The ridiculous to the sublime

Monday 28th March 2011

The tour we organised on behalf of York National Trust to Tunisia returned last week to great acclaim - after all the worry we had prior to departure our intrepid travelers had a super time. The feed-back we are getting is that the local population were very friendly and extremely grateful that our party was supporting their tourist industry. On top of that they had the great archaeological sites of Carthage and El Jem virtually to themselves, where normally there can be many hundreds of visitors at any given time.

What with revolution in Libya and earthquakes in Japan at 'blossom-time' life has not been dull in the Operations Dept. of Brightwater Holidays. But our tours continue to pick up speed with departures to Malta, Andalucia, Madeira and Sicily in progress as we speak. We hope that our tour in Sicily is not troubled by the NATO Mirage fighter-planes heading to enforce the 'no-fly zone' over Libya.

While certain parts of the world are going mad, spring has truly arrived in the UK with a lovely spell of sunny weather from top to bottom of the country and I have been fortunate to visit two thriving Gardening Clubs reconfirming my faith in my fellow man. On Friday afternoon I was in Budleigh Salterton just south of Exeter speaking to a large and active group. http://www.visitbudleigh.com/ I am pretty sure this is the first time I have given my presentation in an actual football stadium - very nice venue it was too.

The Budleigh Gardeners Association have been travelling with Brightwater Holidays every year for the last fourteen visiting places as far away as the Outer Hebrides to Monet's Garden to Nice - They are a great bunch.

This morning I was on my home patch (sort of) speaking to the Gardening Group of the Wells U3A - blimey, talk about an active group; they were queuing across the Cathedral Green just to get into the Wells Museum where my talk was taking place - over 100 turned up - I joke not that it was standing room only!

What a beautiful city Wells is with its magnificent Cathedral buildings and its ancient streets. Vicars' Close is reputed to be the oldest residential street in Europe - it was a joy walking down it with no other person to be seen. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicars%27_Close,_Wells

Have a look at our Private Gardens of Somerset tour that visits this area, going to some lovely gardens not often open to the public.http://www.brightwaterholidays.co.uk/tour.aspx?TID=EC117CC8-07C0-4319-AA51-E20AD652B055

Busy week ahead with visits to York, South Wales and Hampshire. Watch this space. Thank goodness Alison is back in the office after her holiday - can the girl never switch off? She has come back with a new tour of Gardens of Florida!

Re-charge your batteries with Brightwater Holidays

Monday 21st March 2011

Nice feedback from our recent tour to the Far North West -
'I needed a break to blow the winter cobwebs away and this tour was perfect. One bonus was a big bath with lashing of hot water in the en suite, another was the total competence and politeness of Willie the driver and the solution offered by Trish (the Tour Manager) when my camera battery ran out. It was a breath of fresh air and I am looking forward to my next holiday with Brightwater to the 'Extreme South West' - Tresco in May!'

Beautiful Plumage!

Wednesday 16th March 2011

A nice start to my birthday, arriving back home last night at quarter to one in the morning after a presentation near Bedford, to be jumped on this morning at 0645 by my excited children - 'Happy Birthday Dad!'

A grey day in Bedford-shire crawling through road works on the M25 and M1 north of London was only made a little bit more interesting when two flashes of bright green flew over the car and landed in a tree on the verge of the motorway - they were Ring-necked Parakeets - how exotic http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/r/ringneckedparakeet/index.aspx

These brightly coloured birds have established themselves in and around London from escaped aviary birds and are now officially on the British Bird list. Two weeks ago the M25 brought muntjac deer, now bright green parrots, whatever next?

