We're back

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Nicola (pic is of Nell with the first egg laid by our hens after their three months B&Bing at Freightliners Farm)

Even if I've been a bit dreading the end of our trip - and then we all had the terrible down of Pete's dad dying - the girls are thrilled to be home. They've loved travelling but to come home and sleep in their own beds with all their favourite toys was a fantastic excitement for them. And the next will be meeting up with their friends.

But they forgot all this as we got closer to London on the train. It was London herself they were looking forward to seeing again. As early as Broxbourne, which is way out, they went into excitement overdrive impatiently waiting for the suburbs to get denser and the green of the Lea Valley to fade to grey. Nell got very confused when Lola said this was Greater London so we weren't home yet as we lived in Inner London."

"My bit of London is great too," Nell said loyally, even though she hasn't been there for three months.

Without taking her eye away from the window - she was looking for Enfield which we explored in early June on the way to Milann's 9th birthday party - Lola explained, "But in London language Inner means great too," which definitely reassured Nell.

With that cleared up we still had to wait for another 15 minutes after Tottenham Hale before we pulled into Liverpool Street. Sometimes time goes-so-slowly; it seemed to take an age waiting for landmarks to ohh and ahh over. But eventually The Gherkin and Canary Wharf edged on to the skyline and then we were in a tunnel and finally London.

Loaded down as ever (we'd detoured from King's Lynn past Bishop's Stortford to pick up our mice cage, plus food and bedding, homemade jam, new outfits for the kids and a riding hat) we treated ourselves to a taxi home.

London's streets seem so narrow, and our black cab driver - who'd driven past the Queen that morning -told us how Arsenal was being bought by the Russians, etc, etc. Being London it all seems the same and yet in just a few months things are utterly different. Even the colour of our front door - which I'd forgotten I'd painted.

It's good to be home, but I don't think I want to unpack our bags just yet - after all there's a lot more of Britain to see, and we only detoured past 35 other countries which has left us with the sort of travel bug you don't mind having.

Art girls

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Nicola

Here are two fine pix of Nell and Lola at Wakefield Art Gallery doing their own work - inspired by the city's famous sculptors Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore etc (or maybe just bored?).

Where to live?

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Nicola

"We've had a lot of homes," muses Lola as we arrive at this week's holiday home, a place we are house-sitting in Yorkshire (not the pic above!). I think that home ought to be where you are right now, but deep in my psyche is also the gently rolling arable hills of the Herts/Essex borders - the area Andrew Motion has recently written about in his exquisite childhood memoir, In the Blood. He makes it clear how to grow up normalish despite a backpack of strange upper middle class ideas about what is right, and what is expected. The twist for him is how his childhood was severed by his mum's horrible accident out hunting.

At the moment Lola and Nell don't seem to have a trace of snobbery in where or what home is. They don't even need it to be close to shops as they are still a long way from being the sort of females Sunderland manager Roy Keane recently berated for stopping players moving to the north east.

Long may this last as they won't be handed homes on a plate, or even be able to anticipate enough cash from me and Pete to be able to get a mortgage on a flat in their early 20s. If I look in an estate agents' window (eg, while waiting for Pete or because I'm nosing around somewhere) the girls are as likely to choose a suburban '70s build as a stockbroker's palace. Right now they love home, London specifically, best. But they also love to muse as we pad around places how they'd "love to live in a castle" (see pic), or, as we were searching for the mermaid pool on Burgh Island in Devon "on an island" http://www.burghisland.com/.

On the latter location I can reassure them: they are islanders even if it's 800 miles by 100 plus (depending on where you do the measuring) so you can't see the edges.

As for castles. Well we have seen lots of castles, some with the roof on and plenty with just blue sky and clouds for decoration. But despite the variety Lola reckons that the best one she's ever seen is the Tower of London -visited on a school trip. "It's got masses of links with the Tudors, and prisons, secrets, jewels and the scratches of prisoners on the walls. I found one of a wild boar," she enthuses when I press for details.

I'm six and at work

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Nell (who enjoyed her time at Morwellham Quay & Copper Mine even the 10 minutes working to find the green gold copper ore)

"Although the children had to do a 10 hour day I found it fun banging stones with my hammer. And I found copper, the grass overseer on the dressing floor area (where the kids worked) was very pleased with me."

Victorian school

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Lola

If you went to school (parents had to pay) it was from three to eight years. I would have already left because I am nine. You wrote on slates with a slate pencil and then rubbed your work off with an old rag. You weren’t allowed your hair down if you were a teacher, and if you were a woman you also were not allowed to be married. The teacher at Morewellham Quay started at 16 years. We had a go copying proverbs in Victorian writing (copperplate). Nell and I weren’t very good at it, but mummy was.

