Category Archives: Sutton-on-Sea

Sutton-on-Sea In September

16 Monday Oct 2023

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Bikes, Cherry Tree Springs, Fifth Wheel Company, MiRider, Sutton-on-Sea

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Just like to say a huge thank you to so many people that have commented or emailed me over my last post. It has cheered me up no end…. it really has. Enough to rattle this post off!

We recently went back to Cherry Tree Springs at Sutton on Sea for an 7 day break. We had been there earlier in the year and really liked the atmosphere and the people there. As we have been trying independent sites this season over Caravan & Motorhome Club sites, I did a comparison. To stay at the C & M Club site for the same dates would have cost £280.00. We paid £178.50 at Cherry Tree so a saving of £101.50…. in fact we stayed an extra night making 8 in total so saved even more!!!

The facilities block is as you would expect… really clean, plenty of hot water and warm. The rest of the site is really well maintained and the pitches are level with plenty of space for parking and room for a large awning.

Even with our slide out… out, I still had room for the VW Amarok and plenty of room on the other side for our huge roll out canopy.

Apart from a couple of days the weather was blueish skies and warm for September which allowed up to get a bit of cycling in. Having the MiRider bikes stored in the garage in the frame I made (read “Rack’em Up“) makes it easy to get them out ready for a quick ride out. Mornings were usually a cycle, north up the coast to Mablethorpe for morning coffee, either sat next to the beach…

… or sat up on the elevated section in front of the cafe next to the life guard station. The coffee there is much better we think.

Top Tip

A great little shortcut on the bike to get to the front…

If you turn right out of Cherry Tree Springs enter Huttoft Road and follow this for about 300 metres… the first turning on your right is Bluestone Road. Turn right and cycle 70 metres up Bluestone Road. At the end is a T-junction, turn right and 8 metres on your left is a walkway between the houses. Take the walkway and at the end is Walkington Way. Cycle along walking ton Way to the end to another T-Junction. Turn left and ride for 100 metres and on your right a steep ramp up to the top of the Roman Bank… this will get you on the prom and you can cycle all the way to Mablethorpe on it. If you turn right at the end of Walkington Way you can fool Huttoft Bank all the way to Chapel St Leonards.

Its a quick little cut through and allowed us to get to the sea front in about 6 or 7 minutes

Another nice cycle ride is to follow Huttoft Bank south to Chapel St Leonards… it’s a bit further but easy cycling and stop off at North Sea Observatory, Chapel Point for a coffee….

We can both recommend you try out their toasted tea cakes…. The coffee is rather good too! looking at some of the plates being brought out to other customers, the English breakfast looks rather good as well. Unfortunately cycling with a full English onboard is not something to be undertaken lightly.

The nice thing about Cherry Tree Springs is there always seems to be someone to have a chat with… not in an intrusive way but sat out with Henry – yep he’s getting better at this now with his little harness on and rather like the attention he gets.

The 5th wheel aways attracts attention and we had a few people stop and talk to us about it. We have done a couple of walk throughs and I’m now getting dab hand at going through the usual questions about what its like to tow (easy peasy, much easier than a bumper pull) and what needs to be done to a pickup to convert it and the weights. Everyone still has a jaw dropping moment when I tell them our user payload is 960Kg… which is slightly more than half of the total weight of our old caravan fully loaded! (PS 5th Wheel Company…. I think we deserve some tee shirts!)

The next step I think will be to install some solar…. and we have a nice flat roof as I found out when I stood on the bed and poked my head out of the front skylight… I think it will be easy to get 800 or 1000 watts of panels on there!

Currently I’m leaning towards Renogy’s kit as the big blue seems to be getting very overpriced and you need so much of it box wise to make a system. But that’s for the future… and maybe if I can get them to work with me on it.

PS If you do stay at Cherry Tree Spring….. give Square Pizza in Sutton a go…. the details are in reception…. not found anything that beat’s them outside of the USA (so far!)

