Idyllic places

maddyone

So many places. Milford Sound, yes we were on a cruise, but it was gorgeous beyond words. The Norwegian fiords are beautiful. Looking across the fiord In Montenegro, from Kotor, it’s like a picture of heaven. So many beautiful places.

Nightmare places would be a football match, or somewhere like Glastonbury festival.

Yes, Milford Sound is beyond words. I'd have liked to stay longer.

Sipping a rum punch on a patio overlooking the ocean in Barbados around six pm when the light fades and the tree frogs start up their chorus,my idea of heaven.

Watching the sunset in Santorini was a sight I'll never forget.

Nightmare (this actually happened) turning up at the gate for a four hour flight from Luton to find virtually everyone else in the queue wearing bunny ears, pink hen party T-shirts, screaming with laughter and already the worse for wear. Yes they kept it up the entire flight and all the way on the transfer bus. Thank goodness we were in a self catering apartment and not the hotel. Idyll was a four day break at some point during the Covid crisis when we were allowed to travel. DH and I went to East Sussex in September and it was bliss. The sun shone, we walked the Seven Sisters and after lock down it felt like we had been set free.

In my back garden, on the sun lounger, glass of wine, a book and my young Boxer dog for company. Breeze in the woods opposite, birds feeding their young in a nest just above my head, swallows swooping over my fields and buzzards feeding their young as they sit on the fence posts. Peace and quiet - utter bliss!

Glens of Antrim or Donegal

Crowded dirty cities

On a deserted hillside in Provence on a warm sunny day with the smell of the thyme and other herbs.
Worst place traffic congested city street.

Mottisfont Abbey now, in the roses season. Stunningly beautiful. Yes, it's more crowded than usual, but not oppressively so. There is a reason why some places receive many visitors.

My dream place: anywhere really hot and dry. Not a big city, but could well be a town the size of Burgos or the like.

Doesn't matter if it is in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Israel (well, ok, probably not right now)

I would be quite happy sitting quietly in the garden at home.

Hate anywhere crowded and very noisy.

It's interesting that so many people's ide of where they wouldn't want to be involves crowd of others and their ideal place is quiet and solitary.

I agree. My DH had to go to a London hospital last week and we couldn't wait to get away from the melee of others. We have spent some absolutely idyllic days in our beautiful, peaceful garden in our lovely, dull village seeing virtually nobody.

Waddow Hall a Girlguiding Training and Activity Centre in East Lancashire and one of five that are closing and quite possibly being sold at the end of this year. I have been going with Guides, Rainbows and Brownies for activity days, camps and residentials for well over 20 years and first visited as an 8 year old Brownie over 50 years ago. Sitting, early morning before anyone gets up, with a brew, overlooking Pendle Hill, listening to the birds is heaven and I will so miss that if we can no longer go ..... certainly is my happy place and holds so many memories.

My idyll is a swimming pool outside a villa in Tuscany. I've just had a swim, am lying on a lounger with with book and a cup of coffee on a table beside me. My husband is on a chair next to me (he doesn't like loungers). Fortunately, we are leaving for Italy, to such a place, on Friday!

My nightmare is anywhere with crwds, especially a mosh pit, or anywhere with highly amplified pop music. But it's OK, as I never go to such places. Oh, and camping.

Sitting amongst the rocks overlooking one of the sandy inlets on Gruinard Bay in Wester Ross, eating 'spoots' (razor clams) plucked 20 minutes earlier from their lairs and grilled over a fire of dead heather roots - which also served to keep the midges (more or less) away. I see that the internet warns against doing that sort of thing now - but 60+ years ago, we didn't 'know any better' so our joy was undiluted. Actually, I'd do it tomorrow if I could...

Hell on Earth = Glastonbury and its clones.

My idyll = my allotment which is a quiet corner plot full of herbs and surrounded by trees, a haven for nature, with a shed where I can cook food and make a hot drink.

The opposite = parties/gatherings where people stand around making polite conversation.