![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Joined the Hawks Ladies for their longest trip of the season, Newquay. Half the girls sensibly set off in their cars Saturday lunch time, but the others had work that day so it was 5.30 pm when the club minibus left Havant. Beforehand, I spent the afternoon in the Westleigh Park bar watching Soccer Saturday with a couple of Kopparbergs, while Malc texted me goal updates from the Hawks' match at Weston-super-Mare.
As we gathered in the car park, several of us asked each other if we'd brought our swimming trunks, but nobody suggested windsurfing even though we were going to the UK's premier surfing resort. The drive down was again dominated by dance music playing loud, but Lisa - coach of one of the club's affiliated boys' teams, who's taken an interest in the fortunes of the Ladies - had brought a mix CD of her own which included, joy of joys, Summer of '69. After the girls had been having a disco in their seats for the last hour, it took a superhuman effort not to hit some air guitar work when Bryan came on, but the Ladies appreciated, and joined in with, my singing along.
As Dorset became Devon, some of the girls began looking longingly at the turnoffs for service stations; not only were people getting peckish but one or two bladders needed emptying. After Andy the driver had responded to calls to stop at Bridport services with "Next one", we called in at Honiton, but Andy, Mike M and Lisa weren't too impressed with the facilities there - just a filling station with a hotel - so they said "We'll go on to a better one". It seemed a long while before, at 8.30, we finally arrived at Exeter services and hit the loos and Burger King. Over our Whopper meals, Dick informed us that we still had another two and a half hours to go. Some of the girls were texting and phoning the ones who were already in Newquay (at Walkabout) and telling them we were almost there.
A few minutes after 11 we pulled up outside our destination as announced by the sat nav...Newquay football ground. Mike M, it turned out, on receiving Trev's notes with both the address of the ground and the address of the hotel on, had promptly put the ground's postcode in the sat nav. Sabrina rang Lizzie to direct us to the hotel, but there was a hiccup : Andy drove on to the end of the road we were in, which turned out to be a dead end. Twenty minutes of futile attempts to back out of an uphill sharp corner with the trailer attached followed, burning out the clutch in the process and filling up the bus with the smell of burning rubber, with the noise drawing residents (it was a quiet residential street) to look out of their windows, or even doors. Andy then agreed to what the girls had been suggesting for a quarter of an hour; the girls got out and unhooked the trailer, allowing him to reverse the bus out, then they brought the trailer up the hill by hand and reattached it. "I've lost the will to live," was Dick's comment. When we finally made it to the hotel at 11.30 and joined the others in the lounge bar we were all ready for a drink.
The bus still stank of burnt clutch when we set off for the ground, but we did make it there without a hitch. To get round the corner up the narrow lane into the ground's car park, the ladies had to take the trailer off again. The bar served a cloudy cider called Cornish Rattler, so that was my tipple for the day, and I got Becky on it. Thank goodness we were at a proper non-league ground with a stand, as it pelted down with rain all afternoon. The tea hut was open, with chips, tea and coffee served by a friendly lady who revealed in conversation with a local that she was a sitting Newquay Town Councillor of ten years' standing and a former Town Mayor, so I mentioned that I was a former Mayor's Consort of Gosport.
Newquay are a decent side, they've been holding fourth spot in the table pretty much all season, so we expected a hard match and got one. We took the lead on 33 minutes when Laura headed home from a free kick, but Newquay equalised a few minutes later. Laura struck again with a toe-poke from a corner to put us back in front just before the break. Charley made it 3-1 seven minutes after the restart heading home a cross from Jodie. It wasn't long before Newquay pulled one back; despite lots of end-to-end play it stayed 3-2 until, right at the end, a Hawk girl was pushed in the penalty area and the ref pointed to the spot. The linesman shouted that he'd already flagged for a foul throw - interestingly enough, Trev supported him - but the ref overruled him and Lizzie made it 4-2 from the spot.
Dodging the rain, it was back to the bar for another Cornish Rattler while the Ladies were brought sausages and chips. Around 3.45 Mike, Andy and Lisa announced they were ready to go; Lauren and Sabrina insisted I be allowed to finish my Rattler before we set off (cheers, girls).
The drive back was a quieter affair (the smell of burnt clutch had died down and the bus got us back in one piece). We made an unscheduled stop at a Morrison's with a filling station in Liskeard as two of the girls were desperate to visit the Ladies; being 4.30 on a Sunday the Morrison's had shut half an hour earlier but a kindly lady let our two lasses in to use the facilities anyway, prompting one of them to declare, on their way out, that she wanted to marry her.
We visited Exeter services again, meeting the Frome Town Ladies team in the dining area. Over nosh Chloe said she was dieting as she goes on holiday in a week's time - "I've got to get into a bikini, I don't want to look like a beached whale." Charley said "Michelle McManus" so I revealed that I am a fan of Miss McManus, leading the girls to try and remember what her number one hit was. Chloe has the Net on her phone so, after Charley and Sadie had sung a snatch of a Gareth Gates song by mistake, courtesy of Google Chloe announced "All This Time" and all the girls on our table treated the service station to an impromptu chorus of it.
For the second half of the journey the girls were sufficiently revived to put the loud music on again. Alas, when Akon's Sorry, Blame It On Me and Cher's Walking In Memphis came on, both times Charley and Sadie shouted "SKIP!" and Lisa complied. Lauren and Dick's protests "Leave it on for Wilhelmus" were to no avail.
It was still pelting down when we arrived back at Westleigh. Dick invited me to squeeze into his car with Lauren, Sabrina and Yzzy, as he was dropping Lauren in Portsea close to the Hard, though I did have to share the front seat with Lauren's large cushion (at my feet), my own sizeable hold-all (on my lap) and the rack of eight water bottles (on top of my hold-all, so in front of my face).
