My blog is now within Dartmoor Accommodation

Please click this link to follow my blog from now :-
http://www.dartmooraccommodation.co.uk/jills-blog/general-blog/

Off over the Moor with the gang

Check out what we did with the family on Saturday. This is Jennifer with Rob before we set off. Click :- http://www.dartmooraccommodation.co.uk/jills-blog/general-blog/shower-ponies-ice-cream-and-sunshine/

Nesta and Shelley our ex battery hens.

We've had hens with a couple of small breaks since 1982.

When we ran the Bed and Breakfast in the eighties, we
had 

over 20 hens and a cockerel, but these days I don't
have 

so many breakfasts and evening meals to cook.

We took on 3 ex battery hens in April. This is Nesta.
She was hen pecked and her claws were so swollen she
couldn't walk properly. These days she is fit and fluffy
with plenty of feathers. Her back has a permanent
patch that will never recover, but
she is much more a happy little bird.

I am bonkers about hens.  And I'm so pleased
that battery houses have now been outlawed.
Sadly one of the 3 hens we brought home faded away
after a couple of days, but Nesta and Shelly
are now fighting fit and have each laid an egg a day
without fail for about 6 weeks . Bless !

How crazy is this? Would you take this on holiday?

Still waiting for the transfer to take place, so carrying out final tweaks to the new version of the website before it finally goes live.
I have added a few links to Amazon from the new website, and was staggered to find this suitcase for sale this morning..... Have you ever seen anything so off the wall as this ? Crazy !

Still waiting for the go-ahead on the updated website.

Trying to be patient. Still waiting for the go-ahead on the new website.

How frustating when I have lots and lots to write about including ...  

 

Liver and bacon in Okehampton at one place
followed by tea and cake at the next !

"I wonder how much she would like "

Yes I can manage that.....

 Thank you Sam Vincent for taking this flattering picture of me - not !

Why no blogs for the past 5 weeks ?

Because I have had my nose down busily working on the updated website which should be launched later today !!!!!

Tom is due in in about half an hour and we will be uploading the new look all singing all dancing www.dartmooraccommodation.co.uk
Hours have been spent learning Concrete5 so that I can input new info easily, and make small changes and updates using the database.
One of the real bonuses of that is that if one of my accommodation providers changes his or her price per night, then adding the change to the database will change the price on all the relevant pages without me laboriously bringing up each page to make the changes.


There are new features onboard which will grow as the site settles in. Pub quizzes will be listed, so if you know of a pub in the area with a regular pub quiz night let them know to get in touch to be added - no charge.

Hopefully before Autumn the town pages, Tavistock, Chagford, Ivybridge etc will have their own what's on events popping up as and when they are about to happen, and disappearing as the date passes.


All this has been made possible with the help of the massively clever Tom, who has now moved on to work at the Met Office (they knew a good thing when they saw it !) But as promised, he has continued to push me forward and encourage me to keep up with the times.
All I wanted was a cosy little website that would show a few B&B's and my comments, but hey - I have ended up nearly 15 years later, with a brilliant colourful go ahead site which more than holds it's head above water amongst other websites who get funding and subsidies, state support and everything else given to them on a plate.
I have never received a handout from anyone. No start up package, no input from officialdom. No overtime payments, no travel allowances.

Time will tell if all the hard work has been worth it.

Do take a look at the new site - preferable at the end of this week, when we have sorted out any gliches, and let me know what you think of it.


I'd better get the kettle on Tom The Magnificent will be here soon.

Oh yes, in the way of superstars talking from the red carpet podium .....
A MILLION THANKS also go to Rob my old man for bearing with me for the last 4 months as I have blastphemed my way to this point.  You my treasure deserve a medal X

Just when we think we're getting better

I'm back at the desk exhausted. That short lived drop of sunshine over lunch is to blame. Both of us recovering from the really nasty Chagford virus that is still in the village, me with complications of bronchitis and now sinusitis, we finished lunch off and thought that a stroll down the lane to Sandy Park would be 'good for us'.
Twenty minutes later 2 elderly walkers could be seen clinging to life and each other as they bravely fought to open the gate back into the garden, having stopped repeatedly on the way home to recover breath and colour.
Upon reaching home I went straight away for a lie down in the sitting room and slept for half an hour, and Rob rang a neighbour to ask if his gardener might kindly come round to mow our lawn for us, because he didn't think he had the strength to even get the mower out of the shed. Now if anyone knows my Robert, they know that he would rather eat his own arm than ask anyone for help.
So you should know just how lowering the Chagford Lurghi can make you.