Follow the brown signs

This morning I woke up raring to go. My blog has been bandied around the social networking medium I am both scared and excited by, Twitter, and it's been great to get good feedback about what I'm doing and the idea that we can all discover Britain by The Brown Sign Way. I was supposed to go for a run (I'm training for a marathon, something I am regretting FYI) and then get on the computer, instead I sat in my pyjamas for some time twittering around and planning the...

Read more >>

Today I decided it was time to discover a vineyard via The Brown Sign Way. A lot of attraction types are being ticked off the list now so I think it's time to be a little more focussed in my approach to my brown signing (I'll still go to all the random places I happen upon too though, don't worry). My sister and I got into my just MOTed and legal (if still smelly when braking and rattly when accelerating) car and headed for a vineyard brown sign near Dorking....

Read more >>

Recently I have been thinking (a lot) about why I like brown tourist signs so much, and why I want to write a book about them. My good friend Rob Archer, Occupational Psychologist extraordinare, asked me some very simple but enlightening questions about what I feel when I go off visiting brown signed tourist attractions. Firstly I said I was excited at the prospect of discovering something new, meeting the people who run the places and that I feel good when I experience something fun and different. But when he asked...

Read more >>

Ok, I am starting to properly build up this blog now, woo! I want it to be as brown and touristy as it can be and to be honest I wouldn't mind your input. I am effectively a one woman brown tourist sign visiting machine but would like your suggestions and comments of your brown tourist signed experiences.




Where have you been that's got a brown tourist sign, maybe on holiday or closer to home? Have you ever noticed a brown sign that intrigued you?...

Read more >>

Somewhat ironically the Museum of English Rural Life does not lie nestled among rolling hillsides and wheat fields with poppies, instead it sits rather self consciously on a busy main road in the middle of the urban sprawl that is Reading, Berkshire. However, despite the interesting juxtaposition of subject matter and location this excellent museum manages to completely immerse visitors in all things rural, leaving you longing for the days of hopping on wagons for a lift down the road and great big picnics in fields at harvest time. ...

Read more >>

Yesterday was hot and lovely down here in the West Country, shame then that most of it was spent in the car. I wanted to get to Cornwall you see, and as much as I've spent a lot of time on roads and looking at maps in the last few weeks I kind of underestimated how long it would take to get to places down here, especially with such terrible traffic on such long and winding roads.
Here is an example of the road we drove down for a...

Read more >>

So the second leg of my trip began on Monday, after a small delay to the tune of mother-gets-pneumonia. The family holiday down in Torquay turned into a sisterly 4 day break. My mum insisted we come down without her and she was feeling a lot better when we left, so please don't shout at me for going, thank you.

We (I) drove down without any stops, despite Jo's ever louder shouts during the last hour because she needed a wee so bad she insisted her bladder was going...

Read more >>

As it began to seriously piss down with rain this morning I started to get a hankering for the seaside, and the Kent coast is a great place to go in the rain, in fact I don't think I've ever been when it's not raining. So south bound we went. I wanted to see the lighthouse at Dungeness but as it appeared through the mist and rain a very obvious sign let us know that the lighthouse was closed. Right by this lighthouse however was a little railway, and a little train...

Read more >>

The idea of going to Orpington Super Bowl as part of my discovery of Britain via the Brown Sign Way appealed to me, massively. Not just because I could relive memories of bunking off lessons at Orpington College when I retook my A-levels there, but also because I have been seriously steeped in British history recently and I wouldn't mind some inane Thursday afternoon frivolity, such is the joy of brown tourist sign variety.
So, after helping my sister with her painting and decorating job so she would finish...

Read more >>

It was weird to be waking up in my own bed yesterday, and strangely part of me wished I was in a far away place with unknown adventures to be embarked on ahead of me. That lacking, I got up and did the gigantic mountain of washing up which has been accumulating because the dishwasher is broken, oh it's good to be home.

I had a look through my "brown sign symbols completed" and my "brown sign symbols not completed" lists and was immediately drawn to a praying knight...

Read more >>

The main event today was caving. I know I know, I've already done a cave, but sadly I don't mean caving as in going underground and chatting to a miner about his work, I mean caving as in giving up, throwing the towel in, getting too hacked off for words and coming home. Technically I was supposed to be coming home on Friday for my pal Lau's big 3 0, but I was tipped over the edge this morning and it all got too much.

I did end up...

Read more >>

When I got up yesterday I had a bath, for an hour. Sounds odd but I seriously needed one, I have been showering you understand but a bath is a very different experience to a shower, so I lay in it for a long time and went wrinkly, then I was happy. Having it in a carpeted avocado suited bathroom is quite a weird experience though I have to say. I had a nice breakfast, but held back on yet another full cooked breakfast, just poached eggs this time. I...

Read more >>

After Friday's day of rest I felt about a billion times better both in body and mind, and as I consequently had less trouble using my right leg I thought some gentle brown signing was in order. I would have liked to head up as north as Hull and do some industrial port attractions but on the way was diverted by a sign for a waterways museum which had the bonus of being located in a town called Goole.

The museum was the Yorkshire Waterways Museum and was an...

Read more >>

As much as the Peaks are beautiful and full of things to do I thought I better branch out and head for Nottinghamshire/Derbyshire borders area. I've got quite a few brown sign types done now so I actually (shock horror) did some research into what there was to do around the area. I first headed for a wildlife park but in my eagerness I arrived like a right keeno an hour before opening time so had to sacrifice that one and head off on the rest of my brown signed...

Read more >>

Yesterday was not such a good day, but it did start well. I had seen brown signs on the way into Sale for Jodrell Bank, the symbol on the sign was not a generic one, but it was intriguing one none the less. I decided I'd get up early the next day to go and check it out. Unfortunately for me my plans didn't go as I imagined, as Eleri and I went down the the funeral wake in the hotel bar and had a few too many drinks with dinner,...

Read more >>

So the day to leave my student digs arrived. I took the chance to wash all my clothes and hung them out all over the banisters to dry like I used to many years ago in my own student house, then packed the damp smoke infused items back into my wardrobe/suitcase and into the boot. Unbelievably my car wasn't broken into, despite being in an area that looked liked this...   I was heading for Sale near Manchester and decided to take the non-motorway route, as it's clearly going to be more...

Read more >>

It was a late/early bedtime last night/this morning (5am - I seriously am getting far too old for this but I was out with a student so I had to keep up), and had a great night having dinner in one of the weirdest restaurants-come-karaoke-eat-as-much-as-you-like-chineses I've ever had the displeasure to eat in then doing most of the bars in Liverpool. There is something just a little bit scary though about walking home through scenes that can only be described as something out of Shaun of the Dead. Wasted Liverpuddlians...

Read more >>

After walking, riding, eating my pie and blog writing (and making friends in the inn) I went to bed knackered. I woke up even more knackered and decided the brown signs may have to wait for my enthusiasm to be rekindled before they got me again. I left the Druid Inn, beautiful location, here's the view from my window...

 
I planned to hang in Chester for a bit, there were races on and as racecourses have their own brown sign symbol it was probably a good opportunity to...

Read more >>