Had the foresight to book today as flex.
As we gathered in the car park, several of us asked each other if we'd brought our swimming trunks, but nobody suggested windsurfing even though we were going to the UK's premier surfing resort. The drive down was again dominated by dance music playing loud, but Lisa - coach of one of the club's affiliated boys' teams, who's taken an interest in the fortunes of the Ladies - had brought a mix CD of her own which included, joy of joys, Summer of '69. After the girls had been having a disco in their seats for the last hour, it took a superhuman effort not to hit some air guitar work when Bryan came on, but the Ladies appreciated, and joined in with, my singing along.
As Dorset became Devon, some of the girls began looking longingly at the turnoffs for service stations; not only were people getting peckish but one or two bladders needed emptying. After Andy the driver had responded to calls to stop at Bridport services with "Next one", we called in at Honiton, but Andy, Mike M and Lisa weren't too impressed with the facilities there - just a filling station with a hotel - so they said "We'll go on to a better one". It seemed a long while before, at 8.30, we finally arrived at Exeter services and hit the loos and Burger King. Over our Whopper meals, Dick informed us that we still had another two and a half hours to go. Some of the girls were texting and phoning the ones who were already in Newquay (at Walkabout) and telling them we were almost there.
A few minutes after 11 we pulled up outside our destination as announced by the sat nav...Newquay football ground. Mike M, it turned out, on receiving Trev's notes with both the address of the ground and the address of the hotel on, had promptly put the ground's postcode in the sat nav. Sabrina rang Lizzie to direct us to the hotel, but there was a hiccup : Andy drove on to the end of the road we were in, which turned out to be a dead end. Twenty minutes of futile attempts to back out of an uphill sharp corner with the trailer attached followed, burning out the clutch in the process and filling up the bus with the smell of burning rubber, with the noise drawing residents (it was a quiet residential street) to look out of their windows, or even doors. Andy then agreed to what the girls had been suggesting for a quarter of an hour; the girls got out and unhooked the trailer, allowing him to reverse the bus out, then they brought the trailer up the hill by hand and reattached it. "I've lost the will to live," was Dick's comment. When we finally made it to the hotel at 11.30 and joined the others in the lounge bar we were all ready for a drink.
The bus still stank of burnt clutch when we set off for the ground, but we did make it there without a hitch. To get round the corner up the narrow lane into the ground's car park, the ladies had to take the trailer off again. The bar served a cloudy cider called Cornish Rattler, so that was my tipple for the day, and I got Becky on it. Thank goodness we were at a proper non-league ground with a stand, as it pelted down with rain all afternoon. The tea hut was open, with chips, tea and coffee served by a friendly lady who revealed in conversation with a local that she was a sitting Newquay Town Councillor of ten years' standing and a former Town Mayor, so I mentioned that I was a former Mayor's Consort of Gosport.
Newquay are a decent side, they've been holding fourth spot in the table pretty much all season, so we expected a hard match and got one. We took the lead on 33 minutes when Laura headed home from a free kick, but Newquay equalised a few minutes later. Laura struck again with a toe-poke from a corner to put us back in front just before the break. Charley made it 3-1 seven minutes after the restart heading home a cross from Jodie. It wasn't long before Newquay pulled one back; despite lots of end-to-end play it stayed 3-2 until, right at the end, a Hawk girl was pushed in the penalty area and the ref pointed to the spot. The linesman shouted that he'd already flagged for a foul throw - interestingly enough, Trev supported him - but the ref overruled him and Lizzie made it 4-2 from the spot.
Dodging the rain, it was back to the bar for another Cornish Rattler while the Ladies were brought sausages and chips. Around 3.45 Mike, Andy and Lisa announced they were ready to go; Lauren and Sabrina insisted I be allowed to finish my Rattler before we set off (cheers, girls).
The drive back was a quieter affair (the smell of burnt clutch had died down and the bus got us back in one piece). We made an unscheduled stop at a Morrison's with a filling station in Liskeard as two of the girls were desperate to visit the Ladies; being 4.30 on a Sunday the Morrison's had shut half an hour earlier but a kindly lady let our two lasses in to use the facilities anyway, prompting one of them to declare, on their way out, that she wanted to marry her.
We visited Exeter services again, meeting the Frome Town Ladies team in the dining area. Over nosh Chloe said she was dieting as she goes on holiday in a week's time - "I've got to get into a bikini, I don't want to look like a beached whale." Charley said "Michelle McManus" so I revealed that I am a fan of Miss McManus, leading the girls to try and remember what her number one hit was. Chloe has the Net on her phone so, after Charley and Sadie had sung a snatch of a Gareth Gates song by mistake, courtesy of Google Chloe announced "All This Time" and all the girls on our table treated the service station to an impromptu chorus of it.
For the second half of the journey the girls were sufficiently revived to put the loud music on again. Alas, when Akon's Sorry, Blame It On Me and Cher's Walking In Memphis came on, both times Charley and Sadie shouted "SKIP!" and Lisa complied. Lauren and Dick's protests "Leave it on for Wilhelmus" were to no avail.
It was still pelting down when we arrived back at Westleigh. Dick invited me to squeeze into his car with Lauren, Sabrina and Yzzy, as he was dropping Lauren in Portsea close to the Hard, though I did have to share the front seat with Lauren's large cushion (at my feet), my own sizeable hold-all (on my lap) and the rack of eight water bottles (on top of my hold-all, so in front of my face).
Had the foresight to book today as flex.
no subject
no subject