The Beaches & Coasts of England: Skegness

We found ourselves scrambling to find something to do for my 29th birthday that didn't involve going in to Mansfield and going bowling. While many people would have found that a perfectly acceptable way to spend their special day, I'm a far more adventurous type.

I was given suggestions upon suggestions. Amazon Local was presented to me time and again. Groupon appeared on my phone, relentlessly trying to sell me a trip.

I was getting frustrated and depressed because I wanted to spend my first birthday in my new home doing something, anything different. 

When I was presented with employment, quite literally the next day, options that before would have been irresponsible seemed possible.

Finally Skegness was put on the table and after much hemming and hawing, I made the decision, found the place to stay, and the trains were booked. It was such a huge relief just to have made a decision.

Because I was a member of Hotels.com, I decided to see what they had to offer. What we found turned out to be the perfect place that we'll most certainly come back to for years to come.

The day was Friday the 6th of June and I worked until 12:30 that day. We were given permission to leave early so that we could catch our train. We booked it back to the house, scrambled our bags and left on the bus to the Mansfield bus station.

Once there we went over the bridge to the train station.

Once we got to the train station it was just a matter of figuring out which platform to be at and which train to get on. It wasn't as easy as we had hoped, but we managed to not get on the wrong train, so that's a plus.

The trains from the smaller stations, like Mansfield, were smaller and usually comprised of two cars. 

The trains were far roomier than buses and much easier to relax on. You weren't sandwiched in and some even had tables you could sit at if you wanted to.

Nottingham train station was much larger and finding the train for Skegness was a bit odd as it was completely at the opposite end of all the other trains. Again, we seemed to find the right one and again we were off. 

We arrived in Skegness over two hours later, my bum absolutely sore and my joints aching. I couldn't hear the waves or smell the ocean but the scream of seagulls overhead just made me feel so much more at ease than I had felt in quite a while. I suppose living next to a large body of water your whole life and moving to an inland area can take a toll on you.

We walked through the streets and past the shops to find the small neighbourhood that housed the Linroy. As soon as you turned on to the street the hustle and bustle melted away and a beautiful, serene area opened up before us.

The accommodations this place had were par none. I know there are other places in the area we could try but as long as the Linroy continues to be the friendly, beautiful, peaceful place we found, we'll continue to go there. 

The room was more fantastic than I could have imagined. It was definitely bigger than I was expecting and the bed and décor were fantastic. Being the top room you'd have thought it would have been quite warm but we found that opening the windows brought the temperature down to a very pleasant level. The only downside was our room windows faced the adjacent house, so all you saw was the side of a brick building, but I think having it situated that way cut down on the noise pollution and that suited me fine. 

After situating out belongings in the room, the caretaker was happy to explain the best restaurants in the area at great length. We decided Italian suited us for that evening so we went in search of Tarantino's. The place was a small dive far from the touristy areas so on arrival I was a bit dubious. 

However as soon as we stepped inside we quickly found out this restaurant was quite possibly the most efficiently managed spot in the area. The owner quickly showed us to a table and we were given menus and our drinks very quickly. We decided on our meals and while I was temporarily confused as to why mine didn't come with pasta, I was pleasantly surprised on the taste and portion size of my meal. 

Chips (French Fries) are practically a mainstay with every meal here. It's still somewhat bizarre to me.

After our main meal we decided to give the desserts a try, and we were very happy with our choice of tiramisu.

Afterwards we decided we needed to walk off our exceptionally large meal, so we headed out towards the beach. 

One thing to note about the beach at Skegness is the amount of shells present is disproportional to the amount of stones. For every shell you will easily find 20+ stones. I'm not sure where these stones come from, what they are, how old they are or if they're even worth anything, but you can be damn sure that I picked up some really pretty ones and kept them.

The beach sand is infinitely more coarse than Florida beach sand and it has a particular brown/grey quality to it, but otherwise sand is sand and I happily walked across it, collecting my pebbles, stones and ocean-thrown glass.

The walkway was somewhat long and very nearly desolate so we continued long in to the late spring evening, taking advantage of the nearly everlasting sunlight.

What was very interesting to me was the amount of wind turbines out in the water. You couldn't hear them at all, even though there were well over 50 of them. I was torn because while the view probably would have looked better without them, I still didn't find them to be a complete eyesore either.

After spending a couple hours wandering aimlessly on the beach, we decided to call it a day and head back to the B&B.

The next morning brought us the threat of rainstorms and a beautiful, bountiful English breakfast.

I'm not sure why this constitutes an English breakfast, or who decided that "Hey, this is what an English breakfast shall forever more include," but you can't readily say no to such amazing deliciousness. You've of course got coffee or tea, toast, fried eggs, bacon, sausage, beans, hash browns, tomatoes and button mushrooms. And it was all very delicious. 

The first morning I was able to eat damn near all of it, but by the second morning I was lucky to get through half. It fills you up and keeps you filled throughout the day.

During breakfast it began to drizzle and after breakfast, lazing about in our food coma, it began to downpour and thunder. So, we sat and watched Frasier and The Big Bang Theory on the television. 

Near two in the afternoon the sun was back out and we decided that we wanted to do a bit of walking around. So, we headed on out and found ourselves meandering the shops. We went in and out of a few, just window shopping really, until he found a stall that sold fresh doughnuts. Yeah, we had to stop.

They had all sorts of candy available and it was just too beautiful not to photograph. We left with a doughnut for each of us and headed on our way. We walked past some of the tourist parts of town, past the local theatre and back again. Some of the rides they had looked fun, but very carnival-style and a bit dodgy-looking.

Only ghosts were riding this flume ride, apparently. It wasn't freezing, per se, but it definitely had a nip to the air and no-one was daring to venture in to the water ride.

We continued on our way, eventually stopping in at the local fun faire. They had rides and games galore and we were finally able to procure him a normal hot dog. 

We went out on the pier for a bit and that's when we both took some throat lozenges as the air was giving me a terrible dry throat, of all things.

I found the design of the metal work to be quite fascinating and I wasted a lot of time taking pictures of it.

As with all days, time was running out so we decided we wanted to do three things with the time we had left: eat at Wolfies, play crazy golf and walk the beach.

We opted to play crazy golf first so that we'd be properly hungry by dinner time. Somehow we managed to play rather well and I even got a free game out of the mix. 

Afterwards we crossed the street to Wolfies which was another place the innkeeper had suggested. While the hours on the door suggested they were not open just yet, the waitress at the top of the stairs assured us that, yes, they were indeed open. So up the stairs we went. 

The décor wasn't anything to write home about but the view was pretty nice. I was lead to believe we'd have a beach view when we came here but I suppose if you strain yours eyes at a certain angle in the restaurant you might be able to see it. Needless to say the food was decent, but the desert was very nice. 

It was some amazing strawberry, raspberry and vanilla ice cream concoction and it was well worth it. The downside is after the desert we were made to sit for almost 40 minutes because no-one brought us our check. Being that my SO never was a frequent restaurant-goer and I'm unsure as to the protocols here, I never know if we wait for the check or if we have to approach someone, somewhere for it. Needless to say the fact no-one came by to check up on us after 40 minutes was a bit telling to me. 

After dinner we decided to hike across the beach, and I do mean hike. We traversed the sands for a few hours, walking a great length of the beach at a slow pace, just looking for interesting rocks, shells and other bits and bobs. We came across interesting, squishy, clear, round, marble-like things closer to the wave action and after googling it later on, came to find out they were jellyfish eggs. I found it quite interesting that they could survive so well out of the water. 

I had brought a bag this time and was busy collecting stones. We came across the remains of a sea skate at one point and I vocalised my desire to find shark's teeth on the beach. I'm not sure what species may live in the waters around Skegness but maybe if I persevere, I may eventually get lucky. 

The sun was finally starting to set, the shadows were getting very long and the time was nearing 10:30 at night. We finally decided to call it a day and head back.

I was so utterly fascinated by these beach "rivers"because you could tell there was a steady current flowing from them that just seemed to materialize from nowhere. From beach sand to tiny tributaries  in just centimetres. 

We finally got back, took a much needed shower, and went to bed.

The next morning found us packing up. At breakfast we asked the caretaker if we could leave the larger of the two bags there while we wandered around the shops and town some more. He said yes under the condition we collect the bag by a certain time. We agreed and headed out.

I had seen on TripAdvisor that a small, donation-based village was highly ranked, so we opted to walk there and see for ourselves what it was about. On the way there we came across English, ghetto Jurassic Park.

And that's all I have to say about that.

Where we eventually ended up was an out-of-the-way little attraction with very old buildings and beautiful gardens and flowers. The place was called the Church Farm Village & Museum and it was a cute, charming little attraction with a small, kitschy gift shop, a tea room and then the rest of the museum/village. The house was pretty interesting in that it was exceptionally old but made to look like a family in the 1920's had just gone out for the day. Another house they had was even older, perhaps from the 15th century according to the docent there, and it had a rugged dirt floor and no actual bedrooms. The walls seemed a type of thatch and the rooms themselves just had an eerie, old feel to them. 

This was the "kitchen"to the older house. The property also had stables, a blacksmith, a wheel smith and much more. The gardens were easily my favourite as they actually were growing potatoes, lettuce and other vegetables. 

Well, we opted to have a sit and drink some refreshments before we headed back out and back to the Linroy to collect our bag. We then wandered in to the Red Lion pub to wait for our train's arrival. It was right across from the train station so it was very convenient.

We then hopped back on the train to Nottingham and then from there on to Mansfield and before we knew it, we were back. I wouldn't say home, exactly. To me it felt more home-like in Skegness. But we were definitely back and definitely tired. We downloaded the photos as soon as we could and just relaxed the rest of the evening.

I'd have to say, it was definitely a birthday to remember. We'll see what my 30th has in store for me next year! Until next time!