IOM day 2

Sunday 1st august 2010

1855
Well we’ve had a busy day although it’s been different to what we expected / planned.

Last night when I went to bed I realised that I’ve got light coloured curtains in my bedroom :-( grr I have blackout curtains at home!!! There was a brown top cover thing for the bed so I put that at the window and figured that would sort it. I then looked up and noticed there was a skylight window to let all the light in :-o I had read something in the guestbook about poles for the skylights so I explored in the wardrobe and found a pole to shut the blind on the skylight – was so relieved to find that, I’d have been soooo annoyed to get woken up by the light every morning.

I got up at around 8am, didn’t set my alarm, that’s just what time I woke up. I got up very relaxed and had breakfast. When mum got up we were discussing what to do today and I was irritated by my IOM-less satnav and mum had a brainwave – you can downloads maps onto the TomTom – great idea, except I realised I’ve got no USB cable with me :-( So it was back to the map I bought on the boat and google maps / AA for directions.

While I was getting washed and dressed we had a visit from the owner of the cottage just to check everything was ok and we found everything. My mum asked her could we have the heating on cos we were cold last night but everything else was fine :-) I deliberately came downstairs while the lady was here just to see if it was the same woman who was a nuisance yesterday – it wasn’t so nuisance woman must be one of our holiday neighbours.

We eventually decided on going to Ramsey to the Grove Country House and museum, mainly cos we wanted a supermarket and the cottage guest book said there was a supermarket in Ramsey open till 5pm.

We headed off towards Ramsey at about 11am with plans and directions etc. Everything was going well, we got near Ramsey and there were signs for the place we were going to but the road right near it was blocked off for roadworks and we couldn’t work out how to get too it. After driving round aimlessly for a while we decided to abandon that idea and go to the wildlife park we’d seen earlier on.

When we got there my mum was trying to go in without even paying – duh!!! I paid for both of us and the lady on the desk said there was an ‘animal encounter’ starting in 5 minutes so we headed off in that direction.

When we got there the lady had just started her talk and had Giant African Land Snails that she was talking about and handling and said she’d bring them round so we could hold them as well if we wanted. Nobody actually wanted to hold the snails haha. She also brought out millipedes, cockroaches, a lizard and a snake. Apart from the snail, I held all of the animals that we were allowed to – we weren’t allowed to hold the lizard or snake but we were allowed to stroke and feel them.

By the time ‘animal encounter’ was finished it was about 1240ish so we decided to go to the café for lunch. It was an expensive lunch – about £15 for the 2 of us :-o It was nice though :-)

After lunch we started wandering round looking at all the animals. In quite a lot of the enclosures there were animals roaming free and often they were quite tricky to see. As we went into the lemur enclosure the lemurs were roaming free and one managed to get out into the corridor we’d just come from :-o we couldn’t leave the door open cos the other lemur was trying to get out as well hahahaha, Whoever went into the bat corridor next was going to get a shock when they encounter a lemur haha. We spent another couple of hours wandering round and aiming for penguin feeding time at 1515.

We watched the penguins being fed with quite small fish and there was a seagull that had decided to muscle in and I think that got nearly as many fish as the penguins haha. Immediately after penguin feeding time it was pelican feeding time so we followed the keeper across the path to the other enclosure.

We had a bit of a rest after the pelicans and tried to work out which bits we hadn’t seen yet – there were a couple of enclosures we hadn’t been in and I was determined to see it all. My mum had more or less had enough by that time so when it got to the final enclosure my mum sat on a bench while I completed the park.

On the way out we bought a few bits and pieces and were pleasantly surprised at the price – only £3 for a magnet, badge and keyring, we thought it would be much more expensive in a place like that.

We needed to go to the supermarket for a few bits and pieces so we went back to Ramsey cos we’d seen a bit shop earlier in the day and if that wasn’t open (cos it was getting on for 5pm) I knew there was supposed to be 2 co-ops open one till 6 and the other till 9. Luckily the supermarket we’d seen earlier was open till 6pm :-) In the fruit and veg section in that supermarket you have to weigh and price your own produce – I had fun with the scales hahahaha

Today we knew exactly where to turn in for the cottages – there’s a set of red & white squashy crash barriers meant for the TT right at the bottom of the lane so we can use that as our landmark haha

When we got back we found that the heating was on :-) I’ve also swapped my stuff onto the other bed ready for tonight. For the rest of the evening we’re just going to chill, watching telly and eating :-)

Back tomorrow * wave *