise our mistake later…

We did seem to be about the only people in this part of the park, as I don’t think we saw a single other soul, except for a couple of staff members, until we got back to near the entrance, which was wonderful, albeit a little spooky at the same time.

When we got to this bit…



… we got the shock of our lives, finding this guy just lying there sunbathing!



It’s not exactly what you expect to come across, as you normally see animals much further away, and although it was a shock, if you know what I mean, it was a nice one.

There was another one, an albino one, hidden further away in the undergrowth, and Mark thought she might have a baby, as he thought he saw something in her pouch, but we couldn’t tell for certain, given where she was.



Next: where are the buffalo?

[purplegal]

Great pictures you rally captured the butterflies well.

[DMA]

The butterfly shots are gorgeous! I was thinking to myself while reading that you really have that technique mastered!

[chezp]

Originally Posted by DMA

The butterfly shots are gorgeous! I was thinking to myself while reading that you really have that technique mastered!

Thank you so much - it's one of the things I don't feel as if I have truly mastered yet, so I really appreciate the comment.

[Colexis Mom]

Great pictures from the park! Looks like a great place. Sounds like the trip home was worth it not just for the passports!

[cubfancolleen]

Love the butterfly pictures!!
Sweet, sleepy kangaroo.