This corridor of England was not looking its best - the M1 out of London is pretty grim at the best of times, but it was a misty/smoggy day with mile after mile of road works and land developments, although in fairness I could see that many thousands of sapling trees had been planted along the new roads and countless roundabouts - give it another 60 years and it might have greened up a bit. I arrived at the village of Biddenham (just west of Bedford) at around six so there was still some light to have a look around the village and I was very pleasantly surprised to find a most attractive leafy thatched village with welcoming pub. I knew I was in the right place as on the main road was a noticeboard at the side of the road stating that the Gardening Club was meeting tonight in the village hall - I was impressed. http://www.biddenham-pc.org.uk/history.php

The Gardeners Association has been going for over twenty years and were a great crowd - the hall was packed and were a most appreciative audience. I had said it wasn't going to be a 'hard sell' but I couldn't resist slipping in to my presentation the fact that we still had a few places left on our Bulbfields Cruise including a visit to Keukenhoff this spring! http://www.brightwaterholidays.com/tour.aspx?TID=897D79EE-3759-4D3E-8B1C-6710827DFD47

The motorway was empty heading home back down to Somerset - just Barry Manilow and Bob Harris for company.

North/South divide

Monday 14th March 2012

It was a game of two halves (and we're not talking about the rugby at Twickenham!) some of us were enjoyning the most wonderful early spring weather in rolling Devon, and our travellers in the 'Extreme' North West of Scotland were up to their middles in snow!

Tour Manager Trish Strang reported in today to say that while all had not quite gone to plan because of the wintry weather the group still managed to enjoy their visit to the far north.

'We saw loads of deer right down by the road, a lovely sighting of an otter at a lunch stop at Kylesku Hotel just north of Ullapool and we had Culloden Visitor Centre to ourselves'

http://www.kyleskuhotel.co.uk/

www.nts.org.uk/culloden

Well done to our hardy travellers!

Auld Reekie

Friday 11 March 2011

Beautiful city of Edinburgh! the truth to express,

Your beauties are matchless I must confess,

And which no one dare gainsay,

But that you are the grandest city in Scotland at the present day!

Thank you William McGonagall, I couldn't have put it better myself.

Yesterday I was transported back in time, back to a time when I used to commute into Edinburgh at rush hour, and I am pleased to report that the traffic on the Forth Road Bridge is still bloody awful and the nose-to-tail queues did nothing for my stress levels. I keep telling my staff just how lucky they are to work in Cupar where the only traffic problems are caused by a tractor on the road or perhaps a five minute delay if the traffic lights are not working. But I was back in my old haunts of Edinburgh - Auld Reekie, what a beautiful city centre (if you forget the clogged traffic system caused by road works and disruption due to the ill-fated implementation of the new tramway). Spires, beautiful cobble-stoned streets, parks, shops and cafes. All that and a great big castle perched upon a huge lump of rock, right in the centre of the city. Fantastic - you can probably tell I hadn't been into Edinburgh for some time, but it was good to be back. Yesterday I was speaking to the prestigious Edinburgh Probus Club; indeed it was their 537th meeting held at 0930 in the grand old St Cuthbert's church building (now public halls) just off Princes Street Gardens, in the West End of the city centre. It was a full house of retired businessmen, all dressed in tweed jackets, blazers and ties, sitting cross armed waiting for me to enlighten them about Brightwater Holidays - I though this was going to be a tough gig, however after a few slides and some funny anecdotes they were all on board and I think I went down well - so well in fact that in the vote of thanks at the end a kind gentleman who said he had travelled with Brightwater Holidays several times and had enjoyed each holiday thoroughly - he could confirm that Brightwater's tours are every bit as good as Mr Mitchell's presentation. Take from that what you will!?

Then I dodged the driving sleet passing a real life 'Proclaimer' (was it Charlie or was it Craig? couldn't be sure) and dashed up Castle Street to have a most productive business lunch with my dear friend Paddy Scott who runs Scotland's Gardens Scheme http://www.gardensof I really enjoy Paddy's company and I always come away from any meeting with him full of ideas of new gardens that we have to include in our garden tours. Note to self; have a look at Corsock House, Castle Douglas http://www.gardensofscotland.org/garden.aspx?id=e6487422-81a8-4596-9fdd-9e13012297fc and Juniper Artland www.jupiterartland.org

The Scotsman newspaper office was next on my list of Edinburgh visits and that too was most productive. We have had a long and successful relationship with the Scotsman ever since we set up Brightwater Holidays almost 20 years ago when one of our first tours 'Gardens of the Far North including the Queen Mother's Secret Garden' was an early hit http://www.castleofmey.org.uk

As I write this blog I am very conscious of a hardy bunch of Brightwater travellers heading north up the A9 on our 'Extreme North West' holiday - into snowy conditions. I do hope that all goes to plan you arrive safely; that the log fire is blazing and a warming dram is waiting at the Kinlochbervie Hotel.