Rack’em Up…

14 Thursday Sep 2023

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Accessories, Bike Rack, Bikes, e-bikes, MiRider, Modifications, Projects, Sutton-on-Sea

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One of the huge advantages of having a 5th wheel caravan over a bumper pull caravan is the payload and space. It’s as good as a large motorhome… we have around 960Kg of payload available to use. One thing we wanted to do was move our two MiRider e-bikes into the ‘garage’ locker of the 5th wheel. Although I built a great rack for the VW Amarok towing a 5th wheel means I had to take that off. When I designed it I aways wanted it easily removable just in case I ever needed the full capacity of the pickup.

The garage space in the Dream Seeker is big enough to fit the two bikes without having to remove any wheels. On the pickup we already removed the seats and dropped the folding handlebars so this is the same with the garage space. I needed something that would allow me to ‘wheel’ the bikes in keeping the front wheels straight and at the same time retaining either one of the bikes in an up right position while the second bike is loaded.

I wanted something that could be installed and removed easily and could also be used in my workshop to store the bikes if required.

After a bit of mooching around the workshop I initially thought of using an old bike rack we had for the rear of our Land Rover Freelander…. a day spent disassembling and reassembling resulted in a heavy and awkward contraption that didn’t really do anything I wanted except hold the bikes.

Mk II

OK, time for coffee and a rethink. Day two. A flat sheet with rails seemed like a good start…. with a small end wall to stop the bikes going in to far…. extend the rails up the wall to hold the front wheels upright would work. I needed to leave a gap for part of the steel chassis of the 5th wheel…. a plan was forming… more coffee.

I’d worked out that if the bikes were 250mm apart, with the pedals folded and the handlebars folded they would pass each other with ease. I off set this slightly so the edge of the plywood would lie flat right next to the rear chassis cross member and left a gap so the short rear chassis rail would pass through the middle. The front wall was tapered either side so I could install the rack through the door vertically and then twist it 90 degrees to lie flat on the floor. To hold it in place I fabricated 4 aluminium plates that would drop onto the existing bolts in the rear chassis crossmember. These bolts were just long enough to allow me to drop a plate on and a second nut. This way I didn’t have to touch the original bolts… they were still to the factory torque.

I thought about clear coating the stand…. then thought about a brush on wax shaded to match the Dream Seeker’s woodwork…. In the end I use some old exterior white hard coat gloss… several coats in fact. One less old paint tin in the workshop! I think that it looks OK and installed in the garage looks bright and clean… for the moment!

I added a ratchet strap, secured at both ends and cut short enough to allow me to hold the bikes down but not get in the way when loading or unloading.

To stop the two bikes pulling together a simple length of oak with a round cut out in each end holds the bikes 250mm apart.

Fitting into the Dream Seeker was easy enough and I installed the fixing plates once I was sure everything fitted in OK.

The bikes fit in perfectly and are held securely. For security I have taken measures that secure the bikes directly to the chassis in two locations and with the bikes in the garage make it damn difficult to even get access to try and defeat them. Obviously I’m to going to show this.

Bikes installed…. and still a bit of space to fit locate the two seats and bike helmets. So off to Sutton-on-Sea soon to test them out!

P.S. While I was at it I also installed two 240 volt sockets in the garage so we can plug the chargers in if needed. Although my preference for safety is to charge the bikes outside the Dream Seeker. I installed the sockets near the opposite door so they will reach the bikes while they are under our awning…. or allow us to power an electric griddle plate under the awning. Always thinking.

10 Days, Two Awesome Sites and Breaking News…

10 Saturday Jun 2023

Posted by in Cherry Tree Springs, General, Lincoln, Locations, MiRider, Sutton-on-Sea

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We have just got back from a ten day trip to two awesome sites. The first part of our ten day outing was back to Sutton-on-Sea on the east coast, located half way between Mablethorpe and Skegness. The weather on the east coast was not playing ball and we had some grey skies while the west enjoyed some glorious sunshine. Coming from Manchester it’s always a bit of a downer when the weather is better at home than where you are.

