The Road to Southport

The front door of our London B&B, aptly named...Lilac Door. Farewell, Lilac Door & Jane, et. al.!!!

The WiFi was a little sketchy last night so I couldn't blog, but I will try to catch up tonight. :-) I had a cappachino after dinner so I am wide awake....plus I had two naps today! Yikes!

We left London yesterday and drove about 4 hours to Southport which is a seaside town on the West coast of England, just south of Liverpool.  This is some traffic on the way out of London. Looks just like Fresno, right?

On the way to the Southport area, we stopped for a quick lunch at the Gateway Cafe in Warwick. There is a castle right across the street, but we missed it because we were in danger of missing Mike's tee time which was still a couple hours away from this point. There will be other castles, of course. 

I wanted to share the front and back cover of this cafe because I love what they are doing. The cafe is run by a church and is a way of ministering to their community. Their pastor can be made available to talk with anyone who wishes to discuss whatever they need/like. Reminds me a little of what the coffee house Mars Hill is trying to do in Hollister.

Up above was my lunch at this little cafe. It was soooooo good. :-) We had to hit the road in a hurry so I ate the last half in the car.

But again, love the idea of this place.

Well, with 6 minutes to spare according to the car clock (and a few minutes late according to Mike) he made it to Royal Liverpool. I guess he got to see Tiger Woods' signed scorecards from playing this place or something like that, but he can correct my lack of info later. You guessed it...Mike is currently sleeping as I write this. :-) While Mike golfed, I drove over to a pub called The Railway and the Hungry Horse (not sure if it accidentally has two names or if that is all supposed to be one name) wrote out some postcards and had a huge ice cream sundae called The Knickerbocker. Then I went to explore a little and had a run in with a side mirror on a parked car down a tiny street. Luckily, it was a modern car with one of those side mirrors that bends in (whew!) but I figured that was enough driving practice and took myself straight back to the golf parking lot and read a book while I waited for Mike to finish.

Pictured above is one of the reasons we were crunched for time on the way to the course...M Many of you know, he loves country music. One of his favorite songs is International Harvester. And even though this vehicle was making him late, he appreciated the fact that he was behind and actual....international harvester!

After golf, we checked into this Southport B&B called Bay Tree House. Inside it is so cozy, I just felt at home right away.  Our innkeepers, Leigh and Cleo are very nice. Leigh looked up our town, Hollister, and I thought hey I would do the same thing!

Our walk to dinner down the Southport promenade.

 The other side of the promenade.  It is so interesting here because the beach itself goes for miles. Above is a little inlet, but there is a large section that is just beach and no waves or tide for miles out. Even walking along the boardwalk, which takes awhile, once you get to the end you still cannot see the ocean for quite a ways. There are lots of shops here.  It is a pretty active place, but not at all as busy as London. We are enjoying being able to relax.

There is a restaurant we found that we liked so much me ate there two nights and a row. It is an Italian place called Trattoria 51 and they will make almost anything off the menu gluten free if you need it. I learned that they call arugula rocket. And I found another kindred spirit...our server would say things like "ah, yes, rocket is good for the blood circulation" or "olive oil...very good for the skin, no?" If you know how I like to look up the health benefits of different foods, you know what I mean! So last night I had sea bass caught that morning and tonight I had GF pizza. it was just what I needed! Wonderful place, the guys that waited on us were SO NICE and welcoming.

Here they are jokingly holding their "trophy"....

...then they made us hold it, too. :-)

Oh! Mike played Royal Lytham, another British Open course. The wind and bunkers were brutal! Here is a picture of the clubhouse:

Tomorrow, off to Yorkshire!!!