"LIFE'S TOO SHORT TO EAT BAD NUTS"

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Perching here and gathering my thoughts ...

A weekend in Lewes

05 June 2006 ~ 17:08

This weekend I treated Nightdragon & I to a break at a country hotel in the town of Lewes (pronounced Lewis) in East Sussex, near the seaside resort of Brighton.

We stayed at a hotel called The White Hart, an old 16th Century coaching inn, which has some very old parts but also more recent additional buildings. It has a leisure complex with gym, sauna, swimming pool and spa pool. We stayed in the modern annexe (which I was quite glad of as I am scared of ghosts lol!)

We arrived about 2pm on Saturday after enjoying a very scenic train journey on the way, checked into our room, had lunch at The Brewery pub and then headed to Lewes Castle. It was a beautiful sunny day of about 75 degrees F.

The castle is Norman and has been around since the time of William The Conqueror. The views from the top of the South Downs are amazing and you can see the river and all the little churches dotted about. They even provide medieval costumes to dress up in if you wish. Mark & I played ball on the lawn.

We then decided we had enough energy left to walk to Anne of Cleves' House. This old house was a gift to his wife from Henry VIII though it is not thought she ever lived there. There was a 40th birthday party going on in the grounds so although it was officially closed at 5pm, the assistant in the gift shop let us have a quick peek around.

We were thirsty by this time so retired to another old pub for a cool drink before making the walk back to the hotel.

There were two wedding receptions and a Golden Wedding anniversary party going on in the various function rooms. I joked that in my pink dress I could have gatecrashed the parties but Mark would have given the game away in his cut-off jeans and T-shirt!

We went to the pool to have a swim, relax in the jacuzzi and the sauna, and Mark wanted to work out in the gym but had not brought any training shoes. The leisure complex is lovely with mosaic tiles, fake palms and the jacuzzi overflows gently into the pool over rocks, like a little waterfall. However the jacuzzi was not as warm as they usually are, probably for that reason. Then it was back to the room for a bath to wash off the chlorine.

We had dinner at the hotel and we treated ourselves to a pudding of lemon sponge and cream. Yes I know I'm diabetic but you have to let yourself go a bit on a weekend away! We then retired to the room to watch TV for a while. The room was big and the bed very comfortable.

We got up on Sunday at 9.15am because breakfast was served only until 10am. We had breakfast sitting by the patio doors with a gorgeous view of the countryside surrounding Lewes.

Sometimes Nightdragon comes on these get-aways a little reluctantly but I have a feeling he really enjoyed this one because he suggested that, once we had checked out, we stay a little longer and get a later train home. So we walked down to the part of town where the river was, had a latte/cappuccino at Costa Coffee, and went back to the castle.

We played ball again in the castle grounds, where a party of French folks were just taking a guided tour. Mark sunbathed while I went to look around the museum. I had to laugh because amongst the medieval artifacts of religious tokens, keys, brooches, stained glass and pottery etc was a shop loyalty card carefully labelled as a joke exhibit. It said 'Lots of people used to carry these cards and many people lost them.'

So then it was time to catch the train home. I think Mark liked Lewes so much because it was such a quiet, sleepy little town, and as you may have gathered, he hates crowds. I sometimes wonder how he manages, living in London!


Stored nuts | Future acorns


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