Sutton-on-Sea

After looking at prices for the C & M club site for serviced pitches…30th May to 3 June it came in at a whopping £231.00 ! So a quick search via the usual web sites came up with Cherry Tree Springs, for the same period on a serviced pitch came in at £147.50 a big saving of £83.50.

Cherry Tree Springs is a quiet site, only about half a mile from the C & M club site and Sutton-on-Sea is just as easily accessible. The staff are super friendly and the grounds people were always happy to stop for a brief chat and help out with local questions and advice on best places.

The facilities block was spotless and cleaning was at a sensible time too (yep been caught out on leaving day… just when the block was closed for cleaning!) The pitches were good firm hard standing and level. Th access roads were a tad narrow but we have been on a lot narrower sites.

I think that Cherry Tree Springs is one of those sites you don’t really want to tell people about when you discover it… you want to keep it all for yourself… so please don’t tell anyone else. We don’t want it booked up when we go back in autumn.

There is also a great dog walk that is off road and takes you right down to the beach in about 15 minutes. Ask at reception for a map.

We cycled up to Mablethorpe for morning coffee each day it was a round trip of about an hour on our MiRider e-bikes and really didn’t need any battery assist… apart from one day when it was a good 20 knot headwind heading into Mablethorp. A couple of times we had a cycle round either Sutton or Mablethorpe for an explore.

I’ve zoomed in a bit so you can see the route we took out of Cherry Tree Springs to get to the beach front. If you head right out of the site onto Huttoft Road, you are only on it for about 300 yards, then right turn into Bluestone Way follow that to the end on you will see a passage between two houses that takes you through to Walkington Way and some immaculate bungalows. At the end turn left onto Roman Bank and another 200 yards you will see a steep ramp curving round up to your right. Ride up this and you are on the “prom” with all the beach huts. Keep peddling north for Sutton and Mablethorpe

MiRiders in Mablethorpe

Saturday Night…. Film and Pizza Night!

Our Saturday nights are always film and pizza nights and have been for quite a few years. After having a mooch on line for a suitable purveyor of round Italian delight, we came up blank. Well there were quite a few but the reviews were… well we wouldn’t be ordering.

Helpful staff to the rescue… I asked in reception if they could recommend anywhere for pizza… (up to this point it looked like I would be driving to Pizza Hut in Skegness) The young lady came up trumps and gave a local company called “Pizza Square” (21 Hight Street, Sutton-on-Sea) a huge recommendation. I’d seen the reviews for a company at the same address that were really bad, however there had been a change of ownership and a new name and a growing reputation for providing excellent pizzas.

Square Pizzas…. best thing since sliced bread!

OK, here is the thing… pizzas are round, yep everyone agrees with that. BUT you are missing the four corners which if you think about it a 12 inch round pizza is actually missing a lot of real estate when you cut the corners off over a 12 inch square pizza. We ordered two 12 inch pizzas…. and we had slices left for the following day… and a couple the day after as well. Just glad we didn’t order a garlic bread (yep 12 inch square again) to go with it. It was delivered within 25 min right to the site and the friendly driver even had change which is unusual as in Manchester like many other cities, they don’t carry cash anymore.

Of course, pizza… or any food really is only as good as the last person to order it thinks. I would however say, check with the staff where ever you are staying and if they say it’s OK, then all you can do is give it a try. If it’s not up to scratch, let the staff know where you are staying and maybe the next person to ask them for recommendations might be directed somewhere else. For us though, Square Pizza gets our thumbs up. Ask in reception… they have some menus!

Sunday arrived and it was time to move on. Just before we left some friends who live in the Isle of Wight were actually up in Edinburgh and travelling back home via Lincoln as they were attending an IFFR (International Fellowship of Flying Rotarians) get-together and staying at the Petwood Hotel, which was 617 Dambusters Officers Mess during the war. We arranged to meet up with them while they were there and found a great site nearby… Hanworth Country Park located between Lincoln and Woodhall Spa.

But I guess that is for part two… along with the breaking news!