#Ironbridge2014: Day 1 (April 13th)

Original image found here.As normal we started Sunday with church. It was a special day as there was a guest speaker called Chris and a lunch for the associate pastor and his wife as he’s retiring. We left part way through dessert as we needed to get on the road but I’ve seen photos from the rest of the lunch and it looked like it was a lot of fun.

When the summer holidays arrive in July, we will have a recently arrived newborn to be coping with so we decided that we’d do our main family holiday now in the Easter holidays rather than going away in the Summer holiday. I think Chris is thinking of some day trips and adventures for him and Our Sidekick to go on when I’m at home with baby – some I might be able to do but I guess it depends on what they’ve got planned.

We left church, popped into Mum’s and a quick visit home and to the garage for some air to put into the tyres then got on the road.

For a Sunday afternoon the traffic wasn’t too bad. It was a little bit busy around the M6 just near Spaghetti junction (that’s M6 J6 to other people) but the traffic kept flowing. As Chris was DJ-ing at a wedding last night he had a bunch of new music so we spent pretty much the whole journey playing “Guess That Song” mixed in with counting VW Campervans (we got to 9 – if you include VW Transporters and Caravelles we were on 11!).

We arrived at the youth hostel just after 6pm to a lovely welcome. The building is on the hillside so the entrance is at ground level on one side of the building but there’s a second entrance on the first floor – so our room looks out onto the road at ground level but the window opposite our door looks out from the first floor.

While the boys unloaded the car I made up the three beds – I figured it was easier for me than attempting the stairs again. The sheet for my bed was far too small and so didn’t fit the bed properly – I think Chris is going to mention it next time we go through reception.

Chris made us dinner in the self catering kitchen. We’d brought a bunch of stuff from the cupboard and the fridge as we’d arrive after the shops closed. He had a packet of green pesto ravioli, then made a sauce from a tin of tomatoes, some onion, some carrots and I think a pepper – it was really yummy. He had some rice noodles for him so that made his bit gluten free.

Following dinner, we went for a wander around the grounds that the youth hostel sits in. It’s on the same bit of ground as the Ironbridge China Museum and sits right next to the River Severn and the Old Canal. We then came back into the hostel and hung out in the lounge. Johnny English was on the TV so we sat and watched that while I wrote this post. We headed back to our room and hang out together just chatting and laughing.

Read about our other adventures while on this trip here.