Best museum ever

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Nicola

“Excuse me, this is the best museum I’ve ever been to,” said Lola very sweetly to the man on the desk at Tullie House in Carlisle. He beamed and then helped supply the date that Bonnie Prince Charlie stayed at M&S – 1745 – to key in and enable Lola to lift the sword out of the stone on the first floor galleries. Later on we looked for the plaque and were amused to see that Butcher Cumberland had also stayed there, a year later.

At Tullie House www.tulliehouse.co.uk the kids got in free (they were even given a free gift and a sticker when we arrived), the collection is fantastic and brings the area to life. When we left we’d tried out a Roman saddle (they may have worked out how to build roads but they didn’t know how to do stirrups, tsk, tsk); fired a Roman stone shot; found out a lot more about the horrors of living in the Marches (ie, the Borders) during the time of the Reivers from a specially made film; seen a leather post bag hooked on to a train; climbed through a Roman mine and eyeballed various stuffed animals that are distinctive to the uplands and dales of this gorgeous area. And the children got a free gift when they arrived. You must go if you are ever in Carlisle – and don’t forget to look at the Cursing Stone (which I’ve written about before) and have now gone back and eyeballed for the second time. Carlisle is so interesting I feel that I could spend a lot more time there, though I’m sure part of that is pure nostalgia from having a VSO boss who came from somewhere around there. Nell had insisted we went back because she wanted to see the guns at Carlisle Castle and during our second walk around it we ended up in the local militia museum getting a much more English view of the Mary Queen of Scots and Bonnie Prince Charlie problems (Catholic absolutists according to one of the curators, a Revier named Forster with an r). I still can’t believe that back in June I’d never heard of the troublesome Reivers.

Flying owls

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Nell and Lola (pic of Nell with a barn owl)

Nell: It was fun flying an owl. I had to wear a big glove and then the owl flew over to me really fast (and quietly) and the man gave it some food to help it get lots of energy. Harry Potter had a plain white owl with a bit of brown on its head but my one wasn't snowy white.

Lola: They look heavy, but they weren't. It was strange. I know you shouldn't, but I'd still like to keep an owl as a pet.

What's good about youth hostels

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Lola (seen here beating Lola at Connect Four)

I like youth hostels because sometimes you get nice breakfasts. And normally you can go out for dinner, and sometimes you can see dogs at pubs, which is a real plus. I like this one because it has got a big space for running around, and there are some books to read (well two!) and youth hostels always have bunks. And mummy sometimes lets me have the top bunk, which I like.
Next door to this youth hostel (Wooler) there are banams with two chicks which are really sweet.

Climbing Arthur's Seat

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nell

Nell: "Climbing Arthur's Seat (251m) was very fun, even though it doesn't look like a seat [or an extinct volcano]. There's a ruin (St Anthony's Chapel) at the halfway point which Lola and I enjoyed. We saw some boys climbing. At the very top it was cold; Skiddaw is even bigger but Everest has snow on it. If you drive a car up there, which I know you can't do, it would be cheating. And there's no road you just wouldn't be able to. You'd have to go over the paths.

At the top we had smarties and shortbread.

I hope everyone climbs it, because it is really fun. You can bring any sweets you like, stay in a youth hostel, have beans on toast for dinner. What's better than that?"

The last polar bear

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nicola, Lola and Nell (pic reminds you that you should always let sleeping bears lie, ahh)

At last we've seen Mercedes - the last polar bear in Britain. Put another way she is the only polar bear in a UK zoo and at her Edinburgh hill top home acts as an ambassador for all the wild polar bears in the North Pole which are suffering because of climate change. We all feel very lucky to have seen a huge, white polar bear, understand more about the problems they are facing from habitat loss and climate change. And we did that without making a polluting return air trip to Hudson Bay, Canada where other polar bear lovers go. There was one dicey moment when Lola realised that her favourite animal (a polar bear) was being fed raw meat taken from her other favourite animal (horse). Luckily she's got used to the idea that not everyone is a vegetarian - or in many animals's cases can be a veggie.

Lola: "I loved her. Mercedes was a wild polar bear in Canada but she got caught three times eating garbage. She was going to be shot but the mercedes car company gave Edinburgh zoo enough money to get her to Scotland and build a cage for her. That's why she's called Mercedes."

