Just returned from the Enjoy Staffordshire Tourism Conference at the Best Western Moat House, as well as being a good opportunity to see and meet with other accommodation providers and attractions it was also a wonderful reminder of all that is great in the county of Staffordshire. We are all guilty of forgetting what treasures we have on our own doorsteps and when suddenly we find ourselves with some free leisure time we hare off for several hours in the car to visit North Wales or Manchester or the Cotswolds when all the time we only need to go a few minutes down the road; no long car journeys necessary. As a land locked County we may not have the sea but we have just about everything else, beautiful countryside with breathtaking scenery form the Peak District in the North to Cannock Chase towards the south. We have history and heritage in bucket loads, the now world famous Staffordshire hoard and adventure and thrills with two of the UK's biggest theme parks plus many other "wild" activities for all ages. In fact so inspired am I that I will be revisiting many of the stunning places we have on offer and I will share my findings here on my blog over the next few months. If you can't wait till then take a look at the following Enjoy Staffordshire and Visit Stoke web sites both packed full with information to help you plan your stay.
[ add comment ] ( 3 views ) | permalink
Running a Guest House can never be boring, variety is the name of the game you simply never know who is going to turn up at your door...they may be famous.. yes even here in little old Newcastle we have our share of famous guests (but you will have to visit us and we will tell you who!!), they may have an interesting job or hobby, they may have a strange and unusual reason for visiting the area... we really did have one guest who was on a mission to visit every "Alldays" store in Britain, it is true I kid you not. So from cactus collectors to astronomers and genealogists to physiotherapists there is never a dull moment and the variety of guests does lead to an amazing selection of conversations at the breakfast table in the morning. This week we have seen off euthanasia, Chinese New year, the eurozone problem, pros and cons of laser eye surgery and breast implants and that's before we even touch sport and especially football. What other job could bring you such a wealth of interesting and lovely people through your door?
[ add comment ] ( 7 views ) | permalink
Enjoyed a night of celebration with staff from Stoke-on-Trent Tourist Information Centre other tourism staff and representatives from the tourism sector in Stoke at the Heart of England Awards for Excellence in Tourism. These are the Industry awards for our sector, (the eqivalent of a Grammy or Oscar) held in Birmingam at the ICC. It is a prestigious event and we went along to support the staff of Stoke TIC who had been shortlisted down to the final three. We enjoyed a lovely meal and a very entertaining evening topped off when Stoke TIC won their category, and were presented with their award by Nick Owen and Suzanne Virdee. This is a fantastic achievement particularly when up against areas with big tourism offices and budgets such as Straford on Avon. Praised for their excellent local knowledge and high levels of customer service, this award is richly deserved. It is about time that there is recognition for some of the good things that happen locally, all too often we hear negative comments about the area but there are many things to be proud of in the Potteries and North Staffordshire and we need to shout out about them more. I wish the staff good luck as they now move on to represent the West Midlands in the national round of the competition.
[ add comment ] ( 17 views ) | permalink
When is a train not a train, answer when it is a bus. I know that we are familiar with the fact that when there are engineering works on the line buses are deployed to transport everyone to their next destination instead of the trains. However this week we had a guest who wanted to visit the new Wedgwood Museum at Barlaston. Having lived in the area some years ago she was familiar with the railway station at Wedgwood and so I checked on the internet and sure enough there was a train running every hour from Stoke to Wedgwood station. I was as delighted as she was as this may prove the answer for many of our guests who don't have access to a car as it is virtually impossible to visit the Wedgwood Factory and Museum at Barlaston some 8 miles out of the city centre by public transport.
My delight was short lived as on her return she informed me that the station at Wedgwood was in fact closed and even though she had been able to purchase a train ticket it was then she found that not only was there no train but the station at Barlaston has been closed for some time. However there is a bus service whose times of running bore no resemblance to the train timetable. The attendant in the ticket office at Stoke on Trent station agreed that it was misleading but there was nothing that could be done about so he refunded her ticket money. Our intrepid guest then travelled by bus only to find that she had to walk a mile from the closest bus stop to the Wedgwood factory. For her it was not a problem but it certainly limited the amount of spending in the Factory Shop!
I don't want this to put anyone off visiting the new award winning Museum (the Wedgwood Museum recently won the prestigious Art Fund prize) which I visited myself a few weeks ago. It is superb and must be high on the list of things to do when visiting the area. The Museum is a credit to all who have been involved with it, it showcases the history of the company and there is lots of information about Josiah Wedgwood, his life, his peers and his work. My advice if you are visiting is to take a break half way round and enjoy afternoon tea across in the Wedgwood tea rooms. There is so much information to take in this allows time to digest and then go back for more. I felt I I couldn't do justice to the latter half of the Museum as I was in information overload. .
[ add comment ] ( 18 views ) | permalink
The title of this blog does not actually refer to the two good looking characters above but instead read on to the end to be enlightened further. Having recently finished refurbishing and redecorating all the double/twin rooms we decided to have new photographs for the web site. Our regular photographer is Beth Peel, who I am sure you will agree has done a super job of capturing a good likeness of the rooms on this web site.
It was a rare sunny morning when Beth was here and at the end of the session we all enjoyed some time in the garden and we were joined by our two dogs, Monty & Reo. Beth managed to get some wonderful photos of the dogs, something we have found really difficult due to their reluctance to pose for long enough for us to capture them on camera; we have lots of photos of their rear ends walking away! Anyway you can see the true handsome pair below.
We are often asked about the dogs and indeed the first question that many of our returning guests ask is "How are the dogs?" Monty & Reo are Hungarian Vizsla's, a mix of pointer and setter. They are the only all brown dog in the world! You can see their wonderful russet brown coats in these photos. Having re-read the Vizsla web site whilst writing this blog I think we must have two imposters, our two don't like water and are afraid of loud noises, hunting dogs they are not. They are however very sociable and love our guests but don't worry as they live in a separate part of the house and you will only get to see them if you ask.
[ 1 comment ] ( 21 views ) | permalink
Calendar
