Black Knowl Club Site, Brockenhurst, Hampshire

               

Yesterday we drove down from our camp in the Midlands, a long but easy trip on a route designed by our Tomtom, longer in distance than that which I had charted, but taking less time because we travelled almost entirely on motorways: the M5, M42, M40, A34, M27 before eventually turning onto the lesser A337 directly south through the New Forest to our camp here near Brockenhurst.

En route we passed through the ever lovely rural landscapes of Warwickshire, Oxfordshire, West Berkshire and Hampshire, over the Chilterns where we saw dozens upon dozens of red kites wheeling in the cool autumn updrafts, through wide avenues of trees dressed in green, gold and red and all the shades in between. In fact apart from the rather utilitarian motorway services, one nuclear power station and the odd industrial roof, our trip was quite lovely.

We found our camp well tucked away in the forest, that part walked through in June and were altogether delighted to find it so, immediately offering the possibility of so many walks without having to drive to a starting point elsewhere. And despite its location in the pony and other beastie populated wood, we have all the mod-cons one can expect to find in a Caravan & Motorhome Club site; wonderful hot showers, recycling facilities, et cetera, et cetera. We were however surprised and perhaps a little disappointed to find the camp so busy; it seem that all the retirees make the most of this window of calm before the site closes for the winter.

After a ridiculously early waking, we spent our bonus hours sorting and discarding accumulated travel brochures, and piling up the great quantity of books we intend to send back to New Zealand for ourselves, and finding they weigh in at about 13 kilograms.

After breakfasting and restoring the caravan to order, albeit minus several kilos of discarded paper products, we set off through the woods that surround our camp and across the moor to the edge of the village, then proceeded into the centre. We were accompanied part of the way by a Welsh couple who had visited the New Forest previously and like us, fallen in love with the area. They had tried to book into the Black Knowl site on several occasions, without success, so were again like us, enjoying the fact they had secured a spot in this very busy camp. Their pale eyed Welsh Collie scampered about, leadless across the moor, delighting in the freedom and surely not welcome by the wildlife who call this space home. Later we spotted the trio sitting on the veranda of one of the several cafes in the village.

In Brockenhurst we popped into the post office to make enquiries regarding the posting of parcelled books across the world, and learned we might be better to divide the booty into several box loads. We can sort that out a little later on, although time is indeed marching on. We discovered that the two supermarkets, Tesco and Sainsbury, cater well to the needs of the locals, in contrast to Lyndhurst just up the road which relies on just the one private outlet. After walking about the village to check what else was on offer, we headed back to camp, pausing to admire the ponies along our way.

We treated ourselves to toasted sandwiches for lunch, the toastie maker having been idle since this time last year, then burned the extra calories off with another two hour work in the afternoon. This time we headed into the forest where we discovered a host of wildlife; squirrels, robins, a small herd of deer, an excited litter of pigs, small groups of ponies and herds of cattle. The deer were far off through the trees, too distant to capture on camera, but the pigs were more obliging, rushing toward us in their excitement for acorns littering the ground. These are not technically wildlife, the ponies, cattle and pigs belonging to the commoners, those folk who hold common rights to the Forest, however the animals run free in the forest generally keeping to within their home “boundaries”.

The weather has remained fine, perfect for walking out, however we are a little disappointed that autumn is not further advanced; we returned to see the Forest cloaked in its autumn colours and to kick our way through the discarded leaves.