Nell: "You should stop driving cars, and especially flying areoplanes, because if you could see how much pollution we are putting into the air you'd actually give up. Ice melts and the sea level gets higher. And the bottom of the world [the low lying coast land and low islands] might get flooded if we don't stop. That polar bear was very lucky because if she was in the North Pole she could have drowned finding her own food, because the polar bears can only swim a certain amount, but there is more sea now. They have to find food, and it's not easy. And if they have babies, and they're looking for food and they drown then the babies [cubs] will die too because they need their mum to give them food and teach them to swim. And their dad isn't very good with children. You would have thought a dad could look after a polar bear baby, but no. Their life is difference to ours. When a dad sexes with a mum polar bear the dad doesn't just stay to see the babies it goes away, not even hoping to get a glimpse of them!"

Cosy castle, pretty garden

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nicola






We can't resist castles and Crathes Castle (now Scottish National Trust) http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/crathes/crathescastle/index.html is just down the road. My friend David left saying it was his favourite so we make the trip.

Crathes, the one-time family home of the Burnetts, one of the many Anglo-Norman families that made their defensive homes around here after the Norman conquest in 1066, is exquisite. The house is castle cosy (with big fires and oak masterpieces); there's a framed horn and sash from King Robert the Bruce and a stunning painted ceiling showing the Nine Nobles (three characters from the Ancient World - Hector of Troy, Julius Caesar & Alexander the Great; three from the Old Testament - King David, Joshua and Judas Maccabeus; and three from more recent times - King Arthur, Charlemagne and Godfrey de Bouillon (a crusader not a stock cube).
But Crathes real glory is its gardens which were included in Bloomsbury Groupie Getrude Jekyll's 1904 book, Some English (oops!) Gardens. Jekyll's garden views have had a major impact on how we all garden - the little rooms, the colour co-ordination, the drifts etc - and at Crathes you get all this in splendid grandeur and if you are there on a Saturday you are sure to see a bride being harried by a photographer too...

The Scottish National Trust keeps the gardens very well and also provides a little quiz for children which helped us find a planted trough, a millstone path, a cherub fountain, yew hedges, a woodland garden, a golden garden and a dovecot. In the greenhouses Nell was entranced by the colour variants of fuscia and ended up collecting fallen flower heads to make a potion which she wanted to send to her friend Sammy.

Nell's potion recipe: Collect petals in a hat, take home and put in a clean jam jar. Mix with a little water or olive oil and then send to your friends...

The things I do for...

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nicola

Well, the things Nell will do for ice cream include walking up hills, down hills, taking big trips on trains, visiting castles etc. Current favourite flavours (as sampled at the stunning Aunty Betty's in foodie town Stonehaven):

Nell: strawberry and cream ideally with chocolate flake

Lola: mint choc chip in an oyster shell (wafer covered in chocolate, coconut and nuts with marshmallow inner)

Pete: rum and raisin

Nicola: strawberry and cream (or chocolate) in a sugar cone

Is ice cream Italian or Russian? It's a constant debate as we make our sweet treat purchases. Nell reckons ice cream makes more sense in cold places, like Russia and Scotland; but I think it's an Italian invention perfect on hot days.

Best things to do

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Lola and Nell (nb, the adults are pretty pleased that the best things in life are free!)

After one month we think the best things to do in Britain are...
Lola:
1) Borrowing a pony to go for a ride - or visiting a place like the Heavy Horse centre near Cockermouth, in the Lake District
2) Watching the salmon jump and see my uncle try to catch a salmon... (Scotland)
3) Stroking a friends' dog (anywhere)
4) Climbing big hills - especially going up as fast as you can
5) Playing in a stream (anywhere)
6) Canoeing with Mummy and Nell. It was like boat club, but better views (Ullswater)

Nell:
1) Carlisle Castle even though I didn't get to see the collection of guns (Carlisle)
2) Walk a friend's dog (anywhere)
3) Look out for new animals in the fields. We've seen bison and ostriches (in different fields!) 4) Dipping nets in rock pools or streams (east or west coast)

Best places to go

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Lola and Nell after one month...

Lola: Number 1 Yorkshire because we were staying with friends who have four children, a giant house, lots of books, two dogs to take for walks and ponies to ride. And I got taken to the blacksmith which was good because the farrier made the shoes really hot and then pressed them on the horse's feet, but it didn't look as though it hurt them at all.

Nell: Number 1 housesitting near Aberdeen Here's been good because we've been doing lovely things - there's the toys of three children and one's got a doll's house. They have a dog called Fleur. I love her because she licks my hand and I went for a walk with her and she was quite like Mummy because she kept on stopping and chatting (eg, with the mums waiting for the school bus). There's lots of wildlife. We saw a brown bird with a long beak (curlew) which did a display for us.

