Boconnoc Steam Rally

This weekend was rather nice. I took the children to another pete on Saturday, a bigger one. S managed to win a coconut and they rode a miniature train. They also had a ride in a donkey cart and they liked that a lot too. It rained a little, but we adjourned to the tea tent and it didn't last. We saw a pipe band tootle away in the main ring and later a Tae-Kwondo performance, with children breaking bits of wood with their bare hands. I have a daughter who now wants to learn this martial art, and I'm quite in favour of that. As long as she sticks to designated bits of wood. There was a demonstration of wife-beating by Mr Punch, which the children enjoyed mightily, and quite a few adults in the crowd were loving it too. Including me. That's entertainment!


Today we went to Boconnoc Steam Rally, which was excellent. I was a bit eek at the entry price (£6 for an adult, £4 for a child) as that took out half my spending money. It's these cheap petes that are 20p here and there that have spoiled me and given me an unrealistically rosy outlook on how much a day out should cost, so it was a gasp and recoil moment, and I was relieved that T didn't count as a person. It was fortunate that I'd taken drinks with us and the children had gorged upon strawberries on the journey, as the food stalls prices were not comparable with a good old tea tent.

But was the rally worth the entry fee, I imagine you ask? Indupitably. There were some huge traction engines and some cute dinky ones. There were vintage tractors, cars and motor bikes. All of which appealed to T, as he is a stereotypically vehicle-loving boy, and S was pleased to point out the ones that could be Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang or were MGs, as Granddad has one. I'm not usually a big fan of machines that chug and parp and chuff, but I did enjoy the spectacle. There were a number of steamies taking trailer-loads of people around the grounds, so we took a ride on one (and that was free). S wasn't so keen after a while, as it was quite noisy and bumpy, but she brightened up when she spotted some fairground rides. So as soon as we were let off the trailer, we had to march to the funfair where she went on a ride and then won a toy blue elephant on a hooking-the-turtle game. T was in his pushchair and seemed quite happy with watching, thankfully.

We went to look around the model tent and I realised that was a bit of an error when T wanted to touch all the models and probably take some of the toy cars home, and on being refused, set up a roar. But he was contented by looking at the model railway and a 1:12 scale traction engine. I was impressed by how much detail and effort evidently goes into these hobbies. While we were in there, it happened to rain, but by the time we came out it had stopped again, so that was good timing on the cloud's part!

There was also the opportunity to take a helicopter ride, which I would have loved to do, but it was £25 each and T counted as a person this time. Instead we watched for a while and savoured the blasting wind the chopper set up as it landed and took off.

It was a really good day out, I'd definitely go again next year.