A ride to the beach café

Since my rediscovery of bicycles my Mum has decided that she too wants to get a little fitter, so yesterday she and I decided to go on a leisurely pootle to the beach and to visit the beach café for a slice of one of the best fruit flapjacks ever.

[Photo of the worlds best flapjack taken during

a previous trip to the café]

So off we trundled, taking the long way round to enjoy the scenery and some tricky off-road. All went to plan, until we finally got to the beach to discover the tide was in, so all we could do was sit on the slipway and watch the waves (and laugh at a woman dodging waves to try and clean poop off her child’s wellington boot with a very short stick and the seawater – surely it would have been easier if she’d made her son go and walk in the water – it was a waterproof welly after all! Some people are silly!)

[Resting on the slipway]

After a bit more people watching, we went up to the beach café to treat ourselves to the worlds best homemade flapjack EVER. Sounds great; but I was soon faced with a dilemma. I should point out that although the café always serves numerous other tempting cake options, I always have their date flapjack, as it is gorgeous. Today however, they were truely testing my devotion by placing some scrumptious looking chocolate Brownies on the counter. Mmm! It looked so moist and mouth-watering that I couldn’t take my eyes off it. It was luring me in and trying to break me. STOP! I always have flapjack from here. NO! This can’t be, I can’t change my mind, the flapjack is always to die for! ARGH! The fruit in the flapjack makes it a marginally healthier option, despite all that sugar and syrup. OH MY! ... the Brownie just looked soooo tempting. EEK!

The decision was too much to handle so after much debating Ma bought us both a piece of the legend-wait-for-it-ary flapjack and a piece of Brownie to share. Hey and let me tell you… that enticing brownie was even scrummier than it looked (Sorry there’s no picture, but I couldn’t waste time photographing it… it needed to be eaten and enjoyed!)

After our satisfying pit stop we decided to continue our adventure and rode down an interesting bit of coastal bridleway. In the past I have always enjoyed this route as there are usually some very friendly pigs, hens and geese that you can chatter too and pet!

[A friendly pig]

Sadly yesterday, things didn’t look quite so bright for my feathered and curly tailed friends. Stuck on their gates were big posters advertising "Christmas Pork" and "Christmas Geese". I was somewhat mortified! Don’t get me wrong I am not naive enough to not know that pigs are only bred for meat, but this blatant marketing seemed somewhat cruel! I am sure that the Pigs and Geese didn’t need constant reminders of their fate, every time someone passes, reads the sign and then stands there discussing which one looks the tastiest or fattest. I couldn’t bring myself to pet them this time – it just seemed mean, I didn't want to encourage them to trust human beings. I want them to revolt and turn against the humans! Just imagine – George Orwell would be so proud!

[Not quite as friendly but very inquisative]

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