Burrator Reservoir, Dartmoor.

http://www.dartmooraccommodation.co.uk/pages/walks/walk_burrator.html

This photo of Rob looks pretty bleak, but take a look at the write up on the walk we took at Burrator Reservoir on Sunday. I kept saying "Wow"

My latest B&B review

I loved Lobhill Farmhouse at Lewdown the minute I stepped in.
Read about it in my latest review.

Very nice indeed.

Analytics figures all very encouraging.

If you have a website and haven't applied for Google analytics then shame on you.
It's a true record of how well your site is doing and it is free to use.

Having a free 5 minutes this afternoon I decided to set the graph to compare figures of this last month with the same peiod for last year and the site took 47% more absolute unique visitors during the period and for yesterdays date of the 7th January the figure was up exactly 100%.

All very encouraging.
Tom has been with me for a couple of months now and we have all sorts of plans for improving the site and adding lots more information. Our what's on pages will be much improved when we finish adding the new options. But that involves adding information into the new database which is pretty boring stuff. But once every date for each Farmers Market and the larger more important dates like Chagford Show are into the correct cells, it will be all green for go.
I will let you know when this happens, should be sometime next week.

I shouldn't be at the desk today, it being Saturday, but as with any self employed business that has an office at home, it's very tempting to nip into the office for 5 minutes and then find out the it's then 2 hours later.

On that note .... I'm away.

Cheerio each

Youth Hostels no longer old hat.

How things have changed in the world of Youth Hostelling ! I visited the Okehampton YHA hostel in October and was delighted to see how clean and lovely it all is these days. When we moved to Chagford in 1984 there used to be a Youth Hostel in nearby Gidleigh that was run by a real martinet of a spinster lady, who used to be very upright and offputting. She insisted that everyone was in bed
by ten with strict segregation of the sexes.
As she offered no food in the evening, all the hostellers used to walk down to the Northmore Arms in Throwleigh, but heaven help them when they managed to find their way back in the dark in jolly mood.
I am way overdue in writing up my reviews. I have 2 food reviews in hand and another accommodation visit waiting to be written up, so please accept my apologies....
You would think that there is nothing easier than sitting at the desk writing about places to stay, but I am very easily distracted. Tea, coffee, phone calls, visitors, e-mail, dog in need of a walk, pastry to make, you name it.... I have just waved goodbye to local Grandparents Margaret and Maurice who had asked me to take photos of their family gathering at Christmas. Seventeen happy family members all in one house! They came to view the results and happily they are very pleased with the results, so copy cd's will be wending their way to offspring in London, New York and France.... and of course we needed to have a cup of tea and a chat about this and that didn't we ?
Anyway, if you would like to have a look at my review of the charming Youth hostel at Okehampton, HERE IS THE LINK TO CLICK.
As you can see - the YHA has certainly moved with the times.

Snow on Dartmoor and launching birthday cards on ebay

Ok so it was very beautiful, but life is much easier now that it's gone, except for those poor souls in Northern Island.

Dartmoor itself was pure picturebook. These 2 shots I took on Christmas Day whilst taking Topsy out for a pee. The first picture is taken from the top of our drive, and the cold looking cow was standing in the field on the left. Sadly the pipes had frozen in the cowsheds, so the farmer had to let the cattle out so that they could find water in the various water sources in the nearby fields in concrete troughs fed by underground springs. Luckily for the farmer the spring water coming from deep underfoot and stays above freezing point, at least until it arrives aloft.

We had some excellent local beef for the festivities, and far too many roast potatoes and roast parsnips than is good for us, and as you can see from this pic, we didn't miss a chance to fit in a game of Scrabble when we could. Click the pic <- Rob on the right waiting patiently for me to join him. I must be growing old, because the prospect of building a snowman or having a snowball fight has absolutely passed me by. I did gather 2 fistfuls of snow thinking to make a snowball, but it was as sticky as dry washing powder. Useless.

The Christmas cake was only marzipanned last night and then the ready to roll icing sugar looked a bit off colour, so we tasted a pinch, decided it tasted a bit fusty, looked at the sell by date only to discover that it should have been used by June 2008 !

How did that happen..... ? Actually the cake is positively awash with sherry and brandy, nuts, cherries and apples, and I am dying to try a slice, which is a shame because the diet will once again have to be put into operation, especially as the chin in now on the droop.

We spent yesterday afternoon uploading information onto ebay as we launched our range of birthday cards. Not as glamorous as it sounds.... Taking the pictues is the easy bit, then organising printers, shopping around for keen prices in the current economic climate is no joke and then totting up all the incidentals that need to be taken into consideration before you can come up with a selling price. The card production, envelopes for the cards, envelopes to send the cards and envelopes in, that need to be stout to stand up to the rigours of today's postmen....

Rob was outside the Post Office in Chagford about a week before Christmas, and the postvan was rather full. The topmost sack rolled out and down to the postman's feet, whereupon he shoved it into the van in front of himself and proceeded to kick it until it fitted in !
So much for any 'FRAGILE DO NOT BEND' items hey ?

Then you have to take into account buying the cellophane bags 4 pence each, for the cards to recline in, the cost of listing them on ebay, that's 40 pence per item PLUS 8.5 pence of the final selling price. Then add to that the cost of using Pay Pal - that's 20 pence plus an 8 pence fee for the transaction !!!! Then add the cost of packaging and sending the package to the customer...... add another 70 pence per card.....

Oh yes and factor in the cost of collecting the cards from the printer, and the cost of Tom in the office creating the pdf of each card that needs to be sent to the printer as an attachment.....

So not much room for profit hey ? What seemed like a good idea some time ago, "let's sell a range of greeting cards on e-bay.... " has taken over 2 months of sorting, arguing and understanding the vagueries of the British Postal system. How many times have we weighed the packages and tried to fit them through that oh so helpful cardboard cut out that they supplied us with since they got mean minded and made us buy stupid looking stamps with the word Large on them. How unattractive is that ?

Oh well enough chuntering for today. If you would like to have a look at the first 6 designs we lauched yesterday here is the link to the birthday cards on ebay.

If I don't see you soon, Have a super New Year. May it hold some good things for you, may the country get itself out of this pickle we are in.... Oh just let me tell you, an item on the news.... telling of the increase in petrol prices..... some Know All with a degree in stating the bleeding obvious commented that it might result in people driving less !!!!!!!!
How many years at University did he study to be able to come out with such cleverness ?
Can I have a job like that ?

Cheers Chums

Jilly x