Is there a coffee shop here somewhere?

Last night, I lay back in a hot, luxurious bath with Barber's Adagio for Strings playing in the background on my ipad and knew for certain what today's blog posting would be about.

Yesterday I had a brilliant and inspired idea.  'Let's go to Richmond Park' I said, dragging OH from his book.  OH looked momentarily dubious but went along with it.  I had the feeling he would have preferred a duvet day and in hindsight he was probably right.

Into the C-Max leapt HuffingtonBear, ready and raring to go, swiftly followed by myself and OH, both sensibly bringing coats (just in case).  Now, because this was a spur of the moment decision we left home somewhat lacking in provisions, after all we felt that heading to a park where there would be plenty of refreshment available was a mighty fine plan.  OH will pretty much do anything if there's a coffee in it for him so off we went.

SatNav lady took us to Richmond the scenic way.  Ordinarily this would have been sweet and thoughtful of her.  However, we just wanted to get there.  Eventually, with SatNav lady telling us we still had six minutes to go, we drove into Richmond Park and parked up at Kingston Gate.  Feeling very virtuous and healthy I re-tied my walking shoes and popped on my coat.  

We set off, the three of us.  Randomly really.  Just pointed ourselves in the direction of 'the rest of the park' and away we went.  Past a group of Chinese people having a 'sports day' affair for their extremely competitive kids, past a calm and organised yummy mummy who had made the most incredible picnic tea for her little gaggle of children and onwards up the hill and into the woods.

We breathed in the fresh air.  HuffingtonBear zigzagged happily on his super-long lead, rummaging and sniffing at everything and anything.  Out through the trees and onto a vast grassy park where we followed one of many paths happily onward.  We talked about bringing a picnic next time.  I decided I would nip to John Lewis in the week and buy a trendy little flask.  OH suggested buying a proper walkers back pack.

At this point I probably ought to confess that we had absolutely no idea where we were going or how we would get back to the car.  We assumed that there would be signposts.  There weren't.  But anyway, we carried on fearlessly until OH noticed some deer in the semi distance.  We continued onwards with HB on a much shortened lead.  Approaching the deer they stopped, looked up and stared.  All of them looked over at us.  There must have been a dozen of them.  Beautiful elegant creatures with beautiful brown eyes.  There were even fawns, little Bambi-like cuties with gangly legs and a slightly scared look about them.  

OK so I had left my camera at home but couldn' resist the temptation to photograph them.  We stopped for just a moment while I took a couple of photos on my phone until I noticed them coming towards us.  Not walking away but almost trotting at us.  'Come on then' I said calmly as we three began to walk apologetically through their party.  Once safely out the other side I looked tentatively over my shoulder to see three deer following us.  We stopped in our tracks,  they stopped.  We carried on walking and they followed - a bit like 'Grandmothers Footsteps' if you remember playing it as a child.  Eventually they gave up following.  They were beautiful - but a bit strange!

We continued our walk to 'nowhere in particular' hoping that sooner or later we would come across a coffee shop, cafe or ice cream van.  Nothing.  And then we came across Isabella Plantation and wandered inside.  Isabella Plantation is an oasis of colour with lush beautiful plants and trees.  We walked down little paths which eventually brought us out to a grassy bank.  The grass, having been cut with nail scissors was pristine and beautiful.  We were again hopeful for 'coffee' but alas no.  Small family groups were strategically positioned around the grassy bank.  No pop bottles, no barbeques, no screaming ankle biters and not a Monster Munch or cocktail sausage in sight just 'lovely' families.  Picture Ma and Pa sat quietly with Jocasta and Tarquin on a House of Fraser picnic blanket.  A banquet of home made treats laid out on the blanket, the children chatting nicely and 'looking at nature' - the only noise being made by Frankie and Poppy on the other side of the grassy knoll, crying out excitedly that Mama had brought a special treat with her... 'Apricots how yummy'.

We walked through the grassy bank.  I somehow felt the need to suck in my stomach and speak to HuffingtonBear as if he were a child 'Come on my darling, let's keep walking' I said.  We finished our walk through the secret garden and were expelled back outside the wire fencing to the mass of grass and trees.  We were completely lost at this stage and had been walking without a break for quite some time.  For a woman laid up with a bad back for a month earlier this year, walking for two hours was no mean feat let me tell you.

OH took control at this point and used my phone to 'find our way back'.  Trusting the Map App on my phone was like trusting a fat kid with an open packet of strawberry bonbons.  So the not very trustworthy app had us walking round in circles.  Every now and again we cheered one another up suggesting we were on the right track and that we recognised the path.  We didn't.  We were just being nice.  I did decide at one point that as long as we just kept walking in the same direction we would end up at one of the park entrances.  Surely that was more sensible than wandering around following the Map App.  The Map App incidentally had decided at one stage that we were in Ham and at another stage that we were in Twickenham.  Map app was not to be trusted. 

Three hours into our walk my head started thumping.  My mouth was dry and my legs were aching.  Still we soldiered on.  OH was sneezing wildly, eyes streaming and the only one having any fun was HB who was still zigzagging about sniffing the occasional deer poo. Still we walked, until we finally discovered the road and a 'lodge'.  Beside the lodge was a map.  Hoorah!  Ten minutes later - yes just ten minutes, we were back at the car.  I cheered quietly 'yayyyy'.  OH opened the boot and HB got in.  I got in - not in the boot, the car, and took off my shoes.  My head was pounding and I had developed a rasping tickly cough.  OH found an ice cream van and we stuffed down the biggest 99 cones he could buy.  

'When we come again' said OH 'we'll bring a map and a flask'. When we got home, we looked up the Richmond Park map on the internet.  Indeed there were several places to eat and drink in the park - we just hadn't been anywhere near any of them.  We traced our path and discovered we had only covered about a quarter of the park.  

So lesson for today is this.  If you fancy going to Richmond Park 'for a walk' then take a map.  Also take a bottle of water.  Maybe take a picnic too.  Oh and hayfever tablets, whatever you do, don't forget hayfever tablets.

Have a great week lovely people, I'm off to John Lewis to buy a flask, blog you later, Julesy xx