Beatrix Potter's house

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nicola, Lola and Nell (pic is of Pete and Nell reading A Tale of Two Bad Mice by Potter's favourite tarn)

Nicola: Beatrix Potter was able to buy a house from the sales of her first book, Peter Rabbit. Pete and I are obscenely jealous! However visiting Hill Top Farm at Sawrey was a really good day out - we were very lucky to get in as there were mini bus loads of Japanese tourists who clearly adore the cutesy side of Potter's illustrations.

Our friend Tom Wakeford (who has recently lent us his house and camping field) is a bit miffed that everyone forgets that Beatrix Potter was an amazing biologist who made astonishing discoveries about lichens in 1896 which the scientific community refused to accept. She has of course been proved write, and Tom has a full chapter on Beatrix in his book Liaisons of Life: from hornworts to hippos how the unassuming microbe has driven evolution (John Wiley, 2001). Though it has been translated into Korean he still needs to sort out the Japanese translation. At Beatrix's old house (which she gifted to the National Trust) one of the guides told us that he was planning to learn Japanese this winter because of the number of Japanese visitors. Good for him.

Lola: "I love Beatrix Potter's books and I got given two for my birthday. I saw a photo of Beatrix Potter and she didn't look anything like she does in the film, Miss Potter. She was really ugly. All of her books (apart from Peter Rabbit) were written at Hill Top. Beatrix Potter would have had no light (electricity) and no running water. She had her desk by the window so she could get the light. It must have been really difficult -dark and cold - in the winter. We also went up to the tarn where Jeremy Fisher was created. We didn't see a frog, but me and Nell pretended to be Hunka Munka and Tom Thumb (from a Tale of Two Bad Mice) and we ran all around the rocks pretending it was our mousehole."

Nell: "Beatrix Potter was an amazing writer. One of her best books was the Tale of Samuel Whiskers which has lots of pictures of her house in it. I found the staircase, the red curtain, the fireplace, the rolling pin and that thing where you hang bowls and cups and spoons (a dish rack).

Wet camping IS fun

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Lola & Nell (currently in the dry using a wi-fi connection at the Rhegged centre in Penrith)

Lola: "Wet camping is very odd, especially if you are by a rising lake like we are (Ullswater, in the Lake District). Every night I go to sleep I worry that the tent will flood! I don't much like going to the loo in the wood because... you can use your imagination. It makes you think what it would be like to live without a permanent roof. I miss toilets, laptops, telephones and beds. Daddy misses coffee."

Nell: "I think it is fun because it is actually quite nice when you have a boat house to go into for breakfast or lunch. It's really good listening to the rain on the tent. We had a BBQ yesterday and I ate croissants stuffed with veggie sausages. We also had chocolate banana and apricots stuffed with chocolate. Mummy says that you have to have lots of treats if it's raining a lot when you camp. I miss toilets, cutlery and plates/bowls etc and a pillow."

Make your own underfloor heating

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Lola and Nell

First get some sticklebricks, then you get two squares and one long, thin stick. Lock these together so there is a square at each end to make a column (see pic). We had eight altogether. Then you need to put your heating system in and flooring (but as Daddy said "that was more than his job's worth, or our's"...

Mummy told us to do this because we saw that the Romans used this method to make their underfloor heating. They called it hypocaust. In a cafe today we found a lady who really has underfloor heating. She said that she lay on the floor when she was really cold because with underfloor heating the floor stays really hot. That's because hot air rises.

Children play scrabble shock

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nicola

We left the kids alone on a rainy day and what do they go and do? Yes that's right they organise a game of scrabble. There were no fights between Jasper, Ned, Lola and Nell, just focussed silence. Nell won with a score of 54. "It was when I put down JAM that I started winning," was her match report.

I'm sure travel writer Tim Moore's wonderful journey around London, Do Not Pass Go, wouldn't have been created without his endless wet childhood holidays.

Back in April manufacturers produced an express version of Monopoly and Scrabble to stop teenagers getting bored. If climate change leaves us with so many more torrential days it could be that it's the board games which we rescue from the floods.

Goodbye N4, N5 & N7 gang

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood.

This lovely pic is of the kids who helped give Lola and Nell a fab send off back in early June. Many thanks to all, but especially Elsa, Lily and her mum who organised it.

Taking the dogs out (style 1)

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nell who led Daisy (a border terrier) the whole way

On our walk we went to a deer field and we saw buffaloes. The buffaloes were hairy and I saw a hairy man one. We've just seen Daisy walk over the cattle grid. And the cat followed us along the lane. He's called Tigger. It was a good walk.