Today's the day! Flying out of Melbourne at 2.55 a.m. bound for London, a trip I've done countless times, but this time without a fixed return date. Very scary and very exciting.
Douglas Adams once famously said “No-one ever said as pretty as an airport”, and who can argue with Douglas Adams? With all those millions of dollars lavished on airports all over the world, why do they still look like a Bunnings or Homebase warehouse? And with the phalanx of architects and designers, why do they still look the same? Take Heathrow’s infamous Terminal 5. Countless years in the planning and execution and it still looks like an aviary for pterodactyls. My flight to London via Dubai turned out to be a three leg flight via Kuala Lumpur and Dubai, and both airports are indistinguishable from each other.
The whole airport experience is destined to be stressful regardless of where you are going, how long your flight and your reason for travel. And who hasn’t experienced trepidation (will I be charged excess baggage?), frustration (why is my flight delayed?), confusion (what did he say?), and anger (where is my bag?).
I've flown economy class, premium economy (more economy than premium), business class (thanks to corporate travel), and first class (thanks to an unexpected upgrade), and it doesn’t matter how much leg room you have, or whether you are served cask wine or French champagne, you are still hermetically sealed in a cigar shaped cylinder with several hundred poor souls, breathing the same recycled air and sharing the same bathroom facilities. And no matter how comfortable or uncomfortable the seat, it’s still boring unless you can sleep, have a good book or enjoy watching classic (read old), episodes of Blackadder and Friends.
But today we live in a world, if not actually addicted to international travel, certainly dependent on the convenience and relative cheapness. I can remember when a return flight to London in the late 1970’s cost A$700; 30 years later it can cost barely double that. We think nothing of hopping on a plane for a weekend away, or a business trip that takes us from London to Luxembourg, or Melbourne to Sydney in a day, and still be home in time for dinner.
But with all this travel, what do we experience of our destination? Airports that all look the same and taxi drivers who can’t speak English (anywhere). Food is often the only distinguishing feature of a country. In Italy we eat Italian food. That’s it, just Italian. In France we eat French cuisine (why did I just slip into French?). In China, it’s just Chinese food, and so on. But in countries with a cuisine that is less, how should I put this delicately, distinctive, we are willing to try anything different, just for the variety.
So why do Australians travel so much, is it because we want something different to eat? Which takes me to airline food; what do airlines do with food??? I was offered an omelette that had the taste, colour and texture of foam rubber. Just as well I wasn’t hungry.
Sitting here at Melbourne Airport at 1.30 a.m., waiting, waiting, waiting. This is the bit about travel I really hate. Sitting in airport lounges waiting for something to happen. Dog tired after a stressful day, packing my bag and wondering how I am going to manage with all my excess luggage this time! I never did travel light. Anyway, I did, and here I am. Thank you Emirates for your generous luggage allowance!
This is my chance to thank everyone for your friendship and support over the last little while – I wouldn’t be here without you. Too many to name and I fear I may accidentally miss someone but you know who you are. However, I will say a special thank you to Debora and Robyn for taking me out to dinner this evening to help me relax before coming out to the airport.
And before I forget, a big raspberry to Telstra for stuffing up my email address (no surprises there I hear you say!) I tried to disconnect my home telephone on Saturday afternoon and instead the moron disconnected my ADSL internet and email address. They are trying to “reinstate” my email address, but in the meantime, if you try to email me at my Bigpond address and it’s rejected, you will know why. Apparently it could take up to five days to be reinstated!!!
I was incandescent with rage when I spoke with them on the phone and discovered what they had done. Needless to say, the telephone wasn’t disconnected! How hopeless is that? Fred, I know what you are saying as you read this, and yes, you are right, I’ve only got myself to blame for using them in the first place.
My flight is a little longer than I anticipated. I thought it was a direct flight to London via Dubai (the ticket says it's non-stop), but I am being routed through Kuala Lumpur first. Oh well, I have a couple of books and I’ll sleep most of the time anyway. Roll on 2.55 a.m. I know I’m a night owl but even I draw the line at this unsociable hour!!!
The adventure begins.
Arrived safely and without incident on Sunday evening and now staying in Portsmouth with my lovely uncle and aunt, Angela and Rodney, and Archie (an adorable Tibetan spaniel – see photo). Cold and wet outside but cosy indoors and it’s lovely to be with my family.
Today Angela and I went into Portsmouth and Gunwharf Quays (a large outlet shopping complex on the waterfront and winner of the 2009 Loo of the Year – yes that’s right, they have awards for public toilets here and I can confirm that the award was well-deserved!!!). We were shopping for something to wear to James and Claire’s wedding next month. As you all know, if shopping were an Olympic event I could shop for Australia, so I was in my element; I can report that the shopping trip was a success .
I’ve attached a photo of the Spinnaker at Gunwharf Quays as well as a photo of Old Portsmouth with the Isle of Wight in the distance. James and Claire’s wedding party next month is at the Spinnaker.
Off to London today with Angela and Shirley for a girls’ day out. Train travel in England is very expensive; a 90 minute train trip from Portsmouth to London costs about A$50 return off peak! Angela and I met Shirley under the clocks at Waterloo, the equivalent of meeting under the clocks at Flinders Street.
Our first stop was Handel’s House in Mayfair – thanks to Anita and Fred for telling me about this as I'm a big fan of his music (I'm listening to him now – Hallelujah!). A beautifully restored Georgian home with some interesting portraits from the era.
Lunch at a restaurant behind Regent Street in Heddon Street called Tidbits – a smorgasbord where you select what you want to eat and you then pay by weight. Good value and atmosphere and the staff went to a lot of trouble to accommodate Shirley who has an allergy to olive oil.
Then we took a stroll along the always elegant Regent Street to the theatre to see a matinee performance of The Misanthrope, a modern rendering of the Moliere play with Damian Lewis (very tasty), Keira Knightly (very thin), Tara Fitzgerald (great voice) and Nicholas Le Provost (looks just like you Graham!). Very funny and well done, it was worth the effort to get the tickets.
Always so much to see in London, we wandered off to Covent Garden for a bit of window shopping (what the French call “licking the windows”), and dinner. I keep seeing Radley shops – it’s all I can do to resist buying yet another handbag. I have to keep reminding myself that I don’t have an income anymore and such luxuries are banned!!! Still, it doesn’t cost anything to look, so long a looking is all I do, but so many yummy things to buy here in London.
Walking past the Opera House in Floral Street I was drawn to a restaurant window with the most amazing collection of puppets suspended from the ceiling. I was starting to flag as I still have a bit of jet lag, and as we were all a bit peckish and like Indian food, the puppets together with the delicious smells wafting through the vents lured us in for dinner. The puppets were all sizes and shapes, from little puppets no more than 12 inches high to some as large as a small child; puppets of men and women dressed in gaudy reds, yellows, oranges, greens and blues, with gold and silver embroidery and highly painted faces, some were on trapezes, and there were also elephants and camels similarly suspended. The atmosphere in Masala Zone was vibrant, the food was inexpensive and there was plenty of it. None of us were able to finish our meals, there was so much. We weren’t surprised by the long queue waiting for a table when we left.
We caught a late’ish train back to Portsmouth and unsurprisingly I slept much of the way home.
* to misquote Samuel Johnson!
Now let me tell you about the disaster of trying to send a bag to England as unaccompanied luggage. I made the mistake of using a company called World Baggage. Be warned – they are incompetent and inept. My bag still hasn’t been dispatched even though I left it with them two weeks ago because they have lost my paperwork and somehow I have to print and scan and resend the UK customs form to them. They refuse – absolutely refuse – to acknowledge that they have lost the papers or apologise, even though it is clearly their fault. I have never experienced such a truly hopeless business - when I complained I was told “We are quite happy for your nominee to collect your bag and we will refund your money”. What use is that, I need the bag here in England and I need it before the end of the week. No chance now. At least Telstra apologised for their stuff up!
Spent an enjoyable afternoon with Angela visiting Claire and (my cousin) James and their adorable young daughters Amelia and Megan. I'm very lucky to have such a lovely family.
Off to London today to meet up with Forrest en route to Italy. Staying with Forrest’s sister and family in Fulham for the night. Margaret and the family are in the process of moving to the house across the road, which is mid-way through being renovated – big time. It will be sensational when it’s finished, but in the meantime they will be camping in a few rooms until the kitchen is built and the back of the house (which is missing and is therefore open to the elements), is rebuilt. I think it’s going to be a chilly few months for the Lady Margaret (so called because according to Forrest she has ambitions for her husband to be knighted), and the family.
I don’t think I endeared myself to Forrest’s brother-in-law who was recently awarded a CB (Commander of the Bath) by a grateful sovereign, when I told him that I’m a republican. I did try to placate the poor man who at this stage was having apoplexy that I only meant for Australia and not Britain, but I think I had shot my bolt by that stage. He then proceeded to tell me that all the Australian’s he knew didn’t want a republic because they didn’t want an Australian politician to appoint the president and when I tried to explain that Australians rejected the republic not because they are monarchists but because they rejected the model that Howard proposed, he made a snide comment about the quality and lack of leadership of Australian politicians. I thought that was a bit of a cheek given the past performance of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, and said so! The mother of all parliaments has been rocked in recent years by cash-for-comments and parliamentarian expenses scandals which have severely tarnished Westminster’s reputations so it’s hard to see why he would be trying to take the moral high ground on that one!
A late dinner at a Thai restaurant then to bed.
A very early start this morning – up at 6.30 a.m. to catch the Eurostar from St Pancras. The station was impressive, it took years and cost millions to refurbish, and it shows. The train is extremely long, or rather because I had two heavy bags the train seemed very long. The trip was uneventful apart from Forrest being unable to find his passport at the station, thinking he had left his sister’s house. He’s not the most organised person.
We had one stop on the way to Dover, somewhere in the middle of nowhere (I don’t think there was a single passenger on the platform). The view from the train is pretty unimpressive, train lines and stations never seem to be located in picturesque settings. It’s not apparent when you enter the tunnel that it is the tunnel and when you arrive in France 20 minutes later it is a bit of an anti-climax really; because of the EU and the open borders, there was no passport control at the French side.
I had breakfast at St Pancras before we left, but Forrest declined, he was saving himself for a much anticipated French pastry and coffee and so he decided to wait until we got to Lille. When we changed trains at Lille for Lyon, there were no patisseries at Lille Railway Station, just a bog standard coffee stall, so he was very disappointed. The train wasn’t that full and there were plenty of spare seats and Forrest preferred to sit at the opposite end of the carriage from me, staring out of the window at the passing scenery. I don’t think that Forrest is much of a reader and he didn't touch the Dan Brown (yes, Dan Brown), he had brought with him.
From Lille onwards the countryside noticeably improved and was picture postcard material; I have to say that the French countryside looks much tidier and more orderly than the English countryside. The TGV train from Lille was unbelievably fast – I don’t know how fast it goes but we were whizzing along and it took barely three hours to arrive in Lyon. We were met by Cath and Adrian, Forrest’s friends who had been in France for the past week and had picked up the hire car in Paris. Now for the long drive to Tuscany. I had suggested to Forrest that we get the train to Florence and pick up a hire car from there, but he had assured me he didn't mind driving long distances and was happy to do all the driving.
We navigated our way out of Lyon with the help of Karen, whom I christened Forrest’s electronic girlfriend. I have to say that travelling around England and Europe with a SatNav may be a good investment. Then again, I didn’t have one when I was in Tuscany last year and managed (without too many wrong turnings thanks to Google Maps – how did we manage in the past???), but life would be much simpler and less stressful with one so there’s another expense I hadn’t budgeted for.
The drive from Lyon to Turino (Turin) took us through the Rhône Alpes which are spectacular. We saw Mont Blanc, chalets and lots of snow. We drove through several (i.e. I lost count) tunnels of varying length including the Tunnel de Frejus, which was really quite long. When Australians refer to the road toll we mean the death toll on the roads, here the road tolls are expensive and frequent; we spent €70 getting from Lyon to Turin.
Forrest wanted to play Russian roulette with the tolls and have each of us pay for the toll in turns, which would have been fine with him paying the first €2.30 toll, but the section through the Tunnel de Frejus was €27! As Forrest had driven through the Alps before I assume he was aware of the variability of prices. Adrian, Cath and I wanted to pay equal shares so I kept a running tally of the costs so that we could settle up at the end of the trip. It was apparent from the outset that Forrest resented this. As we drove along we were discussing the week’s plans and it was suggested that I record everyone’s preferences and then we could decide on the week’s itinerary. For some reason Forrest was strongly opposed to me taking any part in the process.
Driving into Turin was a bit of a challenge as all the locals who had spent the weekend at their weekenders in the Alpes were making their way back to the city and traffic was everywhere. Thanks to Karen we found our way into the centre of Turin. We found an hotel right in the centre, somewhat disconcertingly called Hotel Le Petit, given that we are in Italy. The hotel was very reasonably priced, €60 for a single room and €90 for a double (much to Forrest’s disgust, Adrian negotiated a better rate for the double room!). The rooms were small but clean and comfortable and importantly, warm.
Dinner next door at a very bright local restaurant. The waiter was great, he made lots of recommendations and the food was inexpensive and very tasty. Two bottles of wine later and a round of lemoncellos (a first for me), and we were well satisfied.
Although it was dark by the time we arrived in Turin, it was still relatively early so we went for a walk around the city. Although I thought of Turin as an industrial city and home of the Fiat, the centre of town was surprisingly gracious with lots of colonnaded streets and squares. A drink at a tiny bar – more lemoncello for Cath, Adrian and Forrest and an Aperol for me (thanks to Jo and Graham for introducing me to this drink). And so to bed, very tired after a long day, but we had a lot of fun and laughed all the way from Lyon to Turin.
This morning we set off at a more civilised 8.00 a.m. following a classic Italian breakfast of ham and cheese (yum, two of my favourite things). Driving out of Turin with Forrest at the wheel wasn’t as relaxing as yesterday’s drive through the Alpes with Adrian driving.
While navigating the narrow one-way system out of Turin, Forrest was fiddling with Karen trying to get her to talk to him. This caused much consternation with Cath, Adrian and me and I was subjected to a stream of abuse and invective from Forrest (to be precise, he shouted at me to “Shut the f**k up”), for having the temerity of asking him to slow down and pay attention to the road. This is going to be an interesting couple of weeks.
Then Forrest took a telephone call from his cousin in Rome, much to everyone’s alarm, as the traffic was pretty hairy. To make matters worse, when the line dropped out Forrest proceeded to ring her back and held a lengthy conversation much to the horror and shrieks of anguish from the three passengers as he was driving at speed. He totally ignored our concerns.
Driving along the autostrada through what can only be described as the industrial heartland of Italy is not necessarily the most attractive scenery, especially after the drive through the Alps yesterday afternoon. After much debate we agreed to stop at Parma to buy some cheese and ham (what else?).
Lunch stop at Parma – we had a quick look at the sights and then bought lunch (see photos of ham and cheese). Although cold, it wasn’t so cold that we couldn't have lunch in the local park.
We sacked Karen (her Kiwi accent began to grate), and so Ken, a slightly effete Aussie boy gave us directions to Le Cerchiaie. The drive from Parma to Le Cerchiaie was fairly uneventful until we reached the mountain ranges in Tuscany. Central Tuscany where I stayed last year seems much flatter than the eastern part of the region which is very mountainous. The roads and bridges are amazing feats of engineering and although we were slowed down by some road works, we arrived late afternoon.
The farmhouse is amazing – see the website - http://www.ouritalianhouse.com/ - to get a flavour of where we are staying. Admittedly it’s winter rather than summer so we won’t be using the infinity swimming pool, but the views from the terrace are picture postcard perfect. I’m looking forward to getting out an about with my camera tomorrow. Before setting out for dinner, we discussed where each of us would like to visit during the week and I recorded everyone’s preferences.
Dinner this evening with the Crew, all eight of us, Forrest, Cath and Adrian, Jenny and Tony, Jo and David, and me. We were so loud in the restaurant but they were very good to us and looked after us very well, we had a great meal. Heaps of great food and wine and all for €35, followed by more lemoncello. (According to Margaret, you should buy the most expensive if you want to avoid a headache, although Forrest, who never listens properly, told everyone that Margaret had said we should buy the cheapest!). A good night was had by all.
Wonderfully restful and peaceful night here at Le Cerchiaie. Yet another breakfast of Parma ham and cheese and coffee (soooo Italian).
Off to Assisi for the day, a drive of an hour or so. It’s a wonderful town on the side of a hill and unsurprisingly you might think, the birthplace of Saint Francis. A very holy place and major pilgrimage destination for Catholics, there are lots of richly decorated churches. Forrest had an epiphany in the Basilica di San Francesco and the Tomb of Saint Francis of Assisi and tells us that he has taken a vow of poverty, chastity and obedience, although the later isn’t immediately apparent :-O
Assisi is in Umbria rather than Tuscany and is well worth a visit. It can be seen from miles away because it’s constructed from a pale stone and is in many ways like San Gimignano because of the step streets and spectacular views over the neighbouring countryside. Lots of photo opportunities for me, although Forrest doesn’t share my enthusiasm for photography, assuring me that he doesn’t need a camera because he has his memory, although given his poor memory it was unsurprisingly that he wanted copies of my photos! I remain undaunted; it’s not the first time I’ve travelled with someone who isn’t interested in photography.
We walked what seemed (and probably was), miles, and visited countless churches (Forrest declared himself all churched out). We had morning coffee like the locals, standing at the bar, and lunch al fresco in the town square (a slice of pizza and glass of the local wine – very good and surprisingly cheap). Although it was raining when we left Le Cerchiaie, by lunchtime there was blue sky and it was very mild.
Before leaving Assisi we decided to drive to the top of the village for the views. That was the easy bit. To get back to the bottom of the village we had to drive through the medieval village. As you can imagine, the streets were not designed for cars and are very narrow and windy and it was a rather hairy drive through streets that looked barely wide enough for the car to pass, but Adrian did a magnificent job and we reached the bottom with the paintwork unscathed!
On the way out of Assisi, SatNav Karen (we had reverted to a female voice after Ken was sacked), sent us up a dead end together with two other cars, or so we thought. I got out of the car to take a photo of Assisi in the distance. Obviously an exchange of drugs or something equally illegal was taking place. I will draw a veil over what was going on with the other two cars and leave it to your imagination, but it was all a bit scary so we left the area rather quickly when the penny dropped and we let them get on with it!
Forrest claimed that when he was last in Tuscany truffles from the local greengrocer were €4 per kilo. The price is now €250 per kilo, which suggests either hyper-inflation or his memory was playing tricks on him. I bought some truffle oil and we bought some truffles to have with scrambled eggs. Jenny has found a recipe in one of the many cook books here at Le Cerchiaie so we will be having a very extravagant breakfast later this week.
Tonight we had dinner cooked for us at Le Cerchiaie by the Two Fat (Italian) Ladies (see photo). Crostini followed by tagliatelle with porcini mushrooms (so pungent) and diced sausage, another dish with beans and sausage and fungi (sounds similar but quite different), followed by beef with truffles and salad, and for desert panna cotta with berries. Lots of wine and another very rowdy dinner – if we had neighbours they would surely complain about the noise. And we try not to discuss politics for fear of a riot!!! Nonetheless, Peter Garratt and insulation bats came in for some comment.
Giuseppe Dini manages Le Cerchiaie for Margaret and dropped by after dinner. He is a bit of a local character and very interesting to talk to; he owns and manages a number of properties in the area. He reminds me of Senor Fix-It in John Mortimer’s “Summer’s Lease”, which was set in this area, (complete with the Piero de la Francesca trail and trips to Monterchi, Sansepolcro and Siena).
Giuseppe has written a book called “Tuscany – In and around Medieval Anghiari”, and he just happened to have a few copies with him. Needless to say, I now have an autographed copy signed by Giuseppe “To Chiara” (Claire in Italian). It’s actually a great reference for the area and we have found it invaluable.
Having a ball.
Today we explored Anghiari (or Angry-ari as David calls it), which is one of many picturesque medieval hilltop towns in Tuscany. It’s just up the road from Le Cerchiaie and has a market every Wednesday (and has done so since the 13th century). We decided to buy lunch at the market and bought another kilogram of parmesan cheese (I can’t believe how much cheese we have eaten since we arrived), half a soft cheese (no idea what the cheese is called so please don’t ask), a local terrine, and some more ham and salad. The eight of us go through copious amounts of food, especially David (I don’t think I've ever seen anyone eat as much – last seen masquerading as Austin Powers at his 50th birthday party in Sydney last month – what a hoot!).
Morning coffee, again standing at the counter, doing as the Romans do. There is such a coffee culture here and the coffee bars seem to be the hub of village life. While I'm not really a coffee drinker, even I joy in with a morning coffee.
We ran into Giuseppe in the town square and Forrest mentioned that the olive oil shop he wanted to visit was shut for the midday siesta. Minutes later Giuseppe returned to tell us that the owner of the olive oil shop was opening especially for us – Mr Fix-It indeed! He obviously knows everyone and we think he must be on commission as we each bought something from the shop – I bought a bottle of Vin Santo and some wine soap (not sure what that will be like) and some olive oil hand cream. It is a family owned business that’s been going for centuries and they cold press their own olive oil. Because of Forrest’s olive oil connections we were invited to visit the mill just outside the town and we were given a personal tour of the mill.
Back to Le Cerchiaie for lunch and while everyone else was having a siesta I took some photos of the vistas from the terrace and the kilometre long drive, experimenting with my new lenses and polarising filters. No surprises for hearing I have again taken far too many photos.
Dinner tonight was the 50th birthday celebration for the four school friends, Forrest, David, Adrian and Tony, as they all turn 50 this year. Forrest’s much tattooed daughter Alice (she even has a tattoo on her neck, noice), her boyfriend Dana (whom Forrest detests, after all, who could possibly be good enough for his daughter?), Forrest’s cousin Barbara and Barbara’s husband, Piero, drove up from Rome for the dinner.
We had pre-dinner drinks at Le Cerchiaie before driving to the restaurant, the Castello de Souci (bizarrely this means Castle of Rats!). Barbara has lived in Rome for many years although she’s a Sydney girl, she married an Italian, and Alice and Dana arrived recently in Italy from their travels in South America, without any money. I think Forrest is expected to pick up the bill.
I had taken my camera to the restaurant because I thought Forrest would want some photos of the evening, but he told me in no uncertain terms not to take any photos, although hypocritically he did ask for copies of the photos I did take.
The dinner was another Tuscan banquet following the usual formula of crostini, soup, a pasta entree (primi), meat and vegetables (secondi), and then dessert. Barbara had written a poem for Forrest which was delightful and very funny, and she brought from Rome the most wonderful meringue birthday cake – I have never tasted anything like it, it melted in the mouth. Another raucous night.
PS – I can’t believe it's been only 10 days since I left home!
Before breakfast Jenny, Tony and I drove into Monterchi to see the Madonna del Parto (the Pregnant Madonna), a fresco by Piero della Francesca. It used to be in the local church but in recent years it’s been moved to a special exhibition building. I’m not sure how you move a fresco without damaging it and the result is far from satisfactory as it now totally out of context and almost looks as if it is being projected onto the wall, although in reality it’s behind a sheet of glass in a stark windowless viewing room. The painting itself is hauntingly beautiful and enigmatic but the display lacks any charm and it’s a pity it can’t be viewed as intended. It costs €3.50 to see just this one painting which seems like a lot of money, although if you are pregnant you can get in for free (!).
Barbara, Piero, Alice and Dana joined us for breakfast before Barbara and Piero returned to Rome; Alice and Dana are going to stay at Le Cerchiaie with us for the rest of the week, so they will be getting free food and lodging for a week (so effectively we are all subsidising their peripatetic lifestyle). Breakfast was scrambled eggs with truffles; I’ve never had truffles before and I have to confess that I’m not sure what all the fuss is about, perhaps they are an acquired taste and it grows on you?
After a late breakfast I travelled in the BMW with David and Jo, Jenny and Tony to Sansepolchro to see the Resurrection by Piero della Francesca, described by Aldous Huckley as the greatest painting in the world. We walked around town but because of the late start we arrived just before the siesta, so everything closed down including the Museum that houses the Piero della Francesca Collection. We had a coffee to kill time until 2.30 p.m. when Italy begins to wake up again. The place really does come to a standstill for at least two hours in the middle of the day, an alien concept to us Aussies, although we all agreed that it’s quite a civilised way to live, I can't see it catching on in Australia!
Apart from the Piero della Francesca trail, Sansepolchro isn’t really worth visiting, it’s just another old Italian town, pleasant but not outstanding.
We decided not to go out to dinner, so Jenny and Cath cooked a superb meal at Le Cerchiaie. The boys got stuck into the grappa (it tastes like lighter fluid, although not as pleasant), and cigars outside in the cold while the ladies sensibly sat around the fire chatting; this had been the pattern for the whole week.
Forrest certainly likes a drink, he starts about 3 p.m. with an “aperativo”, moves on to wine throughout dinner and finishes up with a “digestivo”, usually hard spirits, grappa, lemoncello or similar, until late into the night, accompanied by cigar and cigarette smoking (he smokes like a chimney). This trip may have been arranged to celebrate the 50th birthday of the boys, but Forrest will be lucky to make it to his 60th if he keeps drinking like this.
Siena is one of my favourite places – when I spent three days in Siena last year I knew I would be back one day, I hadn’t realised it would be quite so soon. We had an early start as Cath and Adrian wanted to go to Florence for the day, so we drove them to Arezzo to catch the train. Forrest, Alice, Dana and I then went on to Siena and planned to catch up with the others for lunch.
We headed for the Campo right in the centre of the old town, still quite busy notwithstanding the time of the year, although some of the restaurants were closed, whereas last July it was really bustling. We had picked up a brochure with a self-guided tour at the car park (serviced by the most amazing network of escalators from the base of the hill which I hadn’t seen last time because I arrived from Florence by bus).
Although I was familiar with Siena, Forrest appointed Alice the official tour guide and we saw a number of things that that I didn’t see last year because they weren’t in my guidebook, including a large 12th century fount with what looked like large koi, and the Basilica di San Domenico which houses bits of Saint Catherine of Siena, i.e. her head and one of her fingers, displayed in glass cabinets. It is no surprise that the guidebooks don’t make any mention of these ghoulish relics as they are rather macabre, although they do seem to attract a lot of attention. There is also a dead saint or pope (not sure which), in the Duomo, although thankfully he had a gold mask over his shrivelled face, whereas Catherine didn’t.
We met up with the others in the Campo and decided to look for somewhere to have lunch. We were wondering along one of the back streets in search of a restaurant recommended in the Lonely Planet guide but we had trouble finding it. Luckily, a passing Englishman, who spends six months of the year in Tuscany driving tourists around in his two vintage Italian cars, overheard our conversation and recommended somewhere just around the corner from the Basilica di San Domenico with magnificent views over the back of the Duomo. We virtually had the place to ourselves and I had a Capricciosa pizza that was nothing like Loui’s (sic) pizza in Wattletree Road. I’m embarrassed to say that as much as I love the food here, I prefer Loui’s pizzas to the authentic Italian ones!
After lunch we headed back to Arezzo to pick up Adrian and Cath and spent an hour or so in Arezzo, part of the Piero della Francesca trail. Saw (another) duomo but this one had the most beautiful side chapel lit entirely by candles. It was very special and there were a lot of people in the chapel praying – it was quite moving. We then went for a quick drive through the narrow lanes of the old town (a real challenge in the 7 seater Citroen Picasso Forrest and Adrian had hired), and came upon an entirely deserted square, the Piazza Grande, with buildings dating from the 14th century. We were quite captivated by it and decided to stop for a stroll and an afternoon aperitif (see photo).
Adrian sent us a text reminding us that his train was due to arrive at 4.50 p.m. so we dutifully set off to the train station to meet him and Cath. Waiting, waiting, waiting. Eventually I rang to ask him where he was to be told that the train had broken down!!!
When we got back to Le Cerchiaie, rather than eat out we decided to cook again as we have a wonderful kitchen at our disposal (see photo of the Two Fat (Italian) Ladies). Another team effort, it was a rather ad hoc affair with a Tuscan feel (i.e. lots of pasta and tomatoes), but was well received. I had bought a bottle of Vin Santo and some cantucci which I rather took a liking to when I was here last year, although I don’t think my passion for the dessert wine and biscotti was shared by the others. Oh well, I’ll just have to drink the Vin Santo myself :-O
Having appointed himself the group’s tour guide, Forrest decided we would visit Gubbio in Umbria (we are quite close to the border between Tuscany and Umbria). The main attractions according to Forrest are the funicular up to the top of the mountain and the dead pope (who turned out to be a bishop), in the Basilica at the top. Gubbio sits on the slopes of Monte Ingino overlooking a picturesque valley and its history dates back to pre-Roman times, although the buildings in the old town are largely medieval.
We had a bit of trouble finding the funicular and in desperation had to resort to asking for directions when it became apparent that Forrest couldn't remember how to get there after all, although not before walking what seemed like miles up a winding hill path. The funicular is a cross between a ski lift and one of those medieval cages peoples’ bodies were put in for the crows to eat, and holds one comfortably or two at a pinch. It doesn’t stop to allow you to climb aboard, you have to jump on and off as it’s moving. Not for the mobility impaired, and given that I’ve been having problems with my knee since Lyon (I’m a bit dubious about my skiing capacity at this stage), it was interesting getting on and off the lift. Italy isn’t big on OH&S.
The views from the top were spectacular and the Basilica di Sant’Ubaldo was interesting, if you are interested in seeing the mummified body of the 12th century bishop of Gubbio, Sant’Ubaldo (see photo), and was worth the price of the ticket up the mountain. The rest of the Crew wanted to do a walk around the mountain so Forrest and I walked through the old town which was strenuous enough given how hilly the town is, and then we had a light lunch. Forrest’s encyclopaedic knowledge of olives and balsamic vinegar has been invaluable in Tuscany.
The last thing we saw was the Roman amphitheatre which was originally built for 6,000 people, although what remains would seat considerably less, so it must have been an impressive structure when it was first built. Next to the amphitheatre the old men of Gubbio were playing boules (see photo), and they seemed pretty competitive. I expect there was something riding on the result ;-)
When we got back to Le Cerchiaie I had the first siesta of my trip, I was exhausted and slept for two hours! Then we went to dinner at Sansepolchro, a restaurant recommended by Margaret, Enoteca Guidi. We had a private room to ourselves as there were 10 of us, and it was just as well as we were as loud as ever.
Enoteca Guidi is a carpaccio restaurant which was rather unusual but it was a great meal and the best we’ve had to date. As it was the last meal that all 10 of us would have together, we each gave our advice on lessons learned over a lifetime. Jenny’s words of wisdom were “don’t sweat the small stuff”, Cath’s advice was “the past is history, the future a mystery, the present a gift, so let’s enjoy it”. Adrian’s advice was “moderation is the key to success, moderation in all things will make a life richer”, and Alice, the baby of the group was “may the best of your past be the worst of your future”. I think by this stage we were getting pretty philosophical, but it was all good advice!
* in tribute to Forrest’s habit of ending half his sentences with the word “but”.
Yet another early start as Jo and David, Jenny and Tony left this morning for Cortina; Forrest and I will be joining them tomorrow. Watching them cram luggage for four people into a mid-sized BMW was very funny and we couldn't stop laughing.
We then headed off to Cortona for the day (thanks Bryony, a great recommendation). Cortona is one of the many picturesque hilltop villages here in Tuscany. We saw the town in the distance as we approached and drove into the village doing battle with the narrow laneways and one way system. As luck would have it, there was a Sunday market in progress so we wandered around marvelling at the plethora of trash and treasure, or in this case, trash (there was very little treasure in evidence). Being Sunday, most of the shops were shut but in the square there was a food market and so we bought the usual lunch provisions; I was responsible for buying the cheese, Forrest bought yet more ham and Cath and Adrian were responsible for the bread. Even my love of cheese is beginning to wane, I don’t think I’ve ever eaten so much cheese, all delicious of course but even I am beginning to think that enough is enough!
Now I don’t think I mentioned that at this stage we had come to the view that we weren’t actually in Cortona but we had no idea where exactly we were. I was tasting some goats’ cheese (something I thought I disliked, but this cheese was sensational – very smooth and creamy), and it was apparent that the stall holder was an American, so I asked him soto-voce, where were we? He told me that it was Castiglion Fiorentino and asked whether we were lost? I told him that we weren’t exactly lost because Karen (SatNav lady), knew exactly where we were, she just hadn’t bothered to tell us!
It turns out that goat cheese man is from Michigan and arrived in Italy for a two week holiday 20 years ago, and he thinks his probationary period is coming to an end! He was, as of yesterday, the proud father of three pairs of twin kids and seems to be very happy with his lot in life. He was very helpful in translating for us with the other stall holders, all of whom were very friendly. The stall holders we bought the prosciutto from even gave us a cheese as a gift and the baker gave us extra biscuits. Castiglion Fiorentino is an incredibly friendly place and although it appears on the maps, it isn’t in any of the tourist books we had, which is very surprising, as we found it delightful.
We had morning tea in Castiglion Fiorentino, I’ve never drunk so much expresso in my life, and the almond biscuits were very tasty and moist, unlike biscotti which are by their nature rather hard and dry.
At last we were on the road to Cortona and arrived late morning and, like Castiglion Fiorentino, there was a market whereas very few shops were open. This market was selling the usual selection of old tat and interesting antiques including WWII memorabilia. I was very tempted by a chainmail antique evening bag, but decided against it, although it was a struggle to resist! Markets do seem to be a common feature with our travels to date.
Unfortunately we didn’t spend very long in Cortona and the town would benefit from a longer visit so I was disappointed that we didn’t stay longer. From the Santa Maria delle Grazie (where we found yet another dead saint), the views over the countryside were far-reaching and we had seen in the distance a lake, apparently the fourth largest in Italy but I can’t recall what it's called). We decided to drive to the lake to eat our picnic lunch, and although it would have been pretty in summer, today it was cool and windswept and we were the only people in the area.
A quick drive back to Le Cerchiaie because Forrest wanted his siesta before dinner. He seems to have picked up the local customs very quickly!!!
Our last dinner with Cath and Adrian, Alice and Dana at a local restaurant in Anghiari, Ristorante La Nena, followed by gelati in a bar with the locals who were watching a football (i.e. soccer), match on the wide screen TV. The locals didn’t enter into the spirit when Cath started a Mexican wave in the tiny bar. I think they viewed the rowdy Aussies with some disdain, as we were interrupting their important football match!
Up at 5.30 a.m. to take Cath and Adrian, Alice and Dana to Arezzo railway station, bound for Rome. I woke with a very sore throat and I’m not feeling any too well.
After sad farewells to new friends, Forrest and I headed off to Cortina with the aid of Karen. I wasn’t feeling well as Forrest drove to Cortina, a fairly uneventful six hour drive from Tuscany up to the north. The scenery improved markedly once we hit the Alps. Snow covered mountains filled the car’s window screen and the higher we climbed the more the landscape started to look like something from the Sound of Music and the architecture was distinctly alpine.
We arrived mid-afternoon and checked in to the Hotel Villa Argentina in Pocol, a satellite of Cortina, six kilometres up a mountain, which is a ski in/ski out resort. It’s a rather old fashioned and basic hotel, but clean and comfortable and the rooms are warm (perhaps a little too warm), as the radiators have no thermostats, they are either on or off.
The toilets are a little unusual, in as much as the flush isn’t an automatic flush, you have a lever that you turn anti-clockwise to flush and when it has flushed away you then turn the flush off by turning the lever clockwise. Most unusual, I haven’t seen a toilet mechanism like if before.
The view from my room is spectacular (see photo), and the weather is warm and sunny, with magnificent blue skies, not at all what I expected.
Forrest and I drove into Cortina and hired our ski equipment and then caught up with Jo and David, Jenny and Tony for an aperitif in the hotel bar to hear about their first day’s skiing which by the sound of it was nothing short of sensational.
Before dinner we drove back into Cortina to do some shopping because the shops had been shut for the siesta when we had hired our skis, and given that I hadn’t skied for ten years, I no longer had any equipment or clothing so I had to buy some ski pants and wet weather walking boots. The town is serviced by many very expensive boutiques and jewellers and is obviously a very wealthy playground for the rich. We were definitely the poor relations. I’ve never seen so many fur coats.
Dinner was at Il Meloncino al Camineto, a local restaurant recommended by the man in the ski hire shop. It was by far the most expensive meal we’ve had to date, but it was delicious. While we were one of the first in the restaurant, within an hour it had filled up completely with very wealthy Italians, all dressed up and dripping with jewellery. Not like us impoverished Aussie tourists with our jeans, anoraks and wet weather boots.
This morning I woke to a dull and overcast day, not at all like yesterday’s weather. I’m still not feeling too well, but I didn’t want to waste a day’s skiing so I had a private skiing lesson while the others went off to explore one of the many ski fields hereabouts. Because I hadn’t skied for ten years I thought a lesson would help me find my ski legs. Didi, my Italian instructor, and I spent a couple of hours skiing around the immediate area, with Didi giving me tips on my technique, which quite frankly has never been that flash. My style can best be described as untidy and I’m not sure Didi’s words of advice made any real impact on my technique. However, I did gain confidence by skiing with him for a couple of hours which was the main purpose of the exercise. The view that was expressed was that it was like riding a bike, you never forget how to fall off, or something like that.
I skied until lunchtime and decided to call it a day as I didn’t want to overdo it on my first day. I didn’t fall over once, although I had several near misses, so I’m quite pleased with the day’s skiing. I was very worried last week that I wouldn’t be able to ski at all because my dodgy right knee had been playing up for the first time in a long time; I had been limping quite badly, notably around the many hilltop towns we visited. Time will tell how I feel tomorrow.
Dinner was at the second of the three restaurants recommended by the man at the ski hire shop and was another success. Ristorante Al Camin Cortina was a bit out of the way but the food was very good as was the ambience, apart from the fact that the restaurant was entirely empty. We assumed this was because we were early and the Italians eat later, but no-one else had arrived by the time we left at 9.30 p.m. Very strange as we thought it was well priced and the food delicious.
At last my red bag has finally arrived in Portsmouth, three weeks after I left it with the incompetent people at www.worldbaggage.com.,au . At no stage did they apologise for losing my documentation, indeed they never acknowledged that they had it in the first place.
I advised them that a friend would be attending their Sydney premises a few days hence to sort out the mess but rather than email me back to tell me that the bag was still Melbourne, they waited until David arrived to tell him, just to be bloody-minded. Their incompetence knows no bounds and I’m astonished they are still in business; I have never come across such ineptitude and rudeness. I can only assume they don’t rely on repeat business because they can’t have many happy customers and from a trawl of the internet, it would appear that I’m not the only person unhappy with them. I just wish I’d checked them out before I used them.
A big thank you to David, Anita and Fred for sorting out the mess for me. Cheers guys, I owe you.
I woke this morning with a headache and I generally felt very unwell, so I decided to rest and not go out skiing with the others, even though I’m pleased to say that I wasn’t aching following yesterday’s skiing. David and Jo very kindly came to my rescue, as usual Forrest didn't respond to me text messages.
I dozed most of the morning listening to old episodes of “Just a Minute” on my Mp3 player. Eventually I dragged myself out of bed and had a shower and went downstairs to have something to eat for lunch. The restaurant here at the hotel can best be described as abysmal and my hamburger and chips didn’t disappoint, it was as dreadful as expected and did nothing to cheer me. I went for a short walk for some exercise and to lift my mood as I was feeling rather flat, and returned to the hotel to finish my book.
I caught up with the others in the bar later in the afternoon and it sounds like they had a sensational day’s skiing, it’s a pity I wasn’t up to skiing today but it can't be helped. We had dinner at the hotel, notwithstanding the dreadful food, because none of us wanted to drive into Cortina, but the meal really was execrable.
This afternoon Forrest used his time constructively learning how to use the mobile phone he’s had for the last two years including how to send text messages (not before time). While telling me repeatedly that he has no need of a camera because he has his memory, he has now learned how to take photos with his telephone, and spent the afternoon surfing the internet on his phone and sending photos of his day’s skiing to all his friends in Australia. He was very impressed with his newfound skills until we explained to him how expensive this is; he’s now preparing himself for the shock of his next phone bill!
The others stayed up for a nightcap but I had an early night in the hope that I will be able to ski tomorrow.
Feeling much better I went skiing today with the Crew. While we were “booting up”, an English chap in the change room asked whether any of us would be interested in competing with them in an international competition (as part of Team GB, a group of veteran skiers, i.e. must be over 45 so we all qualify!), as one of their team had dropped out and they couldn't compete if they were one short. We all volunteered Tony who was universally agreed to be the best skier in the group. Tony agreed to practice with them today and David tagged along as an observer, so Forrest, Jenny, Jo and I went out on the slopes together.
I couldn't keep up with Forrest who treats each slope as a competition to get to the bottom fastest, and the others who are much better skiers than me, so I suggested that I ski alone so as not to hold them up, and we would meet up at lunchtime. I was happy to ski at my own pace and take in the scenery.
When we met up at lunchtime we took the gondola all the way to the very top where there is a cafe which has the most magnificent views over Cortina. The views from the gondola were also spectacular but not for those with an aversion for heights. Somewhat counter-intuitively for a skier, Forrest doesn’t like heights and wouldn’t look at the views from the gondola.
I don’t have any photos because I didn’t take my camera with me today; I’m concerned I may damage it in a fall (while I didn’t fall on Tuesday, I fell twice today, although embarrassing it was nothing serious). A rucksack would change my centre of gravity, which with the standard of my skiing needs all the help it can get. Perhaps I’ll be able to take the camera out tomorrow for a few photos on the slopes if the skies are blue as they were this afternoon.
After lunch I took the gondola half way down the mountain and then skied back to the hotel. The others skied all the way from the top, down what looked to me to be a terrifyingly steep (i.e. perpendicular) black run! They are all very brave and much better skiers than I will ever be!!! Forrest admitted that it was the hardest he had skied all week.
The original plan was that Forrest and I would leave Cortina on Sunday and drive to the Three Valleys, a ski resort in France, for a couple of days, and then to return the hire car and spend the last couple of days in Paris. However, Forrest has decided that he wants to return to England after leaving Cortina, because he is all skied out and has remembered that as he’d been to Paris before he had seen everything he wanted to see so didn’t see any point in visiting it again. There was some vague talk of him wanting to visit Wales, or perhaps that was whales, it wasn’t really clear.
Back for a siesta before going out shopping and then dinner in Cortina. Tonight we decided to take pot luck in town and follow our instincts and we had dinner in a little local and inexpensive pizzeria, which was most enjoyable.
The forecast maximum temperature tomorrow is a frightening -9°C which doesn’t bode well for the slalom race in the morning.
This morning was the slalom race that both Tony and David have been invited to compete in. They set off before us so we drove up to the race course about 9.00 a.m. It was bitterly cold and the first time any of us donned thermal underwear, in fact I don’t think I have ever been so cold, it was easily -15° Celsius allowing for the wind chill factor.
I was at a disadvantage as I had my rucksack with my camera as I wanted to take some photos of the competition as well as the scenery. Unfortunately, it affected my centre of gravity and as the runs were a bit icy, I took a spill early on and had real problems getting upright and only managed with the kind help of two passing skiers. That tumble rather shattered my confidence for the day, and added to the bitter cold, I kept losing the feeling in my feet, so I wasn’t having much fun on the slopes.
Nonetheless, I made it up to the summit to see Tony and David race. Very exciting for them both, and although I don’t think that either of them had done any ski racing before, it was such a great experience for them both. On the way up on the chair life Forrest commented that it was ideal weather for a sun tan or wind burn. Apparently he doesn’t bother with sunscreen (I've been slathering it on since I arrived), because he wants the snow goggle sun burn look, the badge of honour of weather beaten old skiers, half their face white and the rest ruddy. Not for me, thanks.
Once David and Tony had finished their time trial I left them and the others to their day’s skiing and made my way back to Pocol. Even though the weather began to warm up, my right foot was still numb by the time I got back to the hotel, which I found very disturbing, I don’t fancy getting frost bite! Once in the warmth it recovered, but I found it very frightening to be on the mountain with numb feet, so I decided to call it day and find a nice sunny spot to read until the others came back.
Into Cortina this evening for a little window shopping, as the shops are open until 7.30 p.m. (mind you, they close from lunchtime until mid afternoon). Cortina must surely be the fur capital of the world, I have never seen so many fur coats in my life. Women here wear the most extraordinary array of coats of all designs and they wear them with attitude. I don’t think Australia is cold enough to justify fur, added to which, because of the anti-fur brigade, it's not “politically correct” to wear it. This seems ridiculous to me given that most of us wear leather shoes and carry leather handbags, etc.; if I lived in a cold climate like Cortina I would definitely have a fur coat, and do my best to wear it with attitude!!! Having said that, the likelihood of me ever living somewhere so cold is remote in the extreme.
I think dinner tonight was a highlight. I had the most wonderful cheese fondue with prunes wrapped in prosciutto (that’s Italian for ham, if you were wondering), and Tony had beetroot ravioli which was so sweet I must learn to make it myself, I just love beetroot. Forrest had an enormous plate of raw meat, or Carpaccio to make it sound more appealing, followed by a steak. My primi was followed by pork loin wrapped in more prosciutto (as you can tell, I really do love pig!). All this was washed down with a passable house red. But oh was it cold when we came out of the restaurant, the cold just sliced through my jeans, it must have been at least -10° with a wind chill factor of I don’t know what. Seriously cold. Just before I left Melbourne I was beginning to get a little tired of the heat, it had been so unrelenting all summer. Now I’m beginning to miss my lovely Melbourne weather; how will I manage this year?
When we got back to the hotel the weather forecast was for a “marked drop in temperatures from Friday to Sunday”. Oh dear, we leave on Monday morning.
This morning as I hadn’t set my alarm clock I got up late. I had the best night’s sleep I've had since arriving in Italy and woke very rested. I skied alone as the others had gone to watch the second day of the time trial competition that David and Tony were competing in.
I have to say that this cold takes some getting used to, yesterday I was the coldest I think I have ever been; I certainly couldn't live in a climate like this. Apparently this is quite mild, according to Didi, my ski instructor who has spent the last 30 winters in Cortina, it gets a lot colder mid-winter, it’s almost spring now, although I think there has been a cold snap sweep across Europe which could account for it.
I skied for a while on the lower slopes and then took a lift to one of the higher slopes but that wasn’t a good idea because it was so cold, my nose went numb, my face was icy cold and I began to lose the feeling in my feet again. At the moment my nose is like a dog’s, wet and cold, although in my case not necessarily an indication of good health. My poor nose is still very red from my cold, only made bearable thanks to David giving me some antiseptic cream to ease the rawness.
I stopped about midday on the mountain for a hot chocolate and strudel so that my feet could thaw out (well that’s my story and I’m sticking to it). The last two years I've given up alcohol for Lent, but that wasn’t going to work this year while I was on holiday, so I decided to give up chocolate instead. My intentions were good, but fell in a heap once we arrived in Cortina. Because I didn’t want to continue drinking coffee every day, skiing and hot chocolate seem to go hand in hand, and I succumbed to hot chocolate on the slopes mid-morning. The hot chocolate here is nearly as good as Koko Black in Collins Street, (although I can’t seem to get my favourite hot chocolate mocha here), but it’s the full monty, pure chocolate indulgence, and still very nice.
In the evening we were invited to the Ski Club dinner because Tony and David had competed on behalf of one of the UK teams; it was a great honour to be invited. It started to snow as we arrived which was a little worrying as we only have a front wheel drive car with no chains. The ski club, SC18, was established by 18 Roman worthies many years ago and the club house is amazingly well appointed; they really looked after us and the food was very good.
I had a lot of fun chatting to the English skiing fraternity on my table while Forrest was on another table with the Swiss bankers and industrialists, networking like mad. Sadly he forgot to take any business cards with him, notwithstanding meeting several olive producers. He spent the evening flirting with Veronica, a Milanese lawyer, who declared that she and Forrest were simpatico. Needless to say, Forrest was very smitten. As the story goes, Forrest was then introduced to her husband, whom she described as “my husband today but perhaps not tomorrow”. Goodness knows what games were being played there!
I like being in Italy even with my deficient Italian. Everyone is very friendly, (apart from the occasional negligent shop assistant), and I love the food and countryside. The drivers do leave a bit to be desired and love to tailgate (presumably in the optimistic hope that you will drive faster), and when they realise you won’t they undertake the hairiest overtaking manoeuvres you’ve ever seen, usually on blind corners!
I also love watching the little kids skiing, Didi’s children are 2½ and 4 and apparently both ski well. All the classes you see on the slopes are for bambini, not adults. In fact, you don’t really see adult learners on the slopes at all, presumably unless you learn as a child you just don’t bother. Didi told me he started to ski late, he was 11! Everyone seems to be able to ski at least reasonably well.
I hit the slopes for my final day’s skiing about 9.00 a.m.. It was a glorious day with clear blue skies and I virtually had the slopes behind the hotel to myself, as Sunday is hotel changeover day. By 10 a.m. I decided to return to the hotel for my camera, this time I carried it under my jacket rather than in the rucksack, which made it easier to ski. So long as I can ski at my own pace and take in the scenery every now and then (and take the odd photo), I’m happy. It’s been a lovely week on the slopes here in Cortina.
What can I say about my skiing? I never was a great skier, on a scale of 1-10 I was probably only ever a 5, but it's been great to get back on skis again. By the end of the week I can say that I’m quite pleased with my skiing, given that I haven’t skied for at least 10 years. My knees behaved themselves this week and are holding up well which has rather surprised me given that they were giving me grief last week. All my ski preparation work with Liz Morris, my wonderful personal trainer, paid dividends as my overall fitness and strength held up well.
I have never been, nor will I ever be, a good skier, but by the end of the week I felt pretty confident on the beginners’ slopes!!! I had some great long fast runs and ended the week’s skiing on a high. With a few more lessons I would definitely improve but just ran out of time this week.
Late afternoon we went into Cortina to return our skis and have a wander around the town window shopping. We had an aperitif in a local bar where the locals were very lively indeed, fuelled, we suspected, by more than just alcohol. On the television screen there was the Italian version of Big Brother followed by the Italian version of “Who wants to be a millionaire?”, with exactly the same set used by Eddie Maguire in Australia and Chris Tarrant in Britain. The world continues to get smaller and sadly culture becomes homogenised.
This quaint old-fashioned hotel became know to the Crew as Fawlty Towers. While some of the staff are very sweet, Basil Fawlty was represented by the Concierge. While he was fine with me, some of the others had a different experience. When asked one morning how he was, he is said to have replied, “well, I’m still here(!)”. While he spoke several languages and always remembered my room number, he was inclined to be a bit grumpy.
I had an equally amusing experience with the head waitress (a.k.a. Polly), when I came down to breakfast late one morning. Breakfast was advertised as being between 8.00 a.m. to 10.00 a.m. so I didn’t think 9.15 a.m. was so very late, but even then the dining room was largely set up for lunch. I sat at a table that was not yet set for lunch but I was officiously told by Polly that I couldn't sit at that table. I said rather peevishly, “well you tell me where I can sit”. She seemed very put out and after casting around the room she led me to one of the few tables still cluttered with the detritus of someone else’s breakfast. She cleared one place for me, brushed away the crumbs and signalled that I could sit there!
And finally Manuel, the bell boy; I don’t think he was from Barcelona.
A sign in the lift amused me, it was in Italian, German, French and English, and the English read: Pleasa informe the Reception the day before your departure. Check out time is 10 a.m. (noon).
The hotel is quite inexpensive and notwithstanding the staff issues, it’s good value so long as you don’t actually eat at the hotel. It’s family friendly and there are lots of little kids running around (apart from the brats who repeatedly colonised and broke the hotel’s one computer). If you want a ski in/ski out resort this is the place to choose, especially if you are willing to eat in the hotel’s restaurant.
We farewelled Jo and David this morning who were driving to Venice for a couple of days before returning to Australia. Jenny and Tony had left the day before. I really enjoyed spending the last couple of weeks with Cath and Adrian, Jenny and Tony, and Jo and David, they are a great bunch of people. Now it’s just Forrest and me, it will be interesting to see how he copes with my sole company for the next couple of days.
The road from Cortina took us past some spectacular scenery in northern Italy and Austria. As we drove further north the mountain ranges changed from jagged peaks to soaring rounded ranges. As we headed for Paris we passed through Innsbruck and Zurich; I was rather disappointed with the countryside in Switzerland, it seemed very industrial and not at all what I expected. We stopped for lunch at a roadside cafe somewhere in Switzerland which bizarrely had smoking and non-smoking dining areas! Even the cubicles in the ladies toilets had ash trays, I don’t think I’ve ever seen that anywhere. I would have expected Switzerland to be more advanced on such matters, notwithstanding that it’s not in the EU.
Progressively through the day my mobile phone received the following text messages from Vodaphone; in Italy at 7.36 a.m. (when I turned my mobile phone on), from Vodaphone Austria at 10.52 a.m., from Vodaphone Germany at 1.02 p.m., (although we didn’t actually drive through Germany, we skirted past it), from Vodaphone Switzerland at 1.06 p.m. and finally from Vodaphone France at 5.45 p.m..
Once in France we started to look for somewhere to stay for the night and eventually lighted upon a delightful little town called Colmar, the capital of Upper Alsace. I hadn’t heard of it before but it was in the Michelin Guide and is known as Little Venice because of its canals, and was the birthplace of the man who designed the Statue of Liberty. As always, we headed for the centre of town and found a boutique hotel, the Hotel Le Colombier, in the main street of the Old Town. Colmar is a charming and ancient town with a profusion of ancient buildings in a maze of narrow lanes and streets. I was astonished by both the number and condition of the buildings, they are obviously very well maintained (see photos).
As an aside, I was very surprised by the ease with which my French came back to me, I last studied French in 1977 but I could recall enough to make enquiries at hotels, shops and restaurants. Fortunately, when my limited vocabulary failed me (which admittedly didn’t take long), because I had at least made an effort, I was always helped out by the Frenchies who generally seem to speak English very well and more readily than they did when I was last here in 1986.
We had dinner at a charming restaurant and Forrest unsuccessfully tried to induce the only other diners in the restaurant, two businessmen me from England and the US, to go out drinking after the meal, but they had an early start, so we returned to the hotel and Forrest spent the rest of the evening in the hotel bar. I had an early night.
On our last leg to Paris, we left the hotel without breakfast because Forrest wanted a pastry and coffee from a local patisserie, but his plans were frequently thwarted by a lack of planning and as always everything was closed at that time of the morning. After driving for some time we eventually stopped at a small town mid-morning for a pastry at a local bakery, surprisingly a coffee shop seemed harder to find. The many small villages we drove through seem to be dying, perhaps there is more life during the summer months but they appear shut for business during winter.
We continued to drive west towards Paris, passing through Nancy which has an interesting town square suggesting the town was once very wealthy and important in the 18th century, but oh it was so cold, it was easily below zero. We went for a stroll through the fresh food market, an interesting array of fresh vegetables, fish and meat. The meat stalls were fascinating, with lots of different cuts of meat, offal and horse flesh that we just wouldn’t see in butchers in Australia.
We then stopped at the tiny village of Toul to see the Cathedral, an enormous structure that looms large on the horizon. Sadly by the time we reached the Cathedral, it was shut for lunch so unfortunately it was a wasted diversion because we didn't have time to wait until it reopened.
As Forrest wanted to avoid the toll roads, Karen plotted an alternate route that took us through some very remote agricultural areas in Champagne including villages well and truly off the beaten track. At one stage we were on a road that proved a trifle narrow when we met on-coming traffic.
It was while driving through rural Champagne that we stopped for lunch. Rather surprisingly there were no vines in evidence, I say surprisingly given that we all associate Champagne with sparkling wine and I expected the region would be covered in grape vines, but it wasn’t. Other arable crops yes, chardonnay vines, no. Nonetheless, the countryside is very green with attractive rolling hills.
By taking the long way around to get to Paris we weren’t scheduled to arrive until 5.30 p.m., just in time for the peak hour. Having been to Paris a few years previously, Forrest knew how bad Paris’s peak hour traffic would be but still planned to arrive at 5.30 p.m. when the traffic was at its worst. Although Forrest had changed our original travel plans, he hadn’t shared them with me. I had made some preliminary enquires with an hotel in Paris that Kim had recommended but Forrest appeared to expect the hotel where he had previously stayed to have rooms available without booking, and it didn’t. Fortunately, Paris is teeming with hotels, if not petrol stations (more of that shortly), and we found a nearby hotel in Rue de Lille, the Hotel Bersolys in Saint Germain.
The plan was to fill the petrol tank (as we had to return the hire car with a full tank), drop our bags at the hotel, return the hire car and then have dinner. It was at this point that things went horribly array.
Fact: Paris does not have any petrol stations; what it does have is ad hoc roadside petrol pumps. The drawback is the cost and Forrest wasn’t willing to pay €1.50 per litre, a premium of some 20 Euro cents. So we spent an hour struggling through the gridlocked Parisian peak hour traffic to a petrol station we had passed on the way into Paris. When we finally got there, it was one of those automatic, unmanned stations. Our next problem was that it wouldn’t accept any of our (non-European) credit cards which would only accept chip and pin, which was a prerequisite for pumping the petrol. So still no petrol.
By this stage we had been driving around Paris about two hours so we decided to return the hire car regardless of the state of the petrol tank. However, trying to find the Europcar depot proved even more difficult than finding a petrol station. Poor Forrest, he really doesn’t cope with stress very well as I had discovered to my cost when we were driving out of Turin, and now he had a complete meltdown, swearing and shouting at me for not being able to persuade Karen to plot a route to the Europcar depot which the paperwork claimed was in Esplanade des Invalides. This is not a street address; Karen wouldn’t recognise it and it wasn’t on any of the maps we had. It took several cigarettes for Forrest to regain his composure. He has real anger management issues.
We asked for directions in the street but no-one seemed to be able to help, so eventually we made our way back to the hotel and got directions; it turned out that the Europcar depot was just around the corner. Imagine my surprise when we turned into the Rue de Constantine where the depot is actually located, and Forrest announced that he had been there before because it was where he had returned his hire car the last time he was in Paris, and he’d had difficulty finding it that time as well! What a moron. I’m still waiting for my apology.
Dinner was interesting. We went to a restaurant that Forrest had enjoyed on his previous visit and assured me he knew where it was. I should have known better, because of course he couldn’t find it without much difficulty. Over dinner Forrest’s ill-concealed anger again exploded, although I wanted to avoid a scene in the restaurant, it was a most inappropriate place for him to vent. He really is a very unpleasant man and I'm glad I won’t be seeing him again.
While Forrest returned to England, I decided to stay in Paris as planned to visit the museums off season. The queues in the height of summer are notoriously horrendous so this was an ideal opportunity to see the Louvre and the Musee D’Orsay without the crowds. This proved a good strategy as there were no queues at the Louvre where I spent the entire day from 10.00 .m. to past 6.00 p.m.; it is the most visited museum in the world, and with reason.
The Louvre is like no other museum I have ever visited; it’s part art gallery, part fine arts museum, part stately home complete with 19th century Napoleon III apartments, and part archaeological site. I have never spent so long in one museum. London has the National Gallery and Victoria and Albert Museum which together perhaps offer the range (if not the number) of art works, with a bit of the British Museum thrown in for good measure, but those buildings are Victorian and purpose built rather than the Louvre which was a medieval fort and palace . The foundations of the Louvre include a 14th century moat and keep that have been excavated and are on display in the basement, together with an exhibition on the history of the Louvre and its development over many centuries. Quite fascinating. And I love I. M. Pei’s pyramid in the forecourt, built since I was last in Paris.
Of course, the must-see painting in the Louvre is the Mona Lisa. It was actually bigger than I expected, I think because for years people have being telling me that it’s smaller than they expected, so I expected it to be very small. It’s behind a sheet of glass in a very secure display area, unlike any other painting in the museum, and there are staff standing by the whole time. However, there is much more to the Louvre than the Mona Lisa including an impressive collection of medieval and renaissance art work. In the past I didn’t appreciate this type of art and would always avoid it, but thanks to my visits to Italy over the last couple two years I’ve really come to appreciate it.
There is also an impressive collection of sculptures including Nike of Samothrace (you go girl) and the Vénus de Milo (pretty harmless – sorry – I couldn’t resist). One of the medieval tombstones I found most unusual, the Tomb of Phillipe Pot, is unlike anything I have seen before (see photo).
Culturally the French and Italians are poles apart notwithstanding the close proximity of the two countries. Their food and attitude is quite different, although their driving and parking practices are scarily very similar. Even though London has similarly narrow streets, the English don’t appear to have such an haphazard approach to parking as the French. Plastic bollards, presumably designed not to damage vehicles if struck, have literally been driven over and crushed and are totally ignored. Drivers just pull over wherever there is a space, frequently on a pavement or a corner.
Noticeable is the changed attitude towards English speakers here in France, especially Paris. In the past the French were notoriously rude to tourists who would not at least attempt to speak French, now like their Italian cousins, there is a greater acceptance that English is the international language. Even though I attempt to speak French at every opportunity, once I begin to struggle with a lack of vocabulary or comprehension, they promptly and quite willingly help me out.
I have been surprised by how much French I can remember from my studies in the 1970’s. Words and phrases long since forgotten appeared when needed, which is extraordinary given that I last studied French in 1981. Now I’m being to wonder whether I should pick up French again rather than Italian, but on the whole I know the answer is that I will never be fluent in either but it is useful to have a little of both. Still, I am wistfully thinking about picking up French again. At dinner tonight I felt sufficiently confident to order the nougat ice cream and grilled almonds without the chocolate sauce! (No more chocolate for me until Easter).
I’m loving my time here in Paris, and although it’s still very cold (which I am not enjoying at all), there is an intimacy here in Saint Germain with its narrow streets, quirky local shops and warm and friendly restaurants, I find myself much more comfortable than I expected. I clearly need to spend more time in Paris, the shops are amazing. I’m only glad that most of them are closed when I walk by, they all look very expensive.
I walked myself to a standstill today, by the time I returned to my hotel I could barely put one foot in front of the other. I am now officially all museumed out, well at least for the time being. Today I went to the Musée D’Orsay just down the road from where I am staying, and the Orangerie which is across the river in the Tuilleries Gardens. As with the Louvre yesterday, there were no queues.
When I was last in Paris in 1986, the Musée D’Orsay was still in the process of being converted from a railway station to an art gallery and had not yet opened. Although it’s a magnificent exhibition space, retaining the original ceiling and windows, I feel that too much of the original industrial character of the building has been removed or covered up.
Today the museum was full of school children, there were what seemed like dozens of school parties. Like the Louvre, the Musée D’Orsay was full of Japanese tourists who delight in having photographs taken of themselves next to well-known works of art, frequently in imitation of the pose in the painting or sculpture. There were also a number of painters copying works of art which attracted its own interest (see photo).
When I arrived I was struck by how much smaller the Musée D’Orsay is compared with the Louvre and thinking I would be able to knock it off in a couple of hours, but this proved to be a deceptive impression because most of the galleries are tucked behind the main hall. Apart from the profusion of impressionistic, romantic and mannerist paintings, there are also displays of fine arts including furniture displays from the Arts and Crafts movement and the art nouveau period.
Because Melbourne has had so many touring exhibitions of impressionistic art over the years, (I can remember seeing a Monet exhibition at the National Gallery in the early 1980’s), and there have been many more since, I had previously seen in Melbourne a number of the paintings that belong to the Musée D’Orsay. For that reason I preferred the Louvre because so much of the art, especially the medieval and renaissance works, and the sculptures don’t go on tour in favour of the more popular painting from the 19th and 20th centuries.
There is a splendid restaurant on the first floor overlooking the Seine that was built as part of the building and I took a much need break for lunch (bouillabaisse and glass of wine), while I rested my very weary legs. By this time I was suffering from gallery back and needed to take a break.
As part of the entrance price for the Musée D’Orsay, I was also able to visit the Orangerie across the river. The collection includes some massive works by Monet from his lily period. Two rooms were constructed to display the eight works which are extraordinary by virtue of their scale. Downstairs there is yet more modern art by Picasso, Renoir and Modigliani, and others.
I was slightly disappointed with the Orangerie building as it seems to be a bit like granny’s axe, three new heads and four new handles; very little of the original structure appears to remain. The roof has been replaced with a glass roof, the windows either removed or replaced with modern windows, and the internal structure completely removed and replaced with bare concrete walls; it was a rather brutal environment to view the paintings and there was no sense of the original building remaining.
By the time I got back to the hotel all I was fit to do was fall onto the bed and take a siesta, so that’s what I did.
Back to England today but as my train didn’t leave until early afternoon I decided to take a walk along the Seine to the Eiffel Tower as I would be sitting on trains for the rest of the day and wanted some exercise. It was very overcast which had the merit of the weather being warmer than previous days but it wasn’t ideal photographic conditions, as per the attached photo of the Eiffel Tower, all black and white and no colour.
Just one quick word of warning about the confidence tricksters here in Paris. Wednesday morning as I was walking to the Louvre I was approached by a middle-aged woman who claimed to have just found a gold ring on the ground. She made a great deal of fuss about it being 18 carat gold and then placed it on my finger muttering something about it being my lucky day and to my surprise she then walked away. A few seconds later she returned and asked me for money, saying in her broken English that she is a poor cleaner. I was somewhat bemused by this flagrant attempt to extract money from me and I gave her the ring back and suggested she take it to a pawn shop if she wanted money.
I forgot about the incident but the following day I was walking over one of the bridges to the Orangerie and a young woman walking towards me suddenly stooped down and touched the ground and then by sleight of hand produced a gold ring in her hand, identical to the one I had been offered the previous day (perhaps they buy them by the gross), and held it out to me. I walked past her without a word.
Today I was given the same performance twice more. The second time I was transfixed by the performance and stopped to watch in total amusement. The “discovery” of the ring by was met by surprise and wonderment and it was an Oscar winning performance. Assuming I was a punter he offered the ring to me and I told him in no uncertain terms where he could go. I think he understood my basic Anglo-Saxon.
It is noteworthy that the only place I have had my bag picked was in Paris in 1986, so be warned, the city is full of thieves.
The trip back to Portsmouth was uneventful and I arrived early evening. It’s lovely to be back home with Angela, Rodney and Archie. After my three week gastronomic tour of Italy and France I had expected to have put on weight, but the opposite is true, given the more relaxed fit of my jeans. It must have been all that walking and skiing that burned up the extra calories. Now for a few days of quiet and rest.
I've spent the last week recovering from my first four hectic weeks, leaving Australia on 14th February, travelling first to England and then to Italy and France. Having fun can be very exhausting!
On the surface the differences between Australia and Europe that strike me are not exactly material, in fact it’s all just detail, such as Sensodyne toothpaste tasting different despite being ostensibly the same (yes, I know, that’s very picky), and the weather (if it's not cold, it’s raining). I’ve always said I don’t mind the rain, it’s the cold I can’t cope with. And to quote Billy Connelly, there no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothes, but even with the right clothes, it’s still cold. And I need to buy an umbrella.
And the computer keyboards are all different which I find very strange. The keyboards in England are slightly different (the @ sign is somewhere different), but otherwise essentially the same, Italy is quite different, I had real problems finding both the @ and the apostrophe, and in France they are very different (the A is where the Q is, the W where the Z is, and the M is where the semi-colon is, ahich mqkes it very difficult if you touch type becquse A, M qnd W qre used auite extensively in English, so in France I had to check every word very carefully, whereas in Italy I all but gave up using the apostrophe, which was a real wrench!
I love strolling through supermarkets, so many different things to tempt me; it’s the differences in the domestic details that interest me. The place of origin of fresh food is clearly labelled here in England and it’s extraordinary where all the food comes from, especially fruit and vegetables. Potatoes from Israel, passionfruit from South Africa, broccoli from Belgium and lamb chops from New Zealand. The only two things I’ve found in the local Sainsbury’s that come from Australia are wine and Vegemite (two of my favourite things).
The bit of England I'm living in is not necessary indicative of the whole country, England isn't particularly homogenous and Portsmouth isn't very large or as cosmopolitan or multi-cultural as large urban areas such as London, but there is a sense of disengagement and powerlessness. Notwithstanding a pending election expected to be within the next few months, because voting is not compulsory here and is held on a Thursday rather than a Saturday, many people do not feel empowered and consider that their views are of no value. Consequently they don’t exercise their democratic rights, while at the same time complaining bitterly about their elected politicians who are seen as dishonest and self-serving (not helped by the recent scandals about politicians’ expenses and cash for questions, neither of which reflects well on the mother of all parliaments). For every criticism I hear about the political process, there is a Yes Minister episode that parodied the issue 30 years ago. Plus ça change.
I’ve was watching a television programme about politics and democracy the other night, disturbingly holding up the US as an example of democracy (this is the country that brought us Guantanamo Bay and has the highest proportion of people in prison and convicts executed every year). I find it deeply troubling that Michael Portillo (a former Tory MP), was suggesting that England turn to the US as an example of how to better manage its political structures. For example, politicising justice by electing the police chief was proposed as something to be commended, putting justice on the same populist footing as “Big Brother” and “Dancing with the Stars”, rather than in accordance with basic principles of justice and human rights. I will now get off my soapbox.
Angela always spends Friday afternoon with my cousin James’s partner Claire (yes, I know it’s a bit confusing, and when James and Claire get married later this month she will have the same surname as me, surely one is enough!) and Amelia, their two year old daughter. Amelia is the most delightful little girl with an impish smile, she is quite a charmer. Her sister Megan is only a few months old and still a babe in arms but Amelia is walking and talking and loves the camera. And I've never seen so many toys, I continue to marvel at the amazing toys they make for kids these days, as James said, everything seems to need a battery!
Amelia attends a swimming class for babies and toddlers that she has been going to since she was only a few months old and yesterday afternoon we went to watch. The teacher went through a set routine with the little ones, each supported by either their mum or dad, and it was delightful to see all grandparents and parents (and the occasional cousin), who attend to watch their children and grandchildren with great pride and much delight.
Last night I went out to dinner with Angela and her friends from her P&O days, which was great fun. We went to a pub called The Red Lion, which appears to be a very common name for pubs in England. I had been there before with Angela and Rodney when I came over to England for Christmas in 2007. It’s in a little village on the outskirts of Portsmouth and very “olde England”, if you know what I mean. I had the traditional steak and kidney pudding, complete with suet pastry. Very yummy but very filling.
I love the countryside and today Angela and I spent the afternoon in Chichester, a delightful Cathedral City with a Romano-British history, just a few miles up the road from Portsmouth. It’s everything we think of old England, quaint houses and streetscapes with narrow cobbled streets and as an added bonus, the shopping is much better than Portsmouth.
All in all a very pleasant week doing not very much but walking the dog, reading and sleeping.
We have been anxiously watching the weather forecast for this coming Saturday because of Claire and James’s wedding. Unfortunately the weather has been very unsettled all week with quite a bit of rain, including one thunderstorm which had Archie quivering like a jelly. And the rain here is oh so wet, which I know sounds like I'm stating the obvious, but it can be a slow, persistent rain that sometimes doesn’t even look like it’s raining and yet without an umbrella or raincoat and you can be soaked within minutes.
Sunday we went for a walk around Old Portsmouth, the original township of Portsmouth. Portsmouth is actually an island called Portsea. It’s extraordinary how many English town names we have appropriated in Australia! It was sunny and warm (relatively speaking!), and we had a drink at the Still and West Country House, a attractive old pub right on the seafront. I'm still working my way through the ciders of England, although Bulmers is now on my banned list, there are much tastier and less gassy ciders on the market. Cider was heavily hit with an increased tax in the recent budget and doom and gloom has been forecast for the cider industry in England.
Archie and I went for a walk (complete with waterproof raincoat – for both of us!), and we were very damp by the time we got home. I dried Archie’s undercarriage with the hair dryer, a first for me if not for Archie! He just loves the hairdryer, rolling about on the floor and luxuriating in the warmth, I suppose it’s the equivalent of Tam sitting on the central heating vents. None of the dogs we had when I was growing up would have tolerated being dried with a hair dryer, the noise alone terrified them. Archie is obviously a very 21st century dog, even if he doesn’t like the thunder.
I think I’ve bought myself a little car to get around in as I’ve exhausted the possibilities of walking everywhere, I'm waiting for delivery details. It’s a Mulberry coloured Peugeot 307, similar to the car I hired when I was here in 2007. Because the roads here are so narrow, parking is at a premium and the cost of petrol is nearly twice as much as Melbourne petrol, a small car is the only viable option. Having said that, the car was £6,825 (AU$11,375), the same car in Melbourne would cost more than AU$20,000, so some things are cheaper and other things more expensive. I had thought of buying a Subaru for safety reasons, but I was advised against this as they aren’t that popular here. Unlike Australia (where it seems that every other car is a Subaru, although it probably seems that way to me because I drive one), they are quite rare here in England, where unsurprisingly the majority of cars either English or European made, rather than Japanese.
Today Angela and I went to see Amelia’s swimming lesson again which was fun, and Megan (who is only a three months old is now much more aware than she was when I first came over five weeks ago. She starts her swimming lessons after Easter!
Apart from that it’s been a very quiet week, just reading and walking Archie and improving my skills with my photographic software, Photo Mechanic, Photoshop and Lightroom (as recommended by my professional photographer friend David Simmonds who was on the African safari), and the www.Blurb.com book-making software (as recommended by David and Dale). I'm halfway through compiling the first book of furry African animals which is an extremely time consuming exercise, but also very satisfying. I'm learning the book software as I'm the official photographer for Claire and James’s wedding tomorrow, so no pressure! We are all praying for a fine, rain free day. I've entered into the spirit of the thing and splashed out on a fascinator, something I have never worn before.
This week I've booked my Italian language course in Venice at the end of April, staying with an Italian couple. Four weeks in what I think is one of the most beautiful cities in the world is my idea of bliss. And if I learn some Italian as well, that’s just a bonus.
I am nearly at the end of my first three months which have simply flown by. Since stopping work I’ve spent the last three months sleeping late catching up on several years of sleep deprivation, starting to make some headway into that pile of books I keep buying, and getting my photos under control at long last.
Just in case there is any confusion about whose wedding this is, I hasten to add that it isn't me(!!!), James and Helen are my uncle Rodney (Dad’s brother) and Angela’s children, and James was marrying Claire, his long time partner (11+ years), mother of their two beautiful daughters, Amelia (2½ years) and Megan (3 months). I appreciate this is confusing, whenever I hear the name Claire, both Claire2 (as I think of Claire as surely I have first dibs on the name?), and I both say yes! Claire is a much more common name here in England than Australia, which I quite like because it means I don’t have to spell my name all the time.
After watching the weather forecast all week, we woke to an overcast, cool day. Angela and I had our hair done in the morning and I spent the rest of the morning painting my face and dressing, perfection can take time. Angela has spent many months carefully assembling her outfit, we spent a whole Saturday afternoon last month tracking down a handbag to match her dress, but it was worth it, and she looked lovely.
The wedding was at the Portsmouth Registry Office, a beautifully restored Georgian building which has been attractively refurbished for the purpose. In England you can’t get married in the local park or on the beach or wherever, as we can in Australia, you can only marry in designated premises, so the Registry Office is still a popular venue for weddings in this country. I was more than a little bemused that the Portsmouth Registry Office website says that you can chose a piece of music or song provided that there is no religious content. So that rules out one of my favourite songs by Van Morrison. You can either get married in a church or you have an entirely secular ceremony, no half measures here; I think that is taking political correctness a little too far.
As the appointed photographer I took my usual quota of too many photos and before the ceremony I was advised by the Registrar that I could not take photos of the couple signing the register. Why? Apparently it’s because the register is a legal document. Mmmmm... interesting concept.
The formal ceremony was quite brief and was supplemented by a poem read by Helen, James’s sister. It was called “I'll be there” by Louise Cuddon, it’s a very funny reading and you can Google it if you are interested. I've attached a photo of the happy couple, Claire and James, flanked by Angela and Rodney, Helen and me. I love my dress (although I think it makes me look fat), and the fascinator. I've also attached a couple of other photos of Claire, James and the girls.
The wedding and dinner that followed was attended by family and close friends. The whole thing was beautifully done and the smile didn’t leave James’s face all day. I hope they will be very happy.
The car dealer rang me this morning to let me know that the Peugeot was due to be delivered on Thursday so as instructed I rang Aviva to activate the cover note that was part of the package provided by the dealer. I spent 30 minutes on the telephone to a call centre in Bangalore answering endless questions including my licence status (Australian together with an International licence). I was quoted £350 but then, for no explicable reason, I was told that because I didn’t have a UK licence, something I had advised at the outset, they couldn’t cover me.
Nonetheless, they referred me to one of their “associates” who insure non-UK licence holders. So I spoke with another Indian call centre and answered all the same questions, at the end of which I was quoted a premium of £869! All this took what seemed like hours because I could barely understand the Indian call centre staff and they could barely understand me, I don’t know how many times I spelt my name, the post code, etc, etc. Notwithstanding that I have been driving since 1976, have extensive no-claims bonuses in Australia (and on the advice of Bryony I have copies of the insurance certificates with me to prove this), the computer programme these people use doesn’t allow for the exercise of judgement.
Rodney came home and we discussed the options and agreed that the best way to resolve the problem was to register the car in Rodney’s name and name both of us as drivers, which had been my intention anyway. Rod suggested we go to the Post Office where I could speak with a real person (as distinct from on-line or speaking with someone in a call centre in India), so off we went to the local Post Office. After explaining my licence status we still ended up speaking with someone on the telephone who, after answering all the same questions we had been asked before, then quoted us £1,963!
Back home Rod rang his current insurer who quoted £377 for the same cover, which we readily accepted. But that wasn’t the end of the sorry sage. I rang the car dealer who requested we get the insurer to email through the insurance certificate so that they could register the car with the DVLA (the equivalent of the RTA). I spoke with the insurer (well, someone in Bangalore), and was told they didn’t have an email system. I laughed. No seriously, they won’t email people but said they would fax the dealer.
An hour later I received a call from the car dealer, they had received a fax but it was just a letter confirming the insurance, not the certificate the DVLA requires. So I rang Bangalore again to be told that they could not fax the insurance certificate. The reason? Because it’s an “official” document and can’t be faxed or emailed, it has to be posted, which can take three to four days. Now I can hear Fred laughing, having warned my about the pettifogging bureaucracy I would encounter in England, but this was compounded by Indian pettifogging bureaucracy. In fairness, the car dealer has no problems with Aviva emailing the certificate (they just wouldn’t cover me), but the insurer would neither email nor fax the insurance certificate because it’s an official document. What the hell does that mean??? In the 21st century I can’t prove I have insurance because I have to rely on snail mail.
And another thing, while I'm on the subject of cars, when you register a car here you register it from the first day of the month, for instance, if you register a car on the 25th March you pay for the whole month of March and it is due to be renewed the following year on 1st March and not 25th. Effectively you are paying 10% more for the registration than if you registered the car on the first day of the month. How inefficient is that???
The Peugeot was delivered today at lunchtime, a delicious Mulberry coloured 307. I am very happy. Mimi, my new French car, has joined Midge (my Mulberry coloured MG), and Martha (my blue Subaru). I know that’s two cars more than I need but I have to be mobile while here in England so I now have three cars. I will have to rationalise the situation at some stage.
On delivery I filled the petrol tank, which cost £60 (AU$100), and then went for a drive to get used to Mimi and the English roads, it's not the traffic I have a problem with but the narrowness of the roads. I went to Gunwharf Quays for a bit of retail therapy and ended up with another Radley handbag (in justification it was on sale and a third of the original price), an umbrella and some coffee. It was bitterly cold and blowing a gale on the waterfront (there have been snow storms in Scotland and Ireland overnight), and then I had to find my way back to Angela and Rodney’s without a street map or SatNav (which should arrive tomorrow). I took the scenic route (code for I got lost but got back eventually!).
Having driven around Tuscany last year without a SatNav and this year with one I can’t imagine driving around England and Europe without one again. I would never have contemplated buying a SatNav in Melbourne because I know my way around, but it’s too hard to self-navigate around England and Europe.
My electronic girlfriend and new best friend, Jane (SatNav lady), arrived this morning, so off I went to put her through her paces. It was an unexpectedly lovely clear day with lots of blue sky and fluffy white clouds, ideal for exploring the highways and by-ways of England. I headed west and found myself at Chichester again, the picturesque town Angela and I visited last week. It's a Cathedral city and quite ancient, founded by the Romans, although the architecture today is predominantly Georgian with fragments of Roman mosaics. I explored the Cathedral (which boasts a wonderful Chagall window), and Cathedral Close which dominate the centre of the city and I had a light lunch in Waterstone’s, (a large chain of book shops), which overlooks the Cathedral, while buying yet more books to add to my never-diminishing pile.
On the way home I asked Jane to plot me a route that avoided the major roads and I had a delightful drive along narrow lanes and through little villages, the very essence of English rural life, safe in the knowledge that no matter where I detoured, I wouldn’t get lost as Jane would always get me back home. The stress of self-navigating has been removed with technology. How wonderful.
This evening Angela and I went to the cinema to see The Blind Side, starring Sandra Bullock. Had it not been based on a true story with photos and footage of the real family portrayed in the movie at the end, it could have easily have been dismissed as nothing more than a rather sentimental story, but tying it back to reality made it work, even if I don’t understand American football.
Tonight was the celebratory wedding party following Claire and James’s wedding last week, held at the Spinnaker Tower. The weather was not kind to us and it was pouring with rain when we arrived. I'm told the Spinnaker Tower is one of the 10 best towers in the world and it’s certainly a great asset for Portsmouth, it’s visually very striking.
We took the lift to the viewing platforms at the top, and had stunning 270° views of Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight. The Portsmouth Historic Naval Dockyards were clearly visible (still on my “must-do” list), and as the sun went down and the lights came on, the rain created multi-coloured jewel-like droplets on the windows.
Tonight’s party was for all Claire and James’s friends, whereas the wedding and dinner last week was limited to family and a handful of close friends, and the functions split over two weeks as it was thought it would be too much for Amelia and Megan to do it all on one day. It worked really well and everyone had a great time.
As the official wedding photographer, since last Saturday I have been compiling a book of photos for Claire and James, as I did for Kim and Sean last year, although this time using different software. All I needed were the photos from tonight’s party to complete the project. The www.blurb.com software is very easy to use and I'm reasonably happy with the book so far. I'm not a professional photographer but a very enthusiastic amateur and the flash gun was a bit hit and miss, so I do hope Claire and James are happy with the final product.
More blue sky and the forecast was promising, so Jane and I set off for Petworth House, just a few miles from Portsmouth. It's been owned by the National Trust since 1947 and the house boasts a large art collection including a number of paintings by J M W Turner, probably my favourite painter, as well as paintings by Titian, Van Dyck, Hieronymous Bosch, and Gainsborough. Turner spent time at Petworth and immortalized the 17th century house in a series of famous paintings of the house, grounds and surrounding countryside, including a couple of my favourites.
Apart from the paintings, there are the furniture and porcelain collections, a room known as the Carved Room with the most intricately and beautifully rendered carvings by Grinling Gibbons, ancient sculptures collected on the Grand Tour of the 2nd Earl of Egremont, and the gardens were landscaped by Capability Brown, so there is something for everyone. The gardens are extensive with the daffodils all in bloom, although being early Spring, apart from the daffodils the gardens are not at their best.
Some stately homes prohibit the taking of photographs in the house, and Petworth is one of those houses, unless you agree that any photos you take are for personal use only and not published and you wear a special badge confirming that undertaking. I haven't seen that before.
The village of Petworth is pretty, with its narrow streets and half timbered homes opening right onto the street. At Petworth House I had picked up a brochure for a museum in Petworth called Mrs. Cummings’s Cottage. It’s a tiny house that is an example of what the Petworth estate provided to its workers in 1910. The tenant in 1910 was a Mrs Cummings who was a seamstress at Petworth House, and the house has been decorated and furnished as it would have been in 1910, complete with gas lighting and a single cold water tap in the kitchen. No bathroom. It was considered a very comfortable and well appointed home for an estate worker at the time. Well worth the diversion.
And finally, Gordon Brown has called an election. Gosh, what a surprise. Given the general antipathy to politicians in this country the outcome is by no means certain and I will be watching the contest with much interest.
I’m still exploring the south coast around Portsmouth so today I drove to Arundel Castle, first built immediately following the Norman Invasion in 1066; it’s huge having been built and rebuilt many times over the last 1,000 years. While Petworth House was attractive, the building was unremarkable, for me the attraction was the art collection. Alternatively, Arundel Castle has some interesting art but its main appeal is the building and grounds. It’s the ancestral home of the Dukes of Norfolk and England’s senior Roman Catholic family. The entrance cost, although I thought expensive, was nonetheless worth the price and I spent several enjoyable hours exploring the grounds and house.
Daffodils and pale yellow primroses are in full bloom everywhere at the moment. In parks there is a blanket of yellow, elsewhere there are clumps planted in gardens and along the sides of the road, in public and private spaces, signalling the start of spring. Yellow certainly make everything look cheerful and Arundel Castle is currently covered with daffodils and primroses. I found the walled kitchen garden very interesting, although at this time of the year there weren’t a lot of vegetables and fruit growing, apart from rhubarb, but I was particularly taken with the rhubarb pots designed to ensure that the stems grow straight.
It was at this point that I dropped my camera; it fell a couple of feet and hit the ground with a very loud crash, followed immediately by an even louder scream (that was me). Once I collected myself I ran the camera through its paces and it seems to be working okay, thank goodness, I’m surprised it wasn’t damaged given the distance it fell. I had such a fright and must be more careful in the future.
When I got back to Portsmouth, the insurance certificate had finally arrived in the post today, it has taken a week which is pretty pathetic because we haven’t been able to register the car without it. What a saga getting the car insured and registered has been.
This morning I set off on my travels up north. My first stop was Camberley just outside London to pick up my cousin Shirley, and we then drove to Bolton where we are staying overnight with my cousin Susan.
The weather was fine when I left Portsmouth first thing in the morning with blue sky and fluffy white clouds, but as Shirley and I drove north, the clouds and the sky both became progressively greyer. We arrived late in the afternoon; for such a small country it still takes several hours to get anywhere!
Sue lives in a huge (and reputedly haunted), house and former vicarage in Astley Bridge, a suburb of Bolton, which is in turn a commuter town for Manchester. Sue hosts students and her house resembles the League of Nations. With six bedrooms and four bathrooms Sue has plenty of room and enjoys filling her house with interesting young people from around the world. Tonight she has two more around the dinner table and we had an enjoyable communal dinner with Martina, a student from Norway who speaks excellent English with a Mancunian accent, and Sue’s son Scott.
I was born in Barrow in Furness in Cumbria, in northern England. My father was a Londoner but my mother, although born in Newcastle, grew up in Barrow and I was born there because my mother was nursing her terminally ill mother. I was only there a few weeks and then my parents returned to London after my grandmother and namesake, Clara Hannah, died at the age of only 57.
Of my four grandparents (English, Irish. Spanish and something middle European), I take after my maternal grandmother’s English (Smith) family. From Clara Hannah Smith I inherited my name, my looks, (by which I mean I resemble her), and my sewing skills, and although I never knew her I know she was much loved by my Mum and Auntie Lily, her step-daughter.
So I have no memories of Barrow. None at all. I returned to Barrow in 1986 for a few hours on my way to the Lake District, and again ten years later, but I have never spent any time here and have no sense of belonging. But it’s not just that I was born in Barrow, my mother grew up here, both before, during and after the Second World War, and the deprivations of life in the north were impressed upon me from an early age.
My mother came from a very poor family and she left school when she was 14. She lived in what is known in England as a two-up two-down terrace house at 29 Osborne Street with her mother, step father (my mother’s father died in an industrial accident when she was five), half-brother, step-sister and step brother. You can buy a house in Osborne Street today for £65k (approx AU$100k), and for that you get a living/dining room and kitchen downstairs, two bedrooms upstairs (11'1" x 13'5" and 8'11" x 7'10"), the front door opens straight onto the street and the back yard is a small area backing onto a laneway. That’s it. My mother and five other people lived in this small house. Only when I actually saw how narrow these houses did I begin to understand how very different my life is. And people are still living there today.
My cousin Sue, my mother’s half-brother’s daughter, and I were born a year apart in the same maternity hospital on Abbey Road, and she now lives in Bolton. Sue, her daughter Ellen, Shirley and I drove from Bolton to Barrow to visit Auntie Lily, my mother’s step-sister and only surviving sibling, who at 88 is in very poor health. Auntie Lily still lives only streets away from where she grew up with my mother. Ellen and I drove up in Mimi and Shirley and Sue in Sue’s car; Ellen isn't a natural conversationalist, certainly she had no interest in talking to me and spent most of her time texting her friends during the entire two-hour trip from Bolton to Barrow-in-Furness.
The catalyst for this trip was to scatter my mother’s ashes, but unfortunately I had some problems getting the ashes to England so they are currently still in Australia. Nonetheless, Sue, Shirley and I decided that we would still go to Barrow on what would have been my Mother’s 81st birthday to commemorate her memory. Mum had left me with clear instructions that she wanted her ashes co-mingled with my sister’s ashes, and to then scatter a portion in Melbourne near where Mum lived, a portion on her mother’s grave in Barrow, and the balance at a place Mum always called “up the shore”, where she spent the happiest days of her life as a child. As I have discovered, “Up the shore” is an area known locally as the Black Huts, at a place disconcertingly called Lousy Point. But there was a problem. While I had Googled Lousy Point and knew where that was, neither Sue nor I had any idea which specific hut had belonged to our grandparents. As Auntie Lily is housebound she was unable to come with us but described the hut as being blue.
Undeterred, off we drove to Lousy Point where we had to abandon the car because the road is unsealed and basically un-drivable for Mimi, and we had quite a long but pleasant walk to reach the black huts, so called because the roofs are coated in pitch to weather proof them. Next problem, there were four huts painted blue. Mum’s instructions had been to scatter her ashes at the shoreline in a direct line with the hut her parents had owned when she was growing up, so it was at this point that I was grateful that I didn’t have Mum’s ashes as we couldn't with any certainty identify the right hut. Nonetheless, I took photos of all the huts, there are 12-15 huts in total, so that we could ask Auntie Lily to identify the correct hut.
The area is part of the Sandscale Haws Nature Reserve and is home to much native flora and birdlife and is largely owned by the National Trust. Roanhead Beach and its sand dunes face the Isle of Man and the northern tip of Walney Island and on a fine day I am told you can actually see the Isle of Man (although not today).
In Mum’s day it would have been a beautiful spot but today Lousy Point has been blighted to some extent by industrial buildings that have crept along the coastline and are clearly visible from the huts, and in the middle distance, wind turbines have been constructed.
Next stop was the cemetery to visit my grandmother’s grave. The headstone was quite weathered and some of the lead lettering had disappeared, but I was able to decipher it with some difficulty and was somewhat surprised to discover that my grandmother was sharing her grave with three other people, her husband who died in 1960, her husband’s first wife who died in 1927 and their 13 week old baby (Auntie Lily’s brother) who died in 1920. We also visited the graves of Sue’s father, (my Uncle Tommy and mum’s half-brother), and mother. All in all today was quite an emotionally charged day and I was very grateful to Sue, Shirley and Ellen for sharing the day with me.
Sue, Shirley and Ellen returned to Bolton late that afternoon and I stayed in Barrow as I plan to spend the next couple of weeks exploring the region. I found a lovely small hotel on Abbey Road near where I was born called the Chetwyn Hotel which had once been a large Victorian family home, and is now converted into a hotel.
Despite having been to Barrow on two previous occasions, I have never been to Furness Abbey, the preeminent tourist attraction in Barrow. The abbey was established in the early 12th century and dissolved by Henry VIII in 1537 as part of the dissolution of the monasteries after he fell out with the Roman Catholic Church because the Pope wouldn’t grant him a divorce from Catherine of Aragon after 20 years of marriage.
Sadly, what were no doubt once beautiful buildings were destroyed and all you see today is the ruins. I have previously visited other Abbey ruins such as Fountains and Rievaulx, both in Yorkshire, and Furness is equally imposing. First the lead was stripped from the roof, then the building were dismantled and the building materials used elsewhere. The land was granted by Henry VIII to his cronies and the power of the monasteries, which had owned until then owned 1/6th of the land in England, was dispersed.
Furness Abbey is now owned by English Heritage, and as with the National Trust, because I support the maintenance of Britain’s architectural history I signed up and joined them on the spot. I spent at least two hours among the ruins which are quite extensive. It’s a quiet and peaceful place and by tracing around the ruins of the original buildings you get a sense of what was there before. Highly recommended.
Driving down Abbey Road, I saw an army tank, not something you see every day (see photo). The other thing that I have noticed in Barrow that isn’t as apparent elsewhere is seeing bobbies on the beat, something you don’t see in Melbourne except in the city. And the English are enjoying the arrival of spring and can be seen driving their sports cars with the rooves down and wearing sleeveless tops. It's not that warm enough for me but the weather remains fine and I haven’t seen any rain since I left Portsmouth.
From Furness Abbey I drive over to Walney Island, a sliver of an island running to the west of Barrow and accessible to the mainland via a bridge. The stretch of water between Barrow and Walney Island would be attractive, except that when the tide goes out the fishing and pleasure boats are left sitting on their keels in the mud which is not that attractive. And the industrial buildings do not make a pleasing backdrop. But the other side of the island facing out to sea offers a long beach well used by the locals for walking and horse-riding.
While visiting my grandmother’s grave yesterday had been an emotional experience, I felt the need to return and leave some flowers and pay my respects in private. My mother never recovered from the death of her mother and always missed her; I think the loss of a mother is something that we never fully recover from. Before going back to the hotel I popped in to see Auntie Lily again and had a chat about her childhood with Mum.
This morning was somewhat overcast and although I had only booked into the hotel for two nights I decided to extend my stay by one day because I wanted to visit the Dock Museum. The museum is built over an original Victorian graving (dry) dock and utilises the foundations to display exhibits. It’s a really excellent local museum and I spent a good two hours there, and was fascinated and learned a good deal about the history of the town.
Barrow appears in tourist books because of Furness Abbey and Dock Museum, but otherwise it is not a noted tourist attraction because it isn’t in any sense an attractive town. It grew a thousandfold from a small village of no more than 450 people to 45,000 people some 30 years later and was a purpose-built industrial town and powerhouse of the burgeoning industrial revolution. I had always understood that Barrow was a major ship building town and as a consequence it was bombed during WWII. What I had not realised was that it had developed in the mid-1800’s because of the iron ore (hematite) deposits in the area. It’s a strange coincidence that I have quite a lot of hematite jewellery because I've always loved the colour and lustre. The shipbuilding followed and Barrow has over the years developed a significant marine engineering expertise with a major presence by BAE Systems, which even has operations in Australia. Ships built in Barrow include the Oriana which was built for the UK to Australia route (and was being built when I was born), and HMS Invincible, an aircraft carrier still in service.
Barrow has been called the largest cul-de-sac in Britain because, like Paynesville, once you get there you have to turn around and drive back out as Barrow is at the end of a Peninsula. It has also been unkindly described over the years as “a dump” and “like a morgue with the lights turned on”, (according to a short film I saw at the museum), and because of its engineering bias, it suffers badly from cyclical economic downturns, so at present it's a quiet, lacklustre town struggling with the industrial decline.
Having said all that, I can say that I am extremely proud to have been born here, it is a testament to a hard working, tenacious and proud people who have suffered extreme hardships. It can only be a matter of speculation how my life would have turned out had my family not emigrated to Australia in 1968, and I am so lucky to have had the education and opportunities Australia has afforded me, never let it be said that I am ungrateful. These musings are no more than that as I love Australia, but I also love England and the question I have to resolve this year is, how do I reconcile that? In Australia every time I open my mouth people know I am English. In England I open my mouth and people know I am Australian.
I had lunch a lunch at the Duke of Edinburgh, and being Sunday I had traditional roast beef, horseradish sauce, roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings and lashings of gravy, just as Dad used to make. Very nostalgic, it took me back to my childhood.
I spent the afternoon driving around the town to orientate myself and get a feel for the place, but it is very quiet and felt almost deserted. I drove out to Roa Island which is accessible via a causeway, and from there I could see Piel Island which I would have liked to have visited but there was nowhere to park the car (a frequent problem in this country), so I decided not to wait for the next ferry and instead enjoy a drive in the countryside, passing small parish churches and fields of sheep with their newborn lambs gambling around after their mothers. They look so white and delicate, apart from the black lamb that was wrapped in orange plastic; I can only assume it’s to protect it from the cold and frost.
I finished the day in Dalton, a small market town which predates mediaeval times not far from Barrow. Unlike Barrow, it's quaint and pretty and according to the tourist material is renowned for its traditional public houses, which I have to admit from the outside looked very appealing, although I didn’t actually venture into any.
After three enjoyable days in Barrow it was time to move on and drive up into the Lake District but not before dropping by the tourist bureau to see if I could buy some books on the history of Barrow as the Dock Museum whetted my appetite.
I’m enjoying driving around England with Mimi and Jane and I especially enjoy being able to stop whenever I want to take a photo. One of the reasons I enjoyed the African safari was because I was travelling with friends who were keen photographers like me, and having a professional photographer in the group certainly helped!
I took the scenic route out of Barrow along the coast road, making my way to Holker Hall. I hadn’t heard of Holker Hall before but as it was sort of on the way to the Lake District, I thought it would be worth a viewing and I was not disappointed.
Holker Hall is the home of Lord and Lady Cavendish, the junior branch of the Devonshire family (which owns Chatsworth). I thought it amusing that in the 1980’s comedy, To the Manor Born, Richard De Vere, who as a Polish émigré had changed his unpronounceable Polish name to De Vere, had named his company Cavendish Foods because he thought it sounded more up market!
The house dates back to the early 1600’s and has been in the same family throughout. The wing that is open to the public was rebuilt following a fire in the 1870’s and is quite beautiful. The library and drawing room were both beautifully furnished and decorated and the house had the lived in feel of a real home, admittedly and wealthy one. I was very taken with the whole place, and unlike some stately homes that are very grand and ostentatious and feel like a museum, this house is on a human scale and feels like a home, which it is.
The gardens and parkland are also well laid out and there is a waterfall, a labyrinth and a wonderful sundial carved from a single piece of local granite that tells good time, if you adjust for summer time! There’s also a shop and tea rooms so I had lunch outside in the sunshine; the weather has been remarkably kind to me since I came up north, every day has been fine and I’ve even stopped carrying my umbrella!
After lunch I headed off to Levens Hall via Grange-over-Sands, described to me by Shirley as being like something out of an Agatha Christie novel. I could imagine Jane Marple walking down the main street with a shopping basket over her arm.
On each of my previous two visits to the Lake District I have wanted to visit Levens Hall but for one reason or another it never happened, so I was determined to make it happen this time. The house dated back to the mid 13th century and, like Holker Hall remains a family home. However, this house it a very different building, being much older, and the difference is palpable. Whereas the part of Holker Hall that is open to the public is neo-Elizabethan Gothic built in the 1870’s, the part of Levens Hall that is open to the public is Elizabethan, all dark wood panelling and Jacobean furniture, with small rooms and lower ceilings. It’s much less “homey” than Holker Hall, but the main attraction is the garden.
The topiary garden is the oldest in the world, and while topiary is not really to my taste, it is extraordinary the amount of work that has gone into developing the garden over 300 years and it is well worth seeing. Apart from the topiary garden, the rest of the grounds are interesting and would benefit from a visit in the summer months as it isn’t really at its best at the moment.
From Levens I drove into Kendal which was on the way but is otherwise an unremarkable town, and continued to drive north and into Windermere. As it was coming up to 5.00 p.m. I was conscious that I would have to find accommodation. I drove around the town for a while and half way between Windermere and Bowness I spied an hotel called Woodlands which rather caught my eye (using the rather unscientific basis that I liked the sign!). I pulled in and they had a couple of vacancies and although the rooms are more expensive than Barrow, that’s really to be expected in the Lake District so I took a very pleasant room for a couple of nights. I’ve noticed the English love using wallpaper and the wallpapers I've seen in the last week or so, from Sue’s house in Astley Bridge, to the hotels where I've stayed, use Florence Broadhurst style wallpaper with large bold patterns, with (thankfully), not a Laura Ashley floral sprig to be seen.
Following the Italian theme, I had dinner at a restaurant recommended by the hotel, Villa Positano, where I had the mushroom risotto and lemon sorbet, served in a hollowed out lemon, delicious.
Although I don’t normally eat a cooked breakfast, while on holiday I will often start the day with a full English breakfast to fuel up for the day, especially when it’s included in the hotel’s tariff!
The Lake District is justly renowned for its magnificent views and has inspired poets and artists for hundreds of years. Most famously perhaps was Wordsworth who lived in the Lake District most of his life and wrote "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud", commonly known as "Daffodils". Apart from the ubiquitous daffodils, the prevailing colour of the area is slate grey and although the day started fine, it became increasingly overcast and cool as the day progressed. I spent the morning visiting Wordsworth’s home, Dove Cottage and the adjoining museum. Although I’m not a fan of poetry, I nonetheless found it very interesting, especially as there were a number of paintings and sketches of the area by well known artists such as Edward Lear.
Hearing names like Wordsworth, Southey and Tennyson, I remembered that I grew up in Southey Street in Elwood where all the streets were named after British poets including: Burns, Keats, Milton, (Wordsworth, Shakespeare, Tennyson, Dryden, Browning, Ruskin, Milton, Addison, Cowper, Spenser, Thackeray, Gordon, Lindsay, Bryon, Goldsmith, Scott and Shelley. Presumably the streets in Elwood were laid out by a poetry fan. It’s funny the things that occur to me, my mind does wander.
The olfactory sense is strongly linked to memory. They were burning coal at Dove Cottage, a smell quite different to wood burning fires and I could remember the smell from my childhood when we had a coal fire when we lived at Four Marks in Hampshire. I can remember the coal bunker outside and the delivery of coal in hessian sacks. It’s funny the things that come back to you.
And I’m somewhat surprised by the number of Japanese tourists I’ve seen here in the Lake District, including Dove Cottage. I was even more surprised to see a National Trust sign in English and Japanese.
I spent the rest of the day driving around part of Lake Windermere, eventually making my way to Near Sawrey where Beatrix Potter lived at Hilltop Farm, followed shortly thereafter by Far Sawrey. At one stage Jane sent me down a single lane road that was so narrow I was obliged to drive really slowly (not that I’m complaining, driving slowly allows me to take in the scenery). However, I drove in dread of meeting a car coming the opposite way, as there was nowhere to turn around and it was a great relief when the lane turned into a wider (well relatively), road.
There were fell walkers everywhere, they are an enthusiastic bunch as it was rather cool and threatened rain all day, although thankfully it didn’t materialise. The major villages sport numerous shops selling clothing and paraphernalia for walkers and it’s clearly big business around here. After several years of prevaricating I have bought myself one of those hiking poles used for balance on uneven terrain, justifying it because of my dodgy knee which has a propensity to flare up from time to time without warning.
A propos nothing very much in particular, I also saw a number of Royal Air Force jets fly over Windermere Lake today, presumably there’s an Air Force base nearby. They are pretty impressive as they scream by and disappear in a flash.
Having decided to extend my stay in Windermere by a couple of days, I drove north to Keswick to explore Derwent Water. Contrary to popular belief, there is only one lake in the Lake District, Bassenthwaite Lake. All the others are meres or waters, not lakes. Don’t ask me the difference, I haven’t an idea, it’s just one of those QI questions I haven’t forgotten.
I thought Ambleside had a lot of outdoor shops for ramblers/fell walkers/hikers (call them what you will), but that was nothing compared with Keswick. Half the shops appear to be for hikers, and the other half aren’t worth visiting. Keswick isn’t a particularly attractive town and the shopping highlight for me was the sweet shop with the old fashioned jars and sweets measured out on weighing scales. I bought 200g of floral gems which I adore, and two bars of Caramac made by Nestles (not Nestlé!). I just love Caramac, a caramel chocolate that I remember from my childhood which is somewhat difficult to find these days.
I've been to Keswick twice before but the shopping precinct has now been pedestrianised, and on neither occasion did I venture out onto the water, so I decided to change that today. This was the best way to see the lake and surrounding countryside because the alternative is to walk around the lake; it’s virtually impossible to drive around as there is nowhere to stop and admire the views, and anyway, the road doesn’t go all the way around. The Lake District has been described as a car park during the summer months, it becomes inundated with cars and the area simply can’t cope. The roads were designed for a different age and car parks are few and far between, making driving around the area a bit of a challenge because there are few places to pull over, turnaround or overtake.
The cruise was in a beautiful wooden launch and I sat at the front to get a good view. It also meant that I got a face full of spray which was very refreshing. The countryside around Derwent Water is more rugged and wild than the sedate landscape further south at Windermere. It was well worth the trip.
I then decided to visit the Cumberland Pencil Company Museum, even though I have a tepid interest in pencils. Because I’d been to Keswick twice before and hadn’t been to the museum, I thought I should see it at least once; I have to say that I was pleasantly entertained. The museum is very small but educational and worth the entrance fee, although I thought the cost of the car park was a bit steep. What I hadn’t realised was that lead pencils (so called, it’s actually graphite not lead), were invented in Keswick because they had the best graphite in the world for making pencils, and an industry rapidly developed.
I remember at school that owning a full set of 72 Derwent pencils was a great accomplishment. The best I could manage was a set of 36; my friend Julie P had the full set and was very pleased with herself. Today a full set of 72 pencils costs £95 so they are still quite expensive, but they continue to be made in Cumbria and not China which probably explains the cost, and they are the Rolls Royce of coloured pencils.
From Keswick I drove back south to Windermere, via the Castlerigg Stone Circle, an ancient stone circle thought to be older than Stonehenge. It was poorly signposted and I only found it because there were cars and an ice cream van parked next to a field in the middle of nowhere. Notwithstanding the poor signposting, the stone circle obviously attracts a lot of visitors to justify an ice cream van camping next to the field. It was certainly worth the detour and is a very special place, with magnificent views over the treeless hills.
It’s now been two months since I left home and I have to confess that I don’t miss home or work. Having spent the last 40+ years saying I couldn't live in England, I've settled into the swing of things much more quickly than I expected. I’m really enjoying being here, and with the forthcoming election it’s an interesting time. The people are really polite and friendly, they are courteous everywhere, including on the road.
The first time I drove in England was in 1986, and many times since, but in recent years I decided I didn’t enjoy driving on the narrow roads and one-way systems. It explains the Poms’ love affair with small cars because the roads are so narrow, and everywhere you park seems to cost money. Mimi makes Martha, my Subaru Liberty, look large by comparison.
I do struggle with the speed limits here, they change depending on whether an area is designated “built up”, (what the hell does that mean, it’s so subjective), and whether the road is dual carriageway or motorway. I live in fear of speeding fines because I just don’t get it. I tend to rely on Jane who generally (but not always), displays the speed limit and warns me if I'm speeding. Somewhat bizarrely the areas with speed cameras are indicated with signs to that effect, a system hardly designed to change behaviour if you know where the cameras are located.
One last day in the Lake District and I decided I had to take a walk. I drove to the Bowness pier where there is an all day car park (pay and display and very expensive). The problem with this system is that you have to know how long you are likely to be because you have to pre-pay, the result being that you have to over-estimate the length of your stay or run the risk of a parking ticket, so the council benefits either way. I took a ferry from Bowness to Ambleside and was very pleased to discover that the ferry had been built in Barrow. It was very brisk on the deck and most of the Poms were cowering inside out of the wind, but I enjoyed the freshness and stood at the prow enjoying the views. It is still early spring and a little bit of snow remains visible on the distant hills.
From Ambleside I took a launch to Wray Castle on the western side of the lake as I planned to walk to the next pier, a couple of hours south. Most of the passengers on the launch were also taking the same walk, so it’s obviously a very popular walk. The weather was glorious and I had the most wonderful walk, the air was clear and crisp and the sky was blue. The land hereabouts is largely owned by the National Trust which is quite strict about maintaining the pristine nature of the countryside and is in part responsible for maintaining the shortage of parking and narrowness of the roads, presumably to discourage too many tourists, which I sort of understand.
Apart from the daffodils, what I am particularly enjoying about being in England at this time of the year is the trees, skeletal and bereft of foliage. I think that trees without leaves are quite beautiful because you can see their shape. I have lost count of how many photos I have taken of trees, you can see their strength and character when you see them naked. And without leaves you can see through to the surrounding countryside which you wouldn’t be able to do if the trees were in leaf. My walk today would have been just as enjoyable but a totally different experience, I would have been walking through a leafy arbour and only occasionally catching glimpses of the lake. Today I could see the lake to my left at all times, with ferries, launches and yachts gliding along. It was very serene and I couldn't have enjoyed myself more. There were lots of family groups, cycling or walking their dogs. Dog ownership must be higher in England than Australia, I see so many people walking their dogs here.
The hiking pole does make a difference, taking the strain off my dodgy knee, especially when the ground was uneven, unstable or there was an incline. I was disappointed when I reached the pier as I had enjoyed the walk so much I didn’t want it to end. I like walking, it’s my favourite form of exercise, but I don’t walk nearly often enough. Here there are so many delightful country walks, I suppose living in a city I just don’t get out into the country enough.
I caught the ferry back to Bowness. This ferry was a car ferry like the one that operates between Paynesville and Raymond Island on the Victorian lakes. As it was still only mid afternoon I decided to go for a drive to nowhere in particular just to see how far it is.
Dinner was at a restaurant called Postillion where I had the fish cake followed by sorbet. The service was a little slow and the Spanish waitress did seem to struggle with the concept of peppermint tea and I got Indian tea instead. No matter, it tasted just as good. After recently reading an article about Alexander McCall Smith discussing drinking tea without sugar, Fred will be pleased to hear that I am now drinking my tea unsweetened!
And the answer is they built Hadrian’s Wall. I have always been interested in Romano-British history and for many years have wanted to visit Hadrian’s Wall and specifically Vindolanda. Hadrian’s Wall stretches across England from the Solway Firth in the west to the mouth of the Tyne at Wallsend in the east, and was designed to keep the barbarians (i.e. the Scots), out of the Roman Empire.
Driving north from the Lake District, my first stop was at Banks East Turret, a segment of the wall that happens to be by the road. The countryside here in Northumberland is quite different to the Lake District, the hills are rounded rather than ragged but entirely tree-less and brown rather than green. It’s quite a stark, almost Australian drought affected landscape and not at all like the picture postcard image we expect of England.
On to Birdoswald Roman Fort, an English Heritage property, which has the longest continuous stretch of the wall. The thing about Roman ruins is that they are ruins. When you visit houses like Petworth or Holkers Hall or even Dove Cottage, you are seeing houses largely as they were lived in. But the Roman ruins are just outlines of buildings, if that, there isn’t a single extant complete building, and you have to use your imagination and “artist’s impressions” of what the buildings would have looked like. But how do they really know?
My next stop was the Roman Army Museum which was something of a disappointment. The museum was probably worth the £4.50 (AU$8) entrance fee, but there are no ruins to view notwithstanding that the museum is next to the site of the Roman Fort of Magna because it hasn’t yet been excavated, so there is nothing to see apart from a field. The Roman Army Museum is managed by the Vindolanda Trust, an independent trust. While I have joined both the National Trust and English Heritage, there are also lots of independent sites as well and there is no uniform standard of information delivery, so it’s a bit ad hoc.
The sister site is Vindolanda itself which is a huge site but it became apparent quite quickly that a large part remains unexcavated and they estimate that it will take at least another 100 years to fully excavate the site. Why Vindolanda has become so celebrated is because of the findings that have accompanied the excavations of the ruins. Because the soil is anaerobic, materials such as leather, fabric and wood have not rotted away but have been preserved, which makes the site unique. The justly famous Vindolanda Writing Tablets record both military and personal details from approximately 102 A.D. including the delightful birthday invitation from Claudia Severa to Sulpicia Lepidina.
Although there is a large display on the tablets, the originals are housed in the British Museum (perhaps that should be the Brittunculi Museum – Roman slang for “wretched little Brits”). But apart from the Writing Tablets and an interesting collection of leather Roman shoes, I have to confess to being somewhat disappointed with Vindolanda. It was poorly laid out with no real thought given to providing a guided tour to assist with identifying exactly what you are looking at, apart from a pile of stones. An audio-tour and sequentially numbered display boards and clear tour path would have helped with my comprehension. And it’s not even next to the Wall but some distance south, so all in all a disappointment, not with the ruins themselves but the poor manner in which they are displayed.
It was getting quite late by the time I left Vindolanda but having come all this way I decided to stop at one last Fort, Housesteads Roman Fort. However, by the time I arrived it was just on 5 p.m. and I was about to call it a day when I checked the brochure and saw that it was open until 6 p.m.. What I hadn’t realised was that the Fort was a good 15 minute uphill walk from the car park, but I have to say that the effort was worth it. Housesteads Roman Fort has magnificent views over the surrounding countryside and has the most complete example of a Roman Fort in the northern hemisphere. That’s to say that there are more of the buildings above ground than some of the other sites I’ve seen today.
Being on the top of a hill it was very windy and it must have been a real hardship posting for the garrison, unlike Vindolanda which is in a more protected position. Having said that, I thought Housesteads was well worth the detour even if I felt a little rushed and the visitor centre was shut by the time I left. Like so many of these sites, there are sheep everywhere, quietly munching away on the grass, with their lambs close by. It’s quite surreal seeing these sites of historic importance and the most frequent visitors are undoubtedly the sheep.
Now time to find somewhere to stay for the evening. Looking at the map, Hexham was the nearest sizeable town and as it was where my maternal grandfather was born (or was that Wallsend, in which case it was where my grandmother was born, I'm not sure). Either way, I found an hotel quite easily and so booked in for the night.
Hexham is an old market town established in the 7th century and has a fine Abbey originally built as a monastery from the stones looted (or is that scavenged?), from the Roman fort of Corbridge. I started the day’s sightseeing programme in the park across the road from my hotel, complete with bandstand, and then ambled around the Abbey and its grounds. I had a very pleasant time exploring the grounds behind the Abbey before entering the Abbey for a few minutes quiet prayer and reflection.
I have to say that Hexham is a delightful little town and I was quite taken with it. My test of whether a town is wealthy is by the number of galleries selling art work, and shops selling home wares, jewellery and other fripperies and Hexham has its fair share. I was unexpectedly surprised by Hexham, it wasn’t at all what I expected to find, especially after Barrow, which, when all said and done, is a very poor town.
I spent a pleasant couple of hours roaming around the jumble of tiny streets leading off from the market square. There was a National Trust shop which is always a magnet for me. I bought a couple of compilation CD's and a scarf, after deciding that my favourite scarf is starting to look rather sad and should be retired or, at the very least, given a holiday.
Although I had rather overdosed on Roman ruins yesterday, I decided to visit one last one that was in the vicinity. I had never heard of Corbridge before but have to say that if I were to live in the north of England, and I should add that it is an extremely remote possibility, I would want to live in Corbridge, it is just lovely. It’s located on the banks of the River Tyne with a small market square complete with beautiful parish church and little streets radiating outwards. If I thought Hexham was well-off, that was nothing compared with Corbridge, where modest homes advertised in the local estate agents were in the range of £500,000. And the home wares and frippery shops were much in abundance.
I have to admit that I engaged in some retail therapy, buying a watering can shaped like a pig (don’t laugh), a garden kneeling mat (not for gardening you understand, this one is for kneeling on when I’m taking photos so that my knees don’t get wet. Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time and at the end of the day I can still use it in the garden!). And a cafetière. I have been scouring the home wares shops looking for a cafetière for some weeks and haven’t been able to find one I liked enough to buy, but my patience has been rewarded and I’ve finally found the one I like.
After a lunch of soup and a pot of tea in one of the many tea shops in the town, I made my way to the last Roman fort I will be visiting for a while. While none of the Roman ruins I have seen to date survive much above the foundation level, Corbridge is the exception. Again, much of the fort remains unexcavated, but what has been excavated gives a much better idea of what Roman forts looked like, (they were all built to a similar pattern), thanks in no small part to an exceptionally good audio guide.
This fort, like most along Hadrian’s Wall, is owned and managed by English Heritage, but this is the only one with an audio guide. The reconstruction drawings made a lot more sense at Corbridge than they had elsewhere, because there was more to see above ground, coupled with the diagrams strategically placed around the sight and the well thought through audio guide made all the difference. The people at Vindolanda would do well to take note and emulate Corbridge, as I found Vindolanda frustratingly confused and ill-thought through in terms of presentation. On the other hand, English Heritage presents its sites and museums in a clear and accessible way and they are always child friendly, with lots of activities for children to get them involved. They do it very well.
And now I am officially all walled out.
I continued to head east as I wanted to drive through Newcastle where my mother was born. As Mum grew up in Barrow there were no particular places I wanted to visit but had a desire to drive across the Tyne Bridge (copied by Sydney as you will see from the attached photo). I managed to drive across it not once but three times! It’s a lot shorter than the Sydney Harbour Bridge but I was very happy that I could tick the box having achieved another “must-do”.
And now for the Angel of the North. This is the largest statue of an angel in the world and apparently it’s seen by more than one person per second, helped no doubt by the fact that it’s on a hill and next to a motorway and you can’t miss it, it’s that big. I was so pleased I saw it and can’t understand why my guidebook makes no mention of it, whereas it does mention the Sage Gateshead, an enormous and very modern structure right on the river. When I first saw it I thought it must be a sports complex, but in fact it’s described as an international centre for music.
Final destination for today was Durham. I’ve never been to Durham before but it had been recommended to me on many occasions and as it’s on the way back south to Portsmouth it seemed like an ideal opportunity to stop by and have a look.
What I hadn’t expected was the difficulty I would have finding an hotel. The Marriot only had smoking rooms available (yuk), so I asked them to recommend somewhere else. They suggested either the Radisson or the Premier Inn. I tried the Radisson next but they were all booked out and claimed there were only a couple of hotels in the city centre. So I’m staying at the Premier Inn which is a lot cheaper, even with the added cost of parking (£9 per day!). The downside is that the internet isn’t included in the price and I’m not prepared to pay £5 for one hour or £10 for a day! Anyway, it won’t hurt if I don’t check my emails for a couple of days!
I walked into the old part of town for dinner and then wandered up to the Cathedral and Castle to check opening hours. Durham University is the third oldest in England, after Cambridge and Oxford, and is largely centred around the Cathedral close, or Palace Green as it’s called. Apparently I may have problems getting to see the Castle because tomorrow is World Heritage Day and it may be booked out. Oh well, I’m sure I will find something to do, I always do!
It was starting to get dark so I made my way back to the hotel. Being a Saturday night the locals were out and about looking for a good night and I thought a few of the pubs and nightclubs I passed looked like they may get a bit rowdy as the evening progressed.
I set the alarm this morning for 7.00 a.m. (well, that’s early for me these days), as I wanted to attend communion at 8.00 a.m. at the Cathedral. The service was according to the Book of Common Prayer. I have only been to one other service using the BCP and that was at St Martin in the Fields in London. It's the same but different to the Australian service, using the most beautiful language. I’ve never understood why the Australian Anglican Church had to change the words of the Lord’s Prayer; the words I was taught as a child come from the BCP and they are the only ones I know.
Following the service I went for a walk along the river to see the Cathedral from the other side of the river. Being Sunday there weren’t too many people about and a stroll along the river was very peaceful, I passed one fisherman and two other photographers and on the other side of the river there were several rowing crews, presumably from the university. Durham was the third university to be established in England in 1832 after Oxford (1096) and Cambridge (1209). It's extraordinary that it took hundreds of years before another university was established in England.
Apart from the Cathedral itself, the Palace Green and surrounding buildings were handed over to the University when it was established, and both the whole area has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage site; today is World Heritage day. Spurred on by the advice I received yesterday that it was likely that all the tours would be booked out, I made my way back to the Palace Green where I could enquire about tickets as soon as the ticket booth opened. Despite my concerns, I had no difficulties getting a ticket to take the Castle Tour at 10.00 a.m., and all the tours today were free. I had half an hour to kill before the tour began so I had a quick breakfast at a little cafe on the Palace Green while listening to the Cathedral bells calling the faithful to prayer.
The Castle Tour was a tour of one of the older parts of the university that was originally built for the Prince Bishops of Durham, and was first established in 1072. The keep is now accommodation for students. The tour took in two chapels, the wood panelled Tunstall Chapel which was built during the Tudor period, and the original Norman chapel below it, as well as the Tunstall Gallery, and the buttery which has been in continuous use as a kitchen for over 500 years. Admittedly it has modern equipment, but the original chimneys, window and brickwork remain. The Dining Hall is the largest in England and is very grand. I was most bemused to learn that the Senior Man in College this year is Harriet Russell.
At the conclusion of the tour I was pondering my next move when Saif, who had arranged my ticket for the Castle tour, suggested I attend the Norman History tour due to start at 11.30. Not having a better offer and being interested, I accepted the offer. The tour guide was a French lass who gave us some historical background on the political environment in Britain in 1066 and why Durham was established, and then explained the architectural style prevalent at the time. She also explained the development of the Norman style followed by the Gothic style and the architectural significance of the different shape of windows. Apparently you can tell a lot about a building’s history from its windows.
There was a local couple on this tour, Muriel and Barry, and I got chatting with them. Barry gave me some very interesting background history on the university, having been at the university for many years before he retired. They also told me that there was a concert of Tudor music in the Tunstall Chapel this evening and Muriel suggested I speak with Saif and tell him that Muriel suggested I speak with him about getting a ticket, which I did. It was very good of Muriel and Barry to mention it as I hadn't seen it advertised.
Because it’s Sunday the tours of the Cathedral don’t start until 1.00 p.m., so I had a bit of a wander about and found another bridge, this time a modern one connecting the old part of the university with the new part, which seems to fly over the river at quite a height. Durham is a fascinating place with an interesting mix of the very old and the very new.
The Cathedral Tour was supposed to be for an hour, but lasted nearly two; I learnt so much about the architecture of the building, the Dissolution of the Monasteries and Henry VIII’s grab for the wealth of the Church, and the Reformation and the astonishing damage that the Puritans wrought on the churches. They whitewashed all the paintings on the walls, smashed the stained glass windows, the statues were destroyed and the marble effigies on coffins were dismembered with their heads and limbs hacked off. The things people do in the name of religion. It’s no better than the Taliban destroying those statues in Afghanistan a few years. Plus ça change.
It was nearly 3.00 p.m. by the time the tour finished and I hadn’t had any lunch, so I decided to have an early dinner (in Jane Austen’s time dinner was at 3.00 p.m. so I didn’t think this was too strange), and I decided to go to Café Rouge, a French chain of restaurants. The first time I ate at a Café Rouge was in Cambridge in 1986 and at that time I didn’t realise it was part of a chain. Despite that, the food is very good. Most restaurants here in England seem to be Italian and while I like Italian food, I cook quite a lot of it and prefer to eat other cuisines when I eat out. You would expect there to be lots of French restaurants in England given the proximity of France to England, but not so.
The Music of Tudor England concert was held at the Tudor Tunstall Chapel, University College in the Castle that I had visited this morning. The chapel isn’t that large and probably only holds about 100 so it was standing room only. The Chapel is a choir chapel, meaning that the seats face into the middle rather than towards the altar, and the back seats are the original misericord seats. Misericords are ledges that project from the underside of the hinged seat of a choir seat, which provide support while standing during services. During the tour we were asked not to sit on the misericord seats because they were so old and fragile! Needless to say, I made sure I sat at the back of the chapel so that I could sit on one of the wonderful misericord seats!
The concert was by a small choir called Durham Polyphony, 10 singers, male and female, singing songs written during the Tudor period, including a number of pieces by Tallis and two pieces by John Dowland who has recently been recorded by Sting. It was superb and a real bonus. The concert and all the tours were part of the World Heritage Day and totally free, I enjoyed myself so much I would have happily paid!
After the concert I was chatting with Muriel and Barry and they very kindly invited me to their home for coffee. What a lovely way to end a great day. An extraordinary coincidence was that hanging on their living room wall was a sampler Muriel had worked copied from a sampler done in the early 18th century by a young girl in Williamsburg in the then American colonies. The coincidence is that I worked the same sampler and it's hanging on my bedroom wall at home!
Bill Bryson, (who just happens to be the Chancellor of Durham University), has written of Durham, “A huge amount of history, a huge amount of beauty and a great deal of friendliness”. I couldn't agree more.
Time to start heading south, so Mimi, Jane and I headed of to Whitby. Mum always spoke warmly of Whitby as she had friends who live there. Whitby’s history dates back to at least Saxon times, and a monastery was first established there in the 7th century. The ruins of Whitby Abbey still dominate the town’s skyline. It became a fishing port and shipbuilding town in the 19th century and continues as a fishing port today.
I found a little hotel and checked in for one night and then set out to explore the town. Whitby is bisected by the River Esk, the northern side being the more modern (relatively speaking), side. It was bitterly cold today, I haven’t been this cold since I was in Nancy in France in early March but at least today I had two more layers on and my gloves, which made a huge difference, although I did look like the Michelin Man.
As I hadn’t had any breakfast when I left Durham, I had a very late breakfast, or early lunch depending on your point of view, in a small café overlooking the harbour. I then walked all the way down to the end of one of the piers (there are actually two either side of the port entrance); it was blowing a gale and freezing cold. At the end of the piers are lighthouses. I thought a climb to the top would warm me up and afford good views of the town so for £1.10 I climbed the 81 steps to the top. At 1 p.m. I was the first person to climb the lighthouse all day, the cold was keeping away what tourists there are in Whitby today. Whitby is a very popular tourist destination and should be more prosperous than it appears, it has a slightly down at heel appearance and feel.
There is a wide sandy beach complete with donkey rides, although only the most hardy walkers with their dogs could be seen on the beach today. Brightly coloured bathing boxes were visible from the lighthouse, but I wasn’t game to walk that far in this cold.
There is a swing bridge linking the old town on the south side of the river with the north side, to allow larger fishing ships to pass up the river to the harbour, although I didn’t see it in use today. And above the town are the ruins of a medieval abbey, yet another religious house dismantled by Henry VIII. In fairness to Henry VIII, on this occasion the Germans also had a hand in demolishing Whitby Abbey as they shelled Whitby during the First World War.
Not only was it cold, but it started to rain just as I arrived at the Abbey, reached by climbing 199 steps behind the old town. So there I was trying to take photos, listen to the audio guide and read the guide book, while it was blowing a gale. The visitor centre is housed in the remnants of the Tudor house that was built after the dissolution and is worth a visit, although preferably on a warmer day.
The old town has narrow cobbled streets with tiny shops and workshops, many still used for the production of jet jewellery which was very popular in Victorian times, principally as mourning jewellery. Jet is fossilised wood from the monkey puzzle tree and is from the Jurassic period. It is only found along a seven mile stretch of Whitby beach and while jet can be found elsewhere, Whitby jet is the hardest in the world. In its natural state it looks like slate but unlike slate which is really dense and heavy, jet is unbelievably light and when polished is very glossy and, well, black.
I have a small jet brooch that belonged to my grandmother and a jet bracelet but I had no idea how expensive it is. I decided I would buy a pair of earrings if I could find the perfect pair. I had a very specific pair in mind, long facetted drop earrings. I scoured every shop in Whitby without success. I could buy a pair of Victorian antique earrings for £950, or a copy for £150, but they weren’t what I wanted. By 5.00 p.m. I had all but given up the search as I wasn’t going to buy something just for the sake of it; most of the shops were shut but I spied one last shop that had several pairs of faceted drop earrings in the window. The only problem was that the shop was closed. And then inexplicably the shop owner returned and opened the shop for me and after a tussle with myself between two pairs, I settled on the most beautiful pair of jet earrings in the whole of Whitby. Very happy.
Dinner was at an award winning restaurant called Greens. Because Whitby is a fishing port, I didn’t hesitate to order house smoked salmon followed by fish pie with a kipper side salad. The kipper salad was to die for, I do love kippers. Despite the cold, Whitby proved to be a most pleasant town.
I know I said I liked kippers, and you won’t be surprised to learn that I ordered them for breakfast. I got somewhat more than I expected, two whole kippers, still on the bone. Delicious but very filling.
Everyone tells me that Robin Hood’s Bay is a must see, and it's just down the road from Whitby. I optimistically paid for four hours at the pay and display car park located at the top of the cliff as the cobbled main street is so steep and narrow that there’s nowhere to park in the village, even for the villagers themselves.
The place seemed to be shut for business, it was unbelievably quiet and most of the few shops were closed even though it was gone 10.00 a.m. The bay is horseshoe shaped and reputedly Robin Hood kept his boat there in case he needed to make a quick getaway. Sitting on the cliff front looking out to sea, it was very fresh yet the sun was reflecting off the water like silver. It reminded me of those lines from Henry V, “This precious stone set in a silver sea, this blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England”.
There were a couple of other tourists ambling about and I could imagine that the place could be very pleasant for a few days to walk along the rocky beaches, provided of course that the weather is warmer. On first view the village is just one street, but there are a lot of very tiny cottages hidden behind the main street up steep cobbled lanes and stairways. Most are miniscule, I saw one house where the front door was so low that even I would have to stoop to enter the house. It’s hard to imagine how people actually live there, the houses are both small and inaccessible.
Having exhausted the possibilities of Robin Hood’s Bay, I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t so much closed for business as asleep. I left after about an hour and headed for Scarborough, the next town along the coast. Scarborough looks nice in the guidebook but in reality it’s quite a large town with a pretty waterfront, but I couldn’t be bothered finding somewhere to park, so I pressed on as I planned to spend the night in Bakewell (home of the tart), in Derbyshire, and had a bit of distance to cover.
On the way I had a pit-stop at Thornton-le-Dale because it reminded me of Bourton-on-the-Water in the Cotswolds. I drove through the Yorkshire into Derbyshire through countryside which looks like something you see on a postcard, arriving at Bakewell late afternoon. I found a lovely little B&B, my most inexpensive accommodation of the trip to date at only £35, in the amusingly named Melbourne House, although again, no internet. Dinner at The Red Lion.
It is said that Jane Austen used Chatsworth as her model for Pemberley in Pride and Prejudice and I have long wanted to visit the house. Driving up the long drive I had to stop to give way to sheep and lambs wandering across the road. The building is quite magnificent as you approach it, although there is nothing left of the original Tudor house that was built there in the mid-16th century. The building we now see dates from the mid-17th century and the gardens were laid out by Capability Brown.
It’s extraordinary that the house has remained in the ownership of the Cavendish family since 1549. I say extraordinary because the greed of the socialist British government in the mid 20th century almost saw the estate broken up. When the 10th Earl died unexpectedly at the age of 55, just 16 weeks before the expiry of the statutory five year period necessary following the transfer of the estate to his son, death taxes at a staggering rate of 80% were levied against the estate. In today’s money, that’s £100M. Much property was sold off and it took over 20 years to pay off Her Majesty’s Treasury. The estate is now held in a trust to avoid pernicious death duties from decimating the estate ever again; it would be a crime for Britain to lose its heritage through the breakup of stately homes such as Chatsworth (and I thought Henry VIII and the Puritans did a lot of damage).
In my opinion, Chatsworth stands together with Blenheim and Castle Howard as the three foremost stately homes in England. The house exceeded my expectations and although I hadn’t intended to spend too long at Chatsworth as I wanted to get away mid-afternoon, I spent three hours just in the house, there was so much to see. A late lunch followed and then I had two hours left to explore the extensive gardens. Today the weather was glorious and strolling around the gardens was a very pleasant way to spend the afternoon. I would have liked to spend another day in the area as there is quite a lot more to see and do, but I ran out of time.
I eventually got away from Chatsworth just after 5.00 p.m. and headed back to Portsmouth, a drive of four hours. I arrived home just on 9.00 p.m., having driven 1,240 miles (2,000 kilometres), since leaving two weeks earlier. I didn’t get to see everything on my list, but I always like to leave something to go back for. And I was keen to get back to Portsmouth to develop a Plan B to get to Venice on the weekend, just in case UK airspace remains closed because of the Icelandic volcano.
And so to bed.
Despite spending six hours sightseeing yesterday at Chatsworth and then four hours driving back to Portsmouth, when I eventually went to bed last night I couldn’t get to sleep, my mind was just buzzing along. So when the light outside my bedroom window came on about 3.00 a.m., activated by the movement sensor, I leapt out of bed and flung open the curtains to see the largest fox I have ever seen stealing across the garden. From stem to stern he must have been at least five feet long, I was quite surprised by how big he was.
As soon as he saw the movement of the curtains he turned and scuttled towards the back corner of the garden and disappeared, but it was magic while it lasted.
Today is the start of another adventure, off to Venice for four weeks to learn some Italian. Angela drove me to Gatwick with worrying noises from, I fear, the gearbox of her car. I do hope it’s not something serious, (i.e. expensive).
Using some of my many frequent flyer points, I flew to Venice in business class, partly because they only had business class seats available for the flight I wanted, and partly because I wanted to access the 32kg luggage allowance, 23 kg is not nearly enough for me these days. I've never been known to travel light and now with my camera, lenses and computer, my cases have progressively got heavier and heavier. One of the other benefits of business class is the quality of the champagne, today it was Pommery. Admittedly it was non-vintage, but it was still very nice.
Flying above the fluffy, intermittent cloud cover, and below were snow capped-mountains, were they the Swiss or Italian Alps, who knows? The last and only time I flew to Venice took 36 hours from Melbourne, again using frequent flyer points: Melbourne to Heathrow, then Gatwick to Marco Polo. Today it took just two hours and thankfully there were no delays, notwithstanding the recent problems with the Icelandic volcanic ash. Fortunately I didn’t need a Plan B to get me to Venice.
I bought a pair of sunglasses on the plane as I had lost my favourite pair just before I left home. They were described in the brochure as the lightest on earth, and because I have a small head I have difficulty buying sunglasses that fit, (I’ve given up on Ray Bans, they never fit me properly), even the Wayfarers I bought in the 1980’s are slightly too large and keep slipping down my nose.
Flying into Venice over the shallow mud flats and sandbanks, the obviously man-made channels cut between the low lying land was obvious from the air. To fly into Venice during the day allowed me to see the islands as a whole and from a perspective unseen when I arrived last time after dark in the evening and by water taxi. The water taxi cost €100 and this time because I'm on a budget I took the bus, which costs a more reasonable €2.50. It was an interesting experience to see cars actually driving into Venice across the Ponte della Libertà, last time I didn’t venture up to the top of the island so missed the intrusion of the 21st century.
When I visited Venice in 2008 I knew I would have to return but at the time I had no inkling that I would be back here for four weeks to learn Italian. I'm slightly apprehensive about how this will go, but I'm game and will give it a go. What have I got to lose? Even if I don’t learn any Italian, I'll have spent four lovely weeks living in Venice, not as a tourist but a student, which will be slightly different, I'm sure.
I think I love Italy because the easy-going alfresco lifestyle is an echo of the Australian lifestyle, no doubt in part because so many Italians migrated to Australia after the Second World War. That and the art and history, of course.
Woke to the sound of church bells ringing.
My first lesson today at the Istituo Venezia. Very scary, just like starting a new job when you don’t know the ropes. In this case, it's all in a foreign language, no English! I think it's going to be a long month.
I had terrible trouble mastering the pronunciation of the “dicis” (teens), 17 proving particularly obdurate! The class is quite small, with students of all ages from early 20’s to somewhere in their 60’s, and from countries as diverse as Japan, Holland, France, Austria, England, USA, Germany and Australia (that’s me, of course).
I'm also taking a one hour private lesson in the afternoon so that I can revise and follow up with any questions and difficulties I'm having with pronunciation or comprehension. I keep lapsing into French words and pronunciation which isn't helping a bit. I don’t think I have a facility with foreign language, but what the heck, it keeps the mind active!
Must revise. Uno, due, tre, quattro, cinque...
My first week of Italian lessons has been exciting and interesting and just a little bit exhausting. I’ve expanded my vocabulary, although I am still very limited in what I can say, but I also have a much better appreciation of Venice than I had from my five days here two years ago when I was a wide-eyed tourist. Then I was totally blown away with the beauty of the place and I'm still very taken with the antiquity of Venice and its 1000 year culture, but this time my rose tinted glasses are just a little less tinted than they were. I have explored more widely over the past week, particularly Cannaregio where I am staying, and Dorsoduro where I am studying at Istituto Venezia in the Campo Santa Margherita. I’ve had to grapple with such things as shopping at the supermercato (a total nightmare, the supermarket staff here are so inefficient and slow), managing to get cash out of the ATM’s in Italy and the ticketing system on the vaporetti. In other words, real life.
When I enrolled I nominated to take an extra one hour private lesson but what I hadn’t appreciated was that the classes are in the morning from 9.00 a.m. to 1.00 p.m. but my private class isn't until 3.30 p.m., which rather limits what I can do in the afternoon. The first session in the morning is with Alberto, followed by Elisabetta after the morning break. All the classes are held in Italian only which is something of a challenge but perhaps not as hard as it sounds. Lots of role playing and situational dialogue to help build vocabulary and basic conversation skills. It’s certainly a very different teaching method to when I first learnt French in 1971 (I can’t believe that it was 40 years ago, where does the time go?).
My class mates are from around Europe, five are from Germany, one each from Austria, Holland, France and England. Outside Europe there are four from the USA, one from Japan, and me. The common language is English, and as Rudi, one of the German students said to me the other day, he didn’t realise that he would be learning both Italian and English, as English is the common language we all speak! So easy for me, and I consider I am providing a service because I'm helping the others to improve their English!!!
My hosts, Nadia and Christiano, are a lovely couple. Nadia is a school teacher in her early thirties and Christano is a waiter at a local restaurant and is perhaps a few years older than Nadia. The flat here in Canareggio has three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a small and very basic kitchen (a cook top but no oven, and horror of horrors, no dishwasher!), a living room and a balcony, so by Venetian standards, very spacious. Cannareggio is not the most salubrious of suburbs, Melbourne’s equivalent would perhaps be Brunswick or Collingwood. But it’s not as expensive as staying in an hotel for four weeks, (only €570), whereas Bonnie and Caroline, from Raleigh North Carolina, have paid a staggering €2,800 for just two weeks!
Most days I either have lunch with Uli at the university mensa (canteen), a three course meal for just €10, or I would have fruit followed by coffee with Uli and then my lesson at 3.30 p.m. with Grigorio, so a pattern developed pretty quickly.
Friday lunchtime a group of us had lunch as Margo, Willie and Ute were leaving Venice the next day, having only enrolled for one week. After lunch Margo (who is from Holland) and I decided to visit the Peggy Guggenheim Collection housed in the Palazzo Venier dei Leoni. Peggy Guggenheim bequeathed her home containing her modern art collection to the Guggenheim Foundation which also owns the wonderful Frank Lloyd Wright designed Guggenheim Museum on 5th Avenue in New York City, and the Bilbao Guggenheim Museum housed in the equally stunning Frank Gehry designed museum (on the list to visit this year).
Apparently the Peggy Guggenheim Collection is one of the most visited sights of Venice, and although it’s not large, it contains an impressive collection of modern art including works by Picasso, Kandinsky, Miró, Dali, Magritte and Mondrian. What is particularly appealing about the Palazzo in which the Collection is that there are photographs of Peggy in her home with a number of the works of art now on display, not just paintings but also sculptures. The Palazzo is an unfinished building on the Grand Canal and has stunning views; Margo and I sat on the terrace overlooking the Grand Canal for some time, just enjoying the passing traffic.
We then took a stroll down to the end of the promontory to see the Santa Maria della Salute, a massive Baroque Church, and the Dogana di Mare (Customs House), which was swathed in scaffolding when I was here two years ago. From this vantage point there are sweeping views across the Grand Canal to the north and Guidecca to the south.
By this stage the sun was beginning to set so Margo and I made our way to the Piazza San Marco for a pre-dinner drink at Caffè Florian, one of the two well-known (well-known for being expensive), cafes on the Piazza. They charge like wounded bulls, there is a €6 cover charge for the music, (that’s €6 each!), for the musicians playing selections from The Sound of Music (it was all I could do to stop myself from yodelling), and my Aperol with soda cost another €11! For that we got a prime table outside, a view of the never-ending procession of tourists, a small bowl of crisps and some olives. But it was worth it just to be here. Friday was a late night after we had dinner at a restaurant near the Rialto Bridge.
The next morning I was up early to meet Margo back in the Piazza San Marco to visit the Basilica in a vain attempt to beat the crowds. The queue for the Basilica San Marco before it even opened at 9.45 a.m. was breathtaking and we only escaped a lengthy wait by taking the opportunity to join an organised tour and enter via the group entrance. For €15 including the entrance fee we got a guided tour for over an hour which was well worth the price, because we would not have appreciated the extraordinary mosaics that adorn the walls, all 4,000 square meters of them. The earliest date from the 13th century and it took literally hundreds of years to complete them. The Basilica is over 800 years old, of Byzantine design and unlike anything I have seen before.
Before taking Margo to the Piazzale Roma to catch a taxi to the airport, we had lunch next to the Rialto bridge, and we enjoyed watching the many boats and gondolas glide by. In all a very touristy experience but well worth it, I enjoyed every minute.
I spent the afternoon strolling around Castello and the Arsenale, once the greatest naval shipyard in the world. Because 1st May is a public holiday in Italy, quite a lot of things were closed, but even so, I imagine that this area is always much quieter than San Marco.
Sunday my new Austrian friend Uli very kindly invited me to lunch where she is staying on Guidecca, the cloisters behind the Redentore where some of our fellow students are staying. We had a very pleasant lunch of asparagus risotto, (asparagus and risotto are two of my favourite things), and studied a little after lunch. We ended the afternoon with an aperitif or two in the Campo Santa Margherita, where the Istituto Venezia is located. A very pleasant day even though it started to rain quite heavily.
After class today I went off to explore the Lido, Venice’s beach resort. The Lido is to the south of Venice and is nothing more than a large sandbank which forms a natural barrier between Venice and the Lagoon to the north, and the Adriatic to the south. It was once one Europe’s most fashionable seaside resorts, frequented by the rich and famous, but it’s fair to say that the gloss has long since vanished.
The first surprise I had when I stepped off the vaporetto was that there were cars, motor bikes and bicycles, absent from Venice and the other Lagoon islands I had previously visited. Given that the island is surprisingly large being 12 kms long, presumably the residents need to be able to get around. Nonetheless, I was still surprised having spent the last two weeks in Venice either walking or catching the vaporetto everywhere. On 1st May I was able to buy a monthly ticket for the vaporetto, (like registering a car in England, you can only buy a monthly ticket from the first day of the month. Presumably because they’ve always done it that way). So now I can just hop on and off the vaporetta and I’ve made full use of the service since last weekend. I had to buy something called an IMOB card, which costs €40 but is valid for three years. With an IMOB card I was then able to buy a monthly ticket for only €28. When you consider that a daily ticket costs a staggering €6.50 (presumably to milk the tourists because it costs €1.10 for a single trip with an IMOB card), it makes sense to buy an IMOB card if you are going to be in Venice for more than a few days.
Anyway, I walked south across the island to the beach which was considerably further than I expected so was compelled to buy a gelato as compensation. The shops and hotels lining the main street were unremarkable and as this is the first Italian seaside resort I have visited I can’t make any comparisons, suffice it to say that Surfers Paradise compares well. On reflection it reminds me of St Kilda beach. It’s certainly nothing like Venice.
The beach itself was the biggest surprise. The sand is an uninspiring taupe colour, not sandy sand like Australia, and I stood on the windswept, largely empty beach wishing I was on the beach at Kennett River with Jane, Paul and the boys. I readily admit that I am not a beach person and almost never go in the sea, Cancun being the only exception this century, and I wasn’t seeing the Lido at its best given the blustery weather. According to Nadia, at the height of the season you cannot move on the beach, it is littered with bodies from end to end, and is very popular with the locals. Apparently if you hire a bike you can ride to the end of the island where it is very green and pleasant, but it wasn’t something I was interested in doing today, (or indeed at all!).
Having seen the beach I can now tick it off my list, so I turned around and returned to the north of the island to catch the next ferry back to Venice. If I had to describe the Lido in one word, rather than 568, it would be disappointing.
My private class started earlier this week so I was able to go out and do some sightseeing afterwards. Thursday I went to the Lido and today I went to the Doge’s Palace, followed by a walk around San Marco.
The Doge’s Palace was the seat of government of Venice from the early days of the Republic. The Doges were elected for life by the city-state's aristocracy and was the chief magistrate and leader of the Most Serene Republic of Venice for over a thousand years. The Palace was like so many sumptuous buildings of the time, an extravagant and opulent statement of the wealth and power of its inhabitants and the state. Although there was barely any furniture, the decorations, paintings and plasterwork, were exceptional.
Bizarrely you may think, the highlight of the tour was crossing the Bridge of Sighs over to the prison cells, sadly swathed on the outside in scaffolding and sporting advertising for Bulgari jewellery and bearing Julianne Moore’s face and an Australian sulphur crested cockatoo. According to Uli (who is an architect), in the past when buildings were being restored it was required that the building be clad in a facsimile of the building, but it would appear that the law has changed since many buildings in Venice are used as nothing more sophisticated than billboards. Not a pretty sight. Scaffolding is the bane of my life, I am always trying to compose photos without showing the scaffolding, it sometimes seems to me that the whole of Europe is shrouded in scaffolding.
As it was still early and light I decided to take a stroll around La Fenice, which is an area within the San Marco sestiere (Venice is divided into six sestiere). Interesting and sometimes confusing fact is that each sestiere has its own house numbering system; each house has a unique number in the district, from one to several thousand, rather than a number corresponding to a particular street, which makes finding a specific address sometimes quite difficult. It’s these walks that I often find the most interesting as I just wander around the narrow streets and alleyways, exploring the city, its the only way really.
I stumbled upon a lovely street of shops, Calle della Cortesia. I bought yet another scarf, this time in red. Here in Venice I'm surrounded by handbags and jewellery, but since I’ve bought so many handbags in the last three years, I'm all handbagged out, and I don’t really need any more jewellery either (I sometimes think Venice will sink under the weight of all the glass for sale here), so I'm currently drawn to scarfs and shawls and unsurprisingly I'm spoilt for choice.
Today was the end of my second week at the Istituto Venezia. My objective of increasing my vocabulary and being somewhat more able to communicate in Italy will be met, but fluent I will never be; I am not a natural linguist. Almut, one of my new German friends, commented today that it's unusual to meet native English speakers who are willing to learn a foreign language, as English is so international that in many ways we have little incentive to learn another language. She and Rudi speak German, Spanish, English and now some Italian as well, and although, as Rudi explained, German is the first language of more people in the EU than either French or English, over 50% of the EU population speaks English. Apparently the EU encourages all its citizens to be multilingual and encourages them to be able to speak two languages in addition to their mother tongue!!! Ironically, I was in a shop today and found myself speaking with the owner, not in Italian nor even English, but French! It was a truly surreal moment. Somehow I often find myself grasping for a word and coming out with the French equivalent.
Coincidence number two. Having coffee with some of my class mates who were leaving the course at this point, we were doing the exchanging addresses thing, when I caught sight of Sylvie’s card. Blow me if it isn't exactly the same card that I have, printed by Vista Print. Sylvie has such good taste!
Oh, and the usual place? With my rapidly increasing Italian vocabulary I now know that Il solito posto means “the usual place”, so for all my friends at Hastings, when we used to say, “shall we have coffee at the usual place?” how right were we???
I should say something about the weather which since last weekend has been very wet. The first couple of days following my arrival were glorious, and sleeveless tops were the order of the day. Then a cold snap swept Europe, bringing with it rain. Some days it has rained incessantly, more usually there will be a sudden and intense downpour followed by brilliant sunshine. It generally seems to rain in the morning or late’ish in the afternoon, leaving the rump of the day warm and sunny. Certainly the rain hasn’t stopped me doing anything and in fact the rain or more accurately, the clouds, make the skies much more interesting than dull white skies or even the vibrant blue variety. I say this from a purely photographic perspective, some of my favourite photos incorporate atmospheric lowering skies, full of movement and colour. Of course, carrying an umbrella is essential, but even that doesn’t prevent my feet and lower legs from becoming waterlogged very quickly, the rain seems to be very wet here. Living in Melbourne over the last 10 years or so I've forgotten what it's like to live in a temperate climate where you can have four seasons in one day.
Saturday morning was sunny and I took myself off to the Rialto Markets, where Venetians have been coming for 600 years to buy fish, fruit and vegetable. The fruit and vegetables offer a wonderful array of colour, while the fish market offers a monochrome of pale whites, greys and silver. The fishmongers present their produce in a somewhat unappealing display, all without refrigeration and often even without ice. What must it be like in the height of summer? Much of the seafood on display is unfamiliar to me and the squid, so clean and sanitised in Australia, is smeared inky black and looks quite unappealing. Shell fish of all descriptions are abundant, including small sea snails, all madly trying to escape, in slow motion, and tiny soft shell crabs blowing their last bubbles. Some of the fish is displayed whole but skinned, which is really unpleasant, a bit like skinned rabbits. I'm a bit squeamish about such things and prefer my food not to look too much like it did when it was still alive!
I stopped for an Aperol spritzer at a tiny bar at the market which was a spectacle in itself, all the locals standing outside in the campo, apparently drinking Aperol which is very popular here in Venice, and catching up with the local gossip while the children and dogs played merrily in the sunshine.
From the Rialto I then caught the vaporetto over to San Giorgio Maggiore to see up close the church that dominate so many photos of Venice as a backdrop to gondolas moored at the Piazza San Marco. Unfortunately I had spent so much longer at the markets than expected that by the time I got to San Giorgio Maggiore the Church and Campanile were closed for lunch, so I had an hour or so to kill before it reopened. As I hadn’t had any lunch I took advantage of the opportunity to sit down at the only cafe on the island for something to eat and another Aperol spritzer to while away the time.
The church, famed as being amongst Palladio’s greatest architectural achievements, is magnificent and the works of art, including a couple of Tintoretto’s, was well worth the wait. The Campanile is serviced by a lift, thank goodness, as my knee has been playing up for the last few days, courtesy of the constant pounding on the unyielding pavements here in Venice. The 360° views over Venice and the Lagoon was nothing short of spectacular, and much better than the Campanile in San Marco Piazza, where there is always a queue. I'm glad I made the trip over to the small island, even if there wasn’t anything else much for tourists to see.
During the week Uli had organised some tickets for us to see a performance of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons at Chiesa San Vidal. To reciprocate Uli’s invitation to lunch last weekend, I invited her to dinner which I cooked at the flat. One of my specialities is spaghetti marinara, and when in Rome, sorry, when in Venice, do as the Venetians do and eat seafood, and as Uli is a pescatorian it seemed like the obvious dish to prepare. This was followed by berries with yoghurt (my usual standby desert owing to its simplicity), washed down with a local white wine. I have observed that the wine here and in England is so much cheaper than Australia, which seems ridiculous given how much wine we produce. I can buy Australian wine in supermarkets in England that appear to be cheaper than the same wine bought in Dan Murphy’s or Vintage Cellars. It looks like Tesco and Sainsbury’s have cornered the market on Jacobs Creek and Hardy Brothers. And the wine here in Italy is ridiculously cheap. A decent bottle of Chianti can cost €5 (AU$7.50); the same bottle in Australia would cost at least $30. I tend to buy French wine in England and of course Italian wine in Italy, always drink local is my motto.
The concert wasn’t perhaps the best performance I have heard, and the cellist was hamming it up so much that it would have been funny were it not distracting, but the surroundings were lovely and I never tire of the music; Uli and I had a very pleasant evening. The vaporetto is the only way to travel in Venice so I made my homeward journey along the Grand Canal. And so to bed.
Coincidence number 3. This week in England there were two television programmes set in Venice. The first, part of the “Jamie Does ...” series, has Jamie in Venice cooking lots of seafood and risotto, and Doctor Who (with the new 11th Doctor), was set on Venice in 1580. Doctor Who Confidential included a tour of Venice with Franco da Mosta, (he seems to be the BBC’s tame expert on all things Venetian). It was sort of weird watching these programmes and seeing places I had just visited that day.
Today I had lunch at the Redentore Cloisters with Uli and Louisa. Louisa is from Dortmund, Germany and is 23 and her father is Italian, although he has lived in Germany for years; Louisa is keen to learn Italian, so she’s here for six months, studying at the Istituto Venezia. We had lunch in the garden behind the monastery looking out towards the Lido. It was a bit cool but we enjoyed watching the boats glide by as we relaxed in the gardens.
After lunch we caught the vaporetto, first to San Marco and then to Burano, from where we took a short ferry ride over to Torcello. Torcello was established in the 5th century and was settled before Venice, it once had a population of 20,000 although now it has a permanent population of only about 60. Today being a Sunday it was thronged with tourists who come to see the Byzantine cathedral dating back to 1008. It feels so old and boasts some extraordinary Doomsday mosaics, it’s certainly one of the oldest buildings I’ve ever been in.
There isn't much else to see on Torcello, apart from the pretty but otherwise deserted canal, so we caught the ferry back to Burano, as it was starting to late and cool. After a quick drink at one of the many bars in Burano and a stroll around the shops selling lace, for which Burano is famous, and yet more Murano glass, we headed back to Venice.
While waiting for my vaporetto at Fondamenta Nuove I snapped a couple of women rowing, using the style unique to Venice, where you are standing up and facing forwards. Apparently the ultimate achievement is the Valesana, rowing with two oars simultaneously. It looks kind of weird, but the Venetians have had several hundreds of years to perfect the style.
The weather forecast for this week isn't good and the last couple of days after school I’ve gone back to the flat rather than trudge through the rain, but this afternoon it had cleared up a bit so I ventured out because I wanted to visit the Ca’ D’Oro, described as one of the great showpieces of the Grand Canal. It was once a 15th century palace, although little remains internally to indicate its former magnificence, externally it is quite exquisite.
Since 1984 it has been an art gallery with a small but interesting collection of Renaissance paintings, sculptures and reliefs, including some works by Titian. The ground floor gives hints of how magnificent the original decoration would have been as it still has a wonderful floor mosaic, richly decorated walls, a beautifully rendered courtyard and views out to the Grand Canal.
From Ca’ D’Oro I decided to walk home rather than catch the vaporetto as it wasn’t that far, but I was so exhausted and my legs were aching so much that it took me a good hour, I was just that exhausted.
Today after school I was off to another museum, this time the Museo Correr at Piazza San Marco, which essentially covers the history of the Venetian Republic, with maps, coins, armour and many doge-related exhibits not otherwise in the Doge’s Palace. The second floor covers the history of Venice from the end of the Republic until the unification of Italy in the mid 19th century. There are some standout paintings as well as some works by Canova. It is a deceptively large museum as it covers two whole floors of the Napoleonic wing of the building that frames Piazza San Marco. It took a good couple of hours to do it justice but it was well worth the visit.
Piazza San Marco is a magnet for tourists and I have never seen the area deserted before, until today. As I was making my way to the vaporetto, storm clouds began to gather ominously and I took advantage of the lighting to take some photos of San Giorgio Maggiore across the lagoon, with the darkening clouds as a backdrop. The longer I stayed, the darker the clouds got, until there was a sudden downpour and everyone scuttled for shelter; the whole Piazza was in an instant deserted. The rain didn’t last long, perhaps ten minutes at most, and then the clouds passed and the sun shone again. The weather here is very changeable.
Apart from the unexpected sight of a deserted Piazza San Marco, on the way back to Cannaregio along the Grand Canal I saw something you don’t expect to see in Venice (see photo), and as we approached the Rialto Bridge, a rainbow appeared.
On the subject of cats and dogs I should say something about the canine population of Venice. First, that there is one, and quite a large one at that. I say this with some surprise because it’s hard to imagine how people can keep a dog here in Venice. I'm not just talking lap dogs either, although there are plenty of them, but I've seen Labradors, Irish Red Setters and Collies as well as many mongrels of a similar size. It’s hard to imagine people keeping them in tiny flats here in Venice, and there are no parks to speak of so where do they exercise them?
The downside of all this canine activity is, of course, dog poo, and if the subject of dog poo distresses you, I suggest you stop reading now. The streets of Venice are liberally smeared with it in the way I was warned Paris would be (and wasn’t). In fairness, I have seen a couple of responsible owners clean up after their dogs, but there are obviously owners who don’t.
I would have thought that cats would be a more suitable pet here but surprisingly it doesn’t appear to be the case. And they say that the English are dog mad! Why else would anyone keep a dog in a city like Venice?
Today was my last day at Istituto Venezia. By Thursday I had hit the wall and decided that I would defer my fourth week of tuition until later in the year, or possibly some time next year. I’ve had three very solid weeks and 75 hours of tuition (and I have a certificate to prove it!), so for my final week in Venice I’ve decided to spend it relaxing and sightseeing, especially as the weather forecast for next week is much improved.
This week my private lesson was with Sara, with whom I have had “conversazione” in Italian, principally on the subject of Australia and Melbourne; it was a real challenge for me, although Sara was very nice and patient. My objective to increase my vocabulary and be able to make myself understood where English isn't readily spoken has to some extent been successful. In Venice it seems as if everyone speaks English (as well as French and German), and whenever my little Italian fails me, everyone readily switches to English. My fellow students at Istituto Venezia spoke English as the default language, even if it wasn’t their first language. Uli considered that her English was poor, but she speaks such good English; an English lady also studying at Istituto Venezia thought Uli and I were sisters!!!
It’s very humbling, it could be said that English speakers are linguistic imperialists, but I think the rest of the world is just humouring us because they know that by and large the English speaking world is so hopeless we can’t cope with other languages!
After my last lesson I had time to visit the Museo Fortuny. As a dressmaker I am very familiar with Fortuny fabric and Nadia had recommended it to me. It wasn’t the easiest place to find, I almost walked past it because it looks like a building site and I'm not sure if the interior finish is permanent or temporary, it looked so unimpressive. My guidebook describes the former Palazzo Pesaro as a late gothic palazzo, “the large rooms and portego making a splendid and appropriate setting for the previous Fortuny fabrics”. I beg to differ, the building is a bit of a wreck and has definitely seen better days. The entrance looks like a warehouse and the concrete stairs to the first floor exhibition did nothing to give me confidence.
From the inside it’s impossible to work out what the original house looked like. The first floor is almost entirely given over to one huge room, over 30 meters long with high ceilings. It was very dark and gloomy to protect the delicate fabrics and clothing on display and it took quite some time for my eyes to become accustomed to the gloom. Eventually my eyes got used to the dim lighting and I began to appreciate the room and display. It was set out like a large studio, with examples of fabric, clothing, light fittings and paintings by Mariano Fortuny. In the end I came to appreciate the display and what it was trying to say, although I thought the whole thing was perhaps a little precious.
On the second floor there was a large temporary display of samurai armour, helmets and accessories, somewhat incongruous in the circumstances, although nonetheless impressive. It appears that Fortuny was particularly fond of Japanese art, so it wasn’t as strange a juxtaposition as might be thought.
On the ground floor was a modern installation of photographs etched on large sheets of glass or some sort of polymer. It was strangely compelling and worked with the warehouse-like surroundings; I found that the ground floor was more interesting for the little cellar-like rooms, courtyard and canal entrance at the back of the building. Although I'm struggling to recommend the museum, there was something about it I found appealing.
This evening the gondolas were out in force, there was a veritable traffic jam along one of the narrow canals. I'm told that the mafia has a controlling interest in the gondola business here, as with much of Venetian and indeed Italian business, yet it is discussed in hushed tones, even though it’s an open secret and hardly news.
Last year after nine centuries, Venice broke with tradition by approving its first female gondolier, Giorgia Boscolo, the daughter of a gondolier. The attached photo of a traffic jam in the San Marco sestiere shows Giorgia (clearly visible in her all-white uniform), at the back of the pack. A one hour gondolier ride can cost €120 for one hour, so needless to say, I haven’t taken a trip on a gondola, although I have used the traghettos, gondolas which ferry locals across the Grand Canal for 50 cents. There are only four bridges over the four kilometre long Grand Canal, (until 1854 there was only the Rialto Bridge), so they are pretty useful for getting around Venice. The alternative is to use the vaporetto, although it’s a slow option, it took me nearly an hour to get from San Marco to Ferrovial, a distance of less than four kilometres. And standing all the way, I was beyond exhausted when I finally got home this evening.
It has to be said that I couldn’t live in Venice.
Without the tourists Venice would have no obvious purpose and would wither and die, it's no more than a gigantic museum or more cynically a theme park of Disney proportions. The cost of maintaining the buildings and the devastation regularly wrought by the acqua alta – high tides – comes at an enormous cost. It is hot in summer and the canals become smelly as it gets warmer and warmer, and in the winter it must be dire; cold, foggy and wet. And yet 13 million tourists a year can’t be wrong! There is a charm to the place that is so appealing that tourists throng to Venice every minute of the day and never seem to show any signs of tiring of the spectacle.
It remains to be seen how the locals tolerate the daily invasion. Venice has a permanent population of just 60,000, so that’s 216 tourists per resident per year. According to Nadia the locals regularly decamp on the weekend to escape Venice and the tourists, and who can blame them? The crowds can be so dense that the island experiences a form of human gridlock around the most popular sights, most notably the Rialto where crossing the relatively narrow span can take ten minutes.
Franco da Mosta is right to bemoan the exodus of locals from the island. Fewer and fewer people live permanently here, driven onto the mainland by high rent and property prices in Venice; most people, especially the young, are priced out of the market.
And it must be very hard on the elderly and people with small children. I'm finding it very hard on my legs and knees, the stone paving is unyielding and the hundreds of bridges make no concession to the mobility impaired. It must be a logistical nightmare living here permanently; going to the supermarket is a chore in itself because you have to carry everything you buy. Even if you have one of those little trolley things, they only hold so much, so buying in bulk is definitely not an option. Frequent visits to the supermarket are called for, no wonder they are so crowded all the time. And I don’t know how you move house, presumably everything has to be carried to the nearest canal and then ferried from there.
Today the weather forecast was for rain and it didn’t disappoint. Uli had invited me for lunch at the Redentore Cloister where she’s staying on Guidecca and then, subject to the weather, visit a couple of the smaller islands in the lagoon, but as it rained incessantly all day we decided to have a lazy day and after lunch took the vaporetto over to Venice for a coffee in the Campo Santa Margherita.
Mid-afternoon we made our way through the drizzling rain to San Marco with the intention of calling it a day and catching the vaporetto back to our respective homes, but outside the Santa Maria Zobenigo we were held up by a procession making its way through the narrow streets to the Doge’s Palace. We followed the procession and growing crowd to the Piazza San Marco and although I have no idea what the purpose of the procession was, the rain certainly didn’t deter the many tourists. In the melee I lost Uli, but modern technology came to the rescue. How did we manage before they invented mobile phones???
I slept very late today as I had no commitments, although being Sunday the church bells of Venice ring out regularly all day, calling the faithful to prayer. The bells here don’t so much peel as toll, quite a mournful sound really, unlike the ringing of church bells in England.
I slept late because I was so exhausted after three weeks of sandwiching my sightseeing timetable between five hours of daily tuition, and equally busy weekends. Having risen late I didn’t get out until early afternoon and decided that I would explore Cannaregio. Cannaregio is the northernmost of the six historic sestieri of Venice and is the second largest by land area and the largest by population, with approximately ⅓ of Venice’s 60,000 people. A stroll on a Sunday afternoon in Cannaregio is quite a different experience to a stroll, if that’s the word, around San Marco which is swarming with tourists at the best of times and on the weekend is so crowded that it’s best avoided.
Apart from a few locals in Cannaregio enjoying lunch at the canal side cafes and restaurants catering mainly for locals, there were a few tourists like myself who were looking for a different side to Venice, recognisable by their guidebooks and cameras. The area certainly has a more relaxed, peaceful and leisurely pace than other parts of Venice, which was a welcome change.
Just a quick word about the wellheads in Venice as they appear in a number of photos. They have all been welded up (not just closed but welded), presumably from a public health perspective as the tap water in Venice is piped in from the mainland and is perfectly safe to drink. However, the original well heads remain in situ, as many are works of art.
Across the lagoon from Cannaregio is the cemetery island of San Michele where many famous people are buried; amongst others, Igor Stravinsky, Ezra Pound and Sergei Diaghilev. It’s only a five minute vaporetto ride so I took myself across for a look. I was impressed to see the majority of graves with fresh flowers, although on closer inspection I discovered that the flowers were artificial.
Back to Venice for a gelato and stroll back to the flat via the Ghetto where the Jewish community was confined in the 16th century, the name since given to Jewish conclaves throughout the world. I even saw a Rabbi, a somewhat unexpected sight in Venice.
Dinner at home. I planned an early night but found myself updating my diary into the early hours.
I woke to a lovely sunny day so I took myself off to Murano, the island famous for its glass. It has been the centre of the glass making industry since 1291 when the glass furnaces were relocated from Venice because of the risk of fire. Murano is quite close to Venice, a short vaporetto trip from Fondamente Nuove, the New Quays, which is a mere 400 years old!
Like Venice, Murano is a lagoon island and has a network of pretty canals, although it is mainly visited because of the glass manufacturers and shops, although most of the glass seems to be in Venice where every shop seems to sell glass. Much is of it is kitsch and appears to be made solely for the tourist market, and the vast majority seems to be jewellery and beads for necklaces, earrings and rings. Although leatherwear (in the shape of handbags and wallets), and scarfs, ties and shawls, (silk, cashmere and synthetic), are the other main goods sold in Venice, jewellery is without a doubt the main staple, whereas on Murano it’s essentially just glass. While there are a couple of factories open to the public giving demonstrations on traditional glass blowing techniques, there aren’t many.
After wandering around Murano for a while all the glass begins to look the same and there is little that is unique or special. I bought myself a pretty necklace for a few Euros but for some weeks I had been eyeing off these beautiful mille fiori paperweights, but they are very expensive. The one I wanted ranged from €165 to €190, there was no consistency of pricing in Venice for the same goods, but I just couldn’t convince myself to spend so much money. And then I found a shop selling the most exquisite glass, mainly vases and drinking glasses, rather than the ubiquitous jewellery. The only trouble was that the vase I fell in love with was rather more than I wanted to pay. I asked “quanta costa?”, and was answered in Italian. Perhaps I had misunderstood? So I wandered off in search of a WC, (I don’t think public toilets exist on Murano). Lunch beckoned, it was 1.30 p.m., but I wanted a canal side table as the day was too lovely to sit inside. I wandered back past the shop with the divine vase. Perhaps I had misunderstood the number and should check, just in case, but sadly not. At least my three weeks of Italian lessons hadn’t been wasted, I can count!
I did a deal with myself, if I buy the vase I can’t buy a handbag while I'm in Venice. Done. I know I will love the vase forever, the mille fiori paperweight maybe not, and I have way too many handbags as it is. I had a chat with the lady in the shop, mercifully this time in English (her English was better than my Italian), and discovered that her father had designed the vase. She gave me a generous discount for cash and the deal was done. I am now the owner of the most beautiful vase in Venice. Very happy.
I found a table at a canal side bistro and ordered lunch. I then ventured inside to use the WC and came to the conclusion that I’d been here before on my previous visit to Murano. As I recall, I was desperate for a pee then and had to buy a drink at the bar, just so that I could use their facilities! Lunch of calamari fritti (very fresh), salad and a very light Chianti was most welcome. I love fennel and only discovered it about six months before I left Melbourne. Of course, in Italy I'm in my element as it’s regularly served in salads, just the way I like it! And my “no drinking during the week” rule has fallen by the wayside this week as I'm no longer studying and back on holiday.
I haven’t eaten much in restaurants since I arrived and despite my efforts to speak Italian, the waiters speak to me in English and I respond in Italian. Bizarre. At least I'm trying! I will have to try and schedule in another couple of weeks at Istituto Venezia to further improve my Italian skills. I need to learn the future tense and some more vocabulary, and I must I must memorise all those little words: why, what, this, that, etc. I know them in French and the French words keep slipping into my sentences, much to my embarrassment. Of course in Venice everyone speaks at least some English. In the rest of Italy it’s a bit more hit and miss, so I need to be more self-sufficient. Not fluent nor even conversational, but at least make myself understood. I keep reminding myself that the brain, like the body, responds to the “use it or lose it” principle. And learning a language is supposed to be good exercise for the brain. As I am hopeless at scrabble and crosswords (sorry Fred, I'm never going to be any good at cryptic crosswords). To me crosswords are the by-word of intelligence, wasn’t Inspector Morse a cryptic crossword addict? So, learning Italian will have to be my substitute. Or perhaps I should go back to French given my tendency to resort to French words when my limited Italian vocabulary fails me.
I don’t think anyone comes to Murano expecting to find a bargain, that’s not the point of the place. It’s like buying wine at the cellar door and finding you could have bought it cheaper at Dan Murphy’s. It’s the experience and hope that you will find something unique rather than any cost savings that dictates the value we place on something bought on holiday. After all, I could read about Venice in a guidebook, but it’s no substitute for being here. I daily give thanks for the opportunity to have this year to myself. Indulgent? Of course it is, but we only have one life and it can’t all be about work.
From Murano I took the ferry to Burano, a little further away from Venice. It was mid-afternoon and the weather was glorious, so I didn’t want to return to Venice just yet. I remember Burano from my first trip a couple of years ago as being much prettier than Murano and my memory hadn’t failed me. The houses are very brightly painted and are a photographer’s dream, so photogenic. Very strong colours and not to everyone’s taste, but to me it’s very pretty. Being Monday afternoon it was nowhere near as crowded as it had been last Sunday when I came with Uli and Louisa, and the weather was much better today, so I was able to stroll through the picturesque alleyways and along the canals. It must drive the locals nuts having so many tourists swarming all over their little island, but I suppose it brings the tourist dollar so they can’t complain too much, although I only left €1.50 (AU$2) on the island for the use of the WC. I used to take the view that it was an outrageous imposition to pay for the use of public toilets, but now I gladly pay, just for the convenience (no pun intended!). I left Burano with lots of photos and the memory of a happy afternoon.
The best way to see Venice is to get lost. Forget the map (and while I usually have an extremely well developed sense of direction, it deserts me in Venice – even if I have a map!). Maps are next to useless in Venice because somehow it always looks different on the ground and you can wander around in circles for hours and never realise it. So forget the map and just stroll. You can never really get lost in Venice because you know where you are – in Venice – and never far from one of the yellow signs pointing the way: “Per Piazzale Roma”, “Per San Marco”, “Per Rialto” and “Per Accademia”. It’s the north/south divide. Once you accept that, just go with the flow. It’s the best way to see Venice. I did it last time and I had a great time and see no reason to change my strategy this time.
Today I decided to explore San Polo & Santa Croce and on Uli’s recommendation I went to see the Frari, or to give it its full name, Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari. Although I usually object to paying an entrance fee for most but the celebrated churches, I made an exception in this case and I'm glad that I did, because the Frari is now my favourite Venetian Church. It is a huge, and from the outside somewhat plain, Gothic church, completed in the mid-15th century. It is quite awe inspiring inside and has a staggering collection of art worth the entrance price alone. Canova’s Tomb, designed by Canova himself for Titian and made by Canova’s pupils after his death, is remarkably modern in design, a simple triangular pyramid shape with beautiful carved figures at the base. The Rood screen and Monks’ choir are also beautifully rendered but to a more medieval design, the choir reminding me of the choir at Tunstall Chapel, University College in Durham.
The only things that detract from the magnificence of the church are the cross beams holding the church together so that it doesn’t collapse. I don’t understand why they didn’t use flying buttresses used in French and English Gothic churches of the same period (and even earlier). I can only assume that it’s because land is and always was such a premium in Venice and there wasn’t the room available for the supporting buttresses to be built outside the building, hence the internal crossbeams, or maybe the land isn't as stable. Either way, it detracts from the overall appearance of the church, but this is a minor niggle.
The weather today is just lovely, warm and mild and not a hint of rain, thank goodness. I had lunch “al fresco” at a little bistro just outside Frari, a mushroom and cheese risotto which was yummy. When I woke this morning I thought I was developing a bad cold, my nose was streaming, until, mid afternoon, it dawned on me that I was having a hay fever attack. One anti-histamine tablet later and I was feeling much better. The first attack of the season always takes me by surprise, and it was a relief, I didn’t want another cold!
Apart from a much needed pit stop at the bistrot’s WC (being a tourist is a constant battle with finding “facilities” when I need them), it was time to move on. I spent the afternoon strolling around the many lanes and narrow walkways that make Venice so unique and charming. Venice away from San Marco is delightful, much slower and shadier and more leisurely than the glitz of the main tourist spots.
I had intended to visit Ca’ Rezzonico, a museum just behind the Campo Santa Margherita where I had been studying at Istituto Venezia, but having navigated myself from Frari over to Ca’ Rezzonico, as I approached the museum a disappointed tourist coming the other way told me, in Italian, that the museum was closed on Tuesdays. This was pretty unusual as museums and galleries usually close, if they close at all, on a Monday. I should have read my guidebook more carefully.
Not a problem, just improvise and do something else instead. I had intended to see La Fenice, the famous Opera House that was destroyed by fire in 1996 and has been completely rebuilt. As luck would have it, the musicians were staging a strike protesting against a recent law changing the funding of theatres and opera houses in Italy. I didn’t really grasp the details but the musicians are up in arms about it and are trying to lobby the government to change the law. Good luck to them. I understand from talking to Nadia who is a teacher in the public sector that the government is in dire financial difficulties. Sadly, their misfortune was my good luck because the form of their protest was free entrance to the Opera House and a day of concerts so I was able to see both La Fenice and enjoy a concert, all for free.
On the Grand Canal and just around the corner from the Campo Santa Margherita where I've spent the last three weeks at Istituto Venezia, there is what I consider to be the best museum in Venice, Ca’ Rezzonico. The museum is the museum of 18th century Venice and what distinguishes it from other museums in Venice and why it's my favourite is that the first floor is decorated as it would have appeared in the 18th century. It's described in my guidebook as a richly furnished Baroque palace and one of the most splendid in Venice, it is also one of the few palaces that opens its doors to the public. The rooms are furnished with frescoes, paintings and furniture of the 18th century, not necessary original to the house itself, but authentic pieces nonetheless. The house has a sense of its original purpose unlike the Museo Fortuny or Ca’ D’Oro.
It also has the only two Canaletto’s (he’s my favourite Venetian artist), on public display in Venice which makes it worth the entrance price alone. At one stage it was owned, briefly, by the poet Robert Browning, and is now owned by the City of Venice. On the upper floor there are over 300 paintings by Venetian artists including some paintings by a 20th century artist called Emma Ciardi which I thought delightful. It’s hard not to wonder whether all the Venetians ever do is paint, there are so many paintings, frequently on a religious or allegorical theme and more recently landscapes. Unlike Ca’ D’Oro, which was something of a disappointment apart from the ground floor, the paintings here are presented well and the audio guide and written materials in each room are in several languages including English and are first class, which enhanced the overall experience. Slightly out of context but nonetheless interesting, is a reconstructed 18th century apothecary’s shop, complete with ceramic jars and glass bottles.
After the museum I had lunch in Campo Santa Margherita in the same restaurant I had lunch last time I was here. Today was another warm and sunny day, my arms are becoming very brown, and I had a pleasant and leisurely lunch, giving my weary legs a much needed rest after several hours in the museum; gallery back always places a strain on my back and legs.
Following lunch I wanted to visit the Scuola Grande dei Carmini which is near Istituto Venezia and I felt I couldn’t leave Venice without having a quick look at this discreetly located building decorated by Tiepolo. The headquarters of the Carmelite confraternity and beside the Carmelite church, the Santa Maria dei Carmini, another typically large church although not as extravagantly decorated as the Scuola. On the ground floor the paintings are all monochromatic, designed to demonstrate the simplicity of the Carmelite Order and one of the few places painted in monochrome in Venice. I don’t recall seeing such paintings elsewhere. However, the concept of simplicity isn't compatible with the decoration of the rooms upstairs (see photos), which is lavish.
From Campo Santa Margherita I made my way back to the flat along the Grand Canal, adding more images to my catalogue of Venice in the 21st century; today the water of the Grand Canal was an opalescent jade green.
I had a very slow start to the day today and wandered from Cannaregio through San Polo & Santa Croce, then through San Marco and over to Dorsoduro and Zattere, the quayside that faces Guidecca where I planned to have lunch. There are a number of restaurants along the waterfront, some quite expensive and some rather cheap, there being nothing in between. After much prevarication I eventually decided on one of the more expensive restaurants as I hadn’t spent much on food since arriving in Venice and the menus of the cheaper ones weren’t that appealing.
It was a lovely warm day with a light breeze on the water. While enjoying my lunch I came to the realisation that the reason I like Venice so much is because it reminds me of Melbourne in many ways, a pleasant climate, waterside al fresco restaurants, good food and wine and friendly locals. And everyone speaks English.
In the evening I met Uli for a farewell dinner before I leave Venice tomorrow. We met at the Ponte delgi Scalzi and Uli navigated us to Paradiso Perduto on the Fondamente della Misericordia in Cannaregio, where she had eaten previously. It's a very local eatery and the food is very reasonably priced as well as delicious. It’s very lively and got more so as the evening progressed as it filled up with lots of locals, and there was live music so things got very merry. The chef (and possibly the owner?), decked out in a traditional white chef’s uniform complete with chef’s hat, was quite a character. Walking past our table with a huge baking pan filled to the brim with freshly cooked langoustines, he gave Uli and I one each, so fresh and so yummy; they are like prawns, only the flavour is more subtle, more like lobster. And then he gave us another carafe of wine and then some grappa! He was very sweet, a real character. When I told Cristiano where we had been he told me it was a local institution, everyone knows it. It was such fun and a very late night.
As today is my last day in Venice I took myself of for one last lingering look at Venice. Apart from some last minute shopping and just a few more photos, (there is no such thing as too many photos of Venice), I strolled through Cannaregio, San Marco and Castello before making my way back to the flat to finish my packing. Following a sad farewell with Nadia and Cristiano, a lovely couple who work very long hours and have little time together because of their very different work hours, I took my last vaporetto ride for a while. It’s only one stop from Ferrovial to Piazzale Roma but I wanted to avoid going over the Ponte della Costituzione and then I caught the bus to Marco Polo Airport, by far the cheapest option. Manoeuvring my large and heavy bags was its usual challenge, I have never mastered the art of travelling light and I don’t think I ever will.
I've loved my time in Venice, and I leave knowing I've seen everything I wanted to see, and much more, met some lovely people and had more than a casual glimpse at life in Venice. I also picked up a bit of Italian as well, not much, but enough to make myself understood, just. I always think I've had a good look at a city when my map falls to pieces, and my €2 map from Hellovenezia has literally fallen to pieces. Four weeks in Venice is a rare treat few get to experience and I am very lucky, I feel like I've traversed every square inch of the place.
The bus takes us over the Ponte della Liberta and away from Venice and back into the 21st century. It feels kind of weird after four weeks to be leaving the old Venice behind and entering the far from attractive industrial mainland. The only enduring memory I want to take away from Mestre is the scarlet poppies growing wild along the roadside and in the fields.
I checked in at the airport, put my feet up and read my novel until my flight was called. As I had run out of tea four days ago I’ve been drinking coffee for the last few days and I'm now looking forward to a cup of tea. My two hour flight from Venice was uneventful and with London an hour behind continental Europe, I arrived at Gatwick only an hour later. Angela collected me for the drive back to Portsmouth. It was great to be back home and Archie was very pleased to see me.
Angela and I had lunch in the garden with Claire, James, Amelia and Megan, unfortunately Rodney was working today and wasn’t able to join us. Megan is still very much a baby but at 2½ Amelia is a real little character and a lot of fun; it’s always lovely to see them.
In the evening Angela, Rodney and I we were off to the theatre to see “Yes Prime Minister”, at the Chichester Festival Theatre, which is just up the road from Portsmouth. This is the world premier season and it’s very up-to-date with references to hung parliaments (“hanging’s too good for them”).
The Chichester Festival Theatre is a modern theatre, very similar to the Fairfax Theatre at the Arts Centre in Melbourne. And the audience was like any Melbourne Theatre Company audience, middle aged and middle class. The audience tonight was of an age that obviously remembered the original television series and was very receptive. The play was two hours of typical Yes Minister but not necessarily classic Yes Minister. Two hours is quite a long time to sustain a story line and it was perhaps a little too long and strained and David Haig as Jim Hacker (a wonderful comic actor whom I've seen previously on the West End), began to turn from Jim Hacker into Basil Fawlty towards the end and it all became a little slapstick, but I still loved it and it was very well received.
Many thanks to everyone who sent me their kind birthday wishes. I had a lovely day with Angela & Rodney, Shirley & Colin. We all celebrated my birthday two years ago when we had dinner at the OXO Tower and today we had a long enjoyable lunch in the garden. I received some lovely presents but the best present was being with family.
My second trip into London since I arrived in February, I caught the train from Havant for the 90 minute train trip into Waterloo, the return ticket costing an astonishing £28.10 (about AU$50). By the time I arrived it was getting close to lunch time so I headed off to the Kings Road, Chelsea for lunch and a stroll through my favourite shops. Because it was such a lovely day all the outside tables were filled with Londoners pleased to see some sunshine, so rather than eat outside I had lunch in Peter Jones (a large department store in Sloane Square), which was very pleasant. I had my first glass of English wine, a quite drinkable red, with one of my favourite meals, fishcakes.
I visited my favourite shops, Radley, Zara, Hobbs and my special little boutique in Elystan Street, but this time I resisted the urge to buy anything (I think that’s a first). I then caught the Tube to Mansion House and walked over the Millennium Bridge from St Paul’s Cathedral to the Tate Modern. The gallery is now in its 10th year and I thought I’d have a look, especially as it's next to The Globe theatre where I planned to have dinner. There were some interesting Bacons, a Picasso, and a couple of Mirós on display, although modern art isn't really my thing. Turner is about as modern as my tastes run (a man before his time, his watercolours of Venice still look fresh today).
Having had an early lunch I began to get a bit peckish so I wandered off to The Globe theatre for a quiet drink and meal. I collected my programme to read while I was having dinner and tried a glass of English white wine, again much better than I expected. I fell into conversation with a lovely couple at the table next to me who live in Northumbria, just on the border with Scotland, and the time just flew by. Tonight’s performance at the Globe is Henry VIII, a play Shakespeare wrote in collaboration with John Fletcher and was one of the last plays he wrote; it’s not a play I'm familiar with although the story of Henry VIII is well known, he was a dreadful tyrant.
The thing about The Globe is that it is essentially an authentic Elizabethan theatre, so that means sitting on wooden benches rather than upholstered seats, with a hole in the roof, so it’s open to the elements. I always hire, not just a cushion but also a back rest, I couldn’t cope with sitting for three hours without some back support. I don’t know how the patrons manage in the yard, as it’s called, standing on a concrete floor for the whole performance, even if the tickets are only £5. What struck me this time that I don’t recall from my previous two visits was the invasive noise of the aeroplanes and helicopters overhead, it can be quite distracting.
I had good visibility from my seat in the middle tier, and only two rows back, but as the light began to fade it became much cooler and the wind sprang up. I had to rug up and was glad I had brought a cardigan, jacket and shawl. The lass I was sitting next to was wearing a sleeveless top, but she is obviously made of sturdier stuff, my thin Aussie blood can’t cope with the cold. Having said that, I had to indulge my ice cream tradition, for reasons I can’t recall I always have an ice cream when I go to the theatre in England, even when it is cold. I had one of those little tubs of ice cream they sell in England with the spoon in the lid, although I hadn’t expected the ice cream to be so frozen that the little plastic spoon shattered when I tried to use it!
I have to say that I didn’t enjoy the play as much as I had hoped, perhaps I was tired, because I struggled to concentrate properly. I last saw Dominic Rowan, who played Henry VIII, in The Misanthrope in February, Amanda Raison (Spooks) was Ann Boleyn and Ian McNeice (Doc Martin) was Wolsey. It was a traditional production in as much as the cast wore period dress, but said nothing new about Henry VIII.
Today was a very long day and I had to walk to Waterloo to catch my train back to Havant, so I didn’t get home until nearly 1 a.m. The 90 minute homeward trip seemed longer than this morning’s trip in to London and I was the last person in the carriage by the time we reached Havant. I couldn’t commute to London from Portsmouth every day, although I understand people do. I had planned to go to London again on Wednesday as I have a ticket to see a BBC radio programme being recorded, but I'm still tired from my four weeks in Venice, so I think I may spend the rest of the week resting before I set off on my travels again.
The fallout from my four weeks in Venice is that I returned to England much more tired than I expected, my knees aren’t as young as they used to be, and nor is the rest of me. So this week I haven’t done much at all apart from sleep late, rest and update my blog.
Today Angela and I went to Worthing, just down the road from Portsmouth, where Angela was born and brought up, where she and Rodney met, and where my paternal grandfather and my godmother (my grandfather’s second wife), lived. It’s a relatively short drive along the coast to Worthing, and Angela remembers it as a sleepy little village which has sprawled and now connects a number of previously small separate villages.
The day started with a stop off to pay our respects at my grandfather’s and godmother’s grave. My grandfather died shortly before we left England for Australia and this was the first time I had visited it. I don’t really remember my grandfather as he and my father weren’t close, and I hadn’t realised that Lillian was my godmother until I found my baptismal certificate when I cleaned out Mum’s unit last year. I knew that Auntie Hilda was my godmother, but had not appreciated that in England it is traditional for a girl to have two godmothers and one godfather, and for a boy to have two godfathers and one godmother, so I had one more godmother than I had realised.
Angela gave me a guided tour of Worthing including the beautiful church where she and Rodney were married, nearly 40 years ago. Unfortunately, unlike all churches here in England, they are locked up when not being used for services, apart from the more popular tourist attractions where there is a permanent staff, so we weren’t able to see inside the church.
We also stopped off to see the High Salvington Windmill which was once owned by Angela’s grandfather. It's been restored and remains in working order and they even sell the flour ground by the mill on the occasional open days.
English beaches aren’t like Australian beaches, they are all stones and pebbles rather than sand. I believe there are some English beaches with sand, I've just never seen them. Goring-by-Sea is where Angela grew up and the beach is one of those pebble beaches, with a row of beach boxes. The sound of the sea washing up against the pebbles on the beach is like nothing else and I’d love a recording of it, it’s so soothing.
And I should say something about English skies. I think they are different to Australian skies, more clouds, which I suppose goes without saying, and such contrasts. I keep taking photos just of the skies, they are so interesting.
And on the way back from Worthing we stopped off at Bosham (pronounced Bozem), a tiny little village on the Chichester Harbour, so quaint and picturesque, everything you think of as being an English village. Bosham is next to Emsworth, two names used by P G Wodehouse, who, like John Mortimer, named so many of his characters after English villages. I have long suspected that they named their characters by sticking a pin in a map.
Today is a Bank Holiday so Angela, Rodney and I went to Salisbury, a few miles west of Portsmouth. Rodney knows Salisbury quite well, having worked there on several occasions. It's a typical cathedral city, a picturesque Close and Cathedral with the tallest spire in England.
Rodney tracked down a former colleague who now runs The New Inn. It’s a lovely old pub that is haunted by several ghosts. Rachel, Rod’s friend, has had the building “cleansed”, clearing it of many, but not all, of the ghosts. Rachel described her experiences and sightings and Angela and Rodney also told me stories of pubs they had run that were haunted. At Seven Oaks James had his school coat “purloined” by a ghost, known locally as Harry. The coat reappeared in exactly the same place James had left it, three weeks later. Harry used to take bars of soap from the en suite bathroom, for no apparent reason. Very spooky.
London bound to tick off a few more things on my list. Angela and I set off late morning, taking the A3 to London when we hit the infamous Hindhead bottleneck and road works, which was compounded by a broken down truck in the single lane that was open, which added an hour to the trip. And just as we were driving into Chiswick, Jane unexpectedly shut down as the SatNav wasn’t recharging. Nonetheless, even without a detailed map we were still able to find Chiswick House, one of the many houses open to the public along the Thames.
Unfortunately, while my guide book said it was open daily, it is now only open from Sunday to Wednesday, so it was closed today. But the gardens were open as was the little cafe in the grounds, so we had lunch and sat in the sun watching the local kids playing with the sprinkler. I had also long wanted to visit Hogarth’s house which is in the same area, and although it was closed the last time I was in England for substantial refurbishment, there was a fire at the house last August so it’s still closed. It wasn’t my day.
Improvising, we decided to visit Syon House instead, which is also along the Thames, in Isleworth (the “s” is pronounced). It is the London home of the Dukes of Northumberland who have lived there for 400 years (the country is littered with the homes of the earl of this and lord of that). Syon House isn't the most attractive house I've ever seen, it really looks more like a castle from the outside, with a crenulated roofline. It was originally a Tudor house, being built on the site of Syon Abbey which was destroyed by that tyrant, Henry VIII when he granted the land to one of his cronies. It was subsequently given to the Percy family (the Dukes of Northumberland), by James I.
The house was extensively remodelled in 1761 by Robert Adam and the entrance hall, once a Tudor baronial hall, is now the most impressive Adams room I have ever seen. The plasterwork and elegance of the room’s proportions is breathtaking and made up for the austere external appearance of the building. There are a number of other Adams designed rooms and although the house is interesting, it’s not outstanding.
From Syon I wanted to have a look at Old Isleworth, a quaint village on the Thames that I have photographed from the Richmond side of the river on more than one occasion, but never visited. I developed an interest in the village last year and discussed it with Bryony who had lived in nearby St Margarets. I also discovered when going through Mum’s papers last year that she had worked in Isleworth before she was married, so I fell I have a family association with the place, and I quite like the village feel of the place, right on river. It is thought that the Romans crossed the Thames at this point because at low tide, the river can be forded quite easily.
Angela and I had a cider at the London Apprentice, an early 18th century pub right on the riverfront. Isleworth is directly under a flight path to Heathrow which is nearby, and the sound of passing aeroplanes is a constant background noise, as it is in much of London. I was much amused to see parked outside the pub my lovely Midge (MG), well not mine of course, but an identical car. I took it as an omen, I'm not sure of what, perhaps coincidence is the word I'm looking for.
As the day had drifted by quite quickly it was time to head back to Portsmouth, this time along the M3, to avoid the Hindhead disaster.
A family outing today with Angela and Amelia to feed the ducks and swans at Swanbourne Lake in Arundel. I had visited Arundel Castle in April but I hadn’t seen the lake which is just the other side of the town and part of the Arundel Estate owned by the Duke of Norfolk. On the lake there was a family of white swans with five fluffy grey cygnets, and several rowing boats. My favourite was “Little Miss Pink Wellies”, with “Mimi” a close second.
We took two and a half year old Amelia for a walk in her stroller when she started rubbing her eyes. When asked whether she was tired, she insisted she wasn’t. Two minutes later, she was fast asleep.
When Angela and I were in Isleworth last week I saw a walk around Old Isleworth advertised at All Saints Church and decided I would like to do the walk and get a better feel of the village. It meant another drive back up to London, which is about 65 miles (approximately 110 kilometres), and takes nearly two hours, but being a Sunday the traffic wasn’t as bad as during the week; parking is of course always a problem.
England is so pretty, I can’t get enough of the countryside here in England. Driving almost anywhere from Portsmouth entails miles and miles of green rolling hills and pretty villages. It is easy to think England is just London, but that would be a mistake, there is so much more and you don’t have to drive far to find beautiful countryside, even within the cities if you know where to look.
Today Jane was in good working order and was recharging properly, so I was able to navigate around Richmond and Twickenham without incident. Marble Hill House was on my list, being right on the Thames; it is such a lovely house. It’s not as large or as opulent as many of the houses I have seen recently, it's really quite small and it’s quite delightful. It was built in 1729 for the mistress of George II and without hesitation I can say I much prefer it to Syon House. The entrance hall is beautiful, I love floors paved with black and white tiles, and the rooms are comfortable and without ostentation rather than grand. That’s not to say that the house isn't expensively decorated, after all, Henrietta Howard was the King’s mistress, but it was on a modest more human scale. I loved the house and recommend it highly. The interiors have been restored and recreated to their original splendour and some of the dispersed original contents have been reassembled from as far afield as Melbourne! The only thing that was missing was the kitchen, or “domestic offices”, which I always find interesting.
I seemed to be the only person in the house which is a great pity as it’s well worth a visit and sits in lovely grounds right on the river. When I left the house they thanked me for visiting, which seemed rather strange and I thanked them. What a gem.
As I walked through the park towards the river I saw a lady walking a Joey-dog, (i.e., a wire-haired fox terrier and the breed I grew up with). I now describe myself as being ambidextrous, I love both dogs and cats equally. I miss my Tam cat so much and look forward to settling down and buying another pet. Nirvana would be a pair of brown Burmese cats and a pair of Jack Russell terriers, but that means settling down and at present that’s not an option.
I plan to walk the north bank of the river where Marble Hill House is located, I’ve done the south side from Richmond to Kew a couple of times, but there is so much more to see. I have such a passion for the Thames, I think of it as 2,000 years of liquid history. I’ve just bought a book of walks along the river, I buy so much from www.amazon.co.uk because there is no postage to UK addresses, and the prices are anything up to 50% of retail prices, and it’s always lovely to receive a parcel in the mail. I can remember a case study when I did my MBA that had predicted the demise of the post office with the invention of the telegraph. 150 years later and the post office is flourishing thanks to internet shopping. I do love technology.
I was a bit at a loss deciding what to do when I left Marble Hill House and before the walk at 2.30 p.m. but eventually decided to drive to Isleworth to make sure that I could find somewhere to park, (always an issue here), and have lunch locally. Surprisingly I had no trouble finding somewhere to park just next to the river, and had lunch at the London Apprentice, established nearly 300 years ago in 1731, and where Angela and I had a drink earlier in the week. Not the best pub meal I’ve ever had (the burger was a little more charred than was necessary), but I didn’t want to be late for the walk.
We met at the Church; there were 14 people, 11 women and three men, plus Jane, a Scot and our guide. It was a really interesting walk full of historical detail and just the sort of thing I enjoy. The river was central to the history of Isleworth, and the bird life is extraordinary, with herons fishing along the banks where the water had retreated at low tide.
Just to prove I was listening, there has been habitation at Isleworth for 4,000 years and for many years Isleworth was the orchard of London, being a major supplier of pears. This may perhaps explain why Pears soap was made at Isleworth for 100 years before Lever and Kitchen moved production to Port Lever in 1962. I think mum worked for Pears in Isleworth before I was born.
I think Isleworth looks great and I identified that I would quite like to live there but according to Bryony, it’s too close to the local sewage treatment plant for comfort during the summer months, and it’s right under a flight path to Heathrow, so noisy and smelly. Mmmm, perhaps not.
On leaving Isleworth I drove down the M3 (the long way around but I wanted to avoid Hindhead), and stopped off at Sunbury for a quick look at the Magpie Hotel, my “ancestral home”. It’s been repainted since I last visited. It should be black and white, given its name, but the last time I saw it, it was bizarrely painted green and cream. Now it’s cream with a most un-magpie like sign. It’s nothing like the hotel my father grew up in.
My Jane Austen fixation is no secret. Perhaps it started subconsciously when I was seven or eight years old and I lived in Four Marks, the village next to Chawton where the divine Jane spent the last few years of her life from 1809 until 1817, and was at her most prolific? Shirley, Colin and I went to visit Jane Austen’s house when I was staying with them a couple of years ago, but we hadn’t realised that it closed completely in January, so today I had checked the internet to ensure it was open.
Angela came with me and we drove up to Chawton, just off the A3 (but not as far as Hindhead, thank goodness!). Jane’s house is a pretty red brick cottage that was owned by her brother who had inherited a large estate from wealthy relatives. While Cassandra was responsible for housekeeping, Jane was responsible for making the tea and coffee, which allowed her time to write. I'm grateful to have Angela to look after me at the moment given that I've written over 45,000 words in my blog over the last four months. This writing business is very time consuming!
The little round table that Jane wrote and revised all her books was surprisingly small, I couldn’t imagine using such a small table, it is barely large enough for my notebook, where would I put my cup of tea? The house has been painstakingly restored and decorated and showcases the rooms with furniture of the period and displays letters and memorabilia from Jane Austen and the Austen family, including the topaz crosses that Jane’s brother gave to her and Cassandra and immortalised in Mansfield Park.
My favourite Jane Austen book, “Persuasion”, joins Dorothy L Sayers’ book “Gaudy Night”, which I'm currently reading for my course in Oxford next month, as the two most romantic books ever written (please note, no correspondence will be entered into on this subject :-) !). By the time Jane was my age she’d been dead 10 years, and yet nearly 200 years after her death and even though she only completed six novels, she remains one of the most popular authors of all time. Much has been written about her and her enduring appeal and it’s intriguing why she remains so popular even when her life bears no resemblance to our lives today. I think her books reveal that no matter how much the world changes, people remain essentially the same.
Jane lived very simply and her books earned her a measly £40,000 in today’s money, and that only in the last few years of her life, which is nothing when you compare what J K Rowling made from her seven Harry Potter books. It remains to be seen whether she could have written the same books today given the pressure from publishers to produce books for the mass market.
I never cease to be amazed by how beautiful the English countryside is, and Chawton in the middle of Hampshire is no exception. The village of Chawton, although small, is very picturesque, and the church and estate that her brother inherited is delightful, as the photos demonstrate. Angela and I would have liked a cup of tea and something to eat, but the little tea shop across the road from the house was closed, perhaps because it’s Monday?
From Chawton I wanted to see if I could find the house I used to live in at Four Marks, just up the road. I could remember we lived in Blackberry Lane, but I have no idea what the street number is, although I thought I might remember the house if I saw it as it was on a corner. It’s not a long road and I didn’t see anything that fitted the bill on the left hand-side of the road, but on the right-hand side I passed a house that looked like it might have been the house, although it had been altered, with a second storey added and it now has a mature garden, when we lived there the house was newly built and had no garden.
I'm not entirely sure that the house I identified was the right house and I will have to check through Mum’s papers when I get back home to see if it sheds any more light on the mystery. Although we didn’t live there all that long it would be nice to be able to identify my childhood homes. The only other one I want to visit while here in England is The Lindens in Wolverhampton, but given that’s quite a drive north into the Midlands, I don’t intend to make a special visit up there and will have to piggy back the visit off something else later in the year.
The weather has been a little unsettled and cloudy this week, although we haven’t seen much rain, and today was no exception. Angela, Rodney and I drove up to Windsor today to visit Windsor Castle, I had visited Windsor with Shirley a couple of years ago but we didn’t visit the Castle itself, although I did buy my lovely zebra stripped boots, so the visit was memorable for my boots!!!
I was somewhat surprised by the cost of the car parking in the open air pay and display car park, for five hours I was charged a staggering £9.50! But it was in the shadow of the Castle and a short walk to the town centre.
We arrived about midday so decided to have lunch first and then visit the castle, so we had lovely relaxed lunch outside at Café Rouge. It’s quite expensive to visit the Royal Residences, including Windsor Castle, when compared with National Trust and English Heritage properties, and interestingly there is no bag scanning which is somewhat surprising given that the Queen lives at Windsor, unlike the Tower of London and Kensington Palace. The French are much more thorough, or is that paranoid? The Louvre and Musée D’Orsay both scan your bags whereas bag scanning is not very prevalent at tourist attractions in England, I don’t recall having my bag scanned anywhere here.
Windsor Castle is magnificent and the rooms that have been rebuilt following the disastrous fire in 1992 have been restored to a very high standard. The quality of the craftsmanship is outstanding and if you didn’t know about the fire I don’t think you would know that the work was recent unless you were observant enough to notice that the oak hasn’t the colour of age and is still quite pale. However, the fire is referenced several times on the excellent audio guide that is included in the entrance price.
Unfortunately the St George Chapel was closed when we visited, but we had our tickets endorsed which allows us to return to the Castle again within a year without charge, so if time permits, I could return later in the year. We also saw the Guards parading in their very smart red uniforms and bear skin helmets. They have to ignore the intrusion of tourists continually photographing them, especially when you realise that these guys have just returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan, which makes the whole thing somewhat surreal, going from Helman to Windsor.
According to the flag Liz wasn’t in residence today, it was only the Union Jack rather than the Royal Standard. Perhaps she is at Buck House in anticipation of the Trouping of the Colour on Saturday, her “official birthday”. I'm always amused that Australia has a public holiday for the Queen’s Birthday and England hasn’t, but how then would we know when the ski season has started? Perhaps we should replace the Queen’s birthday with a Republic Day? Now there’s an idea. Perhaps it’s time for another referendum. I hope it's on Rudd’s agenda for his second term.
And the thing that struck Angela, Rod and I was the number of planes flying overhead on their final descent path into Heathrow. We estimated that there was one plane every 60-75 seconds, and they are quite low over Windsor. Perhaps the Queen has got used to the noise?
I first visited Lacock with Liz on my first trip to England in 1986 as it was on my tour of the Cotswolds, one of the prettiest spots to visit in England, especially if it includes Bath (a very Jane Austen destination). Not surprisingly, Lacock was one of the locations used for the definitive television version of Pride & Prejudice in 1995, as well as a version of Emma, but it has also been used for many other film and television productions including a couple of the Harry Potter films, Cranford, The Mayor of Casterbridge, and Tess of the D’Urbervilles. I visited it again in 2002 and again today with Angela and Rodney.
The village, once owned by the Talbot family but donated to the National Trust in 1944, probably explains why it remains much as it would have looked in the eighteenth century, and it’s noticeable that there are no visible power lines or television aerials on any of the buildings. The village has Saxon origins and is named in the Doomsday Book, at that time the village was estimated to be worth £7!
As its name suggests, Lacock Abbey was once an Abbey, but fell to the greed of Henry VIII and was dissolved and sold off to the Sharington family which has been associated with the house ever since. Fortunately, unlike so many of the other monasteries and abbeys, it was partially incorporated into the house that was built by Sharington, so the cloisters and the nunnery, although converted to domestic use, weren’t demolished but incorporated into the new house.
Importantly for me, Lacock was the home of the father of photography, William Henry Fox Talbot, and the visitor centre in Lacock Abbey includes an exhibition of his life and work. It’s easy to forget that photography has been around for nearly 200 years. The photo of the Oriel window at Lacock Abbey (see photo), is the subject of the world’s earliest authenticated negative, the process Fox Talbot invented. It measures a tiny 1 3/8 inches by 1 1/8 inches and was taken in 1835.
It’s extraordinary to think that I was using essentially the same process 140 years later when I first learnt darkroom techniques in 1975. Today with digital technology everything has changed, but that’s only been in the last few years, and the software still refers to techniques such as developing and DNG (digital negatives), even though it’s all done on a computer rather than chemicals and a darkroom.
On the way back from Lacock we passed over a canal with a lock being opened and closed to allow a barge to pass through, so we stopped to watch, it was both interesting and entertaining. Man-made canals criss-cross England as barges were once used to ferry goods around the country before the advent of the railway made the canals redundant, although they are still used extensively for pleasure craft. Some canals are no longer in use, such as the Wiltshire and Berkshire Canal near Lacock which was abandoned before the WWI and is now grassed over; only a depression in the fields and the occasional weeping willow shows the path of the canal.
Although Australians think of England as being a small country and that everything is easily accessible, it nonetheless takes quite a bit of time to get around, even if using the motorways and fast A roads (speed limit 70 miles per hour). So, in the last two days I've driven a total of 325 miles (approximately 525 kilometres), which is more than half way to Sydney, fortunately being from Australia I'm comfortable with driving long distances, but it is nonetheless not what I expected.
Bizarrely, although England is nominally metric, it hasn’t changed from imperial measurements for the roads (I'm told because of the cost), so everything is still measured in miles. I still struggle to work out the speed limit in many places unless it’s actually sign posted, which is rare, because you are supposed to know whether you are on a motorway, whether the road is dual or single carriage way, and whether you are in a built up area, (a built up area is defined as having street lighting), as the roads aren’t generally signposted, you are expected to be familiar with the highway code. It seems to me that even the locals aren’t familiar with the speed limits, it's all a bit hit and miss.
If you can work all that out you will still be confused because I'm yet to see anyone doing the correct speed, generally I rely on Jane to tell me the speed limit. The 70 mile an hour speed limit on the motorways and dual carriageways (approximately 114 kph), seems fast to me compared with Victoria’s 100 kph speed limit, but I'm constantly being overtaken by cars travelling at speeds considerably in excess of the speed limit.
They don’t seem to use speed cameras as effectively here as in Victoria where they have without a doubt changed driver behaviour. That’s not to say that people don’t speed in Victoria, but there is a greater risk of being caught by a speed camera than seems to be the case here. Here you are alerted to the presence of a speed camera with a sign by the road, and Jane seems to know where they are as well, which rather defeats the purpose, but the road toll here in England is on a par with Australia and England has the best record in Europe, so notwithstanding that the average speed is greater than Victoria, they must be doing something right.
Yesterday it rained all day, but today the sun is shining, so time to hit the road again.
I had long wanted to see William Morris’s Red House in Bexleyheath and after an aborted effort a couple of years ago when it snowed on the day I had planned to go, today was the day. I decided to gamble with there being no delays on the A3 at Hindhead and was rewarded with a clear run, presumably because it’s Saturday. As I was driving up to London I was trying to think when I first became aware of William Morris, but it’s been such a long time I can’t place it. I did two tapestries of his designs more than 20 years ago, the Strawberry Thief which still hangs on my bedroom wall, and the Peacock, and I have several books on Morris, perhaps there was an exhibition at the National Gallery in Victoria? I just can’t remember although I recall going to an exhibition at the V&A in London in 1996 when it was the centenary of his death and the poster still hangs on my study wall at home.
And my favourite architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, was influenced by the Arts and Crafts movement, which is an ideal segue for the Red House, the only house William Morris ever built for himself. It is now owned by the National Trust and has only been open to the public in the last few years. Morris was an extraordinary man and established the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (which still exists), and directly inspired the establishment of the National Trust. Little wonder that it only took the National Trust six weeks to raise the funds to buy the house when it came onto the market in 2003. At present only about half of it is open to the public and the rooms are sparsely furnished and decorated, but hopefully over the years they will be able to add to the rooms with additional Morris ephemera as it comes onto the market.
I arrived at midday, just in time to take a guided tour of the house which was a great introduction as the guide was very knowledgeable. I've now added Kelmscott, Morris’s last home in Oxfordshire, to my never decreasing list of places to visit.
Following the tour I had a quick lunch and a cup of tea, took a few more photos and wandered back to the car with no clear idea what to do next. As it was only mid-afternoon I had a look at my map and saw that the Thames Barrier was reasonably close, so Jane plotted a course and I was off again.
The Thames Barrier took seven years to build and was completed in 1982. It was built to protect London from tidal surges and 10 gates, together with the piers, span the 520 meters of river near Woolwich. The Thames is tidal as far as Twickenham and the river level rises and falls by up to seven meters on each tide. The pictures I took at Isleworth the other day show the river at low tide; there is a marker by the road and a sign warning that the river is liable to flooding, and for good reason. A tidal surge could increase the height of the river at high tide by anything from two to four meters and can cause serious damage as well as loss of life. When the Thames Barrier gates are raised, they stand as high as a five storey building and as at today’s date the barrier has been raised a total of 119 times in response to potential damaging surge tides.
The information centre is very interesting although I thought the £3.50 charge a little high, it strikes me that this should be a free service to encourage interest in something that is technically interesting but not necessary very sexy. There is an excellent working model to explain how the barrier works, several videos and the staff are very helpful and willing to answer any questions. I took the advice of the information centre staff who described the barrier as being “very photogenic”, and I was rewarded with a typically English cloudy sky and great angles. I took a few photos to add to my growing “Gap Year” collection (10,000 photos and rising!).
My last trip to London for a while I think, over two hours one way is beginning to get a little boring and it uses half a tank of petrol so each trip costs approximately £30 or the equivalent of a train ticket to London, admittedly without the convenience, provided I don’t drive into the congestion zone which would add another £8 to the trip.
On my way back to Portsmouth the other day from the Thames Barrier, I passed Eltham Palace (pronounced Eltam, the “h” is silent), the childhood home of Henry VIII. It is now managed by English Heritage, having been extensively restored by the Courtaulds when they lived there in the 1930’s. They must have spent millions restoring what was left of the Tudor house (not much apart from the Hall), and building what was then a modern extension in 1930’s Art Deco style. It is magnificent and the entrance hall is stunning. It was one of the most modern houses of its time when it was built, with central heating, telephones in all the bedrooms, underfloor heating and clocks synchronised with Greenwich Meantime, (Greenwich is just up the road). It’s highly recommended, especially if you are a fan of Art Deco.
I'm a bit perplexed, because although the Courtaulds spent a fortune on the restoration and building of new wing, in 1944 they surrendered their lease to the Crown and moved to Rhodesia where they remained for reasons I haven’t been able to establish.
The house was very well presented with a good (free) audio guide, and signage in each room. The bonus was the garden, which is quite beautiful and surprisingly large, incorporating the moat from the original house, which is now mainly dry (there is a small lake to one side of the house), but the rest is a sunken garden with beautiful English borders which we can’t grow in Melbourne anymore because we don’t have the water, and a lovely rose garden.
What struck me most was that, while within sticking distance of London, (I could see Canada Tower in the distance), I felt like I was in the middle of the countryside. London keeps surprising me.
I had also hoped to visit the Dulwich Art Gallery, recommended by Anita and Fred, but it’s closed on Mondays, and the Ranger’s House which is not far from Eltham, was closed when I got there, so I drove around Greenwich instead, but the traffic defeated me and I decided to drive back to Portsmouth. In an effort to avoid the A3 and Hindhead I asked Jane to plot another route. She took me via Brighton which I don’t think was the best way to come and added at least 30 minutes to the trip, hence my decision not to drive up to London again for a while.
Despite being in Portsmouth on and off for the last few months, I hadn’t been to the Historic Naval Dockyards so a visit was long overdue.
It's not cheap, the entrance fee is £19.50, but this allows me to return again within 12 months. The only things I had to see on the day of issue were the Victory (Nelson’s ship at the Battle of Trafalgar), the harbour cruise and the Mary Rose Museum. Everything else could be deferred until another day. The dockyard is so big and there is so much to see, so I decided to see only those things that I had to see today and come back another time.
The next scheduled harbour tour was at midday, so having 45 minutes to kill I wandered into the Apprentices’ Museum which chronicles the stories of the many trades that have been practiced at the dockyards during its 500 year history. Many hand tools were displayed, together with an explanation of the various crafts and trades. The only trade women were allowed to practise, indeed it was an exclusively female occupation, was flag making. Everything else was done by men, even sail making.
The harbour cruise was very popular and there was quite a queue when I came out of the Apprentices’ Museum. The tour only takes about 45 minutes and fortunately it was a fine day (I'm the world’s worst sailor, I often joke that I get seasick stepping over puddles), and the sea in the Solent was relatively calm today so I only felt slightly queasy by the end of it. It was interesting to see Portsmouth, the Spinnaker Tower, Old Portsmouth and Gosport (the other side of the Solent), from a different perspective. Back on dry land it was then safe to have some lunch, I wasn’t game before the cruise!
I was then off to see the Victory, the oldest commissioned warship in the world. It was launched in 1765 and remained in active service until 1812. Famously, Nelson was fatally wounded on the quarter deck and asked Hardy to kiss him, or something like that. I was enthralled by the ship which is brilliantly presented and has been restored to its Trafalgar layout and configuration. There is a well laid out one-way system which guides you through the ship and ensures you see everything. There are audio points, signage and staff on hand to answer questions. There was a group of uniformed sailors taking notes and photos as they went around the ship; they looked very smart and very young in their blue uniforms.
What surprised me was how large the Victory is and how many decks there are, I expected it to be somehow smaller. I'm sure with a full complement of men it was very crowded and cramped, but I'm not very tall so it wasn’t a problem for me below decks. However, without modern sanitation and washing facilities, I imagine it got a bit smelly when at sea, and although I don’t mind sleeping in a hammock, a life at sea wouldn’t suit me, not least because I get seasick. I loved all the rigging and masts and found the whole experience even more interesting than I expected.
And this was another Jane Austen experience, as Portsmouth and the dockyards featured in Mansfield Park and would have been well known to the Divine Jane, as two of her brothers were in the Navy. I mention Jane because my most read diary entry was my visit with Angela to Chawton (see diary entry for 7th June), so I figure that the more I mention Jane Austen, the more my diary will be read!!!
My final stop for the day was the Mary Rose Museum. Unfortunately the wreck itself is still under wraps and won’t be on display until 2012, 30 years after it was raised from the sea and nearly 40 years after it was discovered buried under the silt and sand of the Solent where it had lain for 437 years. A multi-million pound purpose built museum will be constructed around it and the dry dock where it is housed, to display what is left of the hull (about half), together with the many thousands of artefacts that were recovered from the sea. At the moment the hull is hidden inside a large marquee so there isn't anything to see at the moment which is disappointing, but there is a museum telling the history of the ship and displaying some of the finds, as well as a couple of movies which are well worth seeing.
Hundreds of sailors perished when it sank, indeed few survived, including the ship’s dog (kept to keep the rats at bay). Many of the guns on display are in extraordinarily good condition, there are even leather shoes on display, it’s a bit like the Roman artefacts I saw at Hadrian’s Wall. They don’t know why the Mary Rose sank although there are many theories, even though it was witnessed by many, including Henry VIII, as the fleet was engaged in a battle with the French fleet just off the English coast.
I found the whole thing quite fascinating and I'm glad I made the time to visit the Dockyards at long last, even though I only saw four of the many things available, I stayed more than five hours. Portsmouth Historic Dockyard is highly recommended, although a little expensive, and the car park was a further £6, (parking is so expensive here in England). It’s not a cheap day out, but it is very interesting. I will need to find another day to finish seeing the rest of the attractions on display, most notably the HMS Warrior, the National Museum of the Royal Navy, and there are several other buildings within the complex that are open to visitors. Today was warm and sunny, even out on the water, I have been so lucky with the weather! Let there be more of it.
I hadn’t realised when I visited Salisbury with Angela and Rodney the other day that one of only four surviving copies of the Magna Carta is on display at Salisbury Cathedral, so today I made a return trip to see it. It’s certainly a town that warranted another visit because it’s really quite delightful, full of Georgian houses, and many buildings, particularly in the Cathedral Close which is one of the largest in England, are even older.
I arrived about midday and wandered through the old town which is quite like Chichester, a Cathedral town with an old central core with remnants of the city wall still in place. The Cathedral is at the core of the old town and again, because the weather was so fine, I sat outside in the museum gardens and had a pot of tea. I seem to be drinking even more tea than usual because I can order a pot of tea with leaf tea, none of those pathetic weak tea bags for me; I like my tea hot and strong. You even get a second pot with hot water. How very civilised.
As luck would have it I walked into the Cathedral just in time to join a guided tour which is always the best way to get a better appreciation of somewhere. The Cathedral took a mere 38 years to build, i.e. very fast by mediaeval standards. The guide was very knowledgeable and we must have spent a couple of hours wandering around the Cathedral and Chapter House, where the Magna Carta is housed. The Cathedral is quite beautiful and full of light and the Chapter House displays not just the Magna Carta but other documents and relics of the Cathedral, and the carvings around the room, some of which were defaced by the Puritans, who did nearly as much damage as that tyrant, Henry VIII, have since been replaced. In all in all very pleasant day and I suspect I will return again as there are a couple of houses in the area I would like to visit, time permitting (so much to see, so little time).
Today I set off for East Anglia, a part of the country I haven’t explored before, although I have been to Cambridge a couple of times. It was an overcast, dull morning, quite cool and perfect driving weather. With Jane plotting a course for King’s Lynn, and my other constant travel companion, Radio 4, I headed north.
Jane claimed that the trip would take 3½ hours, but what she failed to allow for was the M25. Angela had warned me that the traffic could be bad on the M25, the ring road around London, but being a Saturday I dismissed her warning, thinking the traffic would be lighter. Perhaps it was, but it didn’t alter the fact that north of London the four fast lanes became a car park, as traffic slowed and then came to a complete standstill owing to road works. By St Albans I had lost half an hour so decided to pull off the M25. I needed petrol anyway, and as I had long wanted to visit St Albans because of its Roman ruins, I saw this as an opportunity to have a quick look at the town.
St Albans is in the so-called London commuter belt and is a bustling town with a lot of new housing and quite frankly, isn't that attractive. I didn’t get anywhere near the Roman ruins but being a Saturday morning, it was very busy with shoppers so I got caught up in still more traffic. Defeated, I asked Jane to plot a new course to King’s Lynn and as we were now north of the M25, she plotted an entirely different course, thank goodness. By this stage it was raining quite steadily and the temperature dropped as low as 13°C. As I drove into Cambridgeshire I saw my first windmill (I hope the first of many), and wild poppies lined the roads everywhere.
I had had difficulty finding somewhere to stay for a whole week but I’d successfully booked a room at a little B&B in King’s Lynn, which I planned to use as a base to explore further afield. My room is quite small but has broadband wi-fi which is essential so that I can stay in touch with the outside world!
I hadn’t realised how close King’s Lynn is to Sandringham, the Queen’s weekender, bought in 1862 by Queen Victoria for the then Prince of Wales and his wife. It was extensively remodelled and while still not very homey, it’s all relative, because it isn't as grand or over-blown like some of the Royal Palaces and stately homes I've visited. This is very much the Queen’s private home.
As with Windsor Castle, the security at Sandringham is very low key and again, there is no bag scanning which is very surprising. Only a few rooms are open to the public and I don’t really think I got my money’s worth, but the museum is mildly interesting and the gardens are lovely. I love the idea that the Queen condescends to be photographed with the Sandringham Estate workers once every 10 years, yes, that’s every 10 years. How does she squeeze it into her hectic diary?
Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t have a problem with the Queen, I just don’t think in the 21st century that Australia should remain a monarchy. What irritates me is that there is no real desire to change from an hereditary monarchy here in England, but at the same time they don’t want Charles to be king. There is a sense that people want everything to be decided like Big Brother, i.e. the person with the best PR machine wins and style over substance is everything. And despite the fact that all the pomp and ceremony brings in tourist dollars (and yen and Euros), the tabloid newspapers (aka the gutter press), still witter on about the £8M spent on the Civil List each year and the drain on the public purse.
I have to say that the standard of journalism in this country leaves a great deal to be desired. Now admittedly I don’t have a huge respect for journos at the best of the times having seen their handiwork in Australia. They will write anything to sell newspapers and they only ever apologise when they are sued, and not otherwise, so basically they get away with character assassination on a major scale. The tabloids here are complete rubbish, and don’t get me started on Jeremy Paxman. What a rude man, in fact all BBC journalists are rude and aggressive, which is surprising given that the English are, on the whole, a very polite people.
I had recalled reading an article a few years ago about Wells-next-the-Sea, I think in Vogue, so not unreasonably I had thought it would be worth visiting. Well, let me disabuse you. Wells-next-the-Sea is a bit of a dump, very low brow and down market. I was hugely disappointed. The shops, such as they are, are very tacky, and the restaurants are just fish and chips and fast-food shops. I felt I had been mislead, but a perusal of the estate agents’ windows suggests otherwise. Even the most modest properties are on the market for more than £500k (AU$1M), so something is going on here, I just can’t work out what. It’s like a cross between Portsea and Broadmeadows, the divide here can be quite misleading and even hidden. I can’t quite get a handle on it. As I hadn’t had lunch I had a light snack of cockles with vinegar, they are so small and delicate they are eaten with a tooth pick. We don’t have anything like them in Australia but I remember them from my childhood and always have them on my infrequent visits to the “seaside”.
Wells-next-the-Sea is not to be confused with Wells Beach which is about a mile away. The town is only accessible by boat when the tide is in, and I assume access channels have to be dredged. Wells, like Rye, one of the Cinque Ports in East Sussex, is no longer on the coast because the port has silted up to such an extent that the town has been effectively stranded inland. It’s quite bizarre. It was such a fine day I decided to take the long walk out to the beach along a raised causeway which runs alongside boats stranded as the tide retreated. Once I finally reached the beach, with beach huts stretching away as far as the eye could see, the sea was so distant, I could just see and hear the breakers, they were a long way north. I decided to walk parallel with the beach to look at the beach boxes, most on stilts because of the constantly shifting sands. Not quite so gaily coloured as the Brighton Beach boxes in Melbourne, but like Brighton, ownership of these boxes doesn’t come cheap.
Norfolk is famous for its big skies, and until you come down to the beach you don’t realise how big they are. By the time I had walked the length of the beach and back, I could still hear the breakers but could no longer see them, that’s how far out the tide goes. The beaches aren’t that dreadful stone so beloved of the south coast, (e.g., Brighton, Worthing, Hastings), but fine white soft sand with lots of shells. Admittedly the few Poms on the beach were cowering behind windbreaks, but they were enjoying the views, or walking their dogs (there is such a dog culture here, I love it), or playing with their children and flying kites. It was wonderful. It’s not hard to appreciate why, as an island England became such a sea-faring nation. Nowhere in England are you more than 70 miles from coast. In Australia there are places where you can be more than 700 miles from the nearest coast.
The walk certainly blew the cobwebs away, and I enjoyed the exercise, walking along the beach is so much kinder to my ageing joints. Dinner had to be fish and chips. What I couldn’t understand was why the queue in the fish and chip shop was so long, when there were four young men standing around with quaint little trilby hats, doing not very much. I don’t get the impression that efficiency is a KPI here. Despite my lovely walk along the beach, I have to admit that I was disappointed by the town, the attached photos I think give a misleading impression.
One of the things I enjoyed about today was driving through the countryside. Although I had always thought of Norfolk as being very flat, (I think I was influenced by P G Wodehouse, or was it John Mortimer?), in fact the countryside hereabouts is gently rolling green hills, with poppies scattered throughout, and pheasants, grouse and woodcock running through the hedgerows. All very English.
And today my blog has tipped over the 50,000 word mark, which I think is astonishing! That’s half a minor thesis!
I have just had the most wonderful day in Holkham. I must confess I don’t recall having heard of Holkham before; it’s the ancestral home of the Earls of Leicester. Now I assumed, wrongly as it turns out, that this was the family of Robert Dudley, Elizabeth I’s “favourite”, but it turns out that while he was an Earl of Leicester, the title has been bestowed seven times since 1107, but the line was forfeited or died out each time. Finally, in 1744 the title was conferred on Thomas Coke (pronounced in that infuriating English way of pronouncing things non-phonetically, Cook). But that isn't the end of the story because that line died out as well, although the estate passed on to a great nephew. It was that nephew’s son who was the famous Coke of Norfolk who revolutionised farming practice in the 18th century. In 1837 at the age of 83, Coke of Norfolk was bestowed the title of Earl of Leicester of Holkham.
Thomas Coke had been offered a peerage seven times but declined it because apparently he didn’t like the Hanoverian kings and was as a fervent Whig and friend of Charles James Fox, (which explains why there is a painting by Joshua Reynolds of Fox in the house, although it doesn’t explain why it’s hidden away in a side corridor which most people would miss). On Victoria’s accession to the throne, he eventually accepted an earldom and so he assumed the title of Earl of Leicester of Holkham; this is referred to as the “second creation”.
I was vaguely familiar with the work of Coke, having seen a documentary or something on him a long time ago. Coke was responsible for starting the fore-runner to the agricultural shows, with his three day annual gathering at sheep shearing time. It became a magnet for farmers far and wide who wanted to meet to discuss and learning about new farming techniques.
But the story still doesn’t end there, because in 1948 the estate was nearly gifted to the National Trust because the then Earl’s son was living in South Africa with no intention of returning to England, so the Earl wanted to pass the estate to the National Trust to maintain the property in perpetuity. Now it has to be said that the National Trust does a fabulous job and I'm a card carrying member of both the National Trust and English Heritage, but there is something special about estates held in the same family for centuries, it shows a real commitment and connection with the land. Anyway, the son wouldn’t agree with the proposal and the National Trust wouldn’t accept the property without his agreement, (surprise, surprise, there were tax implications), so the estate effectively devolved to the son of the son, who moved from South Africa to England and is now the seventh earl of Leicester. It’s a great story, if a little convoluted!
When I arrived it was quite early and the house wasn’t open until midday, but there was plenty to do. A herd of fallow deer roam the park, so I took a few (well okay, more than a few), photos, visited the Museum of Farming, (small but very informative with an emphasis on the work of Coke of Norfolk), and the Bygones Museum (also v interesting).
By the time I had finished there it was well gone midday so I visited the house which is both huge and fascinating. It’s a great Palladian pile and the rooms are wonderfully proportioned and decorated. There is the usual collection of ancestors’ portraits, many by Gainsborough and Reynolds, and the fabric of the building appears to be in remarkably good condition. The library was my favourite room, very homey and quite beautiful, and it is still used by the family to this day. It’s on a par with the living room in Holker Hall in Cumbria which I saw a couple of months ago.
The staff is incredibly helpful and informative and enjoy imparting their knowledge about the house and family. I thought every room was magnificent and as usual, I loved the huge kitchen, all gleaming brass pots and pans; I always like visiting the “domestic offices”.
Time for lunch at the Stables Cafe, sitting outside in the sun watching the little kids and dogs playing in the courtyard that would once have been the centre of a bustling working farm estate. I’ve been so lucky with the weather, today was another glorious warm sunny day. There is also a really good shop on the estate, sometimes the gift shops can be a bit disappointing, (I wasn’t that impressed with the shop at Sandringham).
Next was the walled garden which is the largest I've ever seen. Sadly, it has fallen into disrepair when the cost of labour outstripped the price of cheaper imports and thereby made growing fruit and vegetables for the estate too costly to be justified. The estate is now resuscitating the garden with the help of various grants and agricultural students, and hopefully in a few years it will be fully restored to its former glory. There were a few peonies and roses in bloom (note to myself, I must investigate a macro lens).
The grounds also boast an obelisk, built before the house, and a monument to Coke of Norfolk, so I had a good walk across the grounds to see both monuments. Walking in the English countryside isn't good for my hay fever but it's certainly good for my soul.
Before I left the park I saw the herd of deer again and thought I would take just a few more photos, always in search of that elusive great shot. Deer are a bit skittish and you have to approach them with caution for fear of scattering them, they won’t let you get too close but I had my telephoto lens. This explains why it was so late by the time I left the estate, everything was closed as it was about 6 p.m.!
I had spent all day at Holkham and loved every minute of it. I had had such a lovely, leisurely day and it wasn’t over yet because on leaving the grounds, I saw that the Holkham Beach and Nature Reserve was immediately across the road. Although it was getting late and the car park closed at dusk, the sun was still quite high in the sky thanks to summer time. There is a suggestion that England align its time with mainland Europe, which would make it lighter later in the summer months. The Scots don’t think much of the idea and are talking about adopting their own time zone, we haven’t heard what the Welsh plan to do. What a mess that would be!
It is a bit of walk across the sand dunes to the beach but it was worth it. The beach stretches away for miles and the sea was, well, miles away, or so it seemed. I was determined to reach the sea today even though I had to jump across a couple of small streams draining into the sea. I stood on that deep wide expanse of sand, listening to the crashing waves and the call of the sea birds, (quite a different sound to sea birds in Australia), looking at those endless Norfolk skies, they are huge. I was almost alone on the beach and it reminded me of the opening sequence of Kingdom starring Stephen Fry with him standing on a wide endless beach looking out to sea. Now I could see what he was seeing and understand why Stephen Fry loves the area so much. Ironically, when I Googled the Kingdom later in the evening I discovered that the beach scenes in Kingdom were indeed filmed on the Wells and Holkham beaches (they are adjacent), so without knowing it I really was seeing the same image I had watched on television in Melbourne.
The only word for it is magnificent. It certainly puts those stone covered beaches in the south of England to shame. I could barely drag myself away, but conscious of the car park being locked, I decided to head off and find somewhere for dinner. I had earlier driven through Burnham Market which was a very pretty town and, unlike Wells-next-the-Sea, the town was decidedly affluent and there wasn’t a single fish and chip shop anywhere, just lots and lots of very expensive cars, making Mimi looking out of place. Of course, she is now looking very dirty with all her recent travel, I must wash her sometime this year.
I found a very smart looking pub and as I was getting peckish I ordered the hamburger (I do love hamburgers), and a glass of Australian Pinot Noir (the alternative being something from Chile). I prefer to drink Australian or New Zealand wine if French or Italian wine isn't available rather than South American or South African wine (the less said about Californian wine the better). I got into conversation with a couple from St Albans who had a pair of white highland terriers called Daisy and Lottie (pets are such a good ice-breaker, especially for me as I love cats and dogs equally which is why I consider myself ambidextrous!). I spent a very pleasant evening chatting with them.
After two fabulous days I decided to stay closer to home today and explore King’s Lynn, a town I have long wanted to visit for reasons I can’t quite recall so you can imagine my disappointment this morning when I went to explore King’s Lynn to find a town that lacks any vibrancy. It’s lacks that indefinable quality, the X-factor, that makes some towns special and others merely a collection of buildings.
The vandals (aka property developers), destroyed the heart of King’s Lynn in the 1960’s, no doubt aided and abetted by the Council. What is left is a city centre with an interesting collection of 17th and 18th century buildings but mainly a lot of pay and display car parks built at the expense of the old buildings. Even Captain Vancouver’s house was demolished to make way for a shopping centre, a 1960’s pedestrianised unappealing collection of down market high street shops, (like so many towns in England). As a concession to Vancouver, (who sailed with Captain Cook when they circumnavigated the world), they named the shopping centre the Vancouver Centre. Wow, the old sentimentalists, what a bunch of softies.
King’s Lynn doesn’t appear to be a very wealthy town, using my shopping index i.e. there are very shops selling fripperies. I did the self-guided tour of the Hanseatic League. The Hanseatic League was a confederation of mainly German and Dutch seaboard towns which traded with each other. The town is built on the banks of the River Ouze, which I think is Anglo-Saxon for ooze, (only joking, but the river is tidal as it’s at the mouth of the Wash, and is very unappealing). The whole dock area is most unattractive and I have to confess to being very disappointed.
The test of whether I like somewhere is by the number of photos I take. King’s Lynn scored very low on the photo scale, perhaps 2/10, so I decided to cut my losses and do a couple of other things I had planned to do later in the week. Annoyingly I had put enough money in the pay and display meter in the morning for five hours and I left after less than three.
Notwithstanding a dodgy start to the day, the weather was glorious and I'm back in short sleeves. My arms remain very tanned, I don’t think they have lost much colour since I came back from Tuscany last year, which is so unlike me.
Norfolk is famous for several things including its big skies, lavender and windmills, and according to my guidebook it was the lavender season, so I drove over to the only lavender farm I could find in the area. Again, I was disappointed because it was so tiny. I had expected to see fields of lavender bushes as far as the eye could see, all I got was a couple of rows. I was very unimpressed, we have bigger lavender farms in the Yarra Valley.
Undaunted I went in search of some of the windmills for which Norfolk and East Anglia are famous. There aren’t that many left but I found two, quite different in construction to the Salvington Mill in Sussex that was owned by Angela’s grandfather.
I wanted to finish the day with a drive along the coast, but again I was destined for disappointment. There is no such thing as a coast road like the Great Ocean Road, and the coast is mainly marsh land and bird habitat. The best I could manage was distant sea glimpses. All in all a very disappointing day, but that’s coming off a high of the last couple of days, so I'm not complaining, and the weather was sensational, more blue cloudless skies.
Market Shipborough (aka Swaffham), is a pretty market town in west Norfolk, popularised by Kingdom, starring the wonderful Stephen Fry and one of my favourite actresses, Hermione Norris. Sadly ITV axed the show after three series, just as they axed Foyles War (but were forced to bring the show back by popular demand. Apparently ITV was going to axe Lewis as well but thanks to the popularity of Laurence Fox with thirtysomething women, they had a change of heart).
Swaffham is a short drive from King’s Lynn and the weather was yet again quite beautiful. Blue skies, fluffy white clouds, warm with a slight breeze. Just perfect sightseeing weather, I can’t believe how lucky I've been with the weather.
My first stop was the tourist information bureau for a local map. Howard Carter, the famous Egyptologist who discovered the Tutankhamun treasures came from Swaffham and the local museum has an exhibition on him, but it's not really my thing, preferring the more modern Romans!
Now I have to confess that one of the reasons I came to Norfolk and the only reason I came to Swaffham is because of Kingdom, in fact I’d never heard of Swaffham until I saw Kingdom. I even found the house that was Peter Kingdom’s (Stephen Fry) office! Stephen Fry has lived in the area for over 20 years and was brought up in Norfolk, which is all the recommendation I needed. As he writes in the tourist visitor guide, “I have lived a few miles away from Swaffham for over twenty years. I have always admired the balance between modernity and tradition that the town has managed to strike and always felt at home amongst its people. There’s something about the place. A perfect market town, perfectly placed in the heart of Norfolk’s perfect Breckland”, and I agree. It still doesn’t have the X-factor and yet it has more vitality than the sadly characterless King’s Lynn.
I wandered over to the Church (I always seem to gravitate to churches and always have, even when I was a practising atheist, I think it’s the peace and tranquillity I find inside that draws me like a magnet). A testament to the wealth of a town is the size and beauty of the local church. The Church of Saints Peter and Paul, described in the tourist brochure as one of the most splendid Parish churches in Norfolk, is no exception.
Swaffham grew wealthy, like so many towns in England, on the wool trade during the middle ages, and the church is beautiful. It was built between 1454 and 1465, and has a magnificent hammerbeam roof, although what I saw internally was modern, i.e. Victorian.
I had only stopped by for a few minutes and ended up staying an hour, finding one of the Stewards who was obviously on guard, happy to chat. So many churches in England are closed to casual visitors, it’s a sad sign of the times and these days I am surprised to find a church that is open, although almost always with someone in attendance (Jane Austen’s church in Chawton being a notable exception). I love finding a church that is open, although I have to say that locals are always happy to invite you to get the key from a neighbour who has the key, to see the treasures within. I think my enthusiasm and camera vouchsafe my respectability!
There is a stained glass window by William Morris and Co. commemorating Swaffham’s war dead: 90 in WWI and 25 in WWII. According to the Steward, the ratio of 90:25 is fairly constant across the country and demonstrates the carnage wrought by trench warfare; wars are fought quite differently today. Sadly, the Great War, the War to end all Wars, didn’t.
I had lunch in the town square, and then a leisurely drive through the perilously narrow laneways, many single traffic only. And poppies, poppies everywhere; they fringe the roads and fields everywhere. One field was a dense mass of scarlet (see photos). I am captivated by both the power of the red and the delicacy of the petals fluttering in the breeze; the fields of poppies are a constant mass of flickering, almost nervous, colour.
I was looking for a medieval church at Houghton-on-the-Hill (who said Norfolk was flat?), long lost and resurrected (perhaps not the right world), a few years ago when it was rediscovered covered in vines. No wonder it was lost for so long, I couldn’t find it! I passed through a number of sleepy villages, what do the people do around here all day?
I drove back to King’s Lynn via Swaffham and stopped for a refreshing cup of tea, spilling outside the nearby pubs were the England supports watching the World Cup, cheering loyally as England managed to win through to the next round. Thank goodness for that, the media would have had hysterics if the England football team had been bundled out at this early stage, as France was (what an uproar that caused in France). I was disappointed that Australia was bundled out of the competition, but football/soccer isn't an Australian sport so no surprises there.
My pilgrimage to Walsingham was a bit unplanned. A sleepless night had been followed by a slow start to the day and I set off on my travels rather later than usual. I had sat up half the night watching video clips and listening to the internet, agog at the news that Australia has its first female prime minister. When I left Australia, Rudd was riding high in the polls. One day a rooster, the next day a feather duster. Now we have Julia Gillard; she left Wales as a child and now sounds like Fred Dagg/John Clarke (who incidentally is a Kiwi). I've lived in Australia over 40 years and sound like someone with an identity crisis. Perhaps I should take a leaf out of Julia’s book and adopt an Australian accent. Wouldn’t that be “noice”?
I was taking a slow drive north east to Itteringham and saw the signpost for Walsingham. Walsingham was a medieval shrine and like Assisi in Tuscany, a pilgrims’ site for centuries, but thanks to that tyrant (aka Henry VIII), and despite his own devout pilgrimage to Walsingham, he ordered the destruction of the shrine.
Having missed my cooked breakfast this morning (I blame Julia Gillard, she has a lot to answer for), my first stop was an early lunch at a quaint tea room in Walsingham. While waiting for my ploughman’s lunch to be served, a respectably dressed couple of middle aged women sat at the table next to me. I noticed the lady sitting opposite me was obviously wearing a wig, but as I looked more closely, the twin set, string of pearls and long dangly earrings were off-set by a deep voice and large hands with immaculately manicured red nails. I realised that she was a he! I couldn’t work out the relationship between the two, but everyone in these enlightened days behaved as if this was perfectly normal. If you think about it, 100 years ago I could not have worn what I was wearing today, jeans and a singlet, entirely androgynous clothing of the 21st century, but traditionally men’s clothing, and we don’t call that cross-dressing. Women have so much more freedom in their dress than men, which is the only area women have any supremacy, (don’t get me started). Personally I don’t think cross-dressing will catch on for men, they are such cowards when it comes to their appearance and expressing themselves through their clothing.
Refreshed, I visited the ruins of the shrine, re-established in the early 20th century; there is now both an Anglican and a Catholic shrine (I'm not sure why there are two). The shrine, rebuilt in the 1920’s to replace the shrine that was destroyed, is an interesting place, very serene and visited by people young and old. I drank some of the healing waters from the well and lit several candles. It was a time of contemplation and reflection and I lost track of time. I prayed for my own miracle, that I would make up my mind what I want to do with the rest of my life!
When I eventually surfaced I realised that the day was slipping away from me and the original object of the day was to drive to Itteringham to visit a small gallery I had visited online many times because I like the work of the artist Angie Lewin. Unfortunately, Sat Nav Jane and I had words on a number of occasions, she was totally confused and at one stage had me drive literally around in circles (surely not driver error?). I had grave doubts as to her ability to navigate me to Itteringham but eventually she managed it, it really is a tiny place with one shop and a public telephone box and not much else, it's a miracle Jane found it at all, it really is out of the way and not somewhere you would find unless you were actually looking for it.
St Judes Gallery (www.stjudesgallery.co.uk) is surprisingly small and their selection wasn’t as large as I had expected given their website, but I still managed to buy three prints, two of trains (an amalgam of my love of London and Spencer Street Station), by Gail Brodholt. Sadly the print I really liked by Angie Lewin wasn’t available for sale and they didn’t have many of her works so I restrained myself and only bought the one; fortunately there is always the online shop. My challenge is to get all three prints home in one piece, as they are quite large, but they will look fab in my living room. Although St Judes Gallery is very much off the beaten track and it took a real effort to find it, I'm happy with the outcome, especially as I got a good discount for my efforts!
My drive back to King’s Lynn took in Greater Walsingham (not to be confused with Walsingham), and the delightfully named Great Snoring and Little Snoring (that’s not a joke, they really exist.).
Back to King’s Lynn and dinner at the Duke’s Head, an hotel in the Saturday Market, a large square with some very handsome 18th century buildings. I had a lovely meal but couldn’t understand why the restaurant was nearly empty and I fell into conversation with the waiter. I think the problem is that this is King’s Lynn, the town with no identity. The waiter was a delightful young man and we had a long chat about King’s Lynn and his ambitions, but he was unable to shed any light on the problem; it seemed to me that he wasn’t very worldly (his mother wouldn’t like it if he moved away), and his idea of a good 21st birthday celebration was to go somewhere with his mates where he could get hammered. Only those with an appreciation of what the world has to offer can appreciate and grasp their options.
Back to Portsmouth today but not before I visited the Fens. Now this is the part of Norfolk that is truly flat. The area was drained in the 1630’s via a series of channels and sluice gates to make it arable and traditionally there were a lot of windmills, although because of the nature of the landscape very few have survived. There is however a functioning mill at Denver which still grinds flour, although the mill is now powered by an engine rather than wind. I climbed to the top of the mill before having a delicious cream tea for lunch, perhaps not the most nutritious meal I could have.
I drove home via Ely ostensibly to have a look at the Cathedral, but as they charge a £10 entrance fee and I was a bit churched out, I passed on this occasion and asked Jane to plot the fastest course to Portsmouth which took me over the Dartmouth Bridge. What a shock to the system that was, the tailback was miles long, just to pay a piddling £1.50 toll because there are no e-tags. The cost to the economy because of lost productivity must be huge. It added at least an hour to my trip home and by trying to avoid the dreaded Hindhead roadworks as well it took forever to get back to Portsmouth. It should have taken three hours but with all the traffic it took about 4½: the traffic here is truly horrendous.
Mimi and I have just driven over 4,000 miles together, for such a small country there us an awful lot to see and I haven’t finished yet.
I had an email on Thursday from Shirley letting me know that Aunty Hilda has had a stroke and is in hospital. I was keen to visit her as soon as possible so although Shirley is away for the weekend I drove up to Camberley and Colin and I went to Chertsey together.
Aunty Hilda was barely conscious of our presence, but Colin and I talked to her for 30 or 40 minutes. I hope she has a speedy recovery but I fear her days of living independently in Sunbury-on-Thames must be over. She has been blind for years and I don’t really know how she manages, even with carers visiting her several times a day, but pretty good for 90!
Not given to early mornings, this morning I had to get up at 6.00 a.m. to catch the train to Waterloo to attend Eucharist at St Martin-in-the-Fields with Colleen, my lovely Vicar from St George’s in Malvern, and her husband Walter, who are in London at the moment visiting Colleen’s grandchildren. It was great to see old friends from Melbourne, the first I've seen since February.
St Martin-in-the-Fields had been recommended to me by Colleen when I first started travelling to London for work, and I regularly worship there when I am in London. It is so peaceful and still despite being in the middle of Trafalgar Square. It is one of the most beautiful churches anywhere, designed by James Gibbs and completed in 1726. It became a model for the Colonial style of church building in the southern US states and following a massive refurbishment in the last couple of years it positively gleams inside and out.
The window behind the altar is quite stunning in its simplicity; Colleen tells me it was designed by a Muslim designer which I think makes it all the more extraordinary and special. I just love it. I have propped up against the window in my study at home four pieces of glass from the previous window.
St Martin-in-the-Fields holds evening and lunchtime concerts and I've attended many in the past, performances of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, Mozart’s Requiem, Handel’s Zadok the Priest and the Queen of Sheba all being particularly memorable. It is a must see Church on any London itinerary, with the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery and Nelson’s Column adjacent in Trafalgar Square.
I planned to spend the afternoon at the Victoria & Albert Museum because there are three exhibits I want to see and two close next week, so I bought tickets for the Quilts from 1700 to 2010 exhibition and the Strawberry Hill exhibition. The couple I had met at the Globe Theatre in May had told me about the Quilts exhibition, they had come down from Northumberland especially to see it and recommended it highly. I must confess that I had confused the concept of patchworks with quilts and while they often go together, it’s not essential for a quilt to be patchwork. Without doubt my favourite quilt wasn’t a patchwork at all but plain white and exquisitely stitched. Patchwork is the “make do and mend” approach of previous generations before the invention of the disposable society, and they were often used to express political views, such as support for Caroline of Brunswick when the Prince Regent was divorcing her in 1820. The last item on display was another unmade bed by Tracey Emin.
What I particularly enjoyed about the exhibition was the sense of camaraderie among the largely female visitors, chatting casually about the workmanship and designs to total strangers at an exhibition is unusual in my experience.
I had a bite to eat in the courtyard; in the last couple of years they have put a fountain and lawn in the central courtyard and today the children were enjoying themselves, running about in the water and even a few adults were standing ankle deep trying to cool down. The forecast for London today was 31°C, a veritable heatwave by English standards! I was certainly glad I had my hat to keep the sun off my face, it was so bright and sunny and my arms keep getting browner and browner. I can’t complain about the weather over the last few weeks. To cool down I had a strawberry gelati, although I thought the £3.95 charged for three scoops was a bit steep.
The second exhibition I saw was about Strawberry Hill, the gothic home of Horace Walpole just outside central London. The house itself is undergoing a huge restoration and won’t be open to the public until later this year; but this exhibition about the house, its furnishings and decoration has whetted my appetite, so I will now have to add Strawberry Hill to my never diminishing list of places to visit.
After several hours of gallery time including a quick look at the most stunning jewellery collection I have ever seen, as well as the Islamic gallery, (little wonder that the V&A is one of my favourite museums, eclipsed only by the Louvre), I was starting to develop “gallery back”. Without doubt the V&A is the best museum in Britain, and it’s against some stiff competition, (note to myself, I must visit the British Museum soon, so much to see, so little time).
A quick look in the exceptional but very expensive shop, where I succumbed to a divine pair of gold acorn earrings, I strolled down the Brompton Road, passing briefly through Harrods (the crowds and the price of the handbags, even when on sale, just takes the breath away), a short sortie into Zara (I think my Zara moment has passed), and down Sloane Street to Sloane Square to catch the train to start the long journey back to Portsmouth. I just managed to catch the 5.30 p.m. which got me home by 7.00 p.m.. Although it was a long day it was very enjoyable, especially seeing Colleen and Walter again. I think it's about time some more Aussie friends came to visit England.
When Angela, Rod and I first visited Salisbury a couple of months ago I saw advertised at the Cathedral an architectural photographic course, and I made a note of the date although at the time I didn’t book the class. A last minute decision yesterday to ring and see if there was a vacancy proved successful. I enjoy these practical photographic short courses, I've taken a few in Melbourne and always get a lot out of them because there is always something new to learn, tips to pick up and people to meet, so I set off to Salisbury early. Jane and I had words about the route she selected but she is unfailingly polite and never answers back.
The class was held in one of the Cathedral’s many buildings in the Close, it looked like it had been a school room when originally built because of the raised platform at one end with a wooden desk built in, like something out of Dickens.
Lillian Newman was the tutor and she ran us through the basics. That’s the only drawback with these open short courses, they have to cater for all levels of experience. Fortunately in this class of eight men and three women, everyone was camera literate, a number being members of local photographic clubs (note to myself, I must investigate joining a photographic club next year). One of my class mates had brought his camera which uses 5" X 4" film, something I’ve never seen outside a museum.
The class was relatively inexpensive at £27.50 and this included entrance to the Cathedral and the tower. The climb to the top of the tower was part of the course and the 332 steps lead us up narrow, winding staircases to the foot of the spire, the tallest in Britain, which is visible for miles. From inside the tower we could see the medieval scaffolding supporting the spire and outside laid out before us were the breathtaking views of Salisbury and the surrounding countryside. As usual I took loads of photos, but this time I was in good company.
Salisbury is like Oxford in that it’s quite compact and encircled by green rolling hills. Although it had rained overnight and was overcast when we arrived, by the time we had climbed up the tower, the sun was shining and when we emerged on the viewing platform we were unexpectedly rewarded with blue sky and fluffy white clouds. We were supposed to spend about 90 minutes taking photos in the tower but we actually took over two hours, the time just flew by.
A quick sandwich lunch and back to the class to review different architectural photographic styles, with an introduction to some of the well-known photographers of the genre which I found very interesting. The second exercise of the day was to pick one of the photographic styles and then walk around Salisbury taking photographs in that style. David, one of my fellow students and I teamed up and we wandered around to be, chatting and taking photos as we went. It was a very interesting exercise, I've never done anything like that before.
Back in the class room Lillian took a selection of each student’s photos and put them up on the screen for peer review and comment. I was very pleased that she selected more of my photos than anyone else, how competitive I am about my photos, such vanity! A selection of my photos from the shoot are attached, so you be the judge!
Vita Sackville West, she of the famous Sissinghurst Garden, was born and grew up at Knole, a Tudor pile in Sevenoaks, just outside the M25 and within the London commuter belt. Angela and Rod lived in Sevenoaks over 20 years ago and I was keen to see the town I had heard so much about. A hurricane ripped through Sevenoaks in 1987 when Angela and Rod were living there and millions of trees were uprooted and destroyed and for a while it ceased to be Sevenoaks!!!
Knole is one of the few remaining Tudor castles that have survived relatively intact, it was visited by both Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, as well as successive monarchs. It’s now owned by the National Trust, although Lord Sackville and his family still lives, but he is now a tenant in his family’s ancestral home which I think is a bit sad. One of the reasons I liked Holkham so much was because it still belongs to the same family that built it, there is something sad about estates passing out of the family, even if it is to the National Trust who do such a fabulous job.
Knole is all dark wood panelling and 16th and 17th century portraits, and there is a major restoration project underway on some of the 300 year old textiles in the house. I have no idea what you do to conserve fabric, especially once it's badly degraded, but they do a lot of great work resuscitating these priceless treasures.
The park is extensive and home to a herd of fallow and sika deer. Unlike Holkham where the deer are very skittish and you couldn’t get very close to them at all, at Knole they seem very comfortable with humans. At one stage Angela and I were within three feet of a stage and he was quite unperturbed by our presence. They are very pretty animals, swishing their stubby little tails and constantly grazing. No need for a lawn mower here, they cut and fertilise the grass for free.
We had lunch at the pub that Angela and Rod used to manage in the 1980’s, then called The Bligh but now the White Rose, and we had a very quick walk around the town before the long drive home. I'm finding it difficult to get used to the sheer volume of traffic the motorways carry at all times of the day and night and regardless of the day of the week, if anything the traffic appears busier on the weekends than during the week.
It seems to take forever to travel even relatively short distances. It took us two hours to get to Sevenoaks using an alternative route to avoid the A3 and Hindhead. Coming back we gambled on a clear run through Hindhead and were rewarded with a quick (relatively speaking), 90 minute drive back to Portsmouth. The lesson is, use the A3 and hope that there are no delays at Hindhead, because I don’t think it matters which way you go, there will always be delays. So frustrating.
I first visited both Oxford and Cambridge in 1986 and loved them both, I think at that time I preferred Cambridge, but that was before Inspector Morse hit the television screens in 1989. Since then I have been back to Oxford twice, and last year I spent five days staying at the Bath Place Hotel which has D L Sayers connections, is a quaint little hotel backing onto the famous Turf Inn where Bob Hawke famously drank a yard of ale (2½ pints), in 11 seconds and entered the Guinness Book of Records. I had a wonderful time with Shirley and Angela who each joined me for a day or two.
I fell in love with Oxford, all those ancient colleges, quadrangles, soft golden stone and gargoyles. When I got home last year I discovered on the internet a course called “The Oxford Experience”, held each year in July during the summer holidays. The “experience” involves living in student accommodation at Christ Church, one of the oldest colleges at Oxford, and studying week long courses. The subjects that are offered are largely historic or literary, and appear to be designed to attract affluent American tourists. Subjects offered for the first week of this year were:
* Why did King Charles I lose his head?
* The Beatles, Popular Music and Sixties Britain
* Sacred Places and Landscapes
* Oxford Murder
* The Archaeology of the English Cathedrals
* Reading Contemporary British Fiction
* Jewish life in medieval England
* The Brontës
Castles in Britain
* The Twilight of the Romanovs, and
* The Challenges of War: Life in Britain, 1914-1918.
No prizes for guessing that my attention was drawn to Oxford Murder, a course exploring the detective novel genre. I couldn’t resist and had to enrol. Prescribed reading was five novels all set in Oxford, from 1663 until the present, so I have spent the few months working my way through the reading list:
Gaudy Night by Dorothy L Sayers (1935)
The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin(1946)
The Dead of Jericho by Colin Dexter (1981)
An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears (1997), and
Oxford Murders by Guillermo Martinez (2005).
I was advised not to take my car to Oxford because there is nowhere to park it. There are only a few car parks and those that exist charge exorbitant fees. 24 hours can cost over £20, so a one week stay could be very expensive, so the train was the only realistic option. Train travel in England is ridiculously expensive and I was lucky to get a cheap one way fare of only £17.50 (approximately AU$30.00). For this I had to change trains twice.
I caught the train from Cosham, just up the road from Angela and Rodney’s home, and was scheduled to make my first change at St Denys. Wrong. The train didn’t stop at St Denys. Why? Because the train driver forgot to stop! Fortunately I was able to pick up my connecting train at Southampton instead although I very nearly missed it. I couldn’t believe it when the conductor told me she had only known a driver to miss a station twice in seven years. Twice!
I arrived at Oxford just before lunch and without further incident, registered and settled into Room 10, on staircase 7 of the Meadows, with the most wonderful view of the Christ Church Meadows. My room is surprisingly large, although Spartan, with a sink and shared bathroom facilities. I was now living the Oxford dream, this is the Oxford Experience.
Lunch was in the Christ Church Dining Hall, the template for the Hall at Hogwart’s although not actually used in the film because it wasn’t big enough (a set had to be built at Pinewood Studios). Still, we could all imagine the owl post arriving in the morning, it was all a bit surreal.
I had the afternoon free and because the Ashmolean Museum had been closed for a multi-million pound refurb when I was in Oxford last year, this was my first port of call. The wait was worth it, the Ashmolean is the oldest public museum in the world and it is undoubtedly one of the best museums I have seen, and I've seen a lot. It’s not large like the British Museum but what there is is truly first class. I suppose it could be described as a boutique museum. There’s a whole room dedicated to Dutch and Flemish 17th century still life paintings, lots of statues and a small but interesting selection of stringed instruments. Despite the fact that it isn't a large museum, it’s deceptive as there is so much to see that I will have to return if I want to see everything.
At 5.00 p.m. we had an introductory lecture in a decidedly un-Oxford lecture theatre, i.e., it was very modern. We met our tutors, the Beatles tutor looked like an old hippy who hadn’t left the sixties, although truth be told he didn’t look old enough to have been born during the sixties, let alone lived through them! One of the tutors was amusingly called James Bond, although he didn’t look like he had a licence to kill, and my tutor, Michael Harrison, who looked like what an Oxford Don should look like.
Time to meet the people, we had drinks in Tom Quad, the huge (I think too large), quadrangle below Tom Tower. I prefer the smaller more intimate quadrangles of Lincoln or Hartford Colleges, but Tom Quad is certainly impressive and the largest in Oxford. Dinner followed and I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by how good the food is. Over drinks and dinner I met some more students, mainly American, but there are a good many Australians as well, mostly from Perth which was surprising. Apparently there was an information evening held at the University of Western Australia.
After dinner we met with our tutor and the rest of the class; of the 11 in the class I am the only non-North American, there are three men and eight women. Looks like it will be an interesting week.
After this preliminary meeting I met up with a couple of the Australian women from Perth I had met earlier at drinks in Tom Quad and we went on a pub crawl as I was familiar with Oxford and its pubs from my last visit. I was able to introduce Jacquie and Cheryl to the Bear Inn with its famous tie collection; it's impossibly small and we didn’t stay for a drink but drifted through the two rooms on our way to the Turf Inn (impossible to find unless you know where it is), and then the White Horse. These pubs have all featured in episodes of Inspector Morse and more recently in Lewis. At the White Horse we got chatting with some locals and so the week started with a late night.
Day 1 – Book 1: Gaudy Night by Dorothy L Sayers. One of my favourite authors, one of my favourite books. “Gaudy night” is the night of a college rejoicing or grand feast, particularly at Oxford.
I woke with a headache, can’t think why. Breakfast and my first class.
I’d done my homework and read all the books at least twice. The plan is to discuss each of the five books in the order in which they were written. Gaudy Night is a wonderful portrayal of Oxford University between the wars. It’s not really a detective novel, there’s not even a murder in it, it’s more a personal discourse on a range of issues close to D L Sayers’s heart. I think it’s only when you understand the author’s life and the social history of the time that you can fully understand the book which fundamentally is about the position of women in university and society generally, and the conflict between head and heart. It isn't really a traditional whodunit at all.
The first exercise we undertook was to agree a framework for analysing the week’s books. The five criteria we agreed upon were:
1. Resolution of a solvable puzzle
2. Character of detective and others
3. Environment, atmosphere, setting and place
4. Background information, and
5. Language and style.
Gaudy Night scored well on all five criteria:
1. Resolution of a solvable puzzle - 9½
2. Character of detective and others - 9½
3. Environment, atmosphere, setting and place - 9¾
4. Background information – 9, and
5. Language and style – 9-10.
The review generated a discussion on Sayers herself which assisted with understanding her books and their development. She studied at Somerville College (Margaret Thatcher’s college), when women were permitted to study but not graduate from Oxford. It wasn’t until 1920 that her degree was actually conferred, a first class honours degree in modern languages and medieval literature. I vaguely recall reading her biography more than 20 years ago but I couldn’t remember the details. The whole discussion was very interesting and quite illuminating, I really enjoyed meeting other people who are the D L Sayers equivalent of Janeites (i.e., Jane Austen devotees).
We reviewed the first few minutes of the television adaptation and discussed the challenges of adapting novels and why certain changes are made to the story, narrative and plot. Never having studied English Literature at school or university I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the discussion.
Lunch was followed by a walking tour of Oxford with Angela, a Blue Badge guide. She was very knowledgeable and we visited Lincoln College (my favourite college after the Steward very kindly invited Angela and I into the college last year to discuss botany. We never did identify the white flowered creeper covering one of the walls of the quad).
After the walk I stopped by at Blackwells, the definitive Oxford bookshop. I've never seen so many law books not otherwise in a library. The Norrington Room is a vast underground cavern extending under the gardens of Trinity College. It claims to be the largest bookshop in the world and is huge. At the back of the shop is a sign reading “photo point”, which indicates the position where the best photos can be taken (see photo).
I had an hour or so to kill before dinner so went for a walk along St Giles Street and drifted west into Jericho, a tiny suburb of Oxford where the canal workers and printers used to live and work. Jericho is the setting of the Inspector Morse novel we are discussing this week and featured in the television adaptation of the book. The narrow streets are even narrower than they appeared on the television, if such a thing can be imagined, and the streets are lined with the tiniest two up/two down houses. The property values in the area are astronomical for houses with no garden or off-street parking and the front doors open straight onto the street, like the house Mum grew up in Barrow.
By the time I got back to Christ Church I was very tired and lay on the bed and promptly fell asleep, waking in time to be late for dinner. Just as well I wasn’t sitting at high table tonight, because I missed Grace (in Latin), but fortunately nothing else.
Nos miseri homines et egeni, pro cibis quos nobis ad corporis subsidium benigne es largitus, tibi, Deus Omnipotens, Pater Cælestis, gratias reverenter agimus; simul obsecrantes, ut iis sobrie, modeste atque grate utamur, per Jesum Christum Dominum Nostrum. Amen.
After dinner Jacqui, Cheryl and I went to the Turl Bar for a drink with Linda and Lee who are both from Miami, Florida. Gail, also from Perth, joined us later. We had a very loud and raucous night with lots of laughter. Another late night.
Day 2 – Book 2: The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin
I had read this book twice, once in Melbourne and again a couple of weeks ago. We had an interesting discussion about the book described by Michael as a bit of light relief. It is certainly a very funny and rollicking romp through the streets and colleges of Oxford and is set just before the Second World War. It was generally agreed to have been was beautifully written and with great humour.
The Moving Toyshop scored well using the framework we had adopted yesterday:
1. Resolution of a solvable puzzle - 8
2. Character of detective and others - 9
3. Environment, atmosphere, setting and place - 9
4. Background information – 9, and
5. Language and style –10+.
We also discussed the 10 Commandments of detective fiction, the 20 Rules for writing detective stories, and the 5 Rules of P D James, and why Oxford is such a popular setting for detective fiction, seemingly more so than any other city.
Out tutor propounded an interesting theory that detective stories are a different genre to crime novels, and that the detective novel is now a redundant and right wing conservative art form whereas crime novels are left wing and tend to focus on the role of society as the cause of crime. I think Michael was trying to provoke some discussion on the point but as a group I don’t think we took the theory too seriously, or perhaps we just didn’t care!
In the afternoon I took a tour of Christ Church College with one of the senior Porters, who all wear bowler hats and patrol the grounds of the college. Basically they are the policemen of the college and are known as Bulldogs for some reason that was never explained.
After the tour I went for a stroll down St Aldgate’s and the Abingdon Road to the Head of the River, a pub nestled by the edge of the river and next to bridge, and then left along the banks of the river before returning to Christ Church to dress for dinner, jeans and casual dress is permitted for breakfast and lunch but not for dinner. It’s a pleasure to have to make an effort to dress for dinner, I've been encased in jeans and singlets for weeks on end and I'm starting to get a little bored with my wardrobe, it’s a nice change to wear a skirt, silk blouse and heels.
Our after dinner speaker this evening was Colin Dexter, Inspector Morse’s creator and long-time Oxford resident. He is a well-known Oxford identity and although nearly 80 and very deaf, he was most entertaining with his self-deprecating sense of humour. I'm sure he has delivered his speech many times before but it didn’t make it any less funny, and it’s clear that he’s a bit of a ladies man who is clearly enamoured of leggy blondes! Still, he was very sweet to me even though I'm not blonde. I asked him to autograph two books for me, The Dead of Jericho (For Claire – with all best wishes Colin Dexter), and a collection of his short stories (Enjoy Claire! Colin Dexter). I am having such fun.
Following the talk I joined Jacqui, Cheryl, Lee, Linda and Gail at the Bear Inn for the weekly pub quiz. This was a real Oxford pub quiz, i.e. the questions were very difficult and often obscure. Two of the rounds were beyond me, the one on the US and the other on popular music, although we did make up some ground on the final general knowledge round. We had a very funny evening and finished equal third, which would be quite creditable but for there only being but four teams!!! Another raucous late night. Oh dear, this is starting to become a habit.
Day 3 – Book 3: The Dead of Jericho by Colin Dexter
This morning started with a chat about Colin Dexter and his talk last night. The Dead of Jericho was the fifth Inspector Morse book but the first to be filmed for television, we think because it features Oxford and the picturesque colleges, whereas the first four, although set in Oxfordshire don’t feature Oxford itself. Oxford is so photogenic that the cynic might even suggest that it is the city rather than the detective that is responsible for the popularity of the Inspector Morse and Lewis television series! Personally, I think it’s a dead heat.
We watched the opening scenes of the television episode and compared it with the book and discussed the narrative and reasons why they might have been changed. Colin Dexter admitted that he is very happy with what ITV did with Morse, after all, he has made a fortune from the Inspector Morse and Lewis franchise and remains a consultant to Lewis, approving all the stories even though he no longer writes them himself. He often gets a Hitchcock-esque walk on cameo, much as John Mortimer did in Rumpole. For me half the fun of watching the show is trying to spot him, the television equivalent of Where’s Wally?
Television adaptations are constrained by time and budget and have to concertina a plot within a fixed time allowance, so whatever appears in the television programme is there for a reason because it has to convey some information, whether it be mood, character or plot. Music is used similarly.
The Dead of Jericho scored reasonably well:
1. Resolution of a solvable puzzle - 8
2. Character of detective and others - 7½
3. Environment, atmosphere, setting and place - 9¾
4. Background information – n/a, And
5. Language and style – 9.
I skipped lunch in Hall today so that I could attend Communion in the Cathedral. With the Cathedral literally on my doorstep I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to attend. From Christ Church I decided to follow the Dead of Jericho walk that Michael Harrison had provided in the course notes, so I wandered back to St Giles Street and had a late lunch at a little café called Greens, where I bought a print of the streetscape in St Giles including Greens and the Eagle and Child pub (which often features in Morse and Lewis). It’s not the clichéd view of Oxford, all dreaming spires and colleges (after all, I have more than a few photos of those!).
From Greens I strolled along the Woodstock Road and found myself outside Somerville College, D L Sayers’s college and one of the few female colleges established in 1879. I stood outside peering in through the doorway and the Porter asked if I would like to come in and have a look! They are so friendly and welcoming, so I had a look at the college grounds and Chapel, the only things open to visitors. The college is now co-ed, with a jumble of oldish and newish buildings, much as Sayers herself described Shrewsbury, the fictional college in Gaudy Night.
By following the directions we had been given I was able to find the street where the television episode of The Dead of Jericho was filmed and I was quite shocked by how tiny both the street and Ann Scott/Stavely’s house was, it was like a doll’s house. The walk also gave me my first view of the Oxford Canal which, despite a number of previous trips, I had never actually seen even though it featured heavily in my favourite Morse story, The Wench is Dead.
I walked along a stretch of the canal to Port Meadow and then turned back as my wretched knee was playing up again (all those cobblestoned streets are playing havoc with my knees). The Oxford University Press is in Jericho, a huge building which historically employed many of the locals, although I suspect the printing is no longer undertaken in Oxford.
I'm quite intrigued by Jericho, it has an entirely different feel to the Oxford that most tourists see, i.e., the colleges, it has a real village feel about it with lots of little cafés and restaurants and shops selling the fripperies by which I measure the affluence, or otherwise, of a town. Jericho is a world away from the bustle of the ancient colleges and dreaming spires and by walking just a hundred meters back to St Giles Street, I was back in the Oxford I know.
By now my legs were very weary, my age is really starting to slow me down, so a cup of tea on Broad Street was in order so that I could rest my legs. One of the things I like about being in England is that I never have any trouble ordering a pot of tea. It was all very pleasant sitting on a warm summer’s day absorbing the atmosphere and people watching.
Dinner and a long overdue early night, I am so tired.
Day 4 – Book 4: An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears
Today we discussed my least favourite book, An Instance of the Fingerpost. This is a book that you either love or hate, and while there were a couple of us who disliked the book, a couple hadn’t read it, and the rest loved it, including our tutor, so unsurprisingly, this book generated the most spirited discussion to date.
I found the book really hard to read, it took me longer than the other four books put together. The resolution was so confused I had to read it twice because I thought I had missed something the first time, (C S Lewis said if a book is worth reading, it is worth reading twice, in this case I'm not sure I agree with that). It would appear that there is much doubt and confusion about whodunit and why, which is why it was marked down so heavily for Resolution of a Solvable Puzzle, one of the five criteria we had agreed upon on Monday.
I also didn’t like the language and style which I found far too heavy and difficult, so I gave it a one (a concession as my first instinct was zero!), whereas others gave it a 9 or 10, hence the 8 in brackets because there really was no agreement on this point. The ratings for the book were:
1. Resolution of a solvable puzzle - 5
2. Character of detective and others - 9½
3. Environment, atmosphere, setting and place - 10
4. Background information – 10, And
5. Language and style – (8).
Resolution of a solvable puzzle Character of detective and others Environment, atmosphere, setting and place Background information Language and style
5 9½ 10 10 (8)
This afternoon we had our Gaudy Night walk with our tutor Michael. The tour started from the Meringue Steps in Christ Church (if you know the book you will know where I mean). We also saw the bridge under which Peter proposed to Harriet for the last time and was accepted (such a romantic book, it remains in my top 10). We also saw the site of the fictional Shrewsbury College, based on the book’s description.
After the walk I saw a small exhibition at the Bodleian Library on John Aubrey, and at the History of Science Museum (the original Ashmolean building), there is an interesting exhibition of photographs based on Alain de Botton’s book, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work.
My final stop for the day was a pint of cider across the road at the White Horse where I got into conversation with an Australian lass from Hayfield, Gippsland who is doing her D. Phil in Australian history (the immigration policy of 1970’s Australia). Everywhere else it’s known as a PhD but at Oxford it's a D. Phil, how singular of Oxford!. It will take her 3½ years to complete and Malcolm Fraser has agreed to be interviewed by her and interestingly, Gough Whitlam has declined.
Tonight I have an invitation to have dinner at High Table and we met for sherry first before taking our seats. I was seated next to fellow students, an elderly German doctor on my left and an English English teacher who lives in Singapore on my left. It was all a bit of a joke really, but the view from my seat of the dining hall, softly lit with the glow from the table lamps was spectacular. This is all part of the “Oxford Experience”, which they are selling at quite a premium I might add. It’s hard to take it too seriously but it's the closest I will ever get to studying at Oxford, so why not? I can now say, very tongue in check, “when I was up at Oxford”, and refer to Lee as being someone I met at Oxford who was “on my staircase”. What a hoot!!!
The after dinner talk was billed as “Tales out of court and thoughts on the English legal system”. I had assumed that the speaker would be a practising barrister or someone of that ilk, but it was in fact one of the tutors (The Brontës), who is a magistrate, a role that in England remains an unpaid appointment of non-legally trained person who has the time to be able to devote the equivalent of five weeks a year sitting on the bench for no compensation. It was all rather earnest and dreary and I was somewhat disappointed.
Day 5 – Book 5: Oxford Murders by Guillermo Martinez
Oxford Murders did not score well and it was generally accepted to be a poor detective novel on several dimensions. I didn’t like the book, it reminded me of Agatha Christie’s “Murder of Roger Ackroyd”, because in this case the person nominally helping to solve the murder was in fact seeding the misleading clues (I apologise for the spoiler). The style was workmanlike at best and is a very slight novel. It certainly wasn’t anyone’s favourite and rated as follows:
1. Resolution of a solvable puzzle - 8
2. Character of detective and others - 5½
3. Environment, atmosphere, setting and place – 3-8
4. Background information – 8, and
5. Language and style – 6.
I spent the afternoon back at the Ashmolean Museum. More paintings by Turner, the Impressionists and Pre-Raphaelites and Renaissance paintings including my personal favourite, the Hunt in the Forest by Uccello. I also found the exquisitely carved ivory chessmen, the inspiration for the chess set that Lord Peter gave to Harriet in Gaudy Night.
On the way back to Christ Church I had an overwhelming desire to spend some money and bought some clothes, on sale of course. I have been getting a bit bored with my wardrobe lately, I had expected that I would buy clothes here so I didn’t bring all that many. I bought a beautiful yellow silk dress that I decided to wear to the farewell dinner this evening. I even splashed out on a fascinator for the evening, it was just another excuse to dress up!
Tonight, being our last evening, we had farewell drinks in the Cathedral Garden before dinner. The garden has links with Alice in Wonderland because Alice’s father was the Dean of the Cathedral and Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll), was a Christ Church graduate and fellow. We sat with our respective classmates at dinner and received our certificates (I might even get it framed as proof of my time “when I was up at Oxford”!!!).
I had a great time this week and enjoyed it much more than I had expected. Although I started the week a little luke warm (I objected to being charged extra for some of the afternoon activities which was not disclosed in the marketing material), but by the end of the week I really was enjoying it and didn’t want it to end. I can now understand why some people return year after year for a couple of weeks, one week isn't really enough and I would happily go back and do another course. Michael Harrison was an excellent tutor and I’d like to do another subject with him, I even made a note of all the books he recommended. I learnt a lot about analysing books and I enjoyed the spirited discussions (note to myself, I must join a book club next year).
After dinner the six of us, Jacquie, Cheryl, Linda, Lee, Gail and I across the road to a pub Jacquie and Cheryl had discovered for a farewell drink, but when the pub closed at 11.00 p.m., Linda, Lee and I went back to Christ Church but the other three decided to make a night of it and kicked on. Aussies do like a party but I don’t have their stamina!
Today was my last day in Oxford, at least for the time being, and I was up early to pack and have breakfast, followed by sad farewells. I have met some really lovely people and had a lot of fun.
Earlier in the week I had booked a tour of the Bodleian Library. I had taken a tour last year with Shirley but it hadn’t included a tour of the stacks. Usually the tour includes the Radcliff Camera which is part of the library but unfortunately it was closed, which sounds like a reason to return to Oxford another time!
The old Bodleian Library is quite magnificent; it was originally the Divinity School and is very old and beautifully decorated, especially the ceiling. The new Bodleian Library was built across the road in the 1930’s and is connected to the old library by a tunnel under the street and we went through the tunnel and saw a couple of the 11 floors, each filled to the brim with books. For some reason I am fascinated with that sort of thing, I don’t know why. The Bodleian Library is one of a handful of depository libraries in Britain and is entitled to be provided with a copy of every publication in the country, as a consequence it has over 8 million books. There is a third library building near Swindon which houses the overflow.
After the tour I popped into the Oxford Museum which is a small local museum but nonetheless very interesting. There’s a video about Oxford narrated by Tony Robinson (Blackadder’s Baldrick), who has carved himself a niche as the everyman historian thanks to Time Team???
I had lunch at the White Horse before the long awaited Morse tour that is only run on Saturday afternoons. So popular is Inspector Morse that there were two large groups taking the tour today. It was very hot and the weather has been very kind to me this week. I learnt where Dexter got the names of Morse and Lewis (they were both cryptic crossword experts like himself), but not much else, regardless I will always take advantage of any opportunity to walk around Oxford.
It was then time to collect my bags from Christ Church and catch a taxi back to the train station for my trip back to Portsmouth. As much as I like Oxford, perhaps I should visit Cambridge next, it only seems fair.
There is always something new to see, somewhere new to explore, and as Angela doesn’t start her new job until next week, we have a couple more opportunities to do some sightseeing together, and although the weather wasn’t great today, we thought it would be an opportunity to revisit Salisbury to see Mompesson House and Arundells.
Built in 1701 Mompesson House, located in the Cathedral Close, is another National Trust property. It’s a very pretty house built as a family home and isn't grand at all, but is nonetheless comfortable. We have a former resident, Barbara Townsend, to thank for the property being in such good original condition because she lived there for nearly 100 years until her death at the age of 94! It was then bought by an elderly bachelor in the 1970’s on condition that he leave it to the National Trust. Much to his credit he spent quite a lot of money on repairs.
The house is really beautiful with a great aspect and views of the Cathedral, not as grand as Marble Hill House in Twickenham, but just as delightful and a bit more cosy, and the gardens are smaller and more intimate. It’s such a pity that I can’t have an English garden in Melbourne anymore because of the drought, although I will have to do something to resurrect my garden next year. As part of my continuing Jane Austen theme, the house was used in the film of Sense and Sensibility.
The visit was completed with a free cream tea thanks to a voucher the National Trust had sent me recently. My membership has certainly paid for itself!
The other house we visited, also in the Cathedral Close, was Arundells, the home of former Tory Prime Minister, Edward Heath. Having never married, on his death five years ago he left the house and its possessions to a trust. I can’t help thinking that it’s a bit arrogant to expect people will pay to see your home, and as it turns out, not enough do to justify the running costs so the trustees have announced that they will close the house at the end of the year and sell it and use the proceeds to further the trust’s other objects. Nonetheless, there was some interesting art and contemporary photographs of Heath with various Heads of State (including Nixon and Castro), and the gardens are lovely, stretching from the Cathedral Close at the front to the Avon River at the rear of the property with swans floating by.
The house must be worth millions and it is hoped that it will return to residential use. The rooms aren’t all that large but it feels like a home. Anyway, I can’t afford it, so it’s a bit academic!
On the way back to the car we dropped in to see Rachel at the New Inn, the haunted pub we visited in May, before driving back home. We were lucky with the weather today because it was raining very heavily on the way to Salisbury, so heavy that at one stage we considered aborting the trip, but we pressed on and the rain did abate as we got closer to Salisbury. It drizzled on and off but never stopped us enjoying ourselves.
Determined to visit as many historic places of interest as possible, today Kenwood, just north of London on the edge of Hampstead Heath, had drawn the short straw. Shirley and I had arranged to go together, and at the last minute, because Angela still hasn’t started her new job, she joined us for another girl’s day out.
We drove up to Camberley to pick up Shirley, and then on to Kenwood. SatNav Jane had her first hiccup of the day on the way to Shirley’s, sending us down a street that had been closed to through traffic some years ago. Her second hiccup was on the way to Kenwood. Having only bought the TomTom in March, I would have expected the maps to be more current than they appear to be, as it is clear that the changed road conditions were not recent.
Anyway, notwithstanding a very difficult drive in heavy traffic, we eventually arrived. After a reviving cup of tea we went to explore the English Heritage managed building, which is sadly in need of a coat of paint on the outside. Some of the rooms inside have been recently repainted and those rooms that are open to the public are lovely, but the house is now essentially an art gallery rather than a home as it was gifted to the nation empty so that what furniture is in the house is of the period, but not original to the house. I recognised the house from the film Notting Hill and it was also used in a film adaptation of Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park.
There are a couple of art collections housed at Kenwood, the first is the Iveagh Collection which boasts paintings by Turner, Vermeer, several Reynolds, Gainsboroughs and Constables, and a Rembrandt self-portrait. There is also the Suffolk Collection, a wonderful collection of 41 portraits predominantly from the 16th and 17th century.
Sadly there was no sense of the house of former days, and it has something of a melancholy air about it. The Orangery was empty although it afforded wonderful views over the Humphrey Repton designed garden that was supposed to have spectacular views of London, although the trees obscured any view. I was disappointed with the house, perhaps because I have seen so many houses recently maybe I am a little harsh in my judgement, but the art collection was certainly worth seeing.
By the time we had seen the house and had a late lunch it was nearly 4.00 p.m. and given we had only paid and displayed until 4.00 o’clock, it was time to leave. This is where it got really interesting (I'm not sure interesting is the right word). We were heading into peak hour traffic and Jane had her third hiccup, directing me to turn right into a no right turn intersection, (note to TomTom, get your act together guys).
We managed to navigate our way to the M25 with some difficulty and hit the biggest tailback I have ever seen. A one hour trip back to Shirley’s house took two hours. Just before we pulled off the M25 onto the M3, we saw an announcement saying “Accident – 70 minute delay”. It would have been helpful if we had been told that when we first joined the M25 an hour earlier so that we could have taken an alternative route, by the time we found out it was too late. What a nightmare the roads are here, one blip and everything just grinds to a standstill.
Back at Shirley’s we stopped for a comfort break and then set off back to Portsmouth. Bizarrely, Jane gave us an entirely different return route. It was decidedly more picturesque through some lovely little villages in Hampshire and past a lavender farm in full bloom (why did I bother with the one on Norfolk?), but it was much slower. The traffic was a hassle but apart from that it was great to catch up with Shirley again, and although the weather wasn’t that great, it was better than the forecast and as usual it didn’t stop us doing anything we had planned.
I was off to London again today to see an exhibition at Lambeth Palace, the London home of the Archbishop of Canterbury. I walked from Waterloo to Lambeth Palace and wished I had realised it was going to be so cold, fortunately I had my £4 collapsible umbrella with me, now showing signs of exhaustion but still useable, but it was blowing a gale.
Lambeth Palace isn't normally open to the public so this was a rare chance to see inside the walls of the Palace. Colleen had told me about the exhibition of some of the treasures of the library when I saw her last week and as it closes next week, I didn’t want to leave it to the last minute.
The library is one of the oldest of its type and has many treasures of religious works and especially materials pertinent to the Church of England. The exhibition was in a large hall with an impressive hammerbeam roof like the ones I had seen in Oxford, although this one had been severely damaged by an incendiary bomb during the Second World War. Thousands of books were destroyed when the building was hit in May 1941 but fortunately the Gutenberg? Bible was not among those books lost. The one in this library is beautifully hand illustrated and it was a great privilege to see it. Also on display was a contemporary copy of Mary Queen of Scots execution warrant signed by Elizabeth I, and some interesting wartime correspondence to the Bishop of Chichester when he spoke in the House of Lords in February 1944 against the bombing of civilians (plus ça change) .
From Lambeth Palace I walked along the Embankment to Westminster tube station as I was heading for Oxford Street. I'm making much more use of public transport these days to save my poor legs, once upon a time I would probably have walked but those days are long gone. Oxford Street isn't one of my favourite shopping precincts but I wanted to pop into John Lewis to see if I could get the “Keep calm and Carry on” water bottle I wanted. Mission accomplished I then headed to Regent Street and Liberty to stock up on their grapefruit bath oil. It’s a particular favourite of mine and smells divine, the two bottles I intended to buy turned into four when I discovered it was on sale at half price!
After a quick lunch in a small café off Carnaby Street, (groovy baby), my final destination was Covent Garden to see if I could find the handbag I had seen a couple of years ago made out of a suit jacket. At that time I had prevaricated about buying one and have regretted it ever since. The only other place I have seen them was at the V&A shop where they are twice as much (I love the shop but it is soooo expensive), and every time I've been back to Covent Garden since the stall wasn’t there, but my patience was rewarded today.
I couldn’t decide between the blue pinstripe and the Prince of Wales check that reminded me of a coat my father had when I was a little girl (I called it his teddy bear coat because it had a black fake fur collar, I loved that coat), so I bought both. With a discount for cash I got the two for less than the price of one at the V&A, so I thought that was a good outcome. My shopping expedition was a complete success.
To round off my day in London I had a ticket to see the play Enron. I have to confess that I didn’t enjoy the play at all, I thought the humour, such as it was, heavy-handed and it lacked any subtlety, no wonder the play closed on Broadway after only 10 days, it just isn't that good and doesn’t live up to its reviews. While the production values are high it wasn’t enough to save a very ordinary play and I was most disappointed. The fact that the theatre wasn’t full on a Friday evening explains why I had no difficulty getting a ticket at such short notice.
Not many people manage to celebrate 40 years of marriage these days, but Angela & Rod married on a hot summer’s day in 1970 in Worthing and today family and friends joined with them to celebrate a major milestone, their ruby wedding anniversary.
The weather this week has been quite unsettled and there’s been a little bit of rain, but the forecast for today was promising, so when we woke to a cool, overcast day we had our fingers crossed that it would clear.
It was wonderful to see my two uncles together, they hadn’t seen each other for a long time. Rodger was Rodney’s best man, and Maureen, Rodger’s wife, my cousin Shirley (who is also Rodger and Rodney’s cousin, it’s a long story), and Shirley’s husband Colin who were all at the wedding 40 years ago, were all there today. It was a real family occasion, James and Helen, (Angela and Rod’s children and my cousins), were also there, as were Claire, James’s wife, and their daughters, as well as lots of other friends and relatives. Angela was especially delighted that Ann, whom she calls her “French daughter”, was able to fly over from Paris for the weekend to help us celebrate.
We all had a lovely day, the weather turned out beautiful with the bluest of cloudless skies, and I think Angela and Rodney were very happy with the way things turned out. It was great to be part of such a special day.
I'm having a bit of a theatre binge this week, with three plays at the Chichester Festival Theatre, starting with George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion, with Rupert Everett as Professor Henry Higgins and Honeysuckle Weeks as Eliza Doolittle. The theatre is very like the Fairfax Theatre in Melbourne, only much larger, and I thought the set worked well although I couldn’t understand why it was necessary to have two intervals.
Stephanie Cole was in the cast and Phil Davis was excellent as Eliza’s father and overall it was a good production, although I was a little disappointed with Honeysuckle who couldn’t carry off the cockney accent. I could barely decipher what she was saying and it wasn’t helped when her back was turned to the audience. Sorry Fred, but while she looked lovely she didn’t carry the part well, she’s just too posh to be a cockney!
Back in the 1980’s I loved Howard’s Way, England’s answer to Dallas. Lots of shoulder pads and impossibly large earrings set among the wealthy sailing set on the south coast of England. Some of it was filmed in Hamble-le-Rice, a short drive from Portsmouth, so on my way to the New Forest I drove through the village, an English version of Paynesville. I could hear the theme song running through my head as I strolled around the wealthy little village with more yachts than you could poke a stick at. I was bemused to see the Royal Air Force Yacht Club although they weren’t very welcoming, members only! And I just loved the sheep in the frippery shop, just a snip at £200 each. If only I could ship them home, although I couldn’t help thinking that sending sheep to Australia is a bit like sending coals to Newcastle!
On to the New Forest, a former royal hunting ground, created in 1079 by William the Conqueror as a hunting area. It’s a National Park, although there are villages within it, including Calshot on the coast opposite the Isle of Wight. Apart from passing an unsightly power plant on the way, there was little to recommend Calshot apart from the row of beach boxes on one of those dreadful pebbles beaches. I don’t usually like sand, it has a habit of getting into all sorts of nooks and crannied, but it’s much easier to walk along and I can’t imagine how anyone can lie on a pebble beach, but they do. My childhood memory of beaches in England was of pebble beaches covered in oil washed up from the sea, very smelly and sticky.
As I walked onto the Calshot pebbles there was a sign which said “permissive access only”. Not being a property lawyer I didn’t know what it meant, although I had my suspicions, but on my way back I saw the following sign:
Notice – Cadland Estate – This Beach is Private – By a Judgement of Mr Justice Maugham delivered the 19th day of December 1932 in His Majesty’s High Court of Justice, Chancery Division, in an action between the tenant for life of the Cadland Estate and the Southampton County Council and Others. It was DECLARED that the Shore and Foreshore of the Solent forming part of the Cadland Estate from here (the South Eastern Boundary) to the South Western Boundary near Exbury was not subject to any public rights of way or other public rights except the ordinary rights of the public for the purposes of navigation and shipping.
It didn’t say anything about the purposes of photography, but no-one seemed to mind.
From Calshot I drove north to Beaulieu, a very beautiful village, unlike Calshot. I have come to the conclusion that if you want to guarantee a picturesque English village, make sure there is either a National Trust, English Heritage or other stately home nearby, otherwise forget it. Beaulieu is a lovely little village with several shops selling the usual range of fripperies, and I had lunch at the Montagu Arms, a delicious wild mushroom risotto.
The New Forest is less a forest than heath land with ponies and cattle grazing by the roadside; there are trees, but it's not the dense forest as I had expected. There are common grazing rights in the New Forest and there are ponies and cattle roaming about and the speed is limited to 40 miles per hour because you have to be prepared to stop for animals wandering across the road.
From Beaulieu I drove up to Lyndhurst, obviously a very wealthy village, principally because you don’t see a Maserati dealership just anywhere. I got caught up in a traffic jam through the village, perhaps it was rush hour but it usually isn't obvious when there are traffic jams in England, the traffic frequently slows down to a standstill for no apparent reason.
Tonight was the second night of my three nights at the Chichester Festival Theatre, and tonight’s play, at the smaller Minerva Theatre, was the Ragged Trousered Philanthropist, based on the famous book by Robert Tressell and written in 1910. Okay, I hadn’t heard of it before either.
Perhaps the political message was a little heavy-handed and Dickensian, but it was a very powerful social play set in 1904 lampooning the corruption of the local councillors and the greed of the middle class capitalists at the expense of the painters and decorators. It was a very grim story but well done and it had an excellent ensemble cast playing multiple roles; it's the sort of play I would expect the MTC to stage (please take note Dale!).
Tonight was the last play of my trifecta at the Chichester Festival Theatre, a double bill of The Real Inspector Hound by Stoppard and The Critic by Sheridan; two plays about theatre critics separated by 200 years, both employing the play within a play device to great comic effect.
The cast included Nicholas Le Prevost, last seen in February in The Misanthrope, Richard McCabe who played Captain Harville in the 1995 production of Persuasion (there’s my gratuitous Jane Austen reference for the week), and Una Stubbs, whom I remember in Summer Holiday with Cliff Richard in 1963, which ages both of us.
The Real Inspector Hound was first up, very amusing if a little surreal. It was all very silly with lots of intentionally hammy acting, a delicious confection. I didn’t enjoy The Critic quite as much, but it was still an enjoyable evening in the theatre. I keep seeing the same middle-aged, middle-class audience I see at the MTC.
And finally, when I arrived home I was met in the street by a fox and a cat in a face off. The fox beat a hasty retreat leaving the cat to saunter away with the usual disdain of a cat.
Mum’s great friend Pam lives in Yately, not too far from Shirley and Colin in Camberley and Sunbury-on-Thames, and we had arranged to catch up for the day a couple of weeks ago. I’d visited Pam and Vic a couple of years ago on a previous visit and they had made me very welcome and I was looking forward to seeing them again.
I drove up to Yately in the most torrential rain I have ever seen, not helped by SatNav Jane initially refusing to turn on, so I had to go back through the rain to the house to download a Google map. She eventually relented and started to work, all I need is for Jane to start to become unreliable, heavens I would have to resort to reading maps again. What a thought, it’s amazing how quickly we have become reliant on technology only to be thrown into confusion when it goes on the blink.
Pam, Vic and I had a lovely lunch at a local pub called The Highwayman, followed by afternoon tea with Jane, Pam’s daughter and Mum’s god-daughter, and Mica, Jane’s daughter who is studying law at Bournemouth University. Jane lives in Farnborough where I lived as a little girl, and at the moment the biennial Farnborough Air Show is on, so there was a plane flying overhead doing aerobatics, and boy was it loud. I can remember standing in our back garden watching the Red Arrows fly overhead doing all that aerobatic stuff but I hadn’t remembered how loud they were. It took me back, it must have been 1964, such a long time ago.
It was also great to catch up with John, Pam’s first husband, who also knew Mum and Dad when we lived in Byfleet in the early 1960’s. John has had a life-long passion for flying and has recently been learning to fly solo, what a great achievement following his dream.
I can’t really remember the house in Byfleet although I drove past it a couple of years ago. It didn’t trigger many memories apart from the time I ran across the road and tripped, striking the side of my face on a low brick wall; I still have the scar next to my right eye to this day.
Pam always comments on how much like Mum I am, and everyone here tells me I sound Australian, which makes me laugh given how often I'm told in Australia that I haven’t lost my English accent! Neither fish nor fowl.
I also had a very feline day. Pam and Vic have two, Suzy and a delightful little kitten called Lucy whom I accidentally started to call Tam because it was easier (for me, not the cat, the cat didn’t care what I called it). And Jane has a cat called Rover, which I just love, what a great name for a cat! I'm looking forward to settling down and buying another Burmese cat, I even have a name for her, Koko. There is a temptation to call her Tam but no cat can replace my beloved TamTam, every pet is different.
It was great to catch up with old friends again and I drove home through the countryside, avoiding the main roads as much as possible and taking the B roads. The countryside hereabouts is beautiful, all rolling green fields and ancient villages. I never cease to marvel how much countryside there is, it’s surprising given how many people there are in England, they seem to be crammed into the towns and cities like sardine in tiny tiny houses.
I drove from Portsmouth to Cornwall yesterday, a drive Jane claimed would take 4½ hours but took closer to six, even allowing for a couple of pit stops. I'm staying at a B&B in Falmouth recommended by Angela & Rod, very close to the sea (in fact nowhere in Cornwall is more than 16 miles from the coast), and central enough to allow me to explore the surrounding countryside.
Today was very much a horticultural day, first stop the Eden Project, an hour’s drive from Falmouth. The Eden Project was built at the end of the last century in a disused china clay pit. Cornwall produces some of the finest china clay in the world outside China but the disused clay pit was a scar on the landscape. Thanks to the vision of Tim Smit (who had been instrumental in the restoration of the Lost Gardens of Heligan, but more of that later), the project was established in 1998. To see the before and after photos of the site is a testament to the resilience of plants to establish themselves, even in the most inhospitable of landscapes.
The first thing that struck me was that the biomes as they are called, (they look like giant golf balls), were smaller than I expected, they look much larger in the photos I had seen. Nonetheless, the Eden Project is the largest greenhouse in the world. The second thing that struck me was how many people were there, although it is the beginning of the school holidays, so I suppose it’s hardly surprising. Pity about the weather which has gone seriously downhill since the school holidays began, it rained, or rather drizzled, on and off all day.
The rainforest biome was hot and humid as you would expect, and it got hotter the higher I climbed. I was sure I must have lost 1 kg in weight, I was perspiring so much! I don’t know how the Poms managed, it was like Darwin during the wet season. The other biome was on a Mediterranean theme, but I was disappointed that there wasn’t an Australian landscape anywhere.
The project was designed by Nicholas Grimshaw, who was also the architect on the Southern Cross Station. Apart from the biomes there are a lot of other things to do, mainly for children, but there are also some interesting sculptures and installation art for the grown-ups (see photos).
I spent much longer at Eden than I had expected, a good three hours. There is quite a bit of walking involved, up and down the contours of the clay pit, and apart from the biomes, the outside area takes some exploring. It is well worth seeing, although a little expensive at £17.50, it must be very expensive to take a family, but as was pointed out to me when I complained about the cost of the booklet, it is a charity.
After a light lunch, I drove down the road to the Lost Gardens of Heligan. I saw a documentary on the restoration of the gardens in the late 1990’s and have wanted to see the gardens ever since, so today was a long time coming. The gardens were first established in the sixteenth century by the Tremayne family who still own the house and gardens, although the gardens are now leased to the restorers who continue to develop the site as a tourist attraction, and they are doing a great job.
Heligan is now the most visited private garden in England with more than 200 acres restored in the last 20 years. The National Trust wouldn’t touch it, it was considered too far gone. Now the garden is huge and takes more than a day to explore but I only had a few hours, so I focused on the Northern Gardens. I have never seen such large or old rhododendrons, the walled gardens were huge and the various outhouses, including the bee boles, were quite fascinating. It was very well presented with details about the history of the house and its gardens displayed throughout the garden. I started to have fantasies about having my own vegetable garden, it’s a pity we don’t have allotments in Australia, I would so love to have the space to grow my own vegies. I'll just have to make do with growing herbs.
The countryside here is different to Hampshire, the hedgerows are much higher and unforgiving, they are basically granite walls covered in plants, and the roads are sooooo narrow. Jane keeps sending me down the narrowest and I constantly live in dread of meeting cars coming the other way. You can’t see oncoming vehicles because of the high hedgerows and it's a wonder there are not more accidents, but the POMS are unfailingly polite and very patient. I suppose they must be so used to the narrow roads and make allowances accordingly, it’s very unusual to see aggressive or rude drivers here.
Whereas Norfolk was memorable for its poppies, in Cornwall it’s the hydrangeas that are ubiquitous, mainly blue ones but there are some very large specimens, especially at Heligan. I have noticed that the countryside changes colour with the seasons. When I first arrived the trees were bare and there was very little colour, but as the weeks passed and the trees began to bloom, the first wave of wild flowers burst into bloom, all delicate white. As spring has been replaced by summer the colours have become stronger, and purple and orange wild flowers have become the predominant colours, no doubt designed by nature to attract the bees. I just love seeing the bumble bees here, they are big fat bees and quite unlike the bees in Australia.
I'm thinking of sacking Jane, today we had a serious disagreement about the route she plotted for St Ives, compounded by the route she had suggested being closed for maintenance. I eventually arrived, very late morning, and then discovered how difficult it is to part in St Ives. What a nightmare that proved to be, I eventually parked in the Rugby Football Club car park for £5, miles from town. The walk from the car park was mercifully downhill, although I realised that it would be uphill going back.
First stop had to be the Tate St Ives, the main reason for my trip to St Ives. I have to confess to being a little disappointed. The gallery was very small and totally inaccessible except by foot, and the current exhibition which took up a whole floor was a selection of naive and populist naive art. Not to my taste. Having said that, the building itself is worthy of note, it’s a wonderful exhibition space, I just wish it had been larger, and it has wonderful views over Porthmeor Beach.
And then my knee decided to play up, damn it. St Ives is one of those villages built on steeply sloping hills down to the sea, with four beautiful sandy beaches (yes, sandy not pebble). St Ives is built on a jutting piece of land with a series of small sandy coves together with a pretty harbour, empty at low tide, and all very picturesque.
The Poms were making the most of it today, even though the weather wasn’t that great as it was a bit windy and cool, but after all it is the school holidays. There were even life savers on duty for the surfers and swimmers on one of the beaches. Not that there was any real surf to speak of, or surfers for that matter, but there were people with surf boards trying to recapture their long lost youth, in wet suits of course. I wasn’t game to test out the water myself.
The main street was throbbing with tourists, presumably the village’s main source of income these days, which admittedly detracts from the experience but is par for the course in Cornwall, and especially this time of the year. It’s a bit like Lorne or Apollo Bay, just a few centuries older and with some serious pretensions to art (hence the Tate).
Because St Ives is renowned for its artistic residents and galleries I was hoping to add to my art collection but the art galleries along the main road were woeful, full of mass produced images of the coast and surfers. In search of a cold drink and somewhere to rest my increasingly weary legs I wandered up one of the many steep hills. I found a great hotel with a rooftop terrace with sensational views over the harbour. My pint of cider (or is that cyder?), lasted over an hour as I enjoyed the views and read the newspaper, an uncharacteristically leisurely afternoon. Relaxed and replete I wandered back down to the harbour and found some art galleries worth looking at and ended up buying two lithographs by Michele Wright, a local artist, of the red-billed Chough (pronounced Chuff), birds indigenous to Cornwall and appear on Cornwall’s coat of arms. Although they had died out they have in recent years been reintroduced. My shopping haul included a Cornish sea urchin and a perpetual calendar from the Tate which will allow me to display m y growing collection of postcards painting I have been privileged to see over the years.
I contemplated having dinner in St Ives but it was only 5’ish and I wasn’t really hungry so I started the slow walk back up the hill to the car park. It seemed to take twice as long uphill as it did going downhill in the morning, I was tired, my knee was playing up and it was raining. I felt like I’d walked miles and was beginning to think I would never find Mimi again, although I had taken Jane with me as a precaution, but I think the slow walk just made it seem further than it was.
The drive home was very dreary and damp; I drove into the centre of Falmouth to find somewhere to eat. Easier said than done for a town the size of Falmouth, finding a restaurant, as distinct from a pub, wasn’t easy, but I settled on a Nepalese/Indian restaurant. The food wasn’t that great, it was rather bland and soggy, but I fell into conversation with two hard-nosed detectives from Liverpool, rough, tough and hard to bluff (so they told me). Detective Sergeant Simon and Detective Constable Tommy had driven down from Liverpool this morning to interview an expert witness and would be driving back to Liverpool tomorrow morning, which is a very long way on English roads, but that was the price they pay for their tireless efforts in the pursuit of justice.
They had both been to Australia and we had a very interesting chat about the cultural differences and the meaning of multiculturalism. From the restaurant we kicked on to a local Irish pub with the loudest rock (not Irish), band which was a bit of a conversation killer. The evening ended hilariously when I offered to drive them both back to their hotel. The only problem was that they knew how to walk back to their hotel, but they didn't know the name of the street, and thanks to Falmouth’s one-way road system, so common in English towns, that was easier said than done as we couldn’t exactly retrace their steps. More through good luck than management we eventually stumbled upon their hotel.
Postscript: Simon made my day by telling me I looked about 30, and no, he didn’t have his seeing-eye dog with him!
Poltair, the B&B I am staying at, is a large old house facing out to sea. Although my room doesn’t have a sea view, it is very reasonably priced at £35 per night and has the added advantage of a small bar fridge in the room, which is unusual for B&B’s. Yesterday morning Malcolm, the owner, had suggested a guided walk as one of the other guests had arranged to take a walk with a local guide; I thought that would be a great way to see some of the countryside off the beaten track and I wasn’t disappointed.
Angela, the other guest at Poltair, and I were picked up from Poltair by Paul Simmons (www.walkitcornwall.co.uk) and we drove to a spot a little short of Lands’ End; we left the van and set off. The scenery was magnificent, green rolling hills plunging down to the sea, secluded sandy beaches and mile upon mile of coastal path. And the thing that struck me was that there were plenty of people out enjoying the walking path, we frequently passed other hikers, or ramblers as they are referred to here in England. It is unsurprising that rambling is so popular here because there are so many public paths through the most magnificent countryside, such ancient public rights of way don’t exist in Australia.
I can remember going to Land’s End with Liz in 1986 and recall the iconic fingerpost and a shed selling a few tacky souvenirs and that was it. There is even a photo of me next to the fingerpost, somewhere in the archives. Now there is a trashy commercial venture on the point, an intrusive tourist centre where I understand that you have to pay to have your photo taken next to the fingerpost. What a rip off, (but more of that later)!
The walk we took today was along just a tiny section of the South West Coast Path, Britain’s longest way-marked footpath and National Trail, it stretches for 630 miles from Somerset, through Devon and Cornwall, ending in Dorset; Cornwall has the longest coastline of any English county. We climbed up often steep cliff paths and down into sandy coves, none of which are accessible by car. The weather was sensational, not hot but nonetheless I slathered on the SPF15 without which I would have burned to a crisp. It’s a rare day that I'm not wearing a sleeveless top and today was no exception, it was ideal walking weather. I certainly didn't need the fleece I had taken as a precaution against the changeable weather.
Paul has to be admired for his decision ten years ago to leave London and settle in Cornwall. He has an MA in Cornish studies and obviously has a passion for Cornwall. He combines his love of walking with his music (he is a pianist and singer), making a living out of the two things he loves doing. How many of us can say we do that? Good for him, I say!
Unfortunately for me, my dodgy knee didn't appreciate the climbing, either up or down, and I was very glad I’d taken my collapsible walking stick that I had bought at that Norfolk lavender farm, because it was used extensively for support and balance and to cushion the rise and fall of the terrain. I've lived with my dodgy knee since my teens but I can see it deteriorating, although it has to be said I've given it a lot of punishment over the last five or so months, but I dread to think how it will be affecting my mobility in 20 years time.
Paul provided lunch which was like a fun school lunch, egg sandwich (made from eggs laid by Paul’s chooks), carrot, fruit and nuts, bag of crisps, sitting on a headland with views money can’t buy, you have to earn then by walking to them!
We stopped for a pit stop at a little coastal village with a small sandy calm, Porthgwarra, and then on to the final destination, the Minack Theatre. The Minack Theatre is an ersatz Greek theatre perched high on top of the cliffs, with dramatic views over Porthcurno and out to sea. This is a very quirky amphitheatre, built on a steeply slopping promontory in the early 20th century by what I assume was a very eccentric woman called Rowena Cade. The theatre is a memorial to her determination to build the theatre which was built over a period of some 50 years, and although it is rather amateurish and quite frankly I'm astonished they can get insurance since the site is soooooo steep with minimal handrails, it’s a challenge just to climb down to the seats and stage. Nonetheless, it’s obviously very popular because as we left there were people camped out for seats for the next performance that didn't start for at least another two hours, just to get the best possible seats. And it looked like rain; rather them than me!
I took my usual quota of too many photos, and loved every moment of it. The walk is highly recommended.
Postscript: a couple of days later on my way back from the Levant Mine I decided to take a detour and drive down to Land’s End. Without warning and without the provision of a turning circle, the public road ended with a small sign that said Private Land; there were some further words that were too small to read and in any event, by the time you saw the sign it was too late to turn around.
There was then a sign telling you that parking costs £4 for cars (AU$7). As I had no intention of staying I wanted to turn around, but I was afforded no opportunity to do so. There was a sign that said “Please do not turn around here you can exit behind the kiosk”, so as there were cars behind me and in compliance with the sign I pulled up at the kiosk and explained that I just wanted to exit. You are not going to believe what I was told. “It costs £2 to exit!”.
Having been given no opportunity to exit earlier I was being held to ransom for £2! I said “you must be joking” and drove out without paying. I can only assume that the Cornwall Council has colluded with the private operator to allow this to happen without given adequate warning on the road that the public road was about to come to an end and providing a turning circle to permit drivers to exit without entering the so-called private property.
The property owner is purporting to charge an unconscionable exit fee without first giving motorists an opportunity to decide whether they want to incur that fee. I will be complaining to the Cornwall Council and the Competition Commission, I can’t believe they get away with it, presumably because the charge is so small that most tourists can’t be bothered to complain. It has certainly left a very unpleasant taste in my mouth and despite Cornwall’s many attractions, the blatant and cynical exploitation of tourists in this manner does the Cornwall Council no credit. It is incumbent on them to address this outrageous exploitation before they do any further damage to Cornwall’s reputation.
The weather has started to deteriorate, but I am determined to complete my ambitious timetable, so I headed off south to St Michael’s Mount which I vaguely remember visiting with Liz in 1986. It’s a rather romantic place accessible via boat at high tide or via a causeway across the sand at low tide. People start to flock over it even before the water has completely ebbed away and risk getting wet feet. The property has quite a chequered history and is now owned by the National Trust which continues to manage it to the same high standards I have come to expect from all their other properties.
A former Benedictine monastery, it was dissolved by that tyrant Henry VIII and became a fortress for a while before passing into the St Aubyn family who have lived there ever since. It must be quite an unusual existence being isolated from the mainland half the time and invaded by tourists the rest of the time.
The two cafés on the island were doing a roaring trade and I couldn’t be bothered queuing, so I walked back across the sands that were by now fully exposed and had lunch on the terrace of a local pub in Marazion, having been warned to beware the seagulls that literally steal your food from your plate!
Just down the road from St Michael’s Mount is Mousehole (pronounced Mowzall), a pretty village with a tiny harbour facing Penzance (no pirates were in evidence today), and St Michael’s Mount. I had an ice cream, ice cream being a local speciality no doubt because of the richness of Cornish cream. Much smaller than St Ives or Port Isaac, it has a quiet charm and although there were tourists (you can’t escape them in Cornwall), it wasn’t as over-run as other parts of Cornwall. I spent a pleasant hour or so wandering around the narrow streets and around the harbour.
I slept poorly last night and woke tired. While staying in B&B’s breakfast usually finishes at 9.00 a.m. so nonetheless I had to get up and shower. Breakfast of kippers (how I love kippers, although now very hard to find in Melbourne, I found a fishmonger in Ripponlea which stocks them, but they charge an exorbitant $16 for two kippers, but oh so worth it! I suppose they do come all the way from Scotland.)
I decided to stay close to home today and explore Falmouth, so ditching the car I walked the short distance from Poltain to the main shopping and restaurant area where the National Maritime Museum is also located. This is the area I couldn’t find the other evening when I was looking for a restaurant because from the street the area doesn’t look promising.
Falmouth is the third largest natural deep-water harbour in the world after Rio de Janeiro and Sydney, so it’s hardly surprising, especially given Cornwall’s maritime history, that the National Maritime Museum is located there. The Museum had been highly recommended by Angela so I had to give it a try and I'm glad I did, it’s wonderful. Even though I am a terrible sailor and not at all mechanical, I love anything to do with boats and maritime history, so intrinsically linked are they to the social history of the times. There is a particularly fascinating exhibition about lighthouses. I hadn’t realised that there are three types, shoreline, ocean and light vessels. Light vessels are anchored to the ocean floor but it is extremely dangerous as the anchor can fail and as the ships have no independent source of power they can be swept away and sunk or smashed on the rocks they are designed to be warning other ships about, hence the danger to the lighthouse keepers.
The day to day life of lighthouse keepers was described, somewhat counter-intuitively lighthouse keepers had to be very sociable because they lived at such close quarters with two other men for weeks at a time, working rotating shifts. Fascinating stuff. It’s not a big museum but it still absorbed three hours of my time, always a good sign as far as I'm concerned.
And then for lunch. It’s not Padstowe but the Rick Stein franchise is alive and well in Falmouth, so I stopped for a late lunch. Hallelujah, the first glass of white wine I’ve had that is properly chilled. Of course, Rick Stein has Aussie connections so he understands about refrigeration, (unfortunately English fridges don’t chill things enough for my taste). I ordered the baked monk fish because I recalled it was Rick Stein’s favourite fish, so I had to try it in his restaurant; having tried it on a previous visit to England I had been somewhat unimpressed. Today the verdict was more favourable, it’s quite a meaty fish, like cod, and delicious, and the lettuce leaves were coated but not drowned in an olive oil dressing. The meal was accompanied by live music and the buzz of Falmouth on a Saturday afternoon. It was a memorable meal, perhaps not up to the standard of the gold medal meal I had at Rick Stein’s Padstowe restaurant in 2002, but worthy of a special mention.
I spent the afternoon wandering along the waterfront and shops lining the narrow main road. It was buzzing with people enjoying the fine weather.
I walked outside this morning to discover it was raining, not heavily but incessantly, a drenching, mid-range rain. There is an urbane myth that Eskimos have dozens of words for snow. You’d think the English would have a similarly large of words to describe different types of rain! Although I've been lucky with the weather, the point is, I've been lucky with the weather, and that luck appears to have run out. At the moment it’s wet but not cold which is okay, I can handle one or the other but not both.
Cornwall is littered with abandoned mines, tin and copper, and Cornwall is seeking UNESCO International Heritage status for the sites which I think is well deserved as industrial architecture and the social and commercial history that flows from the mines is, historically speaking, important.
The mine I visited first was Levant Mine, which saw 31 men die in 1909 and it took five days to recover all the bodies. I understand that my grandmother, Clara Hannah, was one of 13 children, and that all her brothers perished in the coal mines in the north of English. Even now, in these OH&S conscious days, mining accidents still claim lives.
The Levant Mine is right on the coast and the mines extend out under the sea for some 1½ miles which is a bit of a scary thought. Apparently the miners could hear the sea and boulders moving about on the sea bed above their heads.
I arrived just in time to join a guided tour. The National Trust does such a great job and the tireless enthusiasm of the largely volunteer staff never ceases to amaze me. Notwithstanding the rain, it was very interesting and at the end of the tour which included walking along a short length of one of the tunnels, I decided to walk to the Botallack Mine, ¾ mile further along the coast. England is nominally metric except where the roads are concerned when it remains resolutely imperial. Why? The reason I was given (and if there is a better reason I’d like to know), is that it would be too expensive to replace all the road signs. Australia, with its thousands of kilometres of roads and much smaller population managed to change over in 1974 and accepted that the cost of the change was warranted but apparently, England, on the doorstep of metric Europe “can’t afford it”.
Anyway, back to the walk along the coast path to Botallack. I thought the signpost had said ¾ mile, but I couldn’t help thinking by the time I got to there that perhaps I’d misread the sign and that it was really 1¾ mile, it doesn’t normally take me 40 minutes to walk approximately one kilometre, even with frequent stops to tale photos. Perhaps the distance is measured as the crow flies, rather than allowing for the ups and downs of the craggy coastline. It was nonetheless an exhilarating walk along the cliff face with the Atlantic Ocean raging hundreds of meters below me. I have developed a real taste for these coastal walks and I won’t be running out of walks to do while I'm here.
My efforts were rewarded with a magnificent view of the derelict engine house nestled right on the cliff face. Even though the weather was closing in, the photos give a sense of the desolation of the place and it was quite a climb down, but the views across the Atlantic Ocean and along the coast were magic although perhaps lost on the miners after a long shift in the mine followed by the climb back up to the village. The walk back to the car through a light mist added to the mystery and atmosphere and I enjoyed my walk, even if I didn't get back to the car until 3.15 p.m.
I drove through St Just via Land’s End (see my comments for 29th July), and had dinner at Rick Stein’s Fish and Chips, my reasoning being that it would be a long time before I would have the opportunity to eat at one of his restaurants again so I’d make the most of it. Tonight I started with three shucked oysters (large voluptuous babies, although surprisingly there were no details of where they were sourced), followed by sea bream. I thought they over did the charcoal roasting (it looked burnt to me), I definitely preferred the monkfish).
I left Falmouth eventually and not before I spied out a few more photo opportunities of Falmouth from a tiny village called Flushing, and then it was time to leave Falmouth but not Cornwall, there were still places I had on my list and although I have done things that weren’t on the list, I still have a few more village I would like to see.
It continues to strike me that for such a small country there is so much to see and despite my Australian sensibilities about distance, it takes ages to get from A to B, so I decided to move further north to be closer to the villages still on my list because I thought Launceston would provide a good mid-point for me to explore north Cornwall. I booked three nights at a B&B at Launceston (pronounced Lawn-ston, they don’t pronounce the “ces”). Our Launceston in Tasmania was named in honour of New South Wales’s Governor Philip King because he was born in Launceston in Cornwall.
My first stop was St Agnes, I think because I liked the name, and although nominally on the coast, it isn't on the sea and there is no apparent harbour or sea views. A pretty village but I didn't stop because I also wanted to take in Padstow, made famous by Rick Stein.
I had been to Padstowe in 2002 and eaten at Rick Stein’s Seafood Restaurant (on the top of my most memorable meals list), but it proved to be much prettier than I had remembered, although it is knee deep in shops selling fripperies, art galleries and restaurants. Apart from the Rick Stein franchise which gives the impression that he owns the whole village, there can be no doubt that he has put the town on the map, but with the exposure has come the tourists. Finding somewhere to park was the first challenge, as it so often is in England, there were so many tourists, eating fish and chips, Cornish pasties and ice cream and shopping, fuelling the economy. I don’t know how the locals can bear the invasion.
From Padstowe I drove north east to Lawn-ston, where thanks to Jane I found the tiny B&B on a steep steep slip road but with the best views of the town. The bedroom is the tiniest I have ever seen, the room was a wide as the bed was long, which was a bit claustrophobic. Dinner was fish pie in the local pub.
Not well this morning and the weather wasn’t that flash either, but I set off to see Port Isaac where Doc Martin is filmed as Port When. It is as pretty as it looks on the television, quite small and despite the drizzle, it was still swarming with tourists. I sat for some time on a bench in the harbour enjoying the views under my plastic see-through Radley umbrella, hoping I would feel better or the rain would stop, or preferably both. The rain stopped for a while and I went for a stroll up the hill as far as the house that was used as the surgery in Doc Martin, surrounded by tourists, took an obligatory photo, and then slowly walked back to the car.
I decided not to drive to Boscastle (pronounced Boss-Castle), a village I had visited twice before. It was ravaged by a devastating flood in 1993 and I had wanted to revisit it to see how it had recovered, but I just wasn’t up to it, so I drove back to the B&B and went to bed.
The rain seems to have settled over Cornwall and I'm still not feeling well, so I decided to cut short my stay in Cornwall, which is a pity because I hadn’t finished seeing everything on my list, although Angela and I agreed the list was always over ambitious. Back home for a late lunch and a chat with Archie who was pleased to see me.
Angela and I drove up to Chertsey this afternoon to see Aunty Hilda who has been in hospital since June, having suffered a stroke. While we stayed about half an hour, chatting to her all the while, sadly she wasn’t conscious. I stroked her arm to make sure she knew someone was there with her, but she didn't show any reaction.
On the way back from Chertsey Angela and I dropped by in Shortheath to visit her friends Gilly and Alan and we had a quick drink with them before driving back to Portsmouth.
I can remember seeing the very first episode of Doctor Who in 1963 I was five years old. This was the beginning of a lifelong passion for sci-fi, the English version, so Doctor Who and Blake’s Seven are great favourites. I can also remember sitting in a flat in Pimlico in 2005 watching the first episode of the Russell T Davies resuscitation of the show and saying to myself within five minutes that this was going to be something special. And so it came to pass that David Tennant deposed Tom Baker as the best ever Doctor Who.
I can recall speaking with Tom Baker on ABC Radio sometime in the late 1970s and asking him who had knitted his scarf (someone improbably called Begonia Pope). I’ve just discovered that there’s a website dedicated to Doctor Who’s scarf, including knitting patterns, which even I think is taking obsession a bit far.
The 21st century Doctor Who spawned Torchwood (an acronym of Doctor Who), an adults-only sci-fi romp with Captain Jack Harkness, such fun, very sexy dark viewing, and the Sarah Jane Adventures for children with the evergreen Elizabeth Sladen (dare I ask how she looks that good at 62?).
And it's not that huge a leap from Doctor Who to Sherlock Holmes. I’ve never been a great Sherlock Holmes fan despite my love of the genre, but that has just changed. Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, writers of Doctor Who, have turned their attention to Sherlock Holmes and updated it for the 21st century, a more faithful rendering than last year’s Guy Ritchie movie which was fun but not much to do with Conan Doyle’s stories. They clearly have a great deal of affection for the stories and are faithful in many ways to the characters (both Homes and Watson), of Conan Doyle. I'm not sure what the purists will make of it, but it’s fresh and exciting and relies on deductive reasoning rather than a lot of fancy forensic science and police procedure.
The verdict? What a triumph, three episodes of pure pleasure. The first episode was captivating (A Study in Pink), the second episode (The Blind Banker), was a little convoluted, but the third (The Great Game), was a joy, with a classic Spooks-style cliff hanger of an ending, guaranteeing a second series. I can’t wait. English television at its best.
I don’t recall having met Collette, Shirley’s daughter. Collette has lived in the US for 15 years with her American husband and three young sons. I may have met her in 1986 when I was staying with her grandparents in Sunbury-on-Thames, my Aunty Hilda and Uncle Jimmy, but that was nearly 25 years ago when Collette was only 14 or 15 (she is 40 on Thursday, Happy Birthday Collette!).
Collette and Mathias, who is only two years old and hasn’t met his great-grandmother, have come over to England for a couple of weeks to see Aunty Hilda who is very ill and remains in hospital in Chertsey.
I drove up to Camberley and had coffee with Shirley and Collette, poor Colin was hard at work, and for lunch we went to The Half Moon Inn, in Windlesham, a lovely 17th century former coaching inn. I ordered liver and onions with bubble and squeak, not quite like mum made, but very nice nonetheless.
Poor Mathias was very tired, still jet-lagged having only arrived in England yesterday on what Collette described as a long flight, a mere eight hours!!! It was great to catch up with Shirley for a chat and to meet with Collette and Mathias who will be back in Arizona by the time I get back from Edinburgh.
Off to Edinburgh today via Cambridge. Passing a signpost on the M25 for Byfleet I pulled off to find Royston Avenue where I had lived as a little girl in the very early 1960s. I have the slightest memory of living there and the only thing I can remember is acquiring the scar by my right eye when I ran across the road and tripped and struck my face on the side of a low brick wall; I think I was very lucky not to lose my eye.
What I hadn’t realised about Byfleet until today is how close it is to Brooklands, the world’s first purpose-built motorsport venue as well as one of Britain’s first airfields. It was featured on James May’s Toy Stories last year when they recreated the full length of Brooklands with Scalextric track, following the route of the old Brooklands track. I wasn’t aware that most of the old track has been demolished, which I think is very sad, and there is now a Marks and Spencer and Tesco supermarket in the middle of the old track. They have retained a stretch of the banked concrete track, although it is cut through to make way for a road, Barnes Wallis Way, named after the famous scientist and engineer who designed the bouncing bomb during WWII (six degrees of separation, my step-grandfather was a scientist who worked on that project).
I was so excited by my visit the track which was totally unexpected, I found it quite emotional as I stood on a banked section taking photos and absorbing the atmosphere. The surface is very degraded but very steeply banked and I am so pleased I decided to take a detour.
Time was slipping away so I grabbed a sandwich and got back on track for Cambridge, driving through the rain. I had booked a room at a guest house in Cambridge which on the map looked quite close to the centre of town but at £50 per night it was not exactly shabby but very very ordinary, with the smallest bathroom I have ever seen with only room for a shower cubicle and the toilet! On the website it claimed it was a 15-20 minute walk into the historic town centre, but it was in reality a good 15 minute drive. At least it had the virtue of a good wi-fi connection.
I drove into the town centre and had dinner at Café Rouge, I recall having a meal there with Liz in 1986. Tonight I had a delicious steak because I was craving some red meat, and and crème brûlée, very French.
I drove into town this morning and the first shock was the cost of the car part, £21 for the day! I should have spent the extra £21 on a room within walking distance of the college. Oh well, can’t be helped, it’s a bit of a lottery when you book on the internet.
I spent the day wandering around the old colleges, Trinity and King’s College. Trying to access the backs, i.e. the River Cam, is very difficult because the backs of the colleges back onto the river and the colleges don’t allow public access. I’ve lost count of the number of times I've been propositioned by charming young men (and a couple of women), offering (or is that touting?), for my custom to take me for a punt on the Cam along the backs of the oldest colleges. They aren’t as expensive as the gondolas in Venice (who are by all accounts run by the mafia), but it isn't something I want to do on my own. Anyway, I took a punt with Liz when we visited Cambridge in 1986 and on that occasion we were punted by Phillipa whom we promptly and somewhat unimaginatively named “Phillipa the Punt”. As I recall, she was reading law at Oxford but her family lived in Cambridge and punting was her holiday job. I can’t remember what it cost then but it can’t have been that expensive. For some reason I have quite a clear memory of visiting Cambridge with Liz in 1986 but virtually no memory of my second visit ten years later.
How does Cambridge compare with Oxford? On many levels they are very similar, ancient seats of learning established about the same time, although Oxford is the oldest university in the English speaking world. After disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk (town and gown), in 1209, some academics fled Oxford to Cambridge and established what became Cambridge University. There is a famous rivalry which is no doubt largely because it was more than 600 hundred years before another university was established (at Durham). If I had to choose between studying at Oxford or Cambridge, (and let’s face it, I will never be given the choice although in fairness Melbourne University is one of the top universities in the world so I'm not complaining), I would choose Oxford, although I think that’s a sentimental decision rather than necessarily a rational one.
I recall when I first visited both Cambridge and Oxford in 1986 that I preferred Cambridge, I think because of its proximity to the River Cam which I thought more picturesque, but in the last two years I have become much more enamoured with Oxford, probably because of its exposure on Inspector Morse. Cambridge doesn’t have the iconic buildings that Oxford has, the Radcliffe Camera and Square, the Bodleian Library and Sheldonian Theatre, the dreaming spires. Cambridge does have Kings College Chapel for which it is justly famous and it is certainly spectacular, even if they do charge £5 for the privilege of seeing it. At least they now allow you to take photos inside which they didn't in the past.
Oxford has the Ashmolean, Cambridge has the Fitzwilliam. Both are worth a visit and both are free. As we discussed in the Oxford Murder class, there are more detective novels set in Oxford than almost any other city in Britain and none that I know of are set in Cambridge, even though both offer the device of the closed community i.e. the colleges, which provide the snow/fog-bound country-house or train scenario so beloved of Agatha Christie.
Dinner at the Chop House on King’s Parade where I had one of the best lamb chops I think I’ve ever had, with a caper sauce and a potato and cauliflower gratin. Delicious. After dinner I attended a concert of recorder music at St. Bene’t’s Church (Bene’t is a corruption of Benedict). The Anglo-Saxon tower of the church is the oldest in Cambridgeshire, being built about 1025 A.D.. £8 for delightful music in a sacred space is always a delight for me. I learnt to play the recorder when I was a child living in England and I still have my recorder packed away somewhere at home, although these days I admit only to being able to play the stereo. It was a most enjoyable evening.
Cambridge, like Oxford, is very flat and there are hundreds of bicycles everywhere. I was lucky with the weather today, especially after the rain of yesterday, with lots of blue skies with fluffy white clouds, brilliant sight-seeing weather. What also struck me was how many Japanese tourists there are in Cambridge, while Oxford was teeming with tourists, there they seemed to come from everywhere. There are a lot of up-market shops selling clothes, fripperies and art work which can’t surely be intended for the students, they can’t possibly have the money but all those Japanese and American tourists certainly can.
I woke this morning to rain and drove into town in pouring rain, questioning my sanity and wandering whether I should just turn around and go back to the guest house and save the £21 car parking cost, the weather was that dismal. The forecast had said no rain, so I was disappointed but I decided to preserve.
I had planned to do the 11.00 a.m. walk with a Blue Badge guide at the Tourist Information Office and despite the weather there were about 20 other hardy souls who to the walk with Nancy, a graduate of Newnham College, one of the few female colleges and the only one that remains resolutely female only.
Then as if by magic the weather changed. From rain to blue sky within minutes. I am so lucky. Out first stop was Queens’ College, yes, the apostrophe is in the right place. Coincidentally yesterday I bought Lynn Truss’s book “Eats Shoots and Leaves” from the second-hand bookseller at the market and over lunch I had read an interesting chapter on the use of hyphens. Now how sad is that, because I actually found it fascinating!
Queens’ College is the college with the famous Mathematical Bridge that I was told in 1986 was first built without nuts and bolts and had been dismantled and couldn’t be reassembled again as before. Apparently this isn't true. And then on to King’s College which I had visited yesterday, but I always find these places improve with the benefit of a guide. Nancy also explained the history of the three Gates at Gonville and Caius (pronounced keys). On matriculation students arrive at the Gate of Humility (near the Porters’ Lodge). In the centre of the college students pass through the Gate of Virtue regularly and finally, graduating students pass through the Gate of Honour on their way to the neighbouring Senate House to receive their degrees. It’s certainly an extraordinary structure.
After the walk and before lunch I climbed the tower of Great St Mary’s, the University Church, all 123 steps. I can remember taking photos from this tower in 1986 with my trusty Pentax camera. What a brilliant camera that was, it served me faithfully for over 20 years before I abandoned it forever in favour of Canon and digital technology. Out of the backblocks of my memory I remembered that I had bought my favourite pig jumper at the market all those years ago. I still have it although it is a little fragile and wearing thin, it’s too precious to throw away.
Lunch at the Chop House because I fancied the roast lunch but sadly today it was chicken and I’d set my heart on roast beef, so I had the set menu instead, cold roast port salad followed by mushrooms on toast with a spinach salad with mustard seed dressing. These were the sexiest mushrooms I’ve ever had and they were quite delicious.
A word about Canon cameras. You are never alone with a Canon, it seems to me that half the cameras I see are Canon and a good many are the 5D Mark II that I have. As I sit here writing this I'm watching a man taking photos with his long-suffering wife patiently waiting for him to compose his shot. How lucky he is to have an understanding wife who is prepared to let him indulge his passion for photography, although in my experience it seems that most men expect women to enter into their interests but it is rarely reciprocated.
And then it started to rain again. Summer in England is like Melbourne used to be, four seasons in one day. After lunch I headed for St John’s College because I was determined to see the Bridge of Sighs. St John’s College charges £3.50 entrance which admittedly is cheap when compared Christ Church at Oxford who charge an exorbitant £6.50. I can recall visiting St John’s College in 1986 where there are two bridges that cross the backs, the Bridge of Sighs and the Kitchen (or Wren), Bridge. The Bridge of Sighs is not accessible to the general public, there is a sign that says private, but as in 1986 I wasn’t to be deterred and as there was no-one about to say otherwise, I walked across the bridge taking photos as I went. I did not harm being an ersatz tourists, I take only photos and memories (if only that were true!).
Like the Bridge of Sighs at Oxford, the Bridge of Sighs at Cambridge is nothing like its namesake in Venice, if anything it’s more like the Rialto Bridge with a roof, so essential given the unreliable English weather. St John’s must be one of the largest colleges at Cambridge, there are certainly a lot of buildings and courtyards (they aren’t called quadrangles, that’s what they are called at Oxford), within the grounds.
My final stop for the day as the weather was starting to deteriorate again and the light was failing was the Round Church, more correctly called the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built about 1130 and possibly inspired by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. It isn't used as a parish church anymore but is home to Christian Heritage and is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Cambridge. There is an interesting display on the changing role of religion in England and Cambridge within a social context and is extremely well maintained.
By the time I left it was raining more heavily so I picked up the car and drove back to the guest house.
I left the dismal guest house in Cambridge after breakfast and continued my drive north, today heading to Harrogate in Yorkshire, the mid-point between Cambridge and Edinburgh. I’ve been to York many times, the last time with Mum in 2006, but I wanted to go somewhere different and take in a spa town and Harrogate is the home of my favourite tea merchant, Taylors of Harrogate, so it was an easy decision.
I saw a signpost for Burghley, the largest and grandest house of the Elizabethan period and the home of Lord Burghley, Elizabeth I’s principle advisor for most of her reign. I pulled off the motorway and headed to the village of Stamford only to remember that the house isn't open on Fridays. Oh well, perhaps another time.
As I drove north the weather remained grim and I drove on through the incessant rain and arrived in Harrogate (without a “W"), about lunchtime. It's a pretty spa town and home to the famous Bettys [sic] Tea Rooms. In fact, it's the presence of Bettys that has drawn me to Harrogate today. I almost exclusively drink Taylors of Harrogate teas; Mum first introduced me to their tea when she brought a packet of Yorkshire Gold home for me and I was immediately hooked, I can’t even remember what tea I drank before, I think it must have been Twinnings, ubiquitous but boring.
David Jones stocks Yorkshire Gold but it's very expensive, $14.95 for a 125g packet, and last year I rang the importer in Brisbane to see if I could get Bettys Tea Room Blend and found out that I could buy 1kg packets of Taylors tea at Cottles in South Melbourne Market for about $60, which is half the cost of buying it at DJs, although sadly not Bettys Tea Room Blend.
I found the Bettys Tea Rooms without any difficulty but when I arrived just after 1.00 p.m. I was shocked to see a long queue outside, and it wasn’t warm. Despite hating queuing, I had come so far to be here so I got in line. We were told that it would be about a 15 minute wait, and half an hour later I was shown to my table and the wait was truly worth it. I bagged a table by the big picture window and settled down to enjoy the view.
The service wasn’t that prompt and by the time my Bettys Traditional Afternoon Tea arrived I was more than ready for my sandwiches, smoked salmon and ham (the best smoked salmon and the best ham I've ever had), a most welcome cup of tea (Bettys Tea Room Blend, of course), a fruit scone and three tiny pastries (a miniature chocolate éclair, a tiny raspberry tart and a miniscule almond sponge cake). Every mouthful was scrumptious. To make the most of my long wait, I then ordered a coffee and I think it was the best cup of coffee I have ever had. I eventually dragged myself away, giving up my table because there was still a queue of people waiting for a table, even though it was now 3.30 p.m. I had to buy some supplies so bought a 1kg bag of Bettys Tea Room Blend, and some of their coffee, I just couldn’t resist.
By this time the rain had stopped, which was just as well because I’d left my umbrella in the car, so I decided to check out shops in Harrogate to establish the frippery test and yes, it passed with flying colours. Harrogate is without doubt a wealthy town with lots of jewellers, a branch of Debenhams, Hobbs, L K Bennet and Jaeger and there were lots of BMWs and Audis on the streets.
I thought I should find the B&B which turned out to be an elegant Victorian terrace house in a street of elegant Victorian terrace houses, many of them converted to B&Bs. Apart from the usual difficulties with parking, I found the house without difficulty and it was much closer to the centre of town than I had realised. Apart from my room being at the top of the house (i.e. lots of stairs and undoubtedly the maid’s room), the room, while no larger than the room I had in Cambridge, is delightful, it’s very comfortable and furnished with Victorian antiques. I even unpacked my bag, something I couldn’t quite bring myself to do in Cambridge.
Let me start by saying how much I like Harrogate, it’s a perfect spa town with beautiful Victorian buildings, gentle hills, very green grass and colourful garden beds (obviously a sign of the amount of rain they receive here).
Do I need to get out more? I don’t think myself as particularly unobservant but this morning I saw my second cross-dresser in recent weeks. Perhaps England has a larger proportion of cross-dressers than Australia? I was walking down Swan Road when I saw this immaculately dressed man, complete with wog, high heels, skirt and handbag, in the company with an equally well-dressed petite woman. As Mum used to say, it wouldn’t do for us all to be the same, I have to admire him for being prepared to be himself.
Although the day looked unpromising with more rain, undeterred and armed with my new umbrella, I walked into the town centre. I had made enquiries yesterday about having some pampering treatments at the Turkish Baths but it was sniffily pointed out to me that Saturday appointments book out 6-8 weeks in advance. So there, no pedicure for me today.
The Royal Pump Room Museum is a small, very small, museum. I don’t quite see why they bother, it’s too small and insubstantial to justify the price of admission of the name of museum. I'm not sure what else they could use the space for, it’s the original pump room and should be preserved, perhaps it could be used as an exhibition space for the Mercer Art Gallery. While at the Pump Room I had to try the healing waters for which Harrogate became famous. The smell was decidedly off-putting, like rotten eggs. Actually I’ve never smelt rotten eggs but understand they smell sulphurous, and this water smelled exactly like I would expect rotten eggs to smell. Not to be put off I sculled the water and to my surprise it was extraordinarily like swallowing a mouthful of sea water, it was so salty. I felt so much better (not).
The Mercer Art Gallery is just up the road from the Pump Room where there is currently an open exhibition with the work of local artists for sale. I was quite taken with a number of the works, especially the cut paper pieces by Clare Linley.
By this stage the sun had come out and bathed the town in the most brilliant sunlight, the clouds a confused mix of fluffy white and dark grey clouds. Lots of tourists flocking to the many tea rooms in the town and I couldn’t resist returning to Bettys Tea Rooms for a reviving cuppa and a fat rascal, a type of fruit scone with almonds and a cherry on top). This time I only had a five minute wait as I had just beaten the lunchtime rush.
After a bit of retail therapy, Hobbs has its new range out and a 20% sale, so how could I resist; I left the shop with my purse lighter.
I walked back to Wynnstay, the B&B, and picked up Mimi and Jane to drive out to Fountains Abbey, another National Trust property about 10 mile away. I recall visiting Rievaulx Abbey which is also in Yorkshire in 1986, and Fountains Abbey in 1996, and I've seen a lot of these ruined abbeys this year, but as it was just down the road and I had a couple of hours spare, I thought it would be worth revisiting, if only to enjoy the beautiful countryside where the monks very sensibly established their communities.
I arrived in time to tag along with a guided tour at 3.00 p.m., thinking it would take about an hour and I could spend an hour walking around the extensive grounds before it closed at 5.00 p.m. as usual the National Trust do a fab job and the guide, a volunteer guide mind you, held us enthralled for over 90 minutes. He explained the history of the Abbey, destroyed by that tyrant Henry VIII. Looking at a model of what the abbey had looked like I became very angry to see another example of the destruction to our heritage out of greed, vanity and lust. Not happy Hal!
I took my usual “too many photos”, the light was just fantastic. I recall visiting in 1996 that the main structure was swathed in scaffolding and it was a grey and gloomy day. today it was warm, with blue skies and fabulous clouds. At the end of the tour the guide commented on the number of photos I had taken. My reply? “It’s just megabytes!”.
The Yorkshire countryside hereabouts is all rolling green hills with black and white cows and sheep. I could easily stay here longer if I had the time, it’s a lovely part of the world.
Dinner at La Tasca, a Spanish tapas bar. Not exactly traditional local fare but I fancied something a bit different tonight. I finished the evening with a pot of Bettys Tea Room Blend. Well, who knows when I will ever be back in Harrogate again?
Back to Fountains Abbey this morning to finish what I started yesterday, my exploration of the grounds. Although I've been before, I've only ever seen the Abbey and not the rest of the gardens, and the two hours yesterday was woefully insufficient for the task. Today I took in Fountains Hall which was built between 1594 and 1604 partly with the stone looted from the Abbey. Well I suppose strictly speaking the stone wasn’t looted because it belonged to the owner of the Hall, but it exacerbated the destruction of the Abbey. As you can see, I continue to be angry with Henry VIII and his wanton destruction of what had undoubtedly been a beautiful Abbey.
I walked around the grounds for a couple of hours, taking in the water gardens and had a very pleasant stroll, passing dozens of grouse feeding in the grass. There were dozens of people out walking their dogs and their children, apparently Fountains Abbey is one of the National Trust’s most visited properties.
From Fountains I headed for Richmond along the picturesque B-roads, passing through a series of typical Yorkshire villages, all grey slate and cobbled stoned streets. Richmond is an interesting place and I think I visited there in 1986, but I have no real memories of the place. Prince Charles has compared the town square, believed to be the largest in England, with the Piazza del Campo in Siena. Sitting in the town square having a refreshing drink I could see why he would say this, if it weren’t for the market place being used as a car park; that would never happen in Siena, but I would imagine it's a bit dire in the middle of winter when it's raining.
Richmond Castle is one of the oldest in England, built in 1071 shortly after the Normans invaded England in 1066. It certainly has breathtaking views across the countryside on all sides, hence its strategic importance; it was built on a strong hill, i.e. Riche-mont. Richmond is described as the mother of all Richmonds being the most duplicated British placename with 55 occurrences worldwide, most are in America but Australia can boast five, one each in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, Tasmania and South Australia.
Richmond Castle is managed by English Heritage and today they had displays of medieval life including a fascinating falconry display. There are 62 million people in Britain and 30,000 of them are falconers which I found very surprising. After the display with an owl, a hawk and a peregrine falcon there was a Q&A and I had a long chat with the falconer, it was fascinating.
The town itself is Georgian and once the cars started to empty out of the market place it was easier to see how magnificent the square actually is. I also took a walk along the River Swale and the waterfalls. There must be a lot of minerals in the water as it had a very brown, rusty appearance. This is real James Herriot – All Creatures Great and Small – country. I do like Yorkshire, the people are supposed to be dour but that isn't my impression. It's impossible to identify the part of England I like best because everywhere I go I like!
I drove back to Harrogate for a late dinner at a pub recommended by the B&B, every now and then I enjoy a hamburger with the lot.
Day 1 - 1 show
Here I am at last. Edinburgh. An early dinner of risotto (artichokes, pine nuts and mushrooms, delicious), sitting outside on the High Street watching the world wander by while I go through the Edinburgh International Book Festival programme (which is the first time I've seen it). The city is buzzing. I have wanted to come to Edinburgh during the Festival Edinburgh for as long as I can remember but I've been unable to do so because, as a company secretary, August is always my busiest time of the year. Now that I'm on my Gap Year I have no such constraints, so here I am.
The drive into Scotland from Harrogate was slow. There isn't a motorway direct to Edinburgh from England even though Edinburgh is the capital of Scotland, there isn't even a dual carriageway, hence the slow drive as I got stuck behind a truck with nowhere to overtake. Memorable images: black faced sheep and more wind turbines on one hill than I've ever seen in one place. It must be very windy here.
I booked my accommodation back in February, a room in a B&B called Star Villa, within walking distance to everything which is very important because parking in Edinburgh, especially at this time of the year, is bound to be expensive and difficult to find. Star Villa is a comfortable and reasonably priced B&B, £50 per night plus an additional £5 for parking my car with a local garage for a couple of weeks as I won’t need the car while I'm here.
There are at least 2,500 events held at over 450 venues during August, it’s like a Chinese menu, there’s so much choice it’s difficult to know where to start. How do you navigate through all those choices? There’s not one festival but several including the Edinburgh Fringe, the International Book Festival, the Edinburgh Art Festival, Edinburgh International Festival, Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival, Edinburgh Mela and of course, the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo, all competing against each other for bums on seats.
The Edinburgh Festival is the largest cultural event in the worked and has been going since 1947 when the Edinburgh International Festival was established. It was gatecrashed by an unofficial festival which grew into the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, now the largest of the many festivals held in Edinburgh, with comedy having a stranglehold on the event, although there is a huge variety of things to see. All of the events I had booked a couple of months ago are with the Fringe as there was nothing in the Edinburgh International Festival brochure that interested me.
I hadn’t pre-booked anything for today, not knowing exactly when I would arrive, but a stroll along the High Street saw flyers being thrust into my hand at every turn and there was street theatre all along the section of High Street that has been blocked off to traffic.
I lighted upon Graffiti Classics, a comedy string quartet I had previously seen at Covent Garden Market, performing in the street, and in the absence of a better offer I decided to buy a ticket for their last performance tonight. I stood in a queue for at least 30 minutes and eventually bought a ticket; I can foresee there is going to be a lot of queuing over the next couple of weeks.
After dinner I got a bit distracted with all the street theatre and then realised I hadn’t left enough time to get to the Edinburgh International Conference Centre by 7.45 p.m. so I had to make a dash for it, placing my poor knee under some stress. Edinburgh is going to be pretty tough on my knees, I'm fine with flat surfaces, but climbing up and down hills and stairs puts them under increased strain and Edinburgh is built on a hill.
Graffiti Classics plays jazzed up classics such as Ode to a piece of Lingerie (Bach’s Air on a G string). Okay, very corny but I thought it was funny. 8½/10
My first impressions of Edinburgh: grey, grey skies, grey granite buildings, not a particularly attractive city, at least not the parts I have seen to date. As you would expect, there is the usual selection of shops selling tartan based products and the sound of bagpipes pervades everywhere. The Old Town is very steep with narrow intersecting streets called Closes, Old Fishmarket Close being the second steepest street I've ever walked up, a street in Siena taking first place. Some streets, although they intersect, don’t actually cross each other because they are on different levels, so navigating anywhere requires care to make sure that intersecting streets actually meet.
I arrived in Edinburgh with tickets for 26 shows at a cost of £312.90. To that is added £12 for Classic Graffiti and another £20.30 I spent online this evening on two further tickets; the cost is starting to mount but I'm already enjoying myself. This is going to be a fun couple of weeks.
“The house is now open” are the words that are uttered when the doors to a venue are opened. I will be hearing them many more times before I leave Edinburgh.
My two weeks in Edinburgh are in full swing and I won’t be able to update the blog for a while.
Day 2 - 3 shows
Out and onto High Street this morning to enjoy the street theatre. My attention was caught by a man balanced on a 10 foot ladder on cobblestones on a slope, juggling with knives and wearing a kilt, and solving a Rubik’s cube in 90 seconds. His name is Pete Dobbing and his comments about the desirability of men wearing a kilt were very funny. The consensus of the women in the audience (and there were dozens), was that he looked great in a kilt. Advice to men: stopping chasing skirt and start wearing one. See: www.dobbing2.moonfruit.com/
The street performers are totally upfront about asking for payment for their performance, and the going price is £5, anything less than a pound is an insult. The rationale is that you ordinarily pay for a performance before you’ve seen it, they ask only to be paid once you have seen it. Apparently they have to pay the Edinburgh Festival organisers for the privilege of performing in the street, so they do need to make money to cover their expenses which can be considerable. The £5 is certainly worth it if you see the whole performance, but if you turn up half-way through it does make it a bit difficult to decide how much is a fair thing. In the past I haven’t been well disposed to paying street performers, but I see it in quite a different light now. Edinburgh would be a poorer experience without the street theatre.
Lesson one: you have to book tickets for Just a Minute in advance. I rocked up at the ticket office of the Pleasance first thing in the morning, assuming that as they were free they would be released on the day on a first come, first served basis, but no, when I enquired I was told the event was fully booked out. BUT, I could queue up and see if there were any returns, and I was told that they do release some tickets just before the show is taped. Pretty disappointing having come all this way and missing out so I was determined to came back as instructed and queue for a ticket in the off chance that I can get a ticket.
Just a Minute (JAM), has been on BBC Radio 4 since 1967. It’s so popular and has scheme a huge worldwide following that some two million people tune in every week to hear contestants speaking for 60 seconds on a subject they are given without hesitation, repetition or deviation. I am such a fan of the show and I've been listening to it for as long as I can remember. I listen to it on the internet these days and have dozens of episodes on my Mp3 player. All the original regular panellists have died, and sadly my favourite, Clement Freud, died last year, but the Chairman, Nicholas Parsons, is 86 and still going strong, although I think he is slowing a little. Nonetheless, he is amazing for his age.
One of the things you have to do all the time in Edinburgh is to check that you are in the right queue. There are so many queues, especially at the Pleasance, so it's very important to check. On asking whether I was in the right queue for returned tickets for JAM, a chap I didn't know from Adam told me that he had a spare ticket! What a lucky sausage I am, I thought it was Christmas!
I bagged a second row seat right in the middle, close to the action. Nicholas Parsons came out to warm up the audience and introduce the four contestants, reminding us that this is radio so we should laugh when something is funny. I was very happy that Paul Merton, a worthy successor to Kenneth Williams who died in 1988, was appearing because he wasn’t on the show I saw being recorded in 2003 in Malvern in the days when it was relatively easy to get tickets. Now tickets are like gold dust and you have to enter an online ballot. The other contestants were Shappi Khorsandi (as always, a bit flaky), Gyles Brandreth (always funny, articulate and erudite), and John Bishop, appearing in his first JAM.
The subjects covered were:
* Funny People* (Paul Merton talked for the whole minute and went on to win the show)
* There’s a first time for everything*
* A nasty habit*
* Birds of prey*
* Talking to the taxi driver
* Married life*
* An ideal night out*
* The big society*
* Getting away with it*
* subjects that were broadcast on Radio 4 on 23rd August 2010.
“I am so happy” were the words I said to myself as I walked out of the Pleasance. The Pleasance is something of a Festival institution and hosts many of the comedy shows on at Edinburgh. I loved every minute of the show and I didn't want it to end. All four contestants plus Nicholas Parsons have shows here in Edinburgh this Festival and I have tickets for all of them apart from John Bishop, whom I’d never heard of before but apparently he is a rising star and his face is plastered all over Edinburgh promoting his show. There is a lot of stand-up comedy on the television here in England and all four contestants are stand-up comics as are most of the contestants these days, although it wasn’t always so. 10/10
Sitting in the sun under a brilliant blue sky, today Edinburgh looks much less grey, but as they say, it is a city where you can get hypothermia and sunburn in the same day and I believe them, it was decidedly cool and raining when I left Star Villa this morning. A late lunch or early dinner, linner, at a good restaurant on the High Street, Angels with Bagpipes; I enjoyed a glass of wine and engaged in a spot of people watching.
The High Street was heaving, a constantly moving mass of people surging up and down the steep road, blocked to traffic for the duration of the festival. My early impression of the Festival is that I want to come every year for the rest of my life, this is heaven. There is such a buzz to the place and even though I will see less than 1% of what is on offer, even if I give up sleep, and I do love my sleep, I still would only barely scratch the surface.
I’ve developed a theory that with my camera and notebook I get better service at restaurants than a single woman may normally get. I was once refused a table at a Terrence Conran restaurant in London because I was on my own and I posted a very critical review on a restaurant review website. Thanks to the blogosphere our complaints can reach a huge audience, today everyone is a critic. Or perhaps I’ve just been lucky and generally had good service, certainly the standard of service in Britain today is much better than in the past. And as I was musing on my theory, a woman at the next table turned to me and asked if I was a journalist!
Before I arrived I had booked 26 events but since arriving I have booked another seven, not including JAM. My diary is filling fast and I'm running out of slots to see everything I want to see. I will need a rest to recover from the Festival.
Next performance today, “Tristram Shandy”, at what can best be described as an intimate theatre holding perhaps 20 or 30. This version is as confused and episodic as the novel, although no more than a 45 minute extract of the book as told to a 21st century psychologist, it was funny in its way but ultimately unsatisfying as it ended rather than finished. 5/10
From “Tristram Shandy” in the Old Town to Chris Addison at the Assembly on George Street in the New Town (I really should have paid more attention to grouping events according to venue rather than constantly shuttling backwards and forwards between the Old Town and the New Town).
I think he must be the thinnest person I have ever seen, he’s a very funny stand-up comic. I've seen him on television and hadn’t connected him with the character he plays in The Thick of It/In the Loop (Yes Minister for the 21st century). Somehow he looks quite different and I was slightly surprised by how good he was, he is very intelligent and articulate and his comments on a range of issues including technology, Ugg boots, how well off we are despite the massive deprivations we experience if the internet goes down, and the Daily Mail. Very funny. He arrived on stage on crutches and proceeded to regale the audience with the circumstances of a recent accident, at the end of which he discarded the crutches saying he didn't really need them but the nurse at the hospital thought they would look good on stage! 9/10 (I would have given him 10/10 but docked him for occasional bad language and frequently checking his watch, which I found very irritating).
Day 3 - 4 shows
At the last minute this morning I decided to attend a recording of “Macaulay and Co” with Fred Macaulay. It's broadcast live on BBC Radio Scotland every morning at 10.00 a.m. for two hours and is recorded at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, just around the corner from Star Villa. I first heard Fred Macaulay on Just a Minute and love his accent, (truth be told, I love a Scots accent, soooooo sexy. Perhaps it’s a Sean Connery thing). Fred had a largely local and very appreciative audience and a succession of comedians and singers appearing at the Festival this month. 7½/10
Next stop, “At Home with Mrs Moneypenny”. Mrs Moneypenny is a former investment banker, now head-hunter, and has an MBA from the London Business School and a PhD from the University of Hong Kong. She is married to an Australian wine merchant who plays a lot of golf, and has three children called Cost Centres 1, 2 and 3. For the last 11 years she has written a column for the Financial Times, so you can see why I was intrigued. To add to the mystery the event was held at the AGA showroom, (those lumpy great cooking ranges the English love so much), in the New Town. She flaunted her £1,000 couture dress. £450 Roger Vivier shoes and very expensive diamond and ruby encrusted Asprey brooch which I thought rather vulgar.
On arrival we were handed a very nice glass of (real) champagne, and during the event delicious finger food was prepared for us by the hired help. Not what you expect at the Edinburgh Festival but the show was designed to fund the family’s month in Edinburgh. She is a one-woman powerhouse, her two pieces of advice that struck a chord with me were: you can’t do it alone (you need a support team), and set annual targets. Last year it was to obtain her pilot’s licence, this year to appear at the Edinburgh Festival. She also emphasised the need to recognise that you can’t have it all, that everything is a compromise. She is one smart woman.
Two of her Cost Centres had walk on roles, as did the editor of the Financial Times (a very dishy young man who helped make the blinis). He provided everyone with a copy of today’s FT which had an article about Julia Gillard, Australia’s shortest PM?
I bought two books, a selection of her FT articles. I was drawn by the cartoon on the cover by Alex cartoonist Charles Peattie and had a chat with Mrs Moneypenny herself, (real name Heather McGregor), who autographed them for me. She asked me who I barrack for (sic), and on telling her the Bombers, she autographed her books “To Claire from a St Kilda supporter”. She introduced me to her Sydney-born husband and we were having a chat when Arthur Smith, a well known comedian here in Britain, who had been at the show, turned up for a chat and I became invisible. I took my books and left. 8/10
From the New Town I made another trip back to the Old Town and the Pleasance for more comedy, this time “Paul Merton’s Impro Chums”, an improvised comedy sketch group. Improvisation has become increasingly popular and the sketches are based on suggestions from the audience. I’ve never seen anything like it before, it was all very silly but highly entertaining and I now understand where Paul Merton’s flights of surreal fantasy come from on JAM. 7½/10
With three hours to kill before my next show, time for linner. I found a French restaurant, Chez Jules in Hanover Street and had a tasty and traditional coq au vin and chocolate mousse for dessert. Then off to The Famous Spiegeltent in the Princess Street Gardens, (next stop Melbourne). Tonight my final entertainment was Meow Meow whom I first saw in Melbourne last year in an off-Melbourne International Arts Festival performance at the Arts Centre, thanks to Elena, my wonderful hairdresser, who had recommended her to me.
Meow Meow is something else, she’s an off the wall cabaret performer with a pedigree that includes La Clique. She has a great voice but is a performance artist as much as a singer; she has this totally OTT character. I spoke with her briefly after the show and bought her CD; I frequently buy CD’s at Festival performances, it's my way of supporting independent performers as well as buying a memento of something I have enjoyed. I left a review on the Edinburgh Festival website as follows: Over the top and giving it her all, great entertainment. 10/10
Further impressions of Edinburgh: the geography is very challenging because of the steep hills leading up to the Edinburgh Castle, built high for strategic purposes. Normally I have a very good sense of direction and get the hang of a new town quite quickly, but Edinburgh is proving to be a bit of a challenge. I turn left when I should turn right and the North/South Bridges and the George IV Bridges cause me confusion because they don’t intersect with the streets that appear on the map because they are on several different levels. Having said that, the hills certainly make the city visually pleasing, especially when seen from the Princess Street Gardens.
And a word about skies; such colour and contrast, definitively five stars in my guide to skies I have seen. What I like about Edinburgh is its human scale, there are no high-rise buildings, lots of old buildings with a few modern buildings designed to blend in AND NOT dwarf their surroundings. There is obviously a height restriction which has resulted in a city of pleasing proportions. It would probably be easier to get a sense of the city without the Festival in full swing, the city is absolutely inundated at the moment as the population doubles during August; I imagine it’s a much more sedate city the rest of the year. I first visited Edinburgh in 1996 but I don’t recall visiting more than Edinburgh Castle and walking along the Royal Mile to Holyrood Palace. This is my second and long overdue visit.
For me, Edinburgh is the city of Alexander McCall Smith and apart from wanting to visit Edinburgh during the Festival for many years, in recent years that passion has been fanned by Alexander McCall Smith books, introduced to me by Anita and Fred, my dear, dear friends in Melbourne. Apart from the Festival I imagine it would be a great city to live. I keep looking for Bertie (44 Scotland Street series), but I have found the delicatessen/coffee shop owned by Isabel Dalhousie’s niece Cat (The Sunday Philosophy Club series), in Broughton Street ;-)
Day 4 - 3 shows
First stop this morning was to pick up more tickets that I had bought online last night, the number of shows is mounting, current tally 37. I can’t help myself, I keep seeing more and more things I want to see and I'm keen to break the stranglehold that comedy has on my original schedule. To date I've seen comedy, music and theatre which I think is a good balance. No dance, not my thing.
First on the agenda today was a Frank Sinatra tribute singer in “iCroon”, whom I saw handing out flyers on High Street the other day. It rather appealed to me because I liked the song list on the back of the iCroon flyer, and for £5 what did I have to lose? You could request any Frank Sinatra song from the list but my favourite, Strangers in the Night, a song I remember from my childhood (I'm word perfect if not pitch perfect), wasn’t on the list. I arrived in good time and got a front row seat in yet another intimate (read tiny), venue. I had never heard of Richard Shelton before but for a couple of years he had been in Emmerdale, a popular soap opera here, so I'm sure that Angela & Rod would know who he is. His words of advice, “Life is like a game of snakes and ladders”, which struck a chord with me.
He did a competent job and was very personable. As he got to the end of his set, (virtually everything here at the Festival is just one hour long), he asked for requests from the floor, and of course I requested Strangers in the Night. His pianist didn't know it but Richard sang it anyway, unaccompanied, just for me. So happy. 10/10
I left a review on the Edinburgh Festival website as follows: Great fun for anyone who enjoys the classics of the 40s, 50s and 60s. Disappointed that "Strangers in the Night" wasn't on the play list, but on request Richard sang it anyway, unaccompanied by his pianist who was clearly too young to know it. Well worth the price of admission.
From the New Town I had to wander back to the Old Town for my next show, an all female a cappella group from Oxford University. Actually it was quite good in an amateur student sort of way, with an interesting selection of songs and arrangements. Although I enjoyed the performance, I didn't enjoy it enough to buy the CD. 9/10
The final show for the day was Barry Cryer at the Gilded Balloon, one of the many Festival venues here in Edinburgh. It wasn’t so much a stand-up performance as he was seated throughout à la Dave Allen, unlike the comedians of today who strut about the stage like hyper-active children. Barry Cryer is now 75, a young chap when compared with Nicholas Parsons, and he’s the sort of comedian who can tell a joke about any topic you care to suggest, off the cuff, and that’s basically what the show was like, he went through the alphabet and with the aid of visual triggers projected on the screen behind him he used the alphabet as a springboard for his vast repertoire of jokes; he must have a prodigious memory. Nonetheless, I didn't enjoy the show quite as much as I had expected as it did lapse into crudity for a cheap laugh from time to time; he’s funnier on the radio. 7/10
Perhaps surprisingly I haven’t booked anything from the International Arts Festival, unlike the Melbourne International Arts Festival held every October, there just wasn’t anything on the programme that interested me. The Festivals, and I say festivals in the plural because there are several, are all competing for the same bums on seats, there is only so much you can see and do in one day and there is no shortage of things to see.
Day 5 - 3 shows
It rained all night and is now quite cool but I have my trusty umbrella (I came prepared). First off today was “The Glenn Miller Mystery” at the Pleasance, another small venue within the Pleasance complex, and another front row seat. There was the sound of an old propeller aeroplane idling in the background and subdued lighting as we took our seats, all very atmospheric. I don’t buy into conspiracy theories about anything including the death of Glenn Miller, but I was interested in this production because I grew up to the sound of big band music which I love; it was dad’s favourite (well that and Hammond organ, but I prefer to gloss over that aspect).
The play was a two-hander and I kept trying to second-guess the story, often to be proved wrong, the plot twisted and turned and I was totally intrigued. The story builds slowly and the performance of both actors was first class. I was enjoying the journey so much I didn't want it to end, I was so absorbed. A bit of a left field choice but it’s the stand-out show so far, perhaps because I had no expectations. 10/10
I had a couple of hours to spare before my next show, also in the Old Town, and as I didn't want to wander too far afield I went to the National Museum of Scotland to see the Lewis Chessmen. I had been thinking that the British Museum has something similar in its collection but it turns out that the Lewis Chessmen belong to the British Museum who bought them in the 19th century. It isn't recorded what the poor peasant was paid who found them buried in sand dunes in the middle of nowhere on the Isle of Lewis in 1831, I suspect nothing as he handed them over to the parish priest, but someone profited. Most of the chessmen are now in London with a few on loan to the National Museum of Scotland, so I was a little disappointed not to see the whole collection. No-one knows for sure who carved them or why, and each piece is unique and the purpose is unknown. While they have become known as the Lewis Chessmen all that is certain is that they are carved from walrus tusk and possibly come from Trondheim in Norway. I must make time to go back to the museum and take in some of the other exhibits on display.
The advertising for my next show was rather misleading, it was called “Emma Thompson Presents Fair Trade”, and on the strength of the name I had booked a ticket. Emma Thompson neither presented nor appeared in the play. What we got was an incredibly powerful story about human trafficking and how young women are sold into sexual slavery and prostitution in Britain. By the end of the play I wanted to cry, I was so upset I couldn’t speak. The acting was first class as was the writing. I left a review on the Edinburgh Festival website as follows: I have only one thing to say about this play, see it. 10/10
My final show for the day was Fred Macaulay whom I saw earlier in the week recording his radio programme for BBC Radio Scotland. Tonight was one of only two shows at the Edinburgh Festival where he is performing his stand-up routine. I first heard Fred Macaulay on Just a Minute and The News Quiz and when you are introduced to comedians first on the radio or television you get the PC, non-smutty, non-bad language version. Now I'm not a prude, I can use the F word as well as, if not better than the next person, but I don’t appreciate it on the stage unless the context allows, and with comedians it rarely does. I'm not saying Fred Macaulay was as bad as Billy Connolly, but the swearing really wasn’t necessary and it didn't add anything to the humour. He was funny but not as funny as I had expected. I've seen all these stand up and improvisation comedians and some are good and some are not so, and I can’t understand why they do it, using f**k just to punctuate sentences adds nothing. 8/10
Day 6 - 5 shows
Breakfast this morning was shared with a couple from Newcastle as we swapped reviews of the various shows we had each seen and they told me about the plays they had seen at the Traverse Theatre. Unfortunately by the time I learnt about this venue, the people I was chatting with in the queue for JAM also told me about the Traverse Theatre, the plays with the best reviews were all booked out. Oh well, lesson learned. Next time I'll download the Traverse Theatre programme and book early, each venue seems to produce its own programme as well as the bumper Fringe Festival programme I had downloaded. The problem with going through the Fringe Festival programme is that it’s so huge, there are 2,500 productions at 450 venues, and there is so much choice that without a filtering mechanism it’s near impossible to tell the good from the bad. I'm not sure when the next time will be but I will definitely return to the Edinburgh Festival another year.
Other Edinburgh Festival learnings: all the performances are unreserved seating, so queuing has become a way of life. I normally hate queuing but it's unavoidable here and at least this way I often get a front row seat because most people eschew the first row so I get a great uninterrupted view and room to stretch my legs.
My first show today didn't start until 1.05 p.m. so I walked into the Old Town to pick up yet more tickets I had bought online last night, I'm starting to lose count. I fancied a cup of coffee, not something I normally do, and after much consideration I ordered an Americano (the equivalent of a long black), with cold milk, not something I usually order, but it turned out to be just what I wanted. I'm starting to develop a taste for coffee after years drinking very little which isn't what you’d expect to happen in Britain. I can remember when I was a teenager I didn't drink tea at all, and people would say such ridiculous things as, “why don’t you drink tea, you’re English?”, as if it’s compulsory!!!
My first show for the day was a production of the “Dumb Waiter”, a revival of a Harold Pinter play, (there are two productions here at the Festival). Another intimate theatre, two young men, quite convincing as 1960’s hit men in a claustrophobic basement room, squabbling about making the tea and football while waiting for instructions for their next job. All a bit surreal but enjoyable theatre. 7/10
Next stop over to the New Town and Charlotte Gardens where the Edinburgh International Book Festival events are being held in marquees around the central garden. Thanks goodness I allowed myself an hour between shows to get from one to another, it’s quite exhausting the distances you have to travel to get from one venue to another. Another learning for my next visit, try to book events in closer proximity to reduce travel times.
The author I am seeing today is James Shapiro, debunking the conspiracy theories about the authorship of William Shakespeare’s body of work. I have an unapologetic contempt for conspiracy theorists, a 20th century manifestation of paranoia and mistrust. All those theories about T E Lawrence, Elvis Presley, Glenn Miller, Marilyn Munroe, the Princess of Wales, the 1969 moon landing being filmed in Morocco, government cover-ups about aliens, and on and on. And into the mix is the theory that Shakespeare didn't write his plays and sonnets. Marlowe and the Earl of Oxford are two notable contenders based on nothing more than circumstantial evidence, theories that only began to surface in the 1850’s, more than 200 years after Shakespeare died. Enter an eminent Shakespeare academic who has written a book to discredit all those naysayers who have bought into the conspiracy theory industry.
James Shapiro spoke most eloquently on the subject and is clearly very knowledgeable about his chosen subject, having apparently devoted his life to the study of Shakespeare. I found him convincing and have to say it really doesn’t bother me who wrote the works attributed to William Shakespeare, it is the fact that they exist that is really important, but by the time I booked the Book Festival events, everything I really wanted to see were booked out. 8/10
From the International Book Festival I had to hike back to the Old Town and the Underbelly on Cowgate, a real dive of a place, to see “La Petite Mort – The Orgasm”, performed by Isabel Hertaeg. I had booked the show in the hope that she’d be in the class of Camille O’Sullivan and Meow Meow, but sadly not. An Aussie girl from Ballarat who took on the subject of female sexuality in a very forthright manner. She has a good voice but the act just didn't work and fell flat. I think she should go back to the drawing board and rethink her approach and subject matter, I think the days of being able to shock and titillate when discussing sex are past. 4/10
Two more performances to go, I grabbed a bite to eat before heading off to the Pleasance to see Shappi Khorsandi in “The Moon on a Stick”. I had annoyingly lost my Tula umbrella sometime this afternoon, annoying because (a) I liked it, (b) it cost £15, and (c) when I left the café where I had dinner it was raining quite heavily. I popped into a convenience store in the vain hope that they would sell umbrellas and fortunately they did. I suppose this is Scotland where they expect rain at any time. And it was a bargain at £3.99, I’d have happily paid more just to get out of the rain!
Arriving at the Pleasance Courtyard it was still chucking it down and it was absolute mayhem. I had such difficulty finding the right queue because everyone was trying to shelter under what little cover there was. The queuing system here is run by young Nazis, many from Australia who no doubt have previous experience herding cattle. The only thing that was missing was the cattle prod. But I must say everyone is remarkably well behaved and patient, if a little damp.
Another front row seat, I was bemused to see patrons carrying into the theatre not one nor even two but three pints of beer! After all, it's a one hour show and you wouldn’t want to run out half way through, would you? Just like the two young Scottish lads I was chatting with in the queue at the Underbelly, each holding two pints, one in each hand. A pint is 568 ml, which is nearly a bottle of wine. How can anyone drink that much fluid in the space of just an hour, I would need to pee all the time? I haven’t had a drink for a few days which must make me unique in Edinburgh at the moment!
I first heard Shappi Khorsandi on JAM and took and instant dislike to her, I thought she was so flaky, but over the last year or so I've heard her on the radio a number of times and been quite intrigued by her. Her father is an exiled Iranian dissident and she was brought up in England, so I booked her show more out of curiosity than anything else. I'm glad I did because she was much better than I expected, a really good stand-up comic (and they say women aren’t funny). She had a good rapport with the audience and I was very impressed with her, perhaps more so because I had such low expectations.
The most memorable bit of the show was a reworking of the Cecil Rhodes quote about being born British was to win the lottery of life. According to Shappi, to be British today means if you win the lottery you go to live in Australia, which is basically what my cousin James said to me when I said I was thinking of living in England. “Are you crazy? All my friends would love to live in Australia!”. 10/10
On leaving the Pleasance it was still raining and I briefly toyed with the idea of hopping into a taxi and returning to the B&B, but I wasn’t remotely tired so walked to Old St Paul’s, a Scottish Episcopal Church, for a performance of Fauré’s Requiem. It isn't a piece of music with which I am familiar but it was a beautiful setting and the music suited the venue. 9/10
A late night but a very satisfying day at the Festival with a little bit of everything to entertain me.
Day 7 - 4 shows
Oh my goodness, I think I've lost my notebook! How will I remember what I've done and seen and thought over the last couple of days without it? I stressed throughout breakfast while chatting with the couple from Newcastle. She’s a would-be playwright apparently in the style of John Osborne, contemporary domestic drama, and he’s in some legal/justice role at the university, although I couldn’t quite work it out. Back to my room I pulled the room apart before finding the book at the bottom of my rucksack. I must be losing it.
First cab off the rank today was “Next! Death by Audition”, a play about auditions that went wrong. Kiki Kendrick (okay, I hadn’t heard of her either), gave us a tour through her most unsuccessful auditions. I heard about the show when standing in a queue for something else and Kiki was handing out flyers for her show, that’s the way things work here. It was brilliant, her timing is impeccable and the writing was first class. An excellent hour’s entertainment. 10/10
Ninety minutes to kill before my next show, I popped into the National Gallery of Scotland which is across the road from the Assembly Hall, ostensibly to see the famous Raeburn skater (apparently there is now some doubt about whether Raeburn actually painted it). Also in the collection is one of Rembrandt’s many self-portraits (I’ve lost track of the number I’ve actually seen), plus several Rubens and a Gainsborough. I must try and get back for another look, particularly the Scottish artists, so that I can better understand Alexander McCall Smith’s many references to Scottish artists in the Sunday Philosophy Club series.
Back to the Assembly Hall to see Simon Callow do Shakespeare, not all of it, just excerpts, in a show called “Shakespeare the Man from Stratford”. A nice civilised, middle-class MTC type of audience, I'm in my milieu. Simon Callow is one of those luvvy actors but totally in command of the stage and his material. He tells the story of Shakespeare’s life with quotations from his plays and sonnets to illustrate the story. He breathes life and meaning into the words, how he or indeed any actor can remember all that I can’t imagine, he held the audience enthralled. I'm reluctant to use the term “tour de force”, it’s so hackneyed, but it’s apposite in this case. I frequently marvel at how people can act, it’s quite beyond me. I wouldn’t even be able to remember all the lines, let alone perform them. 10/10
The Assembly Hall is the School of Divinity of the University of Edinburgh, a large Victorian meeting hall mercifully furnished with comfortable 21st century seats and a heavy Victorian wood carved ceiling festooned with 21st century lighting. I think Edinburgh must be a very urbane and cultured city, it is certainly well supplied with public venues. At first I had real difficulty getting the hang of Edinburgh’s hilly geography but after a week I'm now moving between the many venues without too much difficulty, it’s a bit tricky because some streets cross but don’t actually intersect because of the differing levels owing to the steep terrain, but I think I’ve got it sorted. The Old and New Towns of Edinburgh are together a UNESCO World Heritage Site which has given them funding to maintain a lot of the buildings and placed quite strict re-development limits on the city, which no doubt explains an obvious height restriction on new buildings within Edinburgh. It’s a crying shame Melbourne lost so much of its grand Victorian buildings to Whelan the Wrecker in the 60’s and 70’s.
Following Simon Callow I had to go back over to the Pleasance to see “Nicholas Parsons’ Happy Hour”, a show he’s done for the last 10 years. While queuing I fell into conversation with May and Alan who were at the head of the queue and just in front of me, and May told us not to sit in the front row as Nicholas always speaks to everyone sitting in the front row. Well that was a challenge I couldn’t resist and when we were eventually admitted, the three of us sat in the front row of yet another intimate space.
When it came my turn for my little chat with Nicholas he had difficulty understanding my Australian accent. Irritatingly he made some fatuous comment about all the women being called Sheila, I don’t think Australians have called women Sheilas since the 1950’s, any more than the POMS refer to English women as birds anymore (very 1960’s). I can't help thinking the POMS don’t like Australians very much or perhaps I'm just being sensitive. I told Nicholas I didn't know anyone called Sheila but I don’t suppose he understood the sub-text.
He then moved on to Alan who was sitting next to me and Nicholas dropped the F-word. Surprised, I said, “You don’t say that on “Just a Minute!””. I was so shocked, you don’t expect to hear Nicholas Parsons swear, it would be like hearing the Queen Mother swear, I'm sure she knew rude words but you wouldn’t expect to hear her use them in public. Later in the show he told a joke about a little old lady in Edinburgh saying “f**k”, and then apologising, saying she thought everyone said “f**k” at the Fringe Festival, which I suppose was by way of explanation, but I do find it very irritating and so unnecessary. It's not as if I don’t swear, but...
Anyway, everyone in the front row was rewarded with a packet of Smarties, I think I'll have mine bronzed! Nicholas’s show is really a chat show where he has two guests who have shows on at the Fringe Festival, and every day it’s someone different. Today it was a magician called Ali Cook, who eats goldfish and can read your mind. He was really good. He was followed by an improvised comedy music troupe, Showstoppers, like Paul Merton’s Impro Chums, only with music. They were abfab as well. There are so many good acts here I could spend all August in Edinburgh and still not see everything. After the show I had a few words with Nicholas, where else would I get that opportunity but here in Edinburgh? I am having so much fun. 7½/10
Another shuttle back to the New Town to see a play called “An Evening with Elsie Parsons”, at the Dome in George Street, an upmarket restaurant with function rooms upstairs where the play is being performed. To save time and reduce my walking I decided to have dinner at the restaurant downstairs, a cross between the restaurant at the Windsor Hotel and the State Library Domed Reading Room. I believe it used to be a bank, it certainly has a 333 Collins Street look about it. It was a lovely meal and the whiskey menu amused me, with the selection divided into highland (13), island (10 ), and lowland (3) malts.
“An Evening with Elsie Parsons” was a two-handed play that reminded me of Elsie Stokes, a “medium” of some notoriety in the 1970’s. I remember she toured Australia and although I wasn’t interested I was dragged along to see her at the Dallas Brookes Hall to hold Mum’s hand. Personally I think this sort of thing is bollocks and my deep-seated scepticism has never wavered, but I thought the play might be amusing because it was about a couple of bogus mediums conducting a séance that goes horribly wrong when one of the “mediums” actually starts to channel a spirit. It was well performed and there was audience participation, I had to tie the blindfold on the female medium. I got a bit confused as the characters slipped in and out of channelling, but I enjoyed it nonetheless.
I have to confess that I was surprised that there were only 11 people in the audience, I put it down to it being a Sunday evening because the reviews were good and it had been recommended by Richard Shelton, the iCroons/Frank Sinatra man. I felt really sorry for the two actors, it must be very disheartening to perform to a near empty venue. 7/10
Day 8 - 4 shows
My first performance today was something I heard about yesterday when queuing for Simon Callow called “The Big Bite-Size Breakfast”, five 10 minute plays at the Assembly Rooms in George Street. For the price of admission you also get a strawberry, a croissant and a cup of coffee. The five plays were brilliant. There are two other programmes, they call them menus, with another five plays each, performed every morning by rotation, and I must try to see them as well. One was about toothbrushes (although that wasn’t apparent to begin with). It was brilliant. Second were two friends having coffee, good fun. The third was a meeting between the US ambassador and an African General and their interpreter. Very funny. The fourth was about blind dates and OCD (the least convincing of the five plays), and the fifth and final play (or should that be playlette?), was a quirky love story. Hard to pick between the Toothbrush Tales and The Interpreter. 10/10
Without another show until 4.30 p.m. I wanted to explore the New Town and drop by and see Pat, Anita and Fred’s friend from their days at the Domain on St Kilda Road. I remember the Domain when it was the BP building and every Christmas they hung a huge illuminated snowflake from the front of the building. Pat and I had exchanged emails and I knew where her shop was on Henderson Row, so I thought I would drop by to say hello. I recall meeting Pat at a party Anita and Fred gave when they lived at the Domain about 15 years ago.
On the way I took a detour to visit Scotland Street. Now in case I haven’t already mentioned it, I'm a huge Alexander McCall Smith fan thanks to Anita and Fred who introduced me to the Number 1 Ladies Detective Agency series. My favourite series is the Sunday Philosophy Club (I love Isabel), and 44 Scotland Street (go Bertie). Anyway, I had assumed 44 Scotland Street was a made-up address, but there is in fact a Scotland Street in Edinburgh, a short street of Georgian terraces in the New Town, except there isn't a 44, the street isn't that long. What I loved most was some of the street numbers are in Roman numerals, I saw numbers X, XXIV and XXVIII, but more importantly I saw Bertie with his father!!! See photo.
The weather was dismal today, cold and overcast with intermittent rain. The street plan for the New Town was planned like Melbourne and is much more orderly than the Old Town with its organic, medieval layout following the contours of the steep hill up to Edinburgh Castle. Unfortunately Pat wasn’t at her shop when I dropped by and wouldn’t be back for a few hours, but I had a look through her shop, Vivabella, and the lovely clothes. My eye was caught by a great jacket but I had to resist, having spent quite a lot on tickets.
Disappointed not to catch up with Pat and at a loose end until my next show I wandered back to the Old Town and the High Street to take in a bit more street theatre. I saw an Australia from Sydney molesting a koala with a whip (see photo), not that good, and as I walked past the Radisson Hotel on High Street one of the many young people handing out flyers gave me a flyer for “A Perfect Corpse”, which apparently the critic in the Telegraph, (or was it the Guardian?), had said they would pay £1,000 to see, then proceeded to give me a free ticket because the show was about to start, so that was a nice bonus. Sometimes you have to be in the right place at the right time.
The play was extremely well-acted, interesting, with no actual gore (thank goodness), despite the ghoulish topic of dissection and grave robbers in the early 19th century. Honoré de Balzac said “No man should marry until he has studied anatomy and dissected at least one woman”. What a thing to say! Statistically speaking that means that there must be twice as many women and a very high mortality rate for that to work; I don’t really understand the comment, but it’s a good line for this play. 8½/10
A bit tired I decided to have a glass of wine after the play in the Radisson bar but I was a trifle surprised by the cost. £7.75 for a glass of pinot grigio which makes one bottle of wine worth £23.75. based on wine prices here in Britain (which I think are a lot lower than Australia, even for Australian wine!), gives them a profit margin of about £19 per bottle. Nice work if you can get it.
Reading The Times newspaper, Nobel prizewinning economists expect the economy in the US and UK to get worse, so it doesn’t look like a job in London is going to materialise for me in this market. There was also an article in The Times about someone facing a goal sentence for fraud because he lied on his CV. I once worked with someone who claimed he had a B. Com. with Honours, when in fact he hadn’t even completed first year. When it came to light he wasn’t sacked; the Chairman told me that the qualification wasn’t necessary for the job, the dishonesty wasn’t a consideration and he went on to be promoted.
Next up, Gyles Brandreth in “The One to One Show”, whom I've heard on Just a Minute countless times and I saw him last week at the taping of JAM. Gyles is a former MP and writer. I got a front row seat (again), not perhaps the best position as I had to slouch in my seat to look up at the stage. He arrived with an alarm clock, the first intelligent person to do so, so that he could keep track of the time without constantly looking at his watch (which annoys the hell out of me).
Being in the front row, Gyles picked two women to be the foil for his jokes. He made a reference to the Lord Longford inquiry he had assisted in the 1960’s and then looked straight at me and said, “of course you are too young to know who he was”, and then asked my name! He then told me I was gorgeous and was a candidate for Berlusconi’s cabinet!!! Later in the show he referred to receiving a telegram and then again addressed me, explaining that a telegram was before they invented emails, texts and twitter! I wouldn’t mind but he’s only 10 years older than me, but it was all said for comedic effect and it was very funny.
Gyles didn't draw breathe for an hour but when his alarm clock went off, that was the end of the show. I enjoyed it much more than I expected. 10/10
Tonight is the turn of the ladies with Ali McGregor whom I’d seen at the Spiegeltent two years ago and I thought she was fab, and Camille O’Sullivan whom I saw the same year at the Meat Market in North Melbourne with Anita and Fred. Both are former La Clique artists and both are great performers so I had been eagerly awaiting tonight’s shows.
Without doubt Ali McGregor has the better voice of the two, she’s opera trained although she now sings jazz and blues numbers. I have a CD of the show I saw at the Spiegletent and it’s one of my favourites, she’s very smooth.
Another front row seat, Ali did a great set, pretty much the same as the one I saw her do a couple of years ago, but as I said, it’s one of my favourite CD's so I enjoyed it nonetheless. She’s just had a baby and something I didn't know, she’s married to Adam Hills from Spicks and Specks; he also has a show here in Edinburgh at the moment but all shows sold out, I couldn’t get a ticket. I bought her new CD, yet to be released, and had a brief chat with her after the show. She autographed the cover of CD for me. 10/10
I had an hour to kill before Camille and stood in line chatting with two other couples, one from Edinburgh and the other from New York. The couple from Edinburgh know the man who owns the Spiegeltent (who apparently is from Melbourne), as their daughter lives in Melbourne and they know Melbourne quite well. Such a small world.
I was rewarded with front row seats, again. I have to confess, I enjoyed Ali McGregor much more. The Brel, Cohen and Waits songs that Camille sings really aren’t to my taste, and while her act is 50% performance and 50% singing, having seen her twice before, and even though this was ostensibly a new show, I felt I had seen it all before. It seems to me that she has something of a cult following and she plays up to the audience as if she was still performing in a small venue for her friends. I don’t think it works as well in a large venue. I have no idea what the couple from New York made of her. 6/10
Day 9 - 5 shows
Another performance filled day, I had to pick up yet more tickets I had bought last night online, and then walked up Calton Hill which has magnificent 360° views over Edinburgh and the Firth of Forth. As I started the steep climb up the hill it started to rain. Brilliant, just what I wanted. The weather has deteriorated and today’s forecast is not encouraging and my umbrella blew out twice. I climbed to the top of the Nelson Monument, all 170 steps. I don’t know what it is but whenever I’m presented with the opportunity to climb a tower, usually by means of a narrow spiral staircase, I have to take on the challenge. The views were sensational but it was blowing a gale and after taking a few photos I scuttled back down to earth.
My legs are beyond tired and my feet are absolutely killing me, so with time to spare before my next show I had a Thai foot and leg massage, Edinburgh is a really tiring place to walk because of the hard cobbles and steep streets. I’d never had a Thai massage before so it was a bit of a different experience. My legs are very stiff from all the walking. Liz, my personal trainer, would be very disappointed to hear I haven’t been stretching enough (or indeed at all), hence my stiffness. It was an unusual massage, quite like the Bowen Technique, but effective nonetheless. I certainly feel much better and can walk more freely. Money well spent.
The first show for the day at the Pleasance was a play called “Waiting for Lefty”. It had great reviews. I left the following review on the Edinburgh Festival review website: If you enjoy sitting in a portacabin listening to 8 people shout at each other at the top of their voices for an hour, then this play is for you. I left with a headache. The first real dud notwithstanding the excellent reviews. 0/10
I met a woman today with a Jack Russell terrier and a wire-haired terrier. I stopped for a chat and was introduced to Molly the wire-haired terrier. I was surprised that she had a docked tail because I thought it had been made illegal to dock dogs’ tails anymore. The owner told me that although Molly was nine, she’s only had her for three months as she is a rescue dog who has been “re-homed”, (what a wonderful expression the English have for finding a new home for an abandoned pet, they are “re-homed”). I was very upset to hear about Molly being abandoned and struggled not to cry there and then.
Back over to the New Town and the Assembly Rooms in George Street to see “Touching the Blue”, a one man show about a former world snooker champion, now washed-up, who returns to the championship for one last chance at the title. I remember watching Pot Black on television in the 1970’s (when it was in black and white, how did we manage?), and while I have no interest in playing, I used to love watching the pros. I recognise Clive Russell but I couldn’t say what I’d seen him in, although I'm sure he usually plays “hard men”. I thought he did an excellent job, it was a riveting and totally believable performance. 9½ /10
An early dinner, again at Chez Jules, and then back over to the Old Town to a new venue I hadn’t been to before, the Augustinian’s Church on George IV Street. (I passed a woman the other who referred to it as “George the Whatsit Street”, obviously defeated by the Roman numerals.) Tonight it’s a performance of “The Merry Wives of Henry VIII”, a three-hander with the two women playing all the female roles. It was a light fluffy confection of a show, set to a background soundtrack of 70’s and 80’s music. I think rollicking is the word. It was very funny and well presented in a university review sort of way. 7½/10
Next up, Susan Calman at the Underbelly, my least favourite venue because it’s so tatty. The Underbelly is a dive and one area I passed through smelled distinctly damp and musty. Not nice.
I'm a bit bemused by the huge comedy mafia and festival counter-culture that exists, and not just in Edinburgh, although Edinburgh is such a showcase for the talent of comedians who either go on to bigger and better things or sink without a trace. It wouldn’t be hard to overdose on this stuff, a month in Edinburgh with a city teeming with both the cream and junket of comedy which can either make or break someone’s career.
Susan Calman said that at her first Edinburgh Festival in 2006, she had two people attend her shows for the whole of August (it was hard to tell whether she was exaggerating), but what I found most astonishing was that it had cost her £7,500 to appear at the Festival. Ouch. You have to be pretty dedicated to invest that sort of money on your career, but Edinburgh is an important showcase for new talent. Getting a good review here can make all the difference to a fledgling career, although with 2,500 acts and 450 venues that’s a lot of competition, and I've seen very few bad reviews. It’s hard to see how they can all make a living.
I had a good chat with a couple of Edinburgh ladies in the queue, like me they too had heard her on the radio. I’d heard Susan, a lesbian and former corporate lawyer, on Radio 4 and Radio Scotland several times and she’s very funny, with a lovely Scottish accent. She asked the audience to indicate how many had come to see her because they had heard her on the radio, and I was slightly irritated that she seemed to resent her success because the demographic of her audience has changed from a largely gay/lesbian audience to a more middle class Radio 4 audience. What did she expect? Regardless, I thought she was very funny. 8/10
Last gig for the night was at 10.40 p.m. at the Comedy Club in York Street, a permanent comedy venue here in Edinburgh, to see Paul Sinha in “Extreme Anti-White Vitriol”. These late night shows are beginning to test my enthusiasm, it's been a long day but my justification is that it’ll be a while before I come back to Edinburgh again. Although I would love to make it a regular occurrence, perhaps every four or five years, I couldn’t cope if I came annually!
Paul Sinha is a comedian, born in the UK to Indian parents, and is a former GP. He is openly gay, he mentioned it, once or twice... and like Stephen Fry, being gay seems to define who he is, a professional gay if you like. His reviews were excellent and he had been called a racist by a member of the BNP (like the National Front, an ultra-right wing “Britain for the British” party), hence the name of the show, so I thought it would be worth seeing. His quick fire delivery, intelligent and insightful comments about Britain today and its attitude to race made it a very funny show. He’s well-educated and self-deprecating, the ideal man in fact, if only he weren’t gay 8½/10
Leaving the venue in the New Town at near midnight I was glad of my three layers and ski jacket. It was sooo cold! And it's supposed to be the middle of summer. My legs ached, I was tired and I was cold and I toyed with the idea of catching a taxi back to the B&B. So I caught a taxi back to the B&B.
Day 10 - 5 shows
Breakfast this morning I shared a table with a father and son from Waterford in Ireland who are in Edinburgh looking for accommodation for the son who is about to start at Edinburgh University. To my astonishment they had never heard, yes, never heard, of the Edinburgh Festival or knew what a military tattoo is and therefore had no idea that Edinburgh would be teaming with people as it does every August. Unbelievable.
Show number 1 today was Menu 2 from the “Bite-Size Plays” I saw the other morning, another five, 10 minute plays performed by the same company. Perhaps not quite as good as the first menu, but still very entertaining. The first play was about four attractive women who are madly in love with a geeky author, all in his mind, of course. The second was called Borys the Rottweiler, a play seen from the dog’s perspective. The third was about a family, surreal but funny, the fourth a Bonny and Clyde-like couple which was amusing and the fifth play was unmemorable. 8/10
Show number 2, immediately following the Bite Size plays and in the same venue was “I, Elizabeth”, a 70 minute monologue written and performed by Rebecca Vaughan, a most talented and accomplished actress who ran the gamut of emotions. It was an extraordinary performance. Nevertheless, it was a hard show to follow at times, being written in the vernacular of the day, it was heavy-going and I would imagine almost incomprehensible to anyone not familiar with Tudor history and the reign of Elizabeth I. 7/10
Show number 3 was “Wonderland”, the story of Charles Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll, and his relationship with Isa Bowman, the actress who played Alice in Wonderland on stage, and is based on a true story. I will usually only see musicals under sufferance but this production was written by Gyles Brandreth who mentioned it during his show the other day. Why did I bother to see it if I have no interest in either Lewis Carroll or musicals? Because Michael Maloney (first seen in Telford’s Change in 1979), was in it, one of my favourite English actors, not number 1, that position is held by Martin Shaw, but certainly in the top 10. Perhaps not the best reason to see something in which I would otherwise have only a tepid interest, but one of the good things about going to the theatre here is seeing my favourite actors and actresses. And I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed the show. It was by turns funny, touching and interesting, I might even read Alice in Wonderland. 7/10 (marked down from 8/10 because Michael Maloney isn't really a singer but he does his best and I enjoyed his performance nonetheless).
Linner at a Kurdish restaurant, Hanam’s, on Victoria Street. I was intrigued by the selection of non-alcoholic wines, beers and ciders and never having tried non-alcoholic wine before I thought I would try it out of curiosity and ordered a chardonnay. Curiosity satisfied, suffice it to say I won’t be ordering any more. It had a sweet syrupy flavour and bore no resemblance to chardonnay whatsoever. What a pity, and to add insult to injury, the food was dreadful.
Show number 4 and continuing my Elizabethan theme, from the New Town and Assembly Rooms where I had spent most of the day I walked over to the Old Town to see “The Demise of Christopher Marlowe” at yet another tiny venue. This play deals with the assassination of Kit Marlowe who was suspected of being an atheist and conspiring against Elizabeth 1, apparently both treasonable. Some very creditable performances from the cast, although the actress who played Elizabeth 1 in this production was nowhere near as powerful as Rebecca Vaughan who played Elizabeth in “I, Elizabeth” this morning. 7½/10
Show number 5 was Sean Lock in Lockipedia at the Assembly Rooms in George Street, so back to the New Town (this shuttling to and fro between the Old and New Towns is getting exhausting). I first saw Sean Lock on QI with Stephen Fry, in fact on reflection I think I’ve only ever seen him on QI. He’s very funny and I thought he would be worth seeing. The first challenge was the queue which stretched almost to the corner when I joined it 30 minutes before the show began. I have to admit to being a little disappointed, that seems to be my experience here, the more I look forward to something, the more disappointed I am. He was funny but I don’t think he connected with the audience tonight. 7½/10
Today the weather was fine, no rain, blue skies, fluffy clouds. I do hope it stays fine for the rest of my stay here in Edinburgh.
Day 11 - 4 shows
To complement the Festival activities, Edinburgh currently has a wonderful craft market called the West End Market, in the grounds of St John’s Kirk. There are dozens of stalls selling handmade goods and artwork sold direct by the artists themselves, which I always enjoy. There is a great selection of good quality jewellery, artwork, bags and other fripperies. I will have to return when I have some spare time to have a good look around.
This morning was the last of my “Bite-Size Plays”, Menu 3. Today they were fabulous. The first was a conversation between William Shakespeare and Will Kemp. It was very funny. The second playlette was the weakest play about people lacking various senses. The third was an infinite number of monkeys, more Shakespearean allusions, very silly but very funny. The fourth was the inner voice that plagues us all, very clever, and the last was Pride & Prejudice in 10 minutes. It was brilliant, and they all lived happily ever after. Before it started I got chatting with the chap next to me, he had seen this company at previous Edinburgh Festivals. We discussed election results and the nature of coalition governments, both British and Australian. I really enjoy the casual conversations you strike up with people here at the festival, everyone is so friendly and chatty and interesting. 9/10
On the way to my next venue I passed a saxophonist playing in the street, he was great. He was just under a bridge and the sound reverberated around the walls and carried some distance. It was very moody and I can still hear it ringing in my ears. I took a couple of photos and while he asked if I was on Flikr, I had to disappoint him!
Next stop was a tribute to Joyce Grenfell in a tiny tiny venue in a laneway off Candlemaker Row (I love the name). The show was called “Turn Back the Clock", in honour of Joyce Grenfell’s centenary year, and it was a lot of fun. Cheryl Knight did a good job of recreating some of Joyce Grenfell’s best loved monologues and songs. She covered a range of songs and monologues and the most affecting were brilliantly delivered. There were probably only about 30 people in this venue and most of them a lot older than me, but it was very well received. 9/10
From the Vault in the Old Town I had a long walk out to a venue in Leith to see a circus, an acrobatic troupe called Tabú. I booked it because I enjoy acrobats and circuses and this would be something a little different from the comedies and plays I've seen to date. On arriving at the venue I was a little astonished to discover that there were no seats. For a country apparently obsessed with safety, I couldn’t believe that we were herded around the performance space with the performers whizzing about above our heads on high wires. It effectively meant we had to spend the whole two hours being shuffled around the venue, straining our necks looking upwards.
I was particularly concerned about all the young children in the audience, some of them quite small, in my opinion this was not a venue to bring children. I even saw one man nearly kicked in the face by one of the flying trapeze artists. I have to say I was pretty unimpressed with the set up and no matter how good they were, it was just plain irresponsible, this is an OH&S disaster waiting to happen. And at £16 this was one of the most expensive shows I’d booked and for that I didn't even get a seat! As I was at the back, trying to stay out of the firing range, sometimes I couldn’t even see what was going on. I get better value at the street theatre on the High Street. There was an interval and it was announced that the bar was open. Great, small children and inebriated adults. How do they get public liability insurance, the premiums must be astronomical?
At this stage I’d had enough. While I acknowledge that the acrobats were very good and normally I love this sort of thing, Circus Oz are great and I enjoy watching the trapeze artists perform in the City Square in Melbourne during summer, but I wasn’t enjoying this. I went to the loo and was appalled that there were no facilities for washing your hands. How unhygienic, I felt dirty until I found somewhere later in the afternoon to wash my hands. I didn't stay for the second half. 3/10
I treated myself to dinner at Gusto in George Street and ordered partridge wrapped in prosciutto with risotto. I've never had partridge before so I had to try it. It was like chicken wrapped in prosciutto on a bed of risotto, but more expensive. The shops and restaurants here in George Street are just beautiful, elegant rooms, plasterwork, soaring ceilings, domed skylights, all very upmarket. The meal was compensation for last night’s awful dinner. The staff and ambience was first class and the guys hammed it up for me while I took some photos. Highly recommended.
In keeping with my Shakespearean and Elizabethan themes, tonight I saw a play about the 17th Earl of Oxford, Edward de Vere, who is one of the contenders for author of Shakespeare’s works, (if you buy into all that nonsense), called “The Man who was Hamlet”. Like the “I, Elizabeth” play l saw yesterday, it was a one man masterpiece written and performed by the same person, in this case George Dillon. Although this play alludes to Shakespeare and the authorship of the plays, it isn't the central theme of this play. It’s a 90 minute monologue on the life of a man who was the ward of William Cecil, Lord Burghley, Elizabeth 1’s Secretary of State. Steve Berkoff said, “The best example of someone to watch how to perform is George Dillon”. I agree.
It astonishes me that so many performances here in Edinburgh play to such tiny audiences, often near empty auditoriums, such as this play which is nothing short of sensational. George Dillon was fantastic and it was a gripping story, as powerfully performed as “I, Elizabeth”, although in the modern vernacular which made it easier to follow, and yet there were only 13 people in the audience (including Borys the Rottweiler). I think the problem is that there are too many productions and not enough people to go around. I couldn’t imagine this playing to near empty houses at the Melbourne International Arts Festival. 10/10
The final performance for today was “The Crack” at the Spiegeltent, the bastard child of La Clique which has performed at the Spiegeltent in Melbourne. I saw La Clique in London at the Hippodrome a couple of years ago. I recall that Miss Behave, who was the compare, was also in La Clique. La Clique alumni include Camille O’Sullivan, Ali McGregor, and Meow Meow. The Crack is not as good or as polished, but that’s not to say it wasn’t funny or entertaining, it was just the B-grade version whereas La Clique is A-grade. The show was nearly two hours long, very pacy and Nina Conti (Tom Conti’s daughter), an actress and ventriloquist, was most entertaining with a very cheeky monkey. 7½/10
Day 12 - 2 walking tours - 1 show
I deliberately kept today largely free of festival performances so that I could do a couple of walking tours around Edinburgh, conscious that if I didn't set time aside I would experience the Edinburgh Festival but see little and understand less of the city itself.
The first tour I did was free, I think it is organised by Fringe Festival organisers, and eight of us walked along the Royal Mile with Martin, dressed very smartly in kilt and all the accoutrements. He was very knowledgeable as we wandered the length of the Royal Mile from Edinburgh Castle in the west to Holyrood Palace in the east. It’s called the Royal Mile, but it took us two hours and twenty minutes to walk the length of it and by the time we reached Holyrood I felt like I had walked about five miles! 10/10
The tour ended at Holyrood Palace and as I’d been in 1996, I was more interested in seeing the new Parliament House across the road which wasn’t there in 1996. It’s very modern and put me in mind of Federation Square in Melbourne. I loved it as I love all good modern architecture. While there I booked a place on a tour on Monday morning to see the inner workings of the building, or rather buildings, as it is a complex of squat buildings on a large site.
I then had to make my way, very slowly and laboriously as I was tired, back up the hill. My knees are shot to pieces and now my feet are beginning to fray at the edges and complain despite wearing my lumpy runners every day which I wouldn’t normally wear except to the gym, nowadays they are my constant companion to cushion my poor ageing joints. My feet have developed blisters and my little toes are pretty unhappy about the constant pounding.
I stopped for lunch for a local delicacy, a baked tattie with cheese. It was very welcome (I was famished), and had been recommended by Martin the guide, whose son owns the shop.
My second walking tour was the City of the Dead to explore the vaults and “streets” beneath the city which were inhabited for several years following the construction of the North and South Bridges. The vaults had been lost for over 100 years and only relatively recently rediscovered. Despite paying £ 9.50 I was very disappointed. The guide, a young Scot, was entertaining, it was a performance in itself but I didn't really enjoy the tour. There wasn’t much to see and all the hype about ghosts and paranormal experiences irritated the sceptic in me. Not worth the money. 2/10
My only show for the day was Reginald D Hunter, an American comedian whom I've seen on television on QI and also a programme with Andy Hamilton (Drop the Dead Donkey/Outnumbered/Old Harry’s Game), which is a recommendation in itself. His stand-up routine is called “Trophy Nigger” and I gather from talking to various people here in Edinburgh that the word nigger/nigga always appears in the title of his shows, which he does explain as his way of reclaiming and neutralising the word. The people I spoke to suggested that they thought the concept was getting a little tired, so I was a bit apprehensive about the show tonight and arrived with low expectations.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that the more you look forward to something, the less you are likely to enjoy it, and vice versa. Like Paul Sinha the other night, he dwelt on race a good deal. Reginald D Hunter is an Afro-American from Georgia. His stories about growing up in a large family in the deep south were hilarious although a little troubling, it doesn’t sound like it was an easy upbringing.
Reginald D Hunter has lived in Britain for the last 13 or so years so his experience is quite different to Paul Sinha’s who has an Anglo-Indian background, but in both cases they made insightful and intelligent comments about race and racism. Reginald D Hunter’s use of nigger is motivated by his refusal to be offended by the epithet, in the same way that he says women should object less to be being called bitch than they should object to being paid less than men for the same work. His observations about race were funny, but fall into the usual trap about prejudice when slagging off conservative politicians because he sees equity and fairness differently. Politics here in Britain are so much more polarised and backbiting than they are in Australia and everything is very black and white, you either agree with them or you don’t, there is no middle ground.
Nonetheless, I really enjoyed the show more than Sean Lock, and as much as Paul Sinha. The one comment I do recall was his observation that his audience has changed since he’s appeared on television. Susan Calman made a similar observation following exposure on BBC Radio 4 and Radio Scotland, and as a consequence her audiences have become more mainstream and middle-class and less lesbian. Reginald D Hunter also noted that his audience has changed and that people expect his stand-up routine to be the same as his television and radio performances. I take his point, but with mass media exposure what can he expect? He was very funny and I enjoyed his show more than expected. 8½/10
Exhausted from all my walking, I hopped in a taxi back to B&B and had a very interesting chat with the cabbie about the London cab which Edinburgh taxi drivers also drive, built in the past in Coventry and costing about £36k, but now built in China and costing £18k. He complained about how he had been ripped off in the past, but then everyone complains about the loss of the manufacturing base in first world countries (Australia/UK/etc), blaming the government but grabbing the benefit of the cheaper imports. They can't have it both ways.
Edinburgh cabbies also have to do the “knowledge”, it takes a year in Edinburgh, three years in London. The cost of a licence in Edinburgh is about £50k and despite the entry price, annual retesting and running costs (40,000 miles per annum is tough on any car), he still manages to employ two other drivers and he admitted he has made back his investment several times over. I gratefully paid the £8 fare (approximately A$14), for the shortest of trips, rather than walk home.
Day 13 - 3 shows
V late start today. I deliberately slept in and missed breakfast, I am so tired although my Edinburgh Festival is fast drawing to a close.
First stop this morning is the Edinburgh International Book Festival to hear Alexander McCall Smith and James Paterson discussing Alexander McCall Smith’s most recent Precious Ramotswe book for children, not released until 2011, but this edition is in the Scots. Not Gallic you understand but the Scots dialect.
James Patterson read some extracts in his delightful Scots accent. It was most enjoyable, even if I didn't understand every word (I ken enough to get the gist). But what was truly delightful was that half the audience was made up of children and Alexander McCall Smith (let’s call him Sandy), was brilliant with them. He obviously loves kids and has a natural rapport with them, like a kindly school master, asking questions of his young audience and doling out £5 notes and books (extraordinarily he’s written over 60 books for children).
He had children on the stage acting as monkeys and tigers and as the show came to an end he asked the children one last question, “What is the name of Macbeth’s wife?”. The little boy next to me put up his hand. And the answer? “Mrs Macbeth”, of course! For that he was rewarded, but by this stage Sandy had run out of £5 notes. He riffled through his wallet and presented the little boy with a £20 note! Wow, what a generous uncle! Although ostensibly a kids’ book (I couldn’t get tickets for his other Book Festival readings), it was great fun, in fact more so just for the pleasure of seeing the children have such fun. 10/10
At the book signing afterwards, I saw Sandy and Melvyn Bragg (whose book reading was also booked out, a lesson for next time). Anita, Fred and I actually met Sandy in Melbourne earlier this year at the launch of The Double Comfort Safari Club (see photo courtesy of Fred’s mobile). I just love his books. When I spoke with him in January he told me that his favourite character is Isabel Dalhousie who speaks with his voice, which pleases me greatly as she’s my favourite as well. And of course there’s Bertie. They are all responsible for bringing me to this wonderful city.
After the book reading I made my way back to the West End Market in the grounds of St John’s Kirk. They have fabulous crafts made by local artists and I’d spied some artwork I was keen on as I want to retire some of my pictures bought over 20 years ago in favour of something more modern and to my taste. I like to buy art on my travels as a memento of the places I visit. I also like buying art from the artists themselves and in the last few years it’s been largely female artists, even though this hasn’t been a conscious decision. Perhaps female artists are more willing to attend art fairs and meet the public face-to-face than their male colleagues? The pleasure for me is meeting with and buying direct from the artists and seeing their work on my walls for years to come.
The second helping of Alexander McCall Smith, Sandy to his friends, was the Really Terrible Orchestra at St Mary’s Metropolitan Cathedral. I didn't realise how far away it was and I arrived with minutes to spare and my shattered knees complained all the way. Then I had terrible trouble finding a seat and had to call on the usher to find me a seat; I eventually got quite a good seat half way down the nave.
The orchestra is aptly titled, they really are terrible!!! They are so terrible it's quite endearing, but let’s not delude ourselves, they would not pack out the Cathedral or any space half the size if it were not for the popularity of its founder, Alexander McCall Smith, who plays contrabassoon.
The highlight was the speech given by Sandy, it was hysterical as he acknowledged how woeful the orchestra really is. But that’s its charm. If they were an Australian orchestra I'm sure they would be called “The Havago Orchestra”, despite their lack of talent at least they are prepared to have a go!
As we were in the Catholic Cathedral they had inveigled the Cardinal to sing the Flanders and Swann classic, the Hippopotamus Song, and the congregation (?) sang the chorus. I surprised myself, I even knew the lyrics, they must have been nestling somewhere deep in the back of my memory. The performance from the Cardinal was rapturously received and everyone had fun.
The final was the finale from the 1812 Overture, compete with audience participation. When I read that in the programme, I twigged why a brown paper bag had been left on each of the seats. At the appointed moment, the Cathedral rang to the sound of hundreds of people popping their brown paper bags. I burst out laughing, what a joyous moment and one of the many highlights of my Edinburgh Festival. 10/10
Dinner at Browns on George Street, (consistently good), and then the much anticipated Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo. I had bought my ticket before Christmas, so today has been a long time coming. The crowds clambering up the last few hundred meters to the Castle were heaving, thousands of white Anglo-Saxons. There is an obvious lack of cultural integration here at the Edinburgh Festival, no black or Asian faces apart from a very occasional glimpse of a Japanese tourist.
The crowd, as always, was very patient and orderly, and we slowly made our way into the parade ground and up to our seats. I had a great seat facing the entrance and the performance started on time at 7.30 p.m. while it was still light although the light began to fail as the show progressed. And then it began to rain and the stupid couple in front of me put up an umbrella (I don’t think they noticed they were the only people with an umbrella), and even when the ushers told them to lower it, they didn't understand that lower didn't mean lower in their seats, but collapsed. They spent the rest of the performance with black plastic bin liners on their heads because they hadn’t had the sense to take a rain coat (I had my trusty ski jacket).
I filled my 16GB Compact Flash card with photos, my excellent vantage point coupled with my wonderful Canon 5D Mark II had produced some great photos, even as it got darker (with an ISO up to 6400 I can shoot in quite dark conditions without a flash). I do love my camera, it was worth every penny.
Before I knew it the show was over and we were streaming back out of the parade ground. I am so glad I went to the tattoo, it’s a bit of a cliché I know but I've seen it on the television so many times over the years, being there was so special and there was such a buzz that even the rain didn't dampen our spirits. 10/10
Today was a very different day to the rest of my Festival, great fun and very enjoyable. Sadly my time in Edinburgh is drawing to an end, although I have extended my stay at the B&B by a couple of days so that I can better explore Edinburgh before I leave.
Day 14 - 4 shows
I woke to sunny blue skies that swiftly changed to lowering grey skies, threatening rain at any moment. Edinburgh weather is like the Melbourne weather of my childhood, four seasons in one day.
I headed first to Bruntsfield Links, a five minute walk from the B&B to see the wide open grassland and scene of one of the lithographs I had bought at the West End Market yesterday, so that I could see it in the flesh, so to speak. It was quite cool and very windy but the links are a real golf links and open and free to anyone who wants to swing a club. The Bruntsfield Links and Meadows, provide nearly 100 acres of parkland to the south of the city and I was able to walk all the way through the wide green space and up into the Old Town. I’ve got quite comfortable with the Old Town geography now, it took a week or so to get the hang of its steep medieval layout, but after two weeks I'm very comfortable with getting around and can (almost) manage without a map.
First stop was a National Trust of Scotland property, Gladstones’ Land, on the Royal Mile and just down from the Castle, an original tenement building presented as it would have looked when first built in 1550. I was a little disappointed that only a couple of floors were open to the public, but what there was on display was very interesting and there was a lot of furniture and other artefacts that were worth seeing; the staff were also very helpful and knowledgeable. As I'm a member of the English National Trust I have reciprocal visiting rights so it didn't cost anything to visit and I'm pretty sure my English National Trust membership gives me reciprocal rights to visit National Trust properties in Australian as well which is a useful tip for visitors to Britain, you can take out membership of the National Trust in Australia and use your membership in Britain, the savings even over a couple of weeks can be considerable.
I wandered down the High Street taking in more street theatre including two African boys, one a limbo dancer (see photos), as well as the Pierced Lady who bizarrely has nearly 7,000 piercings. Why?
A coffee and muffin stop followed by “Underneath the Lintel” at the Assembly Hall, my first performance for today, something I booked when I was handed a flyer (all too many flyers), describing the play as an existential detective story involving a missing library book and a pair of abandoned trousers, described as ‘provocative, mournful and extremely funny’. Another of the many shows I have seen that was extremely well done. Its only drawback was that it was a tad too long and I found it difficult to maintain my interest or concentration towards the end. According to a review I read somewhere, the last 15 minutes were the best and most revealing, pity because I’d all but stopped listening by then. The play put me in mind of Stephen Poliakoff’s “Shooting the Past” or “Perfect Strangers”, with perhaps a dose of “Amelie” thrown in for good measure. I think the actor was first class, playing a pedantic, prissy Dutch librarian, he had a certain Hercule Poirot air about him. 6/10
My next show was a bit of a sentimental choice, Rodney Bewes in “Three Men in a Boat”. I remember Rodney Bewes from his early days with James Bolam in “The Likely Lads” and I don’t think I've seen him anything else since, although James Bolam has been in heaps of things. It was a one-man show, adapted by Rodney Bewes himself from Jerome K Jerome’s classic book and extremely funny and well-delivered. 9/10
My penultimate show was “Under the Blacklight”, again something I was handed a flyer for and had been positively reviewed. It was at a new venue I had been to before near the Pleasance, another tiny tiny venue. The reviews lied. The acting was hammy and shrill (I could have done a better job), and he storyline nonsensical and hysterical. Thank goodness it only last 30 minutes. 0/10
My final event of the Festival was Sub Rosa, another play that had received spectacular reviews and had been recommended to me on day two when I was queuing for Just a Minute, and tonight’s performance at 10.40 p.m. was the only one I could attend.
It’s a site specific performance in several rooms in an old Masonic building in the New Town, complete with Masonic ephemera and regalia. The audience met at the New Town Theatre and we walked to the Masonic Lodge, the same venue as it turns out where I saw the wonderful George Dillon in “The Man who was Hamlet”. We were instructed that once we entered the building we had to remain silent throughout and move from room to room under the guidance of our guides. There are several performances running concurrently as each of the five acts are performed continuously. It was a little intimidating sitting in a small room on an ill-assorted collection of chairs and stools bearing the dark tale told, first by Svaty Václav, a near naked strong man smelling strongly of lavender oil, the Merkeley Siamese twins and patter artists, Angus MacNeil (a wig master), Mrs Thorn and finally and shockingly, Ida McCraken, described as a gentlewoman of lenient virtue. As we moved from room to room the story slowly unfolded and became darker and more disturbing as it went. By the final act I wanted to leave. Had it been a film I would have walked out, but here I was trapped and had to endure the final few minutes; the tale was so disturbing and graphic that I felt distinctly uncomfortable and even unwell. The final act sealed the fate of the two main characters. It was brilliantly conceived and staged but I found the subject matter to be just too disturbing. 8/10
We were deposited back outside on the street at midnight, dazed and confused. This evening I had handed over my ticket with a mixture of sadness and regret, tinged with a soupçon of relief, my Festival fortnight now over. I walked very slowly back to my B&B, my feet are covered in blisters and my knees are none too happy either. I am exhausted. I have seen so many things and loved every minute of it, it’s been two most enjoyable weeks. I'm not sure what I can compare it with, Edinburgh is unique and has cornered the market in arts and comedy festival, everything else is a poor imitation. I will be back. Not next year, perhaps every five years? I have learnt a lot about Edinburgh, the venues, the different types of performances available, where to eat and most importantly, how to pace yourself.
I've now heard the words “The house is now open” 49 times during my two weeks in Edinburgh. I’ve had the most enjoyable and exhausting time, I'm both disappointed and relieved that it has come to an end because I am exhausted! “The house is now closed.”
I was due to leave Edinburgh today but I decided to extend my stay for another couple of days to have a bit of a look at Edinburgh without the demands of the Festival. I think one of the reasons I like Scotland is because, like Canada and Australia, the locals are fiercely proud of their independence, history and culture.
This morning I took the tour I had booked last Friday to see inside the Scottish Parliament House, a modern building built at the foot of the Royal Mile and opposite Holyrood Palace. The original Scottish Parliament building has long since served as the law courts, so a new building was commissioned when Scotland gained devolution from England in 1998.
As a fan of good modern architecture, this collection of buildings is a delight. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to take any photos of the Garden Court which is the most wonderful light-filled space. A little disappointing I think, the architect, Enric Miralles, was not Scottish but Spanish and he died suddenly and unexpectedly at the age of 44 without seeing his vision fulfilled. The only area I was able to photograph, apart from the outside, was the chamber itself, (only one, the Scottish Parliament isn't bi-cameral), and is based on the European model with all seats facing the Presiding Officer. It’s more like a courtroom rather than the English model that the various Australian parliaments have adopted with parties or factions facing each other across the floor in a more confrontation mode. There are critics of the European model, Martin, my guide on Friday didn't like it but that’s a matter of opinion. I'm agnostic, but if Scotland and indeed Britain moves to a proportional electoral system rather than the current “first past the post”. Personally I prefer the preferential voting system we have in Australia, with proportional representation you run the risk of ending up like Italy, a country that has had over 60 governments since WWII because they can’t control their fractious factions.
A stroll back up the Royal Mile to the Edinburgh Castle which I had decided not to visit again, having been there in 1996, but somehow I found myself drawn back to it and felt I couldn’t really come to Edinburgh and not visit it. I was a little startled by the cost, but I bought a pass that allowed me to visit all Historic Scotland properties for £31.50 over a 14 day period. I will just have to make sure I make it pay for itself.
The grandstand, constructed for the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo, was in the process of being dismantled as the last performance was on Saturday. The Castle has a long military history and is now a popular tourist attraction. The National War Museum of Scotland is very interesting with an exhibition on the land girls who worked the farms (The Women’s Land Army), and the lumber jills who were responsible for felling trees (The Women’s Timber Corp), needed for the war effort. I’d never heard of the lumber jills before, so I found the exhibition totally fascinating.
A wander through the town to see the speed with which the Edinburgh Festival has been dismantled and the city returned to its inhabitants for another 11 months before it all starts again. The High Street has been returned to traffic, the archways and stages for the street theatre have all gone and all that’s left is rubbish bins filled with discarded posters. I was surprised with the rapidity with which Edinburgh has reverted back to a sedate and dignified city.
Although much quieter, Edinburgh remains a vibrant city and there are still quite a lot of tourists around, so I settle on the High Street at one of the best restaurants I discovered, Angels with Bagpipes, and had one of my last meals in Edinburgh while putting in some serious people watching (ogling a George Clooney lookalike at the next table, unfortunately with his girlfriend).
My last day in Edinburgh, I spent a last lingering look at this wonderful, civilised city, taking photos and visiting the last few sights on my list. First off today was to see Mary King’s Close, a series of streets, now all underground after they built the Royal Exchange (now the Council Chambers). This tour was infinitely better presented and conceived than the dreadful City of the Dead Vaults tour I did the other day which was a rip-off at £9.50. This tour was £11 but well worth the money.
I'm a bit out but I was keen to see the Georgian House on Charlotte Square where the Book Festival was held. It’s a National Trust of Scotland property and quite exquisite, restored back to its original appearance when first built in the 1790’s, and there was an excellent video about the house and its first owner and his family, narrated by David Rintoul, a very handsome actor who played Mr Darcy in the 1980 production of Pride & Prejudice (it was time I slipped in a gratuitous reference to Jane Austen, it’s been a while). Although none of the furniture and decorations are original to the house, it is excellent, similar to Number 1 The Crescent, in Bath.
The irony of Edinburgh is the story of Greyfriars Bobby, a dog whose devotion to his late master was such that he sat on the grave every day until he died at the age of 16. He is honoured with a tombstone where he is buried in the graveyard which says “Let his loyalty & devotion be a lesson to us all”. The irony is that at the gate to the cemetery is a sign headed Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 banning dogs from burial grounds and churchyards. So much for loyalty.
It is also noteworthy when looking at the gravestones of Scots is that well into the 19th century, Scottish women maintained the Anglo-Saxon traditional of keeping their family name rather than adopting their husband’s name on marriage, a practice imposed on women by the Norman French invaders in 1066. I prefer to follow tradition and maintain my family name than the modern French practice. Disturbingly, the Normans removed the property rights from women, whereas the Anglo-Saxons recognised the right of married women to hold property. Mind you, within 20 years of the Norman invasion, 11 French Barons owned 25% of England, stolen from the original Anglo-Saxon owners, so the rights of women were always going to be in trouble (let’s face it, chauvinism is a French word). And the other thing that is a feature of Scottish graveyards is the skull and crossbones (see photo). Quite ghoulish.
A wander through the town, all trace of the Festival, which ended yesterday, has almost been obliterated and I'm surprised at the speed with which the Festival facilities have been dismantled and the city returned to its inhabitants for another 11 months before it all starts again. The High Street has been returned to traffic, the archways and stages for the street theatre have all gone and all that remains are rubbish bins filled with discarded posters. The street theatre and spruikers have all gone and the city has reverted back to become a sedate and dignified city.
I decided that as it was my last night in Edinburgh I would have dinner at Café Rouge. What a disappointment that turned out to be, the food was dreadful. The thing I've noticed here in Britain is the number of restaurant chains they have. They aren’t just fast food outlets, they are restaurants such as Café Rouge, Browns, Prezzo, La Tasca, etc. I suppose there is a market for them because they give visitors a certain level of comfort as to the quality and food type when they are otherwise unfamiliar with a new town, but Café Rouge in Edinburgh wasn’t up to standard. The onion soup was gluggy and the fish cakes, marginally acceptable, were swimming in a slimy creamy sauce. Food here often drowns in sauces, completely overwhelming the dish. I won’t be rushing back to Café Rouge again.
Last minute observations: I saw the coffee shop where the first Harry Potter book was written (The Elephant House), Scottish churches have red doors rather than blue (CofE), I love the buses here and Edinburgh is the city of chimneys. It’s not unusual to see old building with chimneys, but the serried ranks of chimneys here are more numerous than I have seen elsewhere.
Let me be quite clear, I love Edinburgh, I love the Festival and I'll definitely return another year. According to someone I was chatting with somewhere in Edinburgh (it’s that sort of place, people are so friendly), Cambridge was originally offered the Festival in 1947 and declined. What fools. Had Cambridge accepted I suspect the Festival would now be even bigger and more popular than it is in Edinburgh because of its relative proximity to London, Edinburgh is quite a hike from the London. Oh well, Cambridge’s loss is Edinburgh’s gain.
Attending the Festival is certainly something I would love to do, say every five years. I have learnt a lot for future reference, about booking and the best venues, and the geography of the city. Next time I'll try and book a day’s events in one locality rather than zigzagging to and fro between the Old and New Towns. My knees are feet didn't appreciate how hard and how steep the streets are. And once the Festival opens it’s necessary to check the reviews as they start to appear in order to find out the hot tickets before they sell out. I missed a few things I would have liked to see because I was too slow to book.
I didn't see a single deep-fried Mars bar, reputedly a Scottish delicacy, and on the whole the food was excellent. I was disappointed that I didn't have any haggis at all, not seeing it on any menus. I must reverse this oversight before I leave Scotland. Nonetheless, on the whole the food was excellent. Angels with Bagpipes on the High Street gets a memorable mention, as does Gusto on George Street.
Importantly I felt very safe in Edinburgh at all hours of the day and night, and everyone was good tempered, despite the queues. I suppose the POMS have had a lot of practice queuing over the years, it was all very orderly.
I like Edinburgh because it has such a human scale. The obvious height restriction on new buildings, no doubt a result of the UNESCO World Heritage listing, means that new buildings do not dwarf the old ones, and there is some very good modern architecture, most notably Parliament House. (Thumbs down to the Radisson Hotel on the High Street, a poor pastiche of Scottish baronial style.) The conservatives love it but modern architecture, done well, can live comfortably with buildings of antiquity. After all, the Royal Mile wasn’t all built on one day, there are hundreds of years of architectural styles along its length.
Edinburgh has a vibrant cultural life, the National Gallery of Scotland is evidence of this, and there are lots of little art galleries around the city with the work of local artists.
I suspect that Edinburgh would be a very easy city to live in, apart from the weather. During my stay in Edinburgh, while the middle of summer, on some days the weather was the same as Melbourne currently in the midst of winter. Goodness knows what Edinburgh must be like in the middle of winter, too cold for me. I would love to come for Hogmanay (New Year), but perhaps the cold would defeat me. Anyway, New Year celebrations should be shared rather than a solo activity.
I have enjoyed Edinburgh so much I’ve decided to head further north and take in some more of Scotland as I'm this close. I want to drive up to see John O’Groats, the furthest point on the mainland from Lands’ End, and I may never have the opportunity again.
I took my leave of Edinburgh this morning and collected Mimi from Robert who had been looking after her for the last couple of weeks. I drove down to Morningside, south of the city, where Isabel Dalhousie lives in the Sunday Philosophy Club books, before heading north (Edinburgh is all about Alexander McCall Smith for me).
First stop was South Queensferry to see the Forth Bridges, both the older rail and more modern road bridges. South Queensferry is a delightful little village right on the water with expansive views over the Firth of Forth with the two bridges before them. I had a pit stop at the Orocco Pier for a coffee, with the most wonderful views of the bridges (see photo of Ladies who Lunch).
From South Queensferry I headed across the Forth Road Bridge, a modern suspension bridge which runs parallel with the much older cantilever Forth Rail Bridge. I drove through Dunfermaline, an ancient town and former capital of Scotland but didn't stop because, as usual trying to find somewhere to park proved too much trouble, and I set a course for Loch Leven where Mary Queen of Scots was imprisoned for a time. It's now largely a ruin and one of the properties covered by the pass I bought at Edinburgh Castle the other day.
I took a small launch out to the island which was included in the price of admission. It runs about every 10 minutes and the ferryman was very genial and we had a good chat on the way out to the island. I just love the Scots, they are sooo friendly.
My final destination for today was St Andrews but I wanted to follow the coast line, stopping at Portaween (not worth the detour), and Crail which I had visited in 1996 but couldn’t remember very well. An interesting fishing village but not as picturesque as Mousehole or Port Isaac in Cornwall.
The drive to St Andrews was through lovely countryside and I arrived about 5’ish. I hadn’t arranged anywhere to stay, not realising that it would be difficult to find somewhere. The town was filled with American golf-playing tourists and all the B&B’s I saw had “No Vacancies” signs except one who wanted to charge me the full double room rate of £75. As there was only Pay and Display parking in the street I decided it was more trouble than it was worth, so I decided to look elsewhere. I eventually found a guest house on North Street, Deveron House, more by good luck than good management, with a “Vacancies” sign in the window. As I could park right outside I took this as a good sign. The owner, a lovely Scot called Graham offered me a double room at the single room rate of £55, which I snapped up.
Dinner at a local restaurant with equally friendly staff, pork meatballs like Nigella’s recipe, very yummy.
Haggis for breakfast. Yum. I can remember having haggis as a child and I demolished my generous serving in record breaking time. Even Graham commented that I must like haggis!
Today I took a long walk around a relatively small town. St Andrews has a population of 16,000, swelling to 23,000 during term time. St Andrews is the third oldest university in Britain after Oxford and Cambridge, in fact Scotland had four universities at a time when England only had the two. Prince William studied here a few years ago, principally I'm reliably told (by the yummy Graham), for security reasons as there are only three roads into St Andrews and there are relatively few opportunities to play up.
Deveron House is just a few hundred meters from the now ruined abbey. I hadn’t realised that the reason why all of Scotland’s many monastic houses were destroyed in the 16th century was not because of that tyrant Henry VIII, after all, he wasn’t king of Scotland, but because Scotland had its own reformation, lead largely by John Knox who was responsible for converting Scotland to a Protestant country. St Andrews was at the heart of that religious ferment, with people burned at the stake in the street for heresy. The Abbey reminded me of Whitby Abbey in Yorkshire, except the weather today was glorious, lots of blue sky and white clouds (how I love the skies in Scotland, they have such character), whereas I recall the weather when I visited Whitby Abbey earlier this year was bitterly cold and wet.
And of course, I had to climb the 172 steps of the tower, I seem compelled to climb every tower I can, partly because it’s there and partly because I want to while I still can. Mercifully my knees are in remission, St Andrews is quite flat so my joints are having a well-earned rest. My two weeks in Edinburgh really did wreck havoc with my feet and knees. The Abbey and Castle are both Historic Scotland properties so I am making good use of my pass, in fact I think it has already paid for itself after three days, so it was a good investment.
There is a little harbour here, not particularly pretty. St Andrews used to have a thriving fishing fleet, like so many small coastal villages here in Britain, but no more. I dropped by the Museum of St Andrews University which was very interesting and then strolled down to the mecca of golf, the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews. Golf was banned in Scotland in 1457, 1470 and again in 1491 because the King was concerned that the men were neglecting their archery practice, essential for the defence of the realm against the Sassenachs (i.e. the English). Football was also banned for the same reason.
The Royal and Ancient was established in 1754 and governs golf everywhere in the world except the US, Canada and Mexico. Can you imagine anyone having the temerity to regulate US citizens? No wonder the US won’t ratify either the International Criminal Court or the Kyoto Protocol. The nerve of some people thinking they can tell Americans what to do!
I digress, of course. The golf links is a wide open paddock with little to recommend it in my opinion, but I had a stroll across the course and took a few photos for the album. By this stage I was very tired, St Andrews is quite compact but by mid-afternoon all I wanted was to sit down, have a cold drink and read one of the books I’d bought at a local second-hand shop, by Alexander McCall Smith. I hadn’t heard of one of them, “La’s Orchestra Saves the World”, about a woman during WWII who set up an orchestra for the locals. Obviously a subject close to Sandy’s heart given that he established the Really Terrible Orchestra! He writes with such charm and his books are irresistible as he draws you in so I spent a happy hour reading and resting my poor feet.
I decided to do something different this evening and went to see a movie, something I haven’t done for about six months. The local cinema, The New Picture House, was showing “Salt”, an Angelina Jolie, Phillip Noyce directed film, and kids films, so I didn't have a lot of choice. Salt was a cross between “Mission Impossible” (apparently it was originally written for Tom Cruise), and “No Way Out”, with Angelina Jolie reprising her role in “Mr and Mrs Smith”. It was a preposterous action thriller with enough twists and turns to keep you guessing. Not everyone’s cup of tea and although I think Ms Jolie is a bit of a nutter, she is a very fine actress and I usually like her movies, so I did enjoy it in an Arnold Schwarzenegger sort of way. And it whiled away 90 minutes before dinner at the Pitcher House Bistro upstairs which was completely empty apart from me and four wait staff. No idea why, my meal was fine and it goes without saying, the service was great!
There’s certainly plenty to see and do in St Andrews even if you don’t play golf. I don’t think I’ve played golf in 10 years, I must dust off my golf clubs when I get home, if nothing else, a good walk ruined.
Off today to Inverness as I continue to head north. I drove over the Tay Bridge and saw the rail bridge, obviously not the same one that collapsed in 1879 killing 75 passengers and immortalised in William McGonagall’s epic poem, widely acclaimed as Britain’s worst poet. Dundee itself is just another town and I didn't bother to stop for a look but pressed on north as Graham at Deveron House had recommended that I stop at the Dunkeld Hilton for lunch. I did stop for coffee and was pleasantly surprised. It was a lovely old fashioned country-house style hotel, not at all what we associate with the Hilton. As it was too early for lunch I had a coffee in the gardens overlooking the River Tay.
I pressed on and drove to Pitlochry which is on the tourist route, but it wasn’t worth stopping being very touristy, but I did stop at Blair Castle for a couple of hours. On the way there an endangered red squirrel ran across my path, they are smaller than the grey American invaders who have taken over most of the red squirrels’ territory in Britain which is why they are now an endangered species; 85% are in Scotland. I've only seen one of the estimated 140,000 still in Britain, so perhaps they aren’t all that endangered.
Blair Castle is built in the Scottish baronial style like the house in the “The Monarch of the Glen”, which isn't that far from Blair Castle. With its roots dating back to the 13th century, it is the home of the Clan Murray and the Duke of Atholl, (the local village is called Blair Atholl), it was quite interesting and has the most amazing collection of deer antlers I have ever seen (see photo). There are extensive gardens but I didn't have time to explore them.
The countryside hereabouts is quite majestic, soaring mountains heavily treed and the trip to Inverness, my destination for tonight, took longer than expected because I kept stopping to take photos notwithstanding that the sensors on my camera are very dirty. I think a lot of dust must have entered the body of the camera when I was changing lenses at South Queensferry a couple of days ago, it was quite windy, and now all my photos need work to remove the many specks of dust.
I arrived in Inverness 6’ish and checked into the B&B I had booked. Booking a room was surprisingly harder than I had expected, everywhere I tried was booked out except Silverstrands. It was inexpensive at £35 per night, although it wasn’t en suite, it didn't bother me, after all, I share a bathroom with Angela and Rodney when I'm in Portsmouth (who are incredibly generous to put me up, or is that put up with me?).
Loch Ness is a long thin loch (Scots for lake), 24 miles long and one mile wide, and Urquhart Castle is located midway down the eastern side. Another ruined castle, it has expansive views up and down the loch, although today it was very hazy. The visitor centre is exceptionally good. Further up the road there is a more commercial Nessie Centre which I by-passed in favour of Urquhart Castle. My Historic Scotland Pass has well and truly paid for itself.
Rather than return to Inverness the same way I decided to drive all around the loch and I'm really glad I did. At the foot of the loch is a village called Fort Augustus, with five locks linking Loch Ness with Loch Oich, part of the Caledonian Canal, a 60 mile long canal across Scotland from the Irish Sea in the west to the North Sea in the east. There are a total of 28 locks and at Fort Augustus there are five of them, transferring vessels from Loch Ness at 15.5 meters above sea level to Loch Oich at 32 meters. Each loch can raise or lower a boat 2.4 meters and I watched fascinated as several boats navigated their way up the water staircase.
Two local lads put on a show for the many tourists, throwing themselves off the swing bridge into the cold water below. They were wearing wetsuits as it must have been very cold indeed, even at this time of year. I have to say it was very breezy and I suspect it doesn’t get much warmer hereabouts.
The east side of the loch is much quieter than the western side as the tourist buses don’t venture around the eastern side, the roads are narrow and largely single track and totally unsuitable for coaches and buses. A very tiring day but the scenery was magic.
The B&B was in a very quiet suburban area and the owners were very friendly. Breakfast was held at one large table rather than separate tables which I quite like because it encourages people to chat, although I’ve noted that young people in their 20’s are reluctant to chat readily with strangers whereas older people are happy to chat. Both mornings here at Silverstrands I had a lovely chat with Margaret who lives south of Edinburgh and works for Mori, the pollsters, recruiting for radio polling. A very nice lady, she had four rescue dogs; I warmed to her immediately. She was great fun and frequent gales of laughter escaped from the breakfast room when the two of us were having breakfast.
Before leaving Inverness I spent an hour or so to have a look around the town. It has a very attractive riverside location. Today I headed for Wick on my way to the northernmost tip of Scotland and mainland Britain. Kenny, the owner of Silverstrands, had told me there was nothing to see that far north but I beg to differ. It’s like saying there’s nothing to see on the Nullarbor. The countryside is constantly changing and is very agricultural; lots of sheep and cattle, although the highland cattle are elusive, to date I’ve only seen them on postcards. I do hope I get to see some in the flesh before I leave the highlands.
Let me say how much I really like the Scots, I think it’s impossible not to like Scotland. They are delightful, friendly, welcoming and very hospitable; their reputation as being dour doesn’t seem warranted. A fiercely proud, independent people, I don’t think I have any Scottish antecedents, (English, Irish, Spanish and something unidentified and possibly middle-European), but sadly no Scots blood. Their history is littered with battles, both internal (the Clans were always fighting one another), and external (initially the Vikings and then their insufferable neighbours, the English). It was only on the death of Elizabeth I in 1603 that Henry VIII’s great nephew and the son of Mary Queen of Scots and the King of Scotland, that the crowns of England and Scotland were united and the Act of Union followed in 1707. And I love their fierce independence. Ironically, Scottish devolution is being hotly debated at the moment and a referendum may be put to the Scots next year. I am so angry with Julia Gillard for her cowardice, apparently she has said that Australia won’t become a republic until the current Queen dies. Why? When was the last time Liz2 even visited Australia? What a joke, if she lives to be the same age as her mother we are stuck with an outmoded and anachronistic rule of government for another 17 years. And why are we so squeamish about offending the Queen, the Scots have no such concerns and they are on her doorstep and no-one has suggested they defer discussion until Liz2 dies. No wonder I didn't vote for Gillard, well I didn't vote at the recent Federal election as I was in Edinburgh when the polls opened at Australia House on the Strand in London, otherwise I would have voted. Then again, as my MP is Peter Costello’s successor, she comfortably retained her seat in what is after all a blue ribbon seat, so voting would have been a bit academic.
I digress, again. I took the scenic route via the Black Isle to see Fortrose and Rosemarkie, recommended by Margaret. Pretty villages that appear to be quite affluent although low on the fripperies index, but well kept homes and gardens, I suspect it must be a dormitory town for Inverness?.
On the way I stopped at Dunrobin Castle, home of the Dukes of Sutherland. Like Blair Castle it's not a ruin but a magnificent family home. Well, when I say that, there was no sense of it being a family home but more a museum of the family’s history. On enquiry, I was told that the family no longer live there but have a private apartment but “don’t stay” there. I found something strange about the way the guide spoke about the family, I couldn’t make up my mind whether she was displaying ill-disguised envy or simply being enigmatic. The entrance fee of £8.50 (A$15) seemed expensive, but it included the formal gardens which are magnificent, with a spectacular waterfront position.
I pressed on as it was late afternoon and I still had a way to go to get to Wick where I planned to stay for the evening, and I hadn’t arranged anywhere to stay. Wick was the herring capital of the world, in 1862 there were 1,120 fishing vessels working out of Wick, now the fleet operates out of Scrabster some miles along the coast. Wick is full of dour grey Victorian buildings peppered with indifferent 20th century English architecture (i.e. uninspired, cheap utilitarian rubbish), and is a bit of a dump. It certainly isn't worth visiting although that didn't stop me having problems finding somewhere to stay, there were “No Vacancies” signs everywhere.
SatNav Jane wouldn’t accept the address of the Bank Guest House I had found on the internet last night, not for the first time I've had problems with TomTom, there was a similar problem when that moron Forrest blamed me because the return address for the car he had hired wasn’t recognised by his SatNav. I did eventually find the Bank Guest House and they did have a vacancy, a lovely room with a view of the River Wick. I had dinner at Ebenezer Place on the smallest street in the world at 6' 9", it’s even in the Guinness Book of Records, a very passable meal complete with a complimentary glass of Drambuie.
Wick, holding no charms for me, I left the B&B for John O’Groats, the furthest point on mainland Britain from Lands’ End. There really is nothing to see at John O’Groats apart from the fabled signpost and is not, as most believe, the most northerly point, that honour belongs to Dunnett Head, a few miles to the west. John O’Groats has been voted the most dismal place in Scotland for good reason.
Dunnett Head is a windswept headland with views over steel grey seas flecked with white caps. And the wind. In fact the wind was so fierce it ripped the car door from my grasp all but pulling it off its hinges. I was so shocked by the ferocity of the strength of the wind that I let out an involuntary scream. The door will have to reattached to the restrainer and there was a small vertical dent in the door where it had struck the front panel forcibly at right angles.
From Dunnett Head I decided to take the scenic North and West Tourist Route to Ullapool on the west coast, a drive of some 160 miles (approximately 260 kilometres). The area around John O’Groats and Dunnett Head was surprisingly rural, not at all wild as I had expected, the weather was wild but the countryside was a patchwork of bland treeless fields, but as I drove west across the top of Britain the landscape changed.
The road across the top of Britain consists largely of a sealed but single track through some of the most magnificent scenery, broad white sandy beaches, lochs, lochs and more lochs, mountains and sheep and cattle. There are a lot of single track roads throughout the more remote parts of Scotland, built with numerous passing places, but drivers have to drive more slowly and cautiously than Australians drive in the outback. I never cease to marvel at the courtesy and patience of English and Scottish drivers, they put their Australian counterparts to shame, they could learn a thing or two about good manners on the road. It's one of the things I can remember my parents saying about Australia when compared with England back in 1969 when we first went to live in Australia, and my parents most definitely weren’t whinging POMS because they loved Australia, but they did say that the drivers in England were more patient and courteous. They also said you couldn’t get decent fish and chips in Australia, I think they remain right about the former.
I don’t think I've commented on British petrol stations. While petrol costs as much in sterling as it does in dollars (£1.16 in Portsmouth or $1.16 in Melbourne), that’s not the fault of the sellers, but they are responsible for the poor amenities they offer. No bucket of water and window cleaner for the windscreen and they charge you to put air in the tyres! Extraordinary.
Some parts of the drive were like a Scottish Nullarbor, all greens and heathery purples rather than red, red and red. The word majestic is well applied to this landscape. At regular intervals sheep (and occasional cattle), can be seen grazing by the side of the road and on one occasion blocking the road entirely before skittering away. I was keen to see some of the highland cattle for which the region is renowned. At last I saw four rather lazy cows lying in a field, so I pulled over to take a couple of photos and it happened again! The car door was ripped from my hand and slammed back into the front panel, deepening the dent made earlier in the day. I will now have to get it repaired when I get back. Mimi is very overdue for a service, I've done over 8,000 miles (nearly 13,000 kilometres) since I bought her in March, and there’s a Peugeot dealership near Angela and Rod so I'll have to get it done when I get back to Portsmouth.
Although it was a long day, driving from 10.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m., it should have taken four hours but I stopped frequently to take photos. Some of the villages are decidedly remote, and did I mention the wind??? In some ways it put me in mind of Tasmania in winter, the only difference is that this is summer.
Starting to flag, I eventually arrived at Ullapool. I hadn’t arranged anywhere to stay but managed to find a rather old-fashioned place on the waterfront (no wi-fi but the luxury of a bath). At £50 I thought it was a bit steep for such an out of the way place and a very ordinary room, but needs must and it’s only for one night.
Dinner was determined more by my alibility to find somewhere to park, a common problem in Britain, I could have ordered a pizza with haggis (!) but settled on lasagne.
I think Ullapool is like Lorne, about 50 years ago. Despite this, it’s a very busy little town and ferries leave from here for the Isle of Lewis. I had toyed with the idea of going to Lewis to see the standing stones, but I'm such a poor sailor and it’s a three hour crossing, so I eventually decided against it.
Continuing to drive south along the much vaunted west coast, famed for its rugged beauty. Still very tired after my long drive yesterday, I didn't want to spend all day driving so I headed to the Isle of Skye and Portree which would take about three hours. The geography hereabouts is very mountainous and largely treeless in places. I remember a television programme years ago about Scotland and the expert in I'm not sure what, referred to the landscape as MAMBA, miles and miles of bugger all! It’s funny the things that stick in your mind, isn't it!
I saw a signpost for Plockton and recalling that Plockton had been the village used in Hamish Macbeth, I took a detour along yet another single and this time very narrow overgrown track, arriving at a beautiful harbour-side village. I have no memory of the village in the BBC television programme but one of the reasons I visit villages that appear in television programmes is because it seems to me that the reason a particular village is used in a television programme is because it is picturesque, so from my perspective, worth seeing. Whatever the reason for filming Hamish Macbeth in Plockton, it certainly wasn’t its ease of access, although it does have a small aerodrome so perhaps they flew in from the South?
It was very grey today with the most fabulous clouds and with only the slightest trace of rain, although there has been flash flooding on the east coast. From Plockton I headed for the Kyle of Lochalsh at the gateway to the Isle of Skye. As the name suggests, Skye is an island, but since 1995 it has been joined to the mainland by a sweeping mile long bridge which seemed a better option than taking a ferry to the Isle of Lewis.
The Isle of Skye boasts more magnificent scenery, the photos don’t do it justice. And those skies, they are so wonderful, I could spend all day just looking at the sky. I have a folder of photos of just skies, I have become obsessed with them.
The main town on Skye is Portree, a very pretty village on the east coast of the island. I did enquire at a hotel with wonderful harbour views but it was full and just as well, when I checked the rooms start at £230 per night! Again, problems with finding somewhere to stay, but the tourist information bureau found me a B&B just outside the town for £35. It’s in a very rural setting and seems to have its own postcode; postcodes in Britain don’t just identify a suburb, they identify a street, so when you give someone your postcode I think there is a privacy issue because it’s very easy to narrow down exactly where you live which is pretty invasive, but then Britain doesn’t have a great record on privacy and civil liberties. I found the house without any difficulty thanks to Jane who can occasionally be unreliable. I decided to stay for a couple of nights so that I could explore Skye.
Dinner at Sea Breezes, a restaurant recommended by the Cul Na Creagan B&B, an excellent seafood restaurant right on the harbour front. Cullen skink (Scottish smoked fish soup, in this case haddock (yum)), followed by rainbow trout with steamed chats, the meal was delicious, the fish was very fresh.
Portree is everything that Ullapool isn't and it’s hardly surprising it’s so popular. The weather remains very unsettled, although this is what passes for summer in these parts, and as we are in peak season, accommodation seems to be at a premium.
Today I drove around the Isle of Skye and my first stop was Dunvegan Castle, but when I got there it was covered in scaffolding so I decided to save my £8, I'm a bit castled out at the moment anyway, and drove up to Uig. Not worth stopping so I continued to drive north up to the tip of the island. There are goats and sheep everywhere, grazing by the side of the road. Mercifully the wind has dropped today.
I stopped at the Museum of Island Life, a series of thatched crofts, each with a display about different aspects of crafting life. It looked like a hard, desolate life and very tough, like living in the outback 200 years ago only colder. It’s a far cry from the centrally heated croft I'm staying in with all mod-cons (specifically the all-essential wi-fi). The owner told me that the front door remains unlocked at all times!
I drove back along the eastern side of the island to Portree, the main town on the island, and had a stroll around the village, and eventually found somewhere to have dinner, and other seafood restaurant. I ordered langoustines, like large prawns but with the flavour of lobster.
I'm still quite tired from all this driving so I decided on an early night.
Milestone – the blog has now hit the 100,000 word mark. I can’t believe how much work this project has turned out to be. I wanted to keep a diary and the blog has been a good discipline but very time consuming and as long there is even one person reading it I will keep writing it! Anyway, it has become a habit and I'm happy that I will have a diary of my Gap Year to look back on when I return to the real world next year!
On the road again, I headed for Eilean Donan, the Island of Donan, possibly the most photographed castle in Scotland, certainly the most picturesque. As Mimi and I swept around the curve in the road, perched on a rocky outcrop in Loch Duich, sat the Castle. It took my breath away, it was so beautiful.
Eilean Donan first entered my consciousness in 1976 nearly 35 years ago when it featured in the first episode of the “New Avengers”, eagerly anticipated in our home at the time. So don’t laugh when I say that as I walked across the bridge to the castle, the New Avengers theme music was playing in my head endlessly. I can recall being somewhat disappointed with the episode, a preposterous story about Nazis and Hitler, but there was the gorgeous Purdy, the incomparable Joanna Lumley. I even had my hair cut Purdy style which looked ridiculous on me because (a) Joanna Lumley is gorgeous and I'm not Joanna Lumley, and (b) I have a vicious cowlick which abrogates against me wearing a full fringe, but that didn't stop me. I’ve followed La Lumley’s career ever since and seen pretty much everything she’s ever appeared in on television, as well as a production of “Blithe Spirit” where she played Evira. Last year I even had my hair cut like hers, again! She is famously married to a man 8 years her junior, so maybe a toy-boy is the answer to looking gorgeous at 64?
Other films where Eilean Donan has guest appeared include the James Bond film, “The World is Not Enough” with Pierce Brosnan, and “Highlander” with Sean Connery, as well as other television programmes including Oliver’s Travels, (one of my favourite programmes), and Hamish Macbeth.
The castle was all but destroyed in 1719 by government forces during the Jacobite uprising, and was rebuilt by the MacRae family between 1912 and 1932. I enjoyed the tour of the castle and the kitchen is an excellent recreation of a meal being prepared in 1932. In fact, it was the best kitchen I have ever seen in a home like this, with the possible exception of Hampton Court Palace. I spent a very enjoyable couple of hours, it’s a popular attraction and well presented.
I continued to drive south through Fort William and heading for Glencoe which had been highly recommended by Graham at Deveron House guest house in St Andrews. I was a little disappointed with the village but not the wild scenery. I found a B&B without difficulty and on arrival Maureen, the owner, very kindly offered me a cup of tea, which is most unusual for a B&B. She was very welcoming. I find I'm drinking a lot of tea, England and Scotland understand tea; I now take it without sugar because I couldn’t get fructose when I first arrived and just got used to tea without it. Maureen also recommended I have dinner at Clachaig Inn, an old coaching inn serving great local food. It was a toss-up between wild boar burger or the more traditional haggis, neeps (swede or turnip) and tatties but haggis won the day and although I was sorely tempted by the wild boar burger, I just love haggis.
I followed my meal with a whiskey, well you have to try it don’t you and at 58% proof and a nip costing £2.90, I won’t be drinking too much! I ordered the Glencoe single malt, not because I drink whiskey but it seemed appropriate and I thought I should try a local whiskey at least once while I'm in Scotland. The whisky menu had over 160 different malt whiskies, it was like a wine list explaining where it comes from and a tasting description.
I woke to a light but persistent rain and a very grey morning and after breakfast headed off around Loch Leven to get a view of Glencoe and the famed Pap of Glencoe with the village across the loch. The rain had set in for the day but with it came a weak rainbow. The whole thing looked very moody with the low lying grey clouds, full of atmosphere. I never cease to marvel at the skies here in Scotland, ever changing from shades of white, through grey to blue/black.
Scotland is positively littered with lochs, large and small, and I lost count long ago. I drove to Oban on the west coast but it was a bit of a disappointment, a rather unattractive fishing town of no note, but there was a bridge with some mini-rapids below where kayakers were enjoying themselves and a small crowd of people on the opposite bank watching them.
The landscape changed from the wild and rugged highlands to the tame and mild lowlands as I drove south to the Trossachs, a beautiful area midway between Glasgow and Edinburgh that provides the drinking water to Glasgow, and the weather steadily improved as the day progressed. I visited the Trossachs in 1996 and remember the area as one of great beauty, the Lake District of Scotland. I've always remembered it fondly.
I tried to remember where I had stayed the last time I was in the area, a delightful family-run B&B right on the edge of a small loch. Unfortunately I couldn’t find it again, and as it was nearly 15 years ago, the house may not be a B&B anymore, so I drove to Callander to look for a B&B for a couple of nights. I've done a lot of driving over the last few days and would like a rest. Dammit, this is supposed to be a holiday! More driving than I intended but I have a lot of ground to cover.
I found a small Guest House just off the main road for a couple of nights (when does a B&B cease to be a B&B and become a guest house?). Nothing special and at £45 per night not cheap, but it's a double room with off-street parking. Anyway, I'm looking forward to the next couple of days to explore the area. The owner of Lubnaig Guest House wears a wonderful, not a traditional clan tartan but a blue and white tartan with a Saltire on the back. I do like a man in a kilt, very sexy.
Dinner around the corner at Poppies Hotel which had been recommended by the Guest House. Excellent service and good food and reasonably priced. Very drinkable chardonnay, One Chain Vineyard, I seem to recall a chain is 22 feet, or is that a furlong? I remain convinced that if you take notes during a meal, as I do for my diary/blog, you get much better service, the wait staff think you are writing about them!
More rain this morning as I set off north to drive through the Trossachs, passing more of the many lochs, Loch Lubnaig and Loch Earn, through Crieff and down to Stirling Castle which is part of my Historic Scotland Pass and as it's about to expire I wanted to maximise its value. It rained all morning but by the time I arrived at Stirling Castle, I was blessed with it had cleared up, there was lots of blue sky with intermittent white and grey clouds.
I was somewhat surprised by the queue of cars to get into the car park at Stirling Castle, I could have turned around and parked elsewhere, but the castle is on the top of a hill and I didn't want to have to walk all the way up (and then all the way back down), what is a very steep hill, so I preferred to wait until a place in the car park became available.
I recall visiting Stirling and the Castle in 1996 but it deserved another visit because places like this are constantly being improved and there was an interesting exhibition on the history of the castle and the tapestries that are being woven especially for the Great Hall. The three that have been completed are magnificent and hang in the beautifully restored hall and there is more refurbishment work underway at the Castle. There were a lot of tourists including a group from the US Cavalry, complete with very impressive hats.
From the ramparts of the Castle can be seen the Wallace Memorial and on another hill I could see over 30 wind turbines. With the wind here in Scotland I'm surprised it isn't covered with more turbines, if it were I imagine it could power the entire national grid! The countryside hereabouts is more English than Scottish, it put me in mind of Hampshire, all green rolling hills and manicured fields.
I returned to Callander and strolled along the main street looking for somewhere to have dinner and settled on MOHR Food, a casual seafood restaurant with a great ambience. I ordered a razor clam entree (very yummy, a bit like scallops), and seafood linguine (a disappointment because of the creamy sauce, my fault for not checking). I got into conversation with the waitress who was obviously an Aussie, and it turned out that while she’s from Perth (that’s Perth, Western Australia, and not Perth, Scotland), in fact she was born in Barrow and moved to Australia when she was 10. Snap! How spooky is that??? I’ve never met anyone else born in Barrow before, apart from family of course.
Having driven the length and breadth of Scotland I can say that it is a land of great diversity, from treeless mountain passes and glacial winds to picturesque lochs and waterways. Lots of sheep, very few highland cattle, (there are more on postcards than seem to exist in reality which is very disappointing), although the black-faced horned sheep fill the gap, they wander across the roads as they graze freely. On the face of it quite the sheep are habituated to humans and their cars, although they skitter away the moment you get out of your car to take a photo, the bludgers. Photography is purely serendipity, the right place, the right time, the right light. I'm very happy with my photos from this trip.
PS Happy birthday Angela!!!
At breakfast this morning there was a couple from Tasmania, another from Yorkshire and a couple from the US (extraordinarily, the husband was wearing a hat at table!). The owner (wearing his trademark joke apron), was very helpful with his recommendations for dinner, both Poppies and MOHR food were on his recommended list. He asked where I was off to today and on telling him that I was driving to Glasgow, explaining I was interested in Charles Rennie Mackintosh, he suggested I visit Helensburgh on the way there as there is a good example of a residential home he had designed, now owned by the National Trust of Scotland.
Before leaving Callander I wanted to see the Bracklinn Falls in the hills just behind Callander. It entailed a walk of a mile from the car park and I heard the falls long before I saw them, not a towering waterfall, but it fell through a narrow ravine and was very picturesque. They are currently building a new footbridge to span the ravine and will provide a great viewing platform, but at the moment it’s roped off, which of course I ignored because I wanted to take some photos, so I gingerly climbed down to the edge for a better position. The walk there was quiet and I pretty much had the place to myself, but by the time I was walking back I passed dozens of people, with their children, with their dogs, with their walking sticks.
I left the Trossachs and drove to Helensburg on the coast to see the Hill House. Hill House (1902) is built, unsurprisingly, on a hill, with now somewhat compromised sea views, but views nonetheless. I arrived a little early and before it opened and while I didn't think the external appearance of the house is all that exciting, it has a modern Scottish baronial look about it and while the gardens are lovely the interiors are just wonderful. I fell in love with the house the moment I walked through the front door, the hallway is so beautiful, the Japanese influence is quite apparent, and the Mackintosh iconic rose motif is incorporated throughout. I now understand the rose motif, when used indiscriminately on cups and tea towels and all the other things marketed as part of the Charles Rennie Mackintosh industry I didn't like them very much, but when seen in context in a house like Hill House, it makes perfect sense.
Both Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Frank Lloyd Wright were influenced by the arts and crafts movement and William Morris, boy could those guys design, and like Walter Burley Griffin (why do these guys all have three names?), Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s wife was also enormously talented unlike poor William Morris, married to the feckless Janey Morris whose talents were limited to looking pretty and adultery.
I love Hill House so much, the hallway and drawing room are pure art nouveau and pure magic; the colour and light and space and aspect all combine to make this house a masterpiece. It reminded me of the beautiful house that Joe Tantaro had designed for AQ8.
Helensburgh is that rare thing in Britain, a planned town, and was founded in 1776 as a seaside holiday resort with expansive views over the River Clyde to Greenock. It's not that attractive by the seafront and shopping centre but it looks like a comfortable middle-class dormitory town for Glasgow because the streets are green and leafy. It’s hardly surprising that the town is called the Garden City of the Clyde. One of its famous sons is John Logie Baird, the inventor of the television, and one of its railway lines is the route of the “Hogwarts Express”. Helensburg is an interesting place but not enough to linger once I had seen Hill House. It was also very cold and windy (what a surprise), although thankfully it didn't rain. I feel that I'm coming down with a cold so I think I'm feeling the cold more than usual.
From Helensburgh to Glasgow is a relatively short drive of 50 kms. Jane had a bit of a meltdown getting me there but we made it in the end. The Ambassador Hotel is well located, although my room could hardly be described as spacious, it would once have been part of a much larger room but has been partitioned which is a pity as the house would have once been a very comfortable Victoria middle-class terraced home, but no longer. Now an hotel, it's reasonable value for the money, but only because it was a last minute discounted price at £110 for two nights. I'm surprised how difficult it was to find accommodation in Glasgow, there don’t seem to be as many B&B’s as Edinburgh and accommodation seems to be hard to find. Nonetheless, I have everything I need, a bed, bathroom, wi-fi and parking. My needs are very simple (LOL!).
Unlike Edinburgh which is grey and flinty and hilly, Glasgow has an altogether warmer hue, red brick and a soft sandstone, the city isn't as old as Edinburgh and is more Victorian than medieval and Georgian, and its roots are industrial rather than commercial.
The Clyde River dominates Glasgow and I've long wanted to visit because of its role as an industrial powerhouse of the 19th century, it’s a cross between Edinburgh and Barrow-in-Furness, sort of, well I know what I mean. Dinner locally, I'm very tired as I'm coming down with a cold, so an early night for me.
I principally came to Glasgow to see the Charles Rennie Mackintosh architecture, so first stop this morning is the Hunterian Art Gallery which is part of the University of Glasgow and where the interiors of 6 Florentine Terrace (1906), the home of Mackintosh and his wife (who was also an artist). It looked quite close to the hotel on the map but the weather forecast wasn’t promising so I decided to drive instead and take my chances with finding somewhere to park. It was definitely the right decision as it turned out because it rained all day.
While driving I listen to BBC Radio 4 and usually enjoy listening to Woman’s Hour, but today I was incensed to hear Kathy Lette interviewed for her comments on Australia’s first female prime minister. Why someone as vulgar as Kathy Lette who hasn’t even lived in Australia for the past 20 years is considered qualified to discuss life in Australia today is beyond me. According to Lette Australia is a sexist country, her evidence being two rather pathetic jokes based on sex, (the woman is obsessed with the subject, she really should move on), and the comments made by Bill Heffernan about Gillard a couple of years ago. Lette couldn’t even get his name right, and anyway his comments were hardly representative of the nation’s views. And the idea that having a female Prime Minister is such a big deal irritates me. There was no mention that the Governor-General is a woman or that we’ve had female State Premiers since 1990 with Joan Kirner in Victoria, or that Australia was one of the first countries to give women the vote and long before Britain. Fortunately they also had a journalist from the Sydney Morning Herald who was able to put a more balanced view but I was pretty angry by the end of the programme.
I actually think the POMS don’t like Australians all that much, or perhaps they just resent our sporting success, but I sense an undercurrent of ill-founded criticism. Of course I don’t think Barry Mackenzie and Les Patterson have helped our reputation, Australians are seen as racist, which is pretty rich coming from a country that boasts a right-wing nationalist party like the BNP. I'm sure there are racists in Australia, but there are certainly racists here too, so I think that’s the pot calling the kettle black.
Mackintosh’s house at 6 Florentine Terrace had been owned by the University of Glasgow but was demolished, yes demolished, by the university! Mackintosh may have died in England, penniless and unrecognised, but by the time they demolished his house he had been recognised for the genius he was. The only saving grace is that they had the foresight to remove all the fixtures and fitting and they have recreated the house in an extension to the art gallery. It’s not the same thing and unfortunately the day I was there the upper floors were closed for repair work on the roof so I only got to see the drawing room and dining room, but I was delighted with what I saw, especially the drawing room; I couldn’t drag myself away from it.
Next stop, the Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum which was an easy walk from the Hunterian Art Gallery despite the incessant rain. It’s a magnificent Victorian public building evidencing the economic prosperity of the city at the time, a huge imposing structure with an important collection of artefacts from the Glasgow 4, as Mackintosh, his wife, his wife’s sister and her sister’s husband were collectively known; they met at the Glasgow School of Art and were very influenced by the Arts and Crafts movement. I also took a look at some of the other exhibits, the Kelvingrove is both an art gallery and a museum so there is both art and dinosaurs in the same building.
I walked back to the car in the rain which was quite heavy and my £4 Edinburgh umbrella has all but bitten the dust. I stopped for a coffee and muffin at Peckhams a charming deli on Byres Road, for some reason there don’t seem to be many delis here in Britain. I don’t usually eat muffins but this was the best chocolate and almond muffin I've ever had, I’d go so far as to say it’s the best muffin I've ever had!
To further explore Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s work I drove into the centre of town and found a car park, eventually. There is a Mackintosh Guide to Glasgow brochure which I have been using to navigate my way around Glasgow. More by good luck than good management, the car park was opposite the Lighthouse, the former Glasgow Herald Building designed by Mackintosh and features the Mackintosh Centre which had more interesting information about Mackintosh. I was particularly amused by a comment made by an American matron to her daughter on visiting the Hill House, “Honey, if this house was in America it would be Frank Lloyd Wright’s home”. And she was right, their styles are very similar.
Mackintosh designed the Lighthouse in 1893 and it has a viewing platform on the top floor in the Mackintosh Tower with views across the rooftops, although it’s not a particularly attractive a city. I loved the signage for the toilets (see photo). Now that the building is hemmed in it’s a bit difficult to see the whole building and appreciate why it’s called the Lighthouse but it has this thrusting tower on one corner that looks like a lighthouse.
An essential must-do is to have tea at the Willow Tea Rooms (1903-1904) that were designed by Mackintosh for a formidable lady called Miss Kate Cranston who was a great supporter of Mackintosh and provided him with a showcase for his talents. There are tea rooms in both Buchanan Street and Sauchiehall Streets, but it was raining so I dived into the nearest one on Buchanan Street which isn't original but a re-creation, but enchanting nonetheless. Later in the afternoon I also visited the tea rooms in Sauchiehall Street and had an early dinner, but it didn't have the charm of the tea rooms in Buchanan Street and the service was very poor.
I wanted to explore a little further afield but it was pouring and by now my jeans were soaked through so I decided to cut my loses and make my way back to the car and the heavy peak hour traffic. I was very glad I had decided to drive, it was too far and too wet to walk back to the Ambassador Hotel. I had decided that I wanted to stay an extra night but the hotel was booked out confirming the difficulty I’d had finding somewhere to stay in the first place. I couldn’t be bothered moving hotels so I decided to call it a day and move on.
I remain disappointed by how little haggis I’ve had while in Scotland, most of the B&B’s where I’ve stayed haven’t had it on their breakfast menus, surely it should be an option by law!!! St Andrews had the best haggis, I don’t count those dry Tesco slices I had in Wick.
And before I leave Scotland I have to say yet again that I am really smitten with Scotland, if it weren’t for the weather it would be a wonderful part of the world to live. But this is early September and the weather is and has been since I arrived in mid-August, very unsettled. I can imagine that in the midst of winter it’s bitterly cold and dark for much of the time, while in summer, such as it is, the days are much longer.
My last day in Scotland, I wanted to finish off my Charles Rennie Mackintosh tour of Glasgow by visiting the Glasgow School of Art which Mackintosh designed in 1896. It’s a Grade-A listed building and Britain’s favourite building of the past 175 years, as voted in a national poll conducted by the Royal British Institute of Architects. While it still operates as an Art School, it also conducts hour long tours by current students. I hadn’t booked because I hadn’t been sure of my estimated time of arrival, so I arrived at 10.50 a.m. (after some difficulty, Glasgow seemed to defeat SatNav Jane today), to be told that the first available tour was midday, but luck was again on my side and I was able to get on the 11.00 a.m. tour because of a double booking.
The tour was very interesting, although unfortunately I wasn’t allowed to take any photos of the interior but it was a masterpiece. I loved the Directors’ Board Room, but without doubt the most beautiful room was the Library. Charles Rennie Mackintosh wasn’t just an architect, he was a furniture designer and interior designer as well. Seeing his work reminded me of Joe Tantaro who designed our most beautiful house at AQ8, sadly never built. It’s a wonderful experience working with someone who is so creative and can visual space in 3D; Joe is a great designer and deserves the awards he has won. I am sure he must have been influenced by Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Frank Lloyd Wright.
From the Glasgow Art School in Dalhousie Street (query whether Alexander McCall Smith named Isabel Dalhousie after Dalhousie Street in Glasgow???), I headed for the Scotland Street School Museum (more references to Alexander McCall Smith?), but again Jane had difficulty finding it because of road works, and when we eventually did, there was nowhere to park. From the outside the building looks like a modern take on the Scottish Baronial style, but it was a bit of a dodgy area and I wasn’t too keen on the parking arrangements so I didn't stay, wanting to drive to England as I’d booked a B&B for the next couple of nights at Berwick on Tweed on the Scottish/English border, the River Tweed being the natural divide between the two countries.
I have to say I can’t get over how many pre-prepared meals are sold in the supermarkets here, you could be forgiven for thinking that the British never cook at all (notwithstanding Nigella, Jamie, Delia, et al), because Tesco, M&S, Sainsbury’s, Waitrose, sell so many pre-cooked meals, you just stick them in the microwave, so much of the food is pre-prepared. And the service in supermarkets is sooooo slow. They don’t pack for you, chat aimlessly no matter how long the queue behind you, and refuse to serve the next customer until the last customer has actually packed, and walked away. Today I was in M&S buying a salad and some fruit and the queues were horrendous (there are no express lanes in British supermarkets), and I had to wait while the check-out chick chatted at length with some ditzy woman who was taking her time packing and paying and taking her leave. I was finally served after about ten minutes, and after I had paid the useless girl she just sat there on her fat arse watching me as I put my change back in my purse and my purse back in my bag, totally ignoring the next customer. I looked at her in disdain and said, “You can serve the next customer!”. No wonder the supermarkets (and M&S generally), are so slow and inefficient.
And another thing, I keep reading stories of such bureaucratic stupidity. Apparently a council authority wrote to the parents of a child threatening to initiate a “child protection issue” because the parents had shown scheme wicked negligence as to allow their seven-year old daughter to walk 20 metres on her own from her home to the school bus stop. Apparently 20 years ago 90% of children made their own way to school, now it’s 9%. Welcome to the cotton-wool generation. And 1 in 5 high students get an A or A* score in their final exams, completely ignoring the realities of a normal bell curve distribution. Angela tells me that schools no longer hold school sports days unless all students win because there can be no losers. Talk about creating unrealistic expectations in children, they are destined for disappointment.
The big news story here at the moment is the need to make significant budget cuts to pay back the huge budget deficit Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling (strangely both Scottish names), ran up during the economic crisis (which apparently was the fault of all those greedy bankers, forget that everyone was happy to take the benefits during the boom days when consumption was king and retail therapy a way of life), no-one wants to pay for it and everyone wants to blame someone else. The problem with public sector job cuts in this country is that so many people are employed by the government, a frightening number, and so many people are on benefits, I don’t know how the country can afford to maintain this level of public patronage.
Despite Berwick on Tweed being right on the border with Scotland, the locals have no trace of a Scots accent, it seems to stop abruptly at the border. The B&B is a lovely old house right in the middle of town, a very pretty town at the mouth of the Tweed River and right on the east coast. My bathroom has a huge bath, always a lovely change when most places only offer a shower, it’s nice to have a choice. Dinner of chorizo with chicken thighs and white beans at a local wine bar, Foxtons, recommended by the B&B, more a pub than a restaurant or wine bar, but no matter, dinner was delicious.
W Somerset Maugham said that to eat well in England, you should have breakfast three times a day. That’s certainly true here at Northumbrian House in Berwick on Tweed. All the food is organic and/or fair trade and they even serve haggis, and this isn't even Scotland!!! Ian, the owner, is very friendly and helpful.
I like Berwick on Tweed in exactly the same way I didn't like King’s Lynn. King’s Lynn had no character whereas Berwick on Tweed is full of it, but it's an indefinable something and I can’t quite put my finger on it.
This morning I drove south to Lindisfarne, also known as Holy Island, which was surprisingly larger than expected, not large like Australia, but I expected it to be more like St Michael’s Mount, a rocky outcrop cut off from the mainland by the sea at high tide, but it’s much larger than that and there is a village as well as the castle and ruined priory. The Castle, now owned by the National Trust since 1944, was quite picturesque and was converted to a home in 1901 by its then owner, the editor of the magazine, “Country Life”.
I'm not sure why someone would want to convert a castle like this into a home, it’s cold and windy and draughty, the rooms are small and dark, and it must be gloomy in winter, although I suspect it was only ever used as a holiday home in summer. There is also a Gertrude Jekyll designed garden (like Edna Walling), now past it's summer best and rather bizarrely situated some distance from the Castle, but it was worth seeing a garden by such a famous garden designer.
From the Castle I walked over to the Priory established in 635 AD and dissolved by that tyrant Henry VIII in 1536. There is an interesting visitor centre exploring the history of Lindisfarne but unfortunately the Lindisfarne Gospels are now in the British Library. I made a final stop-off to buy a bottle of Lindisfarne mead and a bottle of elderflower wine, just to see what they’re like, and a jar of honey for Angela.
I decided to drive a bit further south along the coast road as the coastline here in Northumberland boasts numerous little fishing villages and wide sandy beaches. I ended up at Bambrugh Castle, another defensive stronghold perched high on a hill right on the coast. The original Norman castle was converted to a home by Lord Alexander (a now defunct title because the 4th Lord adopted children who were not entitled to assume the title, although they still own the castle). The 1st Lord Alexander was a very smart cookie who invented electricity or something. The Castle isn't that homey and it’s not very elegant, in fact I didn't really like it at all, but perhaps I'm all castled out at this stage, although from a distance it’s certainly an imposing building.
I drove a bit further south along the Northumbrian Coastal Route and took in the villages of Seahouses, Beadnell, Embleton and Craster, before heading back to Berwick on Tweed for dinner at No 1 Sallyport where I treated myself to a glass of champagne (yummy Piper Heideseck), and a meal of pork with a chorizo, tomato and red pepper casserole. Very yummy.
Despite being all castled out, today I headed off to Alnwick (pronounced Annick), to see Alnwick Castle, somewhere I have long wanted to visit. It had been on my itinerary earlier this year when I was touring Hadrian’s Wall, but I ran out of time. Alnwick was used in the early Harry Potter films but I first remember seeing it in the first series of Blackadder. This trip I have no time constraints, I’ve been basically making my itinerary up as I go along.
The town of Alnwick is about 20 miles south of Berwick on Tweed and is much larger than Berwick on Tweed which surprised me somewhat, for some reason I expected Berwick on Tweed to be larger, not sure why. In the shadow of the Castle, the town of Alnwick is very picturesque. The castle is yet another large and imposing building, typical of the buildings built by the Norman invaders, and has stood pretty much intact for 900 years. It has been lived in continuously by the Percy family for 700 years, first as the Lords of Alnwick, then as the Dukes of Northumberland. Syon House, the rather austere castellated pile on the Thames in Isleworth that Angela and I visited in Isleworth in June, is the London home of the Percy family where they spend most of their time. The family also owned Northumberland House but it was demolished in 1866 following a fire, but there are five Canaletto paintings at Alnwick, one of Alnwick Castle, one of Syon House and one of Northumberland House. The other two are views of Westminster Bridge in London.
In fact, Alnwick Castle boasts an impressive art collection, apart from the five Canaletto’s (which in itself is pretty extraordinary to see five in private ownership), there were several Titians, a couple of Van Dykes and a Turner, amongst many others. The formal state rooms are on a par with the best I've seen elsewhere, although the Adam entrance hall at Syon House does take some beating. The fabric of the building is in exceptionally good condition, and for the entrance price, an eye-watering £20.80, there are also extensive gardens including a relatively modern water feature and a wonderful walled garden. I took loads of photos, especially of the bees pollinating the flowers. The bumble bees here in England are just huge, the size of jelly beans and larger!
I had such a good time at Alnwick Castle I spent a good five hours there, I have no idea where the time goes, it just whizzes by. From the Castle I went to Barter Books, recommended by Ian (the owner of the B&B), one of the largest second-hand book shops in Britain. It’s housed in an old Victorian railway station and was where they found the original copy of the “Stay Calm and Carry On” poster. I've never seen so many second-hand books, they had lots of old Penguin paperbacks with the original orange cover; the bookshop had a very eclectic collection, definitely something for everyone.
It was late afternoon by this stage so I drove back to Berwick on Tweed via Alnmouth, Wooler and Cornhill-on-Tweed. It was the long way around but I wanted to see as much of Northumberland as I could. After a sudden downpour the sun came out behind pregnant clouds and bathed the countryside in a golden glow. It was so beautiful I never cease to be amazed how much countryside there is in Britain, much much more attractive than any city or town I have visited.
The beaches here in Northumberland are like East Anglia and Norfolk, vast wide beaches of soft white sand and endless skies, these ancient landscapes have been delighting tourists for centuries. Although it is still summer, it’s way too cold to go swimming but plenty of people can be seen walking along the beaches with their children and their dogs, making the most of the fresh, crisp air (the wind is a bit of an issue, but as Billy Connelly says, there’s no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothes). Yesterday I was wearing a long sleeved top, a fleecy jacket and ski jacket, topped off with a scarf (it wasn’t cold enough to warrant gloves). What must it be like in winter when it gets really cold and the days get shorter and shorter. It’s late summer and the clocks go back at the end of October, as the days shorten and the weather deteriorates I expect my sightseeing will be curbed somewhat.
My bad knee has been playing up again over the last couple of days, I'm looking forward to seeing Angela, Rodney and Archie and having a bit of a rest. Five weeks away is pretty exhausting but Scotland was fabulous. The people are so friendly and welcoming, with a fascinating history soaked with blood, if they weren’t fighting the English the clans were fighting amongst themselves.
I returned to Portsmouth exhausted from five weeks on the road and headed back to Portsmouth today, a drive of eight hours. I could have broken the back of the trip as I had on the way up to Edinburgh, but I was tired. An uneventful drive I got back to Angela and Rodney’s early evening. It was good to see Angela and Archie again, I felt I had been away for months rather than weeks, but Rod is away at the moment and isn't back until next week. It’s good to be home.
I spent days doing not very much, updating my diary and sleeping. I joined Angela at Amelia’s swimming lesson and Angela and I went shopping at Chichester, but other than that my only excitement was getting Mimi serviced at an eye-watering cost of £281 because I had to buy two new front tyres. This was hardly surprising given the miles I have driven, but didn't include the repairs to the door. I have to take Mimi back to have the door repaired once they get the part in stock. More expense.
I also caught up on some television, the new ratings season must have begun because a number of new programmes have recently started. There’s a new series of Inspector George Gently with the ever yummy Martin Shaw, Downton Abbey, Whites with the endearing Alan Davies and Series 8 of QI. The final series of Mistresses has also just been aired, frothy light-weight rubbish redeemed by the evergreen Joanna Lumley. There have also been some very interesting history programmes, apart from the Tudors who seem to dominate the history agenda here, the Normans have been getting an airing as well as several programmes on maps and map-making.
Also, Series 9 of Spooks (always eagerly awaited) is currently on. I’ve been a huge fan of Spooks since it first hit our screens nine years ago. First we had Matthew MacFadyen, gorgeous, then Rupert Penry-Jones, even more gorgeous, and now Richard Armitage, smouldering. Anyone of them could park his shoes under my bed any day of the week. Sadly Ros Myers, the wonderful Hermione Norris, has been written out of the series for the second and last time. Spooks is still held together by Harry Pierce and Ruth Evershed, the love interest, who against all expectations turned down Harry’s proposal of marriage, although it was at Ros’s funeral so that was hardly surprising. Perhaps later in the series there will be an opportunity for her to reconsider, so who knows?
There is never any shortage of interesting programmes to feed my interest in history and literature. Of course, the standout programme for me this year remains Sherlock, a modern rendered of a classic.
After two weeks recovering from my Scotland adventures, today I had planned to drive to London to see Deanna and Michael, dear family friends from Melbourne who are over here at the moment visiting family. Unfortunately, when I turned on my mobile this morning I had five voicemail messages from Michael asking me to ring him, (I hadn’t turned it on yesterday), and on returning his calls discovered that he was very ill so we rescheduled our get together to next week and before they go home.
On a whim I decided to go to Brighton for the day. Just down the road, I haven’t visited Brighton since 2003 and a visit was long overdue. A quick drive down the A27, I arrived mid-morning, parked Mimi and went in search of pleasure in this famed watering hole. Brighton became popular after the Prince Regent (later George IV), bought a farm in 1785 and then proceeded to spend £375,000 on extensions, turning it into the Royal Pavilion. It was subsequently sold to the City of Brighton for £50,000, which sounds like the bargain of the century not seen again until Alan Bond bought Channel 9 from Frank Packer and then sold it back to him for a vastly reduced price.
I decided not to revisit the Royal Pavilion again, I first saw it in 1986 with Liz when the beautiful gardens were just a car park, and again in 2003 when the gardens had been re-established according to the original plan and a lot of money spent on internal restoration. What I did visit was the Brighton Museum and Art Gallery (originally George IV’s stables, although you wouldn’t know it). This has to be one of the best small museums I have ever seen and no visit to Brighton is complete without popping in. There’s a great exhibition of 20th century furniture and other fine arts, an exhibition about Brighton, an art gallery as well as one of the best museum shops around.
The weather wasn’t brilliant, overcast and threatening, and I decided to have lunch at a Jamie Oliver restaurant, a long overdue treat. I had tried to book a table at his restaurant in London in 2003 and again in 2006 as a treat for Mum, but without success (unless you call being offered a table at 10.30 p.m. a success), and I've never been to Fifteen in Melbourne even though it’s just across the road from work. But today I was able to walk in and get a table for lunch at Jamie’s Italian without a problem. I instantly warmed to the place, it has a great ambience and I had a good seat from which to watch people come and go, it was certainly a busy place.
I was very impressed with the menu and couldn’t decide between the pappardelle with meatballs and the squid ink angel hair pasta with scallops, so I ordered both as entrees. The scallops were very buttery with a slight bite thanks to a touch of chilli, and the meatballs with pappardelle (one of my favourite pastas), was as good as Nigella’s recipe, a lot of pork, and a crinkly ribbony pappardelle. It’s an incredibly successful franchise and not particularly expensive. I thought the staff a touch over-familiar, but that’s just a matter of personal taste.
From Jamie’s Italian to Brighton Beach, all pebbles and seafood stalls. The sky was very grey and moody, and the two piers, one built in 1899 and still standing and the other now a burnt out shell, make the shoreline interesting (i.e. I took a lot of photos). There was an art gallery I wanted to visit, Castor and Pollok, but it was ever so slightly disappointing and I didn't see anything that took my fancy. From the waterfront I wandered back through The Lanes, a maze of antique and independent shops, The Lanes are the original streets of the village of Brighthelmstone, Brighton’s original name.
It started to rain quite heavily and I was grateful I had my large Radley umbrella, and by late afternoon I was ready to call it a day, so I made my way back to the car park (an outrageous £13 (AU$20), for just a few hours). I could recall that my grandmother, Dad’s mother, had lived in Rottingdean, the next suburb along from Brighton, when I was a very little girl. I remember staying with my grandmother and step-grandfather for a week in 1965. I can be precise about the year because I heard “What’s New Pussycat”, by Tom Jones on the radio every morning when I was having breakfast.
Unfortunately I don’t have the address but I can remember what the house looked like, it was perched on the top of a hill with expansive views out to sea, and behind the house were fields with horses grazing. Much to my surprise, the fields were still there but despite driving around the streets along the top of the escarpment I couldn’t find the house I remember and eventually gave it up as a bad job and headed back to Portsmouth as the light began to fail and a mist began to envelope the road.
Grey, grey, grey, that’s all I saw when I opened the curtains this morning. I do hope I haven’t seen the end of the fine weather this year.
Up to London by train, an expensive exercise at £28.50 (AU$50), just for the train fare. First stop was Sir John Soane’s Museum in Lincoln’s Inn Field. I remember visiting the Museum in 1986 with Liz and it’s an extraordinary place filled to the rafters with antiquities and art work. It’s like Dennis Severs’ house in Spitalfields, houses lived in by their owners and designed to be visited and marvelled at. Although born two hundred years and a world apart, Severs was born in California in 1948 and Soane was born in Berkshire in 1753, but created homes to be seen by the public. The house was established as a museum by Act of Parliament in 1833, four years before Soane died, stipulating that the house should be kept as nearly as possible in the state in which it was left on his death. This may account for why Edward Heath left his house to a trust so that the public could see the house, although the trustees now intend to sell the house because the running costs exceed the income, and it’s fair to say that Edward Heath’s house is no match for Soane’s house and its collection of antiquities worthy of the British Museum, including the sarcophagus of Seti I (an Egyptian pharaoh), an alabaster coffin covered inside and out with hieroglyphics. There are several Roman bronzes from Pompei and a table and chairs made of ivory, very old and rather ghastly given the number of elephants that must have died in the process.
The house is unbelievably popular and very busy. I had to queue outside although there wasn’t much of a queue, in fact there was just me, but I had to wait for a few minutes before being allowed to enter. The house is in fact three houses, and the internal is rather dark and gloomy, or it was today as it was so very grey and overcast. They are opening up more of the house as funds allow. The house was obviously a labour of love being constantly added to, display areas lit by numerous light-wells and sky lights.
The museum is free although I did leave the requested voluntary donation of £3, it’s hard to see how they can justify free entry when the running costs must be huge and although it’s owned by a private trust it’s dependent on public money and the lottery fund. Apart from the collection of antiquities, Soane owned a couple of Canaletto’s but unfortunately the one I wanted to see wasn’t there as it’s part of a new exhibition at the Tate featuring the work of Canaletto, so I must make sure I see that! There is also a Turner and a Reynolds as well as the originals of Hogarth’s Rake’s Progress and the Election Series, all crammed into a tiny room.
It took about an hour to go through the whole house, in fact there are two houses, Soane actually owned three, he lived in Number 12, then bought 13, demolished and rebuilt it and then moved into 13 and used 12 for his museum. Not bad for a bricklayer’s son!
From the museum I walked through the heart of the legal precinct, Lincoln’s Inn Fields, Chancery Lane (home of the Law Society), and the Inns of Court. Then along Fleet Street and Ludgate Hill, past St Paul’s Cathedral and over the Millennium Bridge (it didn't wobble once), to the south bank and the Globe Theatre. I had a quick lunch before my first of two plays for the day at The Swan @ the Globe. I got chatting with a lady from Nova Scotia who was in London for a medical conference at Great Ormond Street, the children’s hospital. I also had dinner at the Swan where the food is acceptable but the service is woeful but it was convenient. For dinner I had a glass of Baby Cham which isn't champagne but perry (pear cider). I can remember Mum used to drink it as a treat in the 1960’s but I thought it was a bit sweet and didn't think much of it even though I usually like cider.
The plays were Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, with Roger Allam as Falstaff and Oliver Cotton as Henry IV, with William Gaunt (whom coincidently I saw on television yesterday in an ancient episode of The Champions circa 1968). I had been able to book a seat in what is called the Gentlemen’s Room, which seats 10 people and I think is generally used for corporate entertaining with proper seats rather than the usual hard wooden benches (back rests and cushions can be hired for £3.00). The production was full of brio, a riotous Elizabethan romp and very enjoyable and Roger Allam was excellent as Falstaff.
Although it wasn’t that cold I was nonetheless glad I had my ski jacket, gloves and scarf, especially as I had to walk from the Globe back to Waterloo to catch the (almost) last train back to Portsmouth.
A long drive up to north London to see Deanna and Michael at Red Bridge, I keep forgetting how long it takes to drive to London. It was great to see friends from home and it’s been months since I've seen anyone from Melbourne so the 2½ hour drive was worth it. We had lunch with Deanna’s cousin Joyce and Joyce’s husband Derek, at a nearby Toby Carvery, followed by afternoon tea with Michael’s brother David. I had a lovely day seeing old friends and meeting new ones.
I first visited Stonehenge when I was about six years old, there is some old 8mm cine film of my sister and I dancing all over the stones, long before they were roped off to protect them from the hippies and travellers and druids (and Nicola and I).
I can remember driving past Stonehenge with Liz in 1986, I think on our way back from Cornwall or perhaps Bath, it was so long ago, and suddenly there is was, on our right, with the sun going down behind it. We stopped and took some photos of the sun setting behind Stonehenge. I was struck then, as I remain today, by how close the road is to such an ancient and important site. There were plans to move the road away from its current position but the funding was recently pulled in light of massive government spending cuts. All government departments are required to cut 25% from their budgets and the debate about means testing family benefits here is causing uproar. The suggestion that people should only have children if they can afford to bring them up hasn’t been well received; there is such a sense of entitlement and the benefits (government handout) mentality of this country is totally out of control.
My last visit to Stonehenge was in 2006 with Mum, we went on a special after hours tour which permitted us to step over the rope and actually walk around and touch the stones. It was a very special time and it was a privilege to be able to get special access to Stonehenge. Unfortunately I remember that Mum was very sick that day and wasn’t able to enjoy the outing, at that time we didn't know what was wrong with her and neither of us realised how sick she was.
But I'm getting ahead of myself, the day started in Salisbury, or more specifically, Old Sarum, which was the original site of Salisbury. There is evidence that there has been habitation on the site for 5,000 years but the remains in evidence today date back to the motte and bailey castle built in 1069 following the Norman Invasion. It was built on top of the a hill for military and defensive purposes and as a consequence it is on a windswept hill without an adequate water supply, so in 1220 they dismantled the cathedral and rebuilt it by the banks of the Avon River, a couple of miles down the road. As an English Heritage property I had free access to Old Sarum so my membership continues to pay for itself. There isn't much left of the old Castle and absolutely nothing of the cathedral (apart from the outline marked out on the grass), but the views across Salisbury and the surrounding countryside were wonderful, although a little hazy.
From Old Sarum I set a course for Stonehenge. It’s located on a windswept plain and it was certainly windy, but that didn't stop me walking all the way around it, twice, it’s one of those places you feel drawn to and want to keep gazing at it and gazing at it. In 2006 I had said I would be back but at the time I could have had little idea that it would be so soon, I think I made a mental note that I’d be back in ten years time. Anyway, I was very happy to be back.
From Stonehenge I drove down the road to see Woodhenge. Okay, I’d never heard of it until 2006, but apparently it was the forerunner for Stonehenge, made out of trees, long since gone, and is a Neolithic henge forming part of the Stonehenge World Heritage Site. Woodhenge was identified in 1925 after an aerial archaeological survey and the position of the trees is now marked by concrete posts.
I decided to revisit the same ancient sites I visited with Mum back in 2006, which entailed driving further north to Avebury to see the standing stones, and on the way there I saw the same white horse on the hillside at Alton Barnes that I had seen last time. Avebury is the site of an ancient monument consisting of a large henge and several stone circles and barrow, about 5,000 years old and a contemporary of Stonehenge, and like Stonehenge it’s also a World Heritage Site. The village of Avebury has been built around the stones and today sheep graze nonchalantly among the stones. It’s all a little quaint in a low-key English sort of way. However, much of the site was destroyed and the stones were defaced from the 14th century at the behest of the Christian Church because they represented pagan symbols and should be destroyed. Shades of the Taliban destroying those Buddhist statues in Afghanistan in 2001.
By this stage it was getting late and I was now two hours from Portsmouth, so in the gathering gloom I headed back to Portsmouth.
Amelia is three today! I first saw Amelia when she was only a few weeks old when I first visited Portsmouth at Christmas in 2008, and she has grown into the most delightful little girl, so lively and vivacious and very bright and she has an impressive vocabulary for her age.
Angela and I went to watch Amelia’s swimming class which is always such fun, all these little kiddies splashing about in the water with their mums and dads (and on occasion grand-dads)! Amelia started swimming lessons when she was only a few months old. I'm very impressed with the classes I've seen. The teacher, Budge, is a former Scotland rugby player, so not quite what you would expect but he is so gentle and just delightful with the children. I'm sure there was nothing like this when I was a little girl! No wonder it took me so long to learn how to swim.
I must try and catch up with one of Megan’s classes as she has started swimming lessons, even before she can walk or talk!
Off to visit Sissinghurst today. I first visited Sissinghurst in 2003 and I have always wanted to return and see the gardens again. I should have made more of an effort to visit during the summer months to see the gardens at their best, but the dahlias are out in bloom at the moment and the layout of the gardens is delightful so as the weather forecast today was promising, especially after last week when it rained virtually every day, I couldn’t miss the opportunity and delay, especially as it closes at the end of October for the rest of year.
It was a long drive, over two hours because the A3 was closed for works on the Hindhead tunnel that won’t be finished until summer next year, so I won’t get the benefit of all the delays I've incurred this year!
Sissinghurst was the home of Vita (short for Victoria) Sackville-West and her husband, Harold Nicholson, both well-known bi-sexuals, (Vita had an affair with Virginia Woolf), obviously had a very unusual marriage! They certainly knew a thing or two about garden design. Vita was born at Knole but under the laws of primogenitor she couldn’t inherit Knole and the title passed to an uncle. Apparently Vita never recovered from the loss and was heartbroken when the house was transferred to the National Trust.
The history of Sissinghurst is fascinating, it was a huge Tudor pile, but the only part of the mansion that remains today is the tower and the stables that were converted to accommodation by Vita and Harold. It’s a very modest home but it’s really the garden that people visit and it was very busy today. Like Knole, the property is now owned by the National Trust and as usual they do a great job, the property is immaculate and the gardens maintained to do them justice, even the National Trust shop is excellent. There was also a farmers’ market on the lawn in front of the house where I bought my lunch, a Scotch egg with a difference, it was wrapped in falafel and not sausage meat. It was delicious, followed by homemade damson icecream. Yummy.
Sissinghurst is beautiful and it’s one of those places that I didn't want to leave, I walked around the garden and house twice, and climbed the tower twice as well. I can remember the last time I was there, a flock of sheep were grazing in the adjoining field and their bleating could be heard on the top of the tower. I was disappointed not to see (or hear), any sheep today.
The traffic back to the M25 was a bit fraught, presumably everyone was making the most of the wonderful weather, all those blue skies, so there was a lot of traffic on the road.
On the road again, this time off to Wales via Wolverhampton in the Black Country, a large town in the Midlands and not a tourist highlight, but another sentimental visit. Wolverhampton is where we last lived in England before we migrated to Australia in 1968, my last two schools and last two homes are there. I think we lived there from some time in 1965 (or perhaps 1966?) until we left England on Friday 13th December 1968 (and therefore Friday 13th was always being considered lucky by my family).
It’s a good three hour drive up to Wolverhampton but it went fast enough and I arrived early afternoon. I had been able to find postcodes for SatNav Jane for 56 The Lindens in Tettenhall, which is the last place we lived in England, as well as Palmers Cross Primary School, my last school. However, I had been entirely unsuccessful in finding any trace of the Catholic Primary School I had attended in 1965/66. I couldn’t even remember the name of the school.
First stop was 56 The Lindens, named after Linden House, a large Victorian home on Tettenhall Road and I suspect The Lindens was built in what was once the extensive grounds of the house. Tettenhall Road is lined with fine mid-Victorian homes, many of them listed buildings and many more now divided into flats, and The Lindens is a low-rise complex of 130 flats that snake around a village green style garden. Number 56 is currently on the market and a quick look on the internet revealed that the asking price is only £89,995 for a two bedroom second floor flat. However, there are no details about the remaining term of the lease so it’s a bit difficult to tell. England doesn’t have a system of strata title, so flats are all leasehold (although some can include ownership of a share of the freehold like the old company title that Victoria had before adopting first stratum title and then strata title way back in the 1960’s). The property ownership laws here are quite archaic.
I walked around the complex where I had played as a child; my sister Nicola and I had lots of friends who also lived at The Lindens and I seem to recall a childhood spent playing outside all the time. I can remember Dad erecting our tents on the village green to air them after one of our camping holidays to Leintwardine, and I was surprised to see that the huge playing fields behind the flats have now been built out with a huge school. It all looked so much smaller than I remember and I was somewhat troubled to see a sign in the hallway saying “Beware Asbestos”.
From The Lindens I decided to visit my old school, and driving along Newbridge Crescent I suddenly saw the Wolverhampton Lawn Tennis and Squash Club. I had entirely forgotten that I had been a member of the Club between 1966 and 1968, and I used to have lessons from the tennis pro. It struck me quite forcibly that I have obviously forgotten so much of my last few years in England and in particular our time in Wolverhampton.
I had no trouble finding Palmers Cross Primary School, the last school I attended in England for three years until the end of 1968 before we migrated to Australia. It’s quite a small school, only one class per year, but is very neatly maintained and looks exactly as I remember it. I have happy memories of my time at Palmers Cross and while I struggle to remember the names of any of my friends or teachers, I think Mrs Latham was my teacher in Year 6.
Driving along Codsall Road, I don’t know what made me turn into Sandy Lane, it sort of looked familiar and there was a voice in my head that told me to. I drove past a huge allotment and I thought, this is where the Catholic Primary school I used to go to had been. I got out and walked through the allotment and into a new housing estate and at the front of the estate on Sandy Lane I could see a large Victorian house and I just knew the house had been part of the convent school and that the new houses had been built were the school had been. I had no idea why I was so certain.
I saw an elderly lady in the garden of the old house and I went over and asked her if she knew whether the house had been part of a Catholic Primary School? Not only had it been part of the school, but she was a nun, Sister Genevieve, who had taught at the school from its opening in 1957 until it closed in 2004! I couldn’t remember her nor she me, (I think I was only there a couple of terms some time in 1966), although she did remind me of the name of my teacher, Mrs Langley, who is still alive. With some prompting I also remembered the name of Sister Bernadette, but it was such a long time ago I'm astonished I could even remember that much, after all, it must have been a good 45 years ago and I hadn’t given a moment’s thought to St Joseph’s Convent School for most of those 45 years.
From St Joseph’s I decided I might as well go in search of the house where we lived although I couldn’t remember much about it. From the corner of Sandy Lane I could see the top of a large house the other side of Codsall Road so I set off and passed a street sign, Tyninghame Avenue. That was it, we used to live in Tyninghame House, it all came back to me. I had found it more by good luck than good management, but by driving around a bit I found the house which used to belong to dad’s employer, Mr Gillette who had two Alsatian dogs, one called Grievous. I can’t remember what the other one was called, surely not Bodily Harm?
We lived in a self-contained flat upstairs what was a very large house before we moved to The Lindens. I was somewhat appalled to discover that the house has now been divided into 10, yes 10, flats! Now while it is a big house, 10 flats??? They must be shoeboxes. Most of the garden has been tarmaced over to create a car park for the many residents now living in the house. It’s still a large, imposing house but it’s now hemmed in by all the newer houses that have been built around it. It felt quite claustrophobic and I felt sorry for the house, I'm sure it would have had more land around it when first built. On reflection I think the reason it felt so hemmed in by the houses and trees was because when I lived there the houses were new and the trees small or even non-existent, but in the intervening 45 years, they have grown.
By this stage I thought I should find the hotel I had booked online yesterday. It’s now a Grade 2 listed building but was a Georgian “gentleman’s house” built in 1742 and was a girls’ school for many years until 1985 when it was converted into an hotel. The gardens are all tarmaced over, but my bedroom was very modern and spacious and there was even a bath, which is unusual and not bad for £46. Dinner at a local carvery pub, I had a delicious roast dinner for just £3.59 (AU$6), which seems ridiculously cheap.
I think the reason I have such a poor memory of Wolverhampton is that Mum really hated living here and it wasn’t a very happy time for the family. We had moved to Wolverhampton because Dad had a job there but we didn't have any family or friends which no doubt contributed to Mum’s unhappiness. I can remember that from our living room at The Lindens we could see huge chimney stacks pumping out smoke and fumes, Wolverhampton was quite industrial, and Mum always complained that she couldn’t keep the curtains clean, although I don’t think the chimney stacks are there any more.
I had a drive around the centre of town and saw Beatties, the main department store where Mum used to shop and is now part of the House of Fraser. I was pleasantly surprised, it seemed a very civilised and well-maintained city, and Tettenhall, where we lived, is a comfortable middle-class suburb, although I suspect that Wolverhampton in the late 1960’s was dire as was much of Britain and as a result my parents decided to emigrate to Australia. Nonetheless, Wolverhampton is pivotal in my family’s history, although I suspect Mum would have seen it differently.
Still on my magical mystery tour I headed off to Leintwardine where we used to go camping when we were living in Wolverhampton, except I can’t quite work out why. Within five minutes of leaving Tettenhall I was in the countryside and very attractive countryside at that, but Leintwardine was over an hour’s drive away. Leintwardine is in Herefordshire on the border with Wales and it’s glorious. Sadly I have only the sketchiest memory of our camping holidays although I can remember we used to camp as late in the year as November, we must have been hardier in those days and I’ve since gone soft living in Melbourne’s mild climate.
We used to load up the mini with the aid of roof racks, two large canvas tents, a large gas fired portable stove and all the paraphernalia of camping, Mum, Dad, Nicola, Joey (our beloved wire-haired terrier who died shortly before we left England), and me. I’ve no idea how we all fitted into what is, after all, a very small car. It’s no surprise that I've never been known to travel light, it’s a family thing, we all own too much, horde too much and travel with too much and I fear it’s too late to change my ways, it’s obviously in my genes and there’s nothing I can do to change. That’s my story and I'm sticking to it!
I remember playing on the river bank skimming stones for hours with friends we met on the camping site. The stones on the riverbank are flat and river-smoothed and easy to skim across the top of the water and I spent a few minutes reliving my childhood, there are some skills you never lose! But in reality I feel so disconnected from my childhood that it could almost have happened to someone else, so vague are my memories. Perhaps not surprisingly, my memories of my childhood start in 1969 in the sun in Melbourne, I can remember the names of my school and my friends and my teachers (well, some of them), whereas I can’t remember the name of a single childhood friend in England, only a couple of my teachers and virtually no family, I can’t even remember meeting Angela and Rodney or indeed any of my family apart from my father’s parents. It’s as if my life only began once we moved to Melbourne which is strange, it's not as if I was only three or four years old, I was 10½. Now so many memories are lost forever because I can’t even ask Mum. If only I’d kept a diary...
Leintwardine is a very old village with Roman roots and even now it’s very tiny with only a post office and not much else. The Church of St Mary Magdalene is 13th and 14th century and there are thousands of burials in the graveyard which explains why the churchyard is nearly six feet higher than Church Street. Apart from the very picturesque stone bridge and the river, I can’t remember anything about Leintwardine apart from the camping ground itself, except I couldn’t find it. There are no longer any camping fields in Leintwardine which I suppose is unsurprising as it was 45 years ago, but I think the camping ground was a farmer’s field with a toilet block. I can remember the tents and sitting with Mum eating a peach, her favourite fruit and in those days they were quite expensive so it was something of a treat. And playing by the river, that’s it. I stood in a field by the river taking photos and willing myself to remember something more than skimming stones, but nothing would come, the memories are gone for good.
From Leintwardine I drove north, parallel with the Welsh border, from Herefordshire to Shropshire and Shrewsbury (pronounced Shrowsbury), through the most delightful countryside; there is just so damn much of the stuff, I never tire of it. I’ve never been to Shrewsbury before but as I was broadly in the area I decided to make a visit, partly I think because of Edith Pargeter, otherwise known as Ellis Peters, the author of the Cadfael detective novels which are set in the first half of the 12th century in Shrewsbury where Cadfael was a Benedictine monk at the Abbