Somewhere to celebrate 80th birthday in England

Badger_Lady

Hia,

My grandfather is about to turn 80 and I strongly feel this is an event worth celebrating! However my family are difficult bunch:

- Half are in the North (as far as Newcastle), another set are in France (so they have to fly in) and I'm in Wales. My grandfather however is a Portsmouth boy.

- Several of us are students and we all believe in frugality / MSE.

- Two thirds of us are vegetarian.

So I guess organising it in Portsmouth would be best - we should all make the effort to travel down for him - plus it really suits his interests as a sailor. The man has been a navy cadet instructor, a carpenter and an avid sailor all his life. He's crazy about classic boats, sailing boats and military ships.

Does anyone know of anything special that we could do for him, that everyone'll come along to, keeping it MSE? I'm running out of ideas

P.S. we're looking at the first week of December. His actual birthday is Tuesday but I for one think a nearby weekend is a better bet given the travel involved.

Savvy_Sue

I went on a Ferry trip in Bristol a couple of years ago, but as we came back to dock, the Matthew fired her guns to salute us (all pre-arranged).

Now that was all contacts, but are there any boat trips round the docks, and is Grandad fit enough to get on a boat, and could you then organise anything?

Good luck, btw. We've given up trying to arrange a family 'meet' between Christmas and New Year: some people won't travel on bank holidays, other people won't or can't take time off, but my mother trumps the lot by not being willing to miss her whist drive! :eek:

Badger_Lady

Thanks Sue! Yes, sorry should have mentioned he's fit as a fiddle - still sails his own ketch rig on the harbour I'll have a good old search now...

Badger_Lady

Oh and pirates are good too! We once found a story about a historical infamous pirate with the same name as him

Savvy_Sue

We have a Pirate Pete tour of our docks, is there anything similar in Portsmouth? :rotfl: