A happy camper

I said I'd have something exciting to post about soon, well here it is. It's exciting to me at least, last weekend we went camping. I was terribly excited to be going on our first camping trip of the year, hardly sleeping excited. We were going somewhere I'd never really been before (I'd passed through but never actually spent time there) which made it doubly exciting. We went to Derbyshire.

Much to my mother's amusement (as I was a child who had to be forced out to play and spent even the hottest months in my thickest jumpers) I love getting outdoors. There's something about being out in the fresh air that's just wonderful. Unfortunately the UK weather has been very UK-ish of late and I'll admit it was rather soggy...and windy, oh my goodness it was windy!
This is the tidiest our little tent ever looks, all set up ready for me to move our "stuff" in:

Once we were set up we were ready to explore. On the walk out of the campsite we saw this little guy up a tree, no idea what he was doing up there but he did make me laugh and reminded me of my childhood when all my friends had these little monster toys:

I don't remember what they were called but I recall you could swap them between a cuddly, cute appearance and a monster, I wanted one very much but never had one...what a cruel woman my mother was ;-)

For some reason I didn't take photos of our nosey around Ashbourne on our first evening there but I did take pictures of our day out on the Saturday when we went to Buxton. Buxton is just lovely, if you get the chance to go then do so. The Pavillion Gardens were especially beautiful.

There were many ducks and other water dwelling birds which made Mr.NM very happy as he is very fond of ducks.

I did find Buxton's yarn shop, of course! I was very restrained though, I didn't buy anything. They had a nice selection of Sirdar, Sublime and Rowan as well as some Noro and some sock yarn.

Whilst I was very restrained in the yarn there was a shop I couldn't resist a purchase in. Possible the most exciting bookshop I've ever been in. It was spread over 5 floors and sold books on every subject imaginable including some of the oldest books I've seen (and touched) outside of museums and libraries. There was little order to the books which made it all the more exciting, hunting for hidden treasures in the shelves.

There was even an organ to have a play of the sheet music before purchasing

Possibly the best bit was the little kitchen to make your own cup of tea or coffee to drink as you browsed

I did buy a book, a little book of narrative poems from the 1930s, for some reason (I'm a dimwit) I didn't take a photograph but it's very special and I'm happy with my little purchase.

After a lovely day in Buxton (and some delicious fish and chips) we had to head back to the campsite and settle down for a relaxing evening. We set up our chairs, got out some beer, lit the BBQ and relaxed for the evening.

I'm not going to lie, it was cold but it was OK. I had two very important things to keep me warm. The glowing remnants of the BBQ

And the most important keeper-warmer...WOOL!