THE VLOG (V'S BLOG)

Virginia – or just ‘V’ – is one half of Moss Wood’s new warden team along with Miles, who are joining seasonal wardens Sue and Dave, along with the rest of the team. We thought it would be great to share this unique inside view into the comings and goings of the award-winning Moss Wood Caravan Park…

Continued from Part 1

I gave up the pub and moved in with Miles and his 2 children about 150 yards away from the pub.   The best thing about the pub was I lost over 2 stones in weight, working day and night to pay the bills and buy new belts to keep my trousers up.    It was fun and I enjoyed it and I don’t regret doing it but never again.

My scariest most nervous moment was when my chef didn’t turn up and I had to cook as we had many bookings that night and I knew one of them was for a special occasion.    I am a good cook, and I’d already had wedding catering / street food experience but my goodness.  That first night, cooking and plating in a ‘cheffy’ style and dinging that bell for service was nerve racking.   Someone was actually out there and going to pay with their hard-earned cash for a starter, main course and dessert that I had done.    The staff were under strict instruction to not mention there was a stand in chef, but to double check everything was ok with the diners at every stage on every table.   All was sweet and people paid their bills and left great tips.  Nailed it! Lol   Seriously though it was the most terrifying night of my life.    Every time the waiting staff brought the plates back into the kitchen, they had to show me them first so I could see if the customers had left anything!

Alas back to the part where I moved in with Miles and his two adult children.  1 bathroom. No central heating.   ‘We’ decided to buy a holiday home in the form of a static caravan at a site near Scunthorpe.

Now Scunthorpe isn’t known as a natural beauty spot, but it meant Miles and I could get to work within half an hour from there and we would have our own space for many months of the year.  Oh, and it had a fishing lake and TK Maxx and Debenhams were 15 minutes away.       My oh my did we get the hard sell!    But something just didn’t feel right.

The weeks passed and we became obsessed with looking at statics for sale which also coincided with Miles’ increasing desire to get out of farming (90 – 100 hour weeks, can’t plan anything, always weather dependent, a boss who didn’t appreciate him and the more you gave the more he took it for granted, hours and hours in a tractor on his own, a stiff neck and general discontent).   He’d had this feeling for about 10 years apparently (before I knew him), but Miles doesn’t make snap decisions!      It was whilst we were looking for a static for ourselves, one Saturday afternoon, Miles said – “I’ve seen some jobs advertising for Warden Couples – do you fancy it?”   I read a few ads, we slept on it and the next afternoon I did him a CV.  That night we sent off some applications by email and by the end of the week we had 4 interview offers.  We were flabbergasted.   Miles had never had an interview in his life, so we were understandably nervous.   We pursued 3 of the opportunities and got offered all 3 jobs.

Moss Wood was the last interview we had scheduled, and I have to say was the most formal and ‘toughest’ interview.

How pleased we are that we didn’t accept either of the other offers and waited to see what Moss Wood would bring.    It just felt right.  A beautiful place with the countryside we were familiar with and a great team completely passionate about what they did and how they do it.   David Bellamy awards, Bees, dog friendly and fishing.   Then they showed us the brochure on the Lodge that had been ordered as the previous warden cottage had come to the end of its life.   Central Heating, 2 bathrooms.  Although the interview was the toughest it was also fun and there were opportunities to see the banter between Henry and Kathryn the HR consultant and Chris.   As luck would have it, Neil wasn’t in that day to load up the test on the computer as I’m not sure I would have passed the Excel spreadsheet aspect!

We WANTED this job!

We had to wait an hour for the phone call, we’d just pulled into the services when Kathryn called.

Our new lifestyle was on its way.

Good bye Yorkshire, hello from Lancashire 6 January 2020.

If you are still reading this well done, you may enjoy one of my long jokes – I’m always looking for new victims to share them with.

I look forward to meeting everyone I haven’t yet met, and I promise that the next VLog won’t be as long (maybe).

Until the next time my fellow Mossers.

V

PS I managed to put the 2 stones of weight back on very quickly after leaving the pub.  I don’t want you thinking “My word – she must have been really fat before!”  I’ve actually gained a little more weight since arriving at Moss Wood sampling all the delicious things we are now stocking in the shop.  Best to eat lots of cake and stay safe in these winds! 😊

V will be back in March with the latest installment of the Vlog!