Top news of the day

Sales of knives in Britain are down, and more people are adopting the US habit of using only - gasp - a fork for eating meals. If you don't know, folks in Britain hold their knife in the right hand, and fork in the left hand. They eat and cut at the same time, never transferring the silverware to a different hand. People in America hold the fork in the left and knife in the right when cutting food. They then transfer the fork to the right hand to eat. Britains consider this barbaric behavior, but it's catching on over here, and actually made the BBC news and a big story in the paper!

Back to vacation

Yesterday, I wished for sun. Of course, this meant that we woke up to rain. Pouring rain (at least before we started driving - then is was just rain). This meant that it was the perfect time to go shopping for crafty supplies! So, we started out at a craft store just outside Barnstaple, called Crafty Devils. They have a 5,000 square foot warehouse, which is a bit misleading, since a portion of it is reserved for their internet sales. I browsed around to see what was new on the crafty front in England. I scored a new magazine here and at Tesco (sort of like a Walmart). These were the best magazines of the bunch so far - good freebies (stamp, felt flowers) and good techniques and samples. I also picked up some decoupage sheets and flower soft. I think I can get flower soft in the US, but I haven't seen it in person yet. They also have dies for my die cutting machine, but most of that I can get in the US. The X-Cut company, however, did have some piercing dies that looked interesting and were reasonably priced. More crafty details will be on my other blog when I get a chance.

After my trip to heaven (ie, a crafting store), we continued on to Ilfracombe. We had a walk around the town, and it was raining most of the time. I did find a crafty store to wander in, but no good snags here. We wandered around the harbor, and got a Cornish pasty (I know we're in Devon, but the quest failed in Cornwall). Cornish pasties are a bit different than the ones we're used to in Michigan. The crust was a little bit crunchy on the outside and less flaky. It was a bit more like a bread roll, now that I think about it. The meat on the inside isn't ground - it is cubes of meat. Finally, it seems like they add something to make it have a little bit of gravy inside. The ones we buy back home seem drier, and I need gravy or a sauce for them in order to really enjoy the meal. We were asked if we wanted sauce (ketchup had run out, but Heinz HP was available), but apparently the salesman was about to be insulted if we ruined his pasty with a bit of sauce, so we passed.

In Infracombe, I've also adopted my new motto for the trip - "Everything tastes better with a bit of clotted cream!" We followed lunch with a scoop of Cornish ice cream (made with clotted cream) and topped with clotted cream. I've been waiting for a sunny, warm day to have an ice cream, but I fear if I wait for that day, I'll never get any!

After Ilfracombe, we wandered to Lynton. This is a really interesting town with scary steep roads. Those of you back home - imagine a single lane road steeper than Agate. That's a two-way road in Lynton! Luckily, we didn't encounter any cars when we were headed up the road. In Lynton, we found a nice piece of glass jewelry for me, some peanut brittle for Paul, and tea cosies for our tea pots back home. They have a really lovely art center with handmade goods from all sorts of local artists - my favorite kind of shop to visit.

Lynton is at the top of a river valley, and Lynmouth is at the bottom. You can hike down to the bottom (or up to the top) or take a clever little train back and forth. Paul let me ride the train up the hill, since I wasn't whining too much, but we walked down to enjoy the scenery. The entire town of Lynmouth was destroyed in the 50s by a massive flood, so there is a flood museum that tells the story and shows how the town looked before. The redesigned Lynmouth has a wider river, and bridges that can float away if necessary. There was a lot we could have done here, but not enough time to do it. Since the sun finally arrived (yay!) along with a bit of warmth, we enjoyed some time staring at the water, and having a cream tea. (Everything is better with a bit of clotted cream! Paul wanted to take me on a forced march to the tea shop, but the one he wanted to go to would have closed when we arrived.

Dinner tonight was at the pub next to the hotel. That was relaxing and allowed us to get back "home" nice and early for a good start tomorrow. I think we're heading to a prison in a moor. Scary!