Monument walk

On one of our first days here we popped to the shops to get bread and milk, but Jam was so happy driving around and seeing the countryside that he forgot about the shopping and we were suddenly in the car park to walk up to the Monument. I didn't want to be a killjoy, but had to for Rowan was screaming and the shops were shutting - we're not in London now man! So we carried on with our errands and decided we'd do the Monument another day.

So a few days later, we decided we had done enough unpacking and needed to stretch our legs and go for a bit of fresh air. We got in the car and headed out along the windy roads to the top of the hill and parked the car in the carpark for the walk up to the Monument. We took our super huge pram with us, that we had been given by a friend who had spied it on freecycle ( a great website in London, I wonder if there's one here...) and off we trotted.

It was a breath-taking but brief walk. Beautiful trees whispering all around us. A wide path through the woods and at the end of the path there was the Monument, which is leaning slightly and has railings around it for that fact. The Monument is a 175ft/53m high triangular tower located at the highest point of the Blackdown hills, built in honour of the Duke of Wellington, who was actually called Wellesley and only went to Wellington once in his life. We met some other people out there who had always seen the Monument driving by and thought they would stop and see it close up. We read the information about it together and you could get a key for the tower from the local landlord, so we said we'd race to see who got there first, but we were jesting for it needs some work doing to it now and there is a great fence around it.

Heading back Rowan started to get quite upset for he was hungry, so I said we should stop at a bench, but Jam suggested I get in the pram, which was not such a bad suggestion, as you see, the pram is really quite large and it was quite a lot of fun, so much that I almost wet myself laughing! Must go and practise my pelvic floor...