Holiday Dreams

Tuesday 8th March

Our tour departures are beginning to happen with more frequency - must be the sap rising. Good reports back from both Ecuador tours and the first Andalucia departure of the season.

Ecuador :-

'Excellent trip, would recommend to others - please thank Chris Bailes for his input'

'Chris was everything one would expect in a Tour Manager, imparting knowledge and organising his party of tourists calmly without rush. He was kind caring and helpful as was our local guide. Our Sightseeing tours were well organised with ample opportunity for photo stops and the coach and driver was excellent too'

Andalucia :-

'How did you arrange the weather to be perfect?'

'Our Tour Manager Michael Gill has a good command of the language. He is very knowledgeable and worked hard; was always around and he put a lot of effort into the tour'

'The itinerary was superb - really worked well'

Meanwhile in the office Ann in our Accounts department is busy clearing out cupboards creating space for this year's tour files. We have to keep all files as a matter of company law for up to seven years, but the trouble is that they take up so much space in the office, so we have to have an annual clear out and shift all last year's files out to our off-site storage depot, and we shred a year's worth of files from seven years ago. It is an annual process - a bit like the arrival of the first daffodil - bang goes another year. I have to say it is a very gloomy warehouse where we rent a couple of rooms to store these old files - whenever I go there it is a bit like looking at old chapters of your life seeing the rows of dusty old tour files - each file full of memories . A place where holiday dreams go to die! (Isn't that a bit over-dramatic Graeme?)

Cambridgeshire visit

Thursday 3rd March 2011

Monday lunchtime brought our quarterly staff meeting, which was fairly uneventful, although it was good for the rest of the staff to meet Ellen Walker our new Group Travel Manager who is based in London and not often in the Cupar office. Ellen explained some of the activities she had been involved with over the last few months - particularly her attendance at the GTOA (Group Travel Organiser's Association) AGM http://www.gtoa.co.uk/ . We also announced our plans for upgraded 'On Call' facilities to make life easier for the Operations staff this coming season - yippee!

More meetings followed with new tour ideas aplenty - New Zealand for next winter?, possibly re-introducing our Gardens of Mauritius tour which was popular a few years ago. Also Ann was going to contact someone she met in Grenada to see how their gardens were recovering since Hurricane Ivan struck in 2004.

Our new website team came to the office on Tuesday for a bit of 'Blue-sky' thinking - what was good, what was not, and what we could do with our website http://www.brightwaterholidays.com/ .

Then it was a mad dash to Edinburgh Airport to just catch the Easyjet to Bristol by the skin of our teeth (phew!)

Yesterday found me trundling along the M4 where the only highlight was two lovely Red Kites dancing above the motorway near Swindon, followed by a most unusual wildlife sighting on the M25 - where I saw two small Muntjac Deer grazing peacefully on the verge of one of the busiest motorways in the country! Very nice too http://www.muntjacdeer.co.uk/ . Then it was on up the M11 into Cambridgeshire to speak to the good people of Barley Horticultural Society. I was tickled when I saw the village noticeboard publicising my talk describing it as a 'lighthearted' talk. Next to me was next week's speaker who was a former pilot of Concorde. Not sure which would be the better gig? Fortunately for me, my talk went down very well with those who braved the icey conditions.

I was very impressed with the club's four Chelsea Flower Show winner's medals on display in the old Town House www.barley-village.co.uk/town_house (dating back to the 1300's?) where my talk was held. Barley is a beautiful village with some really lovely 'olde-worlde' thatched cottages sprinkled down its High Street. Brightwater Holidays have a good link with Cambridgeshire as for many years we have organised the tours on behalf of the Friend's of Cambridge Botanic Gardens - I wish I had had more time to visit these beautiful and learned gardens http://www.botanic.cam.ac.uk/ perhaps next time.

Another long dark and fortunately pretty quiet motorway lead me home to Somerset by 01.00 am.