New Month, New Journey

Heading south today, the next week will be spent touring England, some places I will have been to before, and some may be new. This one I have been to before, this is the Tebay services on the M6, almost exactly half way to my first destination near Reading.

This must be one of the most picturesque service areas on the whole motorway network as far as its location is concerned. I had decided as I was leaving Aberdeen quite late I would stay the night here. The hotel is quite pleasant, though maybe I am a little less enthusiastic about it than I used to be.

Tonight it was full of American tourists, at least some of them from the California, San Francisco area, which has to rate as one of my favourite cities and areas in the world. There were rather too many of them for the size of the bar however, fortunately almost as I arrived they went off to dinner not to be seen again. They were on a coach tour, at reception I had been advised to avoid breakfast until after they had finished. A good excuse for not having an early start tomorrow.

After having checked in at the hotel I headed over to this pond sure to find some ducks. One of them had a family of ducklings, I took a few photos of them, she has nine chicks which seems a lot to look after. Gulls were hovering around overhead but not seeming to represent a threat.