Chatsworth weekend – 22.6.07...
Chatsworth weekend – 22.6.07
We left the Barnard Castle club site Friday to make our way to a caravan rally on the Chatsworth estate, and after a bad journey through terrible weather, we took our caravan through the Golden Gates onto the rally field. Due to the bad weather and having no 4 x 4 we pitched up near the roadway. We stayed in the caravan Friday night, as it was a bit on the wet side for going out. The local sheep had to be herded off the site a couple of times until folks going out got used to closing the gate.
Saturday we went off to look for real ale pubs. We started with the Flying Childers in Stanton in Peak. This was a cosy pub named after a famous racehorse. I had Tom Woods Fathers Pride. We went to the Lathkil Hotel in Over Haddon next and had lunch from a lovely display of food while drinking Fullers Chiswick. We bottled Whim Arbour Light and Whim Snow White for later. The next pub was the Monsal Head in Monsal Head. The bar is actually the old stable and you can see the stalls. It was a bit packed with people eating and very busy, so we had a long wait for service, then one of the beers was sour and needed replacing. Lloyds Monsal Bitter and Bradfield Farmers Blonde were the 2 beers bottled for later, but unfortunately the Farmers Blonde was still a little sour. Our final pub was the Red Lion at Litton, and this charming pub was on a lovely village green. The fruit crumble tempted us, so we sat outside and had the delicious desert. I bottled Thornbridge Wild Swan and Abbeydale Absolution for later.
Back on the field, we joined the others that evening in the awnings they had made into a marquee area. They ran a quiz with a difference for us and it was fun as it got people looking for the questions that were all on separate pieces of paper being passed around. There were also some super bacon sandwiches being made for us.
Sunday morning I won one of the raffle prizes at the coffee morning, and we were glad we had taken the awning down earlier as there was a deluge of rain while we were having coffee, so it was a bit wet as we packed up. It had been a lovely weekend, but then Chatsworth is a lovely site for a rally.
