Friday 14th February 2025
Valentine’s Day..
A lovely walk with Ellie first thing (after feeding the birds). It was cold but nice for a walk. Again, Ellie just dashes for the beach! I am sure we could open the lodge door and she would just go on her own!
We booked to go to our favourite pub, The Blacksmiths Arms for a Valentine’s lunch. We have never had a bad meal there and today was no exception. Of course they are very dog friendly with dog blankets and treats.
There are such lovely views from the garden although it was too cold to eat out there today, even with the sun!
The food was so good. I had scallops to start, followed by roasted monkfish in parma ham and then my favourite desert ever, and no one makes it like them.
White chocolate and raspberry creme brulee. It is full of raspberries.
Ellie had a run around the garden after we finished and then back to the lodge. We told them the TV was a bit in and out and also internet. I think most of this is the remoteness of the lodge so we can put up with it but two of the gas rings on the hob weren’t working but they came to repair this early evening.
The retreat has been very quiet since we arrived but it looked as though more people arrived for the weekend to fill some of the empty lodges.
Thursday 13th February 2025
The birds were singing for breakfast again! We had great tits as well but they were too fast to be photographed!
We also watched the red squirrels.
We went to Quarr Abbey, sadly no piglets there only adult pigs so Ellie wasn’t interested! We went into the shop and looked around the art centre but quite frankly everywhere you looked there were card machines for you to make donations!! A good day out…not!
So, we drove into West Cowes, had a wander around but it was really cold and so we ended up in The Union Inn. Another very dog friendly pub. Along with our two drinks brought to the table, a small glass full of gravy bones for Ellie! Won’t do her diet much good.
Back to the lodge with an early evening walk through the woods. We intended going for a short walk but no, Ellie makes the decision how far she wants to go and she decided it was down to the beach!
Wednesday 12th February 2025
The birds arrived for breakfast. Lots of blue tits but they are too quick and the red squirrel was too quick as well!
These are obviously the birds who are used to being fed from the lodge.
We heard from Margaretha – it is snowing in Cyprus! February is a horrible month over there, definitely their winter.
We went to the Donkey Sanctuary in the morning, so that we could see the donkey Hannah that we sponsored for Mal’s sister. Of course Ellie loved seeing the donkeys.
It was very cold there and so we drove into Shanklin to warm ourselves up with some lunch at The Steamer Inn. I had their chowder which was delicious and they are very dog friendly in there.
We then had a walk along Shanklin beach.
Tuesday 11th February 2025
This is our lodge, so close to the beach, so an early morning paddle for Ellie.
It is so nice that the birds have visited us this morning. A little robin keeps singing to us if we don’t put enough bread out!
We went off to the Garlic Farm to buy some Garlic pickle (Rhys loves it too!) We had a walk around the extensive grounds as well and then had lunch there.
Back at the lodge we had a couple of games of Rummikub.
Later we had another beach walk and then watched Exeter v Notts Forest. A stunning performance by Exeter, only to go out on penalties.
Monday 10th February 2025
We packed up and headed for the Isle of Wight, stopping at Ripley for our lunch. There is a lovely dog friendly cafe, Pinnock’s that we go to.
Then on to Portsmouth to catch the ferry and our well travelled doggie enjoying herself!
We have a luxury lodge at Woodside Bay retreat. We have stayed before and it is lovely as it is amongst the wood and just a couple of minutes from the beach. We even have two bathrooms with our own baths and showers!
Our terrace is huge.
For future reference, we had lodge 14 , in the vicinity of the tree house.
In the evening we had our supermarket delivery. That was easy!
Sunday 9th February 2025
Raining and so we just went along the Rope Walk (shelter from the trees). Even so Ellie was very wet.
I did notice watching the FA in the afternoon that it was sunny in Plymouth!
WOW well done Plymouth – for those who don’t know what is going on – They beat Liverpool!!! Then rubbish, Spurs are out.