We have been having the worst summer in memory.  And that is not just my ten year old UK memory, that is the memory of people a LOT older.  Grey, rain, grey, more rain and then more grey…  Most galling thing about it is that the weathermen predicted that this would be the warmest summer on record.  But that was just after our lovely freaky April weather.  Seems that April sucked it all up and left us with nothing for the rest of the year.  Until this past Bank Holiday weekend that is.  Lovely weather hit the south east of the UK.  (From the midlands up it was the usual story as some poor friends that went to Manchester Pride can attest.  It was COLD there apparently!)

Crossing the ferry from Sandbanks to Studland 

I had planned for a long time to go to Studland in Dorset over this weekend and had taken the Friday off ages ago.  My friends Rob and Graeme cancelled on me and thus I had to find someone else quick!  Robert came to the rescue thankfully.  So lunchtime Friday we set off for Studland. I had wanted to stay in Burnbake as this is closest to the beach but due to the lateness in getting everything sorted it was fully booked.  So we had to stay in Herston.  It is only 3 miles away so not far at all.  It is a great site.  Lovely showers (in the new upper block, the lower ones are not so nice), a shop, live entertainment at night and all in all very good.  Very busy too due to it being Bank Holiday, but that would have been the case everywhere.

Our space on arrival…  note the space around us… 

The second night a whole group of Polish people arrived in our absence and pitched their tents right up to ours and did not even leave space for my car to get close!  And they were quite snotty when I pointed this out saying “what, that little tent is yours?!!!”  I mean really.  So what.  It is small but common sense will still tell you someone is staying there…  Thankfully the husband appeared and calm prevailed.

The after with Poland behind and another tent on the right!!!  And Rob contemplating murder…

But we came for the weather.  And even though the forecast had predicted fog in the morning this was the view we got from the tent on the Saturday morning:

TONS of sunshine!!!  Yihay

We showered, made a lovely breakfast and headed for the beach.

The beach is a good 15 minutes walk from the road and as we were quite early on Saturday we did not park too far from this path.  About 10 minutes walk from the car to the path. 

Lovely white sand dunes with little hidey holes in the tall grass

Me basking in the sun!

Sunday morning Rob had to eclipse me on the breakfast front!  Scrambled eggs with spring onion, mushrooms with a creamy sauce, the works! It was very filling and very yummy.

I had also bought a wind break from the National Trust shop on the beach on the Saturday.  This works wonders to shield of other countries and give you a lovely (sort of) private space.

It makes for a nice photo backdrop too!  LOL

Rob smiling

Late Sunday we went with some of Rob’s friends to the bar next to the ferry and had some BBQ burgers there and something to drink.

Saw a most amazing sunset too:

We then took the ferry into Sandbanks for drinks at a bar there.  Look at this view from Sandbanks out over the water:

That morning we had been a bit late and had to park quite far from the path.  Then we walked to the bar and then into Sandbanks via the ferry.  So come the last ferry back at 23:00 we had a 30 minute walk ahead to get to the car!  At least the moon was about 90% full so no worries that we had only beach gear on us and no jumpers or flashlights!

Monday the weather was a bit cooler (about 23 vs the 27 degrees my car showed on Saturday).  The early morning clouds burnt off thankfully and we had another lovely day in the sun on the beach.  But then we had to do the trek back to London.  With the entire rest of the world.  Stopped at a little public loo in Studland and managed to lock myself in the single loo!!!  Stupid thumbturn lock just turned round and round.  Thankfully Rob was not too far and heard me whistle!  So he came to the rescue.  I promptly took the three bits of broken “lock” and threw them as far as I could into the bushes so no-one else will get locked in there.

The first part was hell.  Traffic everywhere and not much motorway.  But as soon as we left Southampton behind and veered off on the A3 all was well and we got home safe and well. 

Click here to see all the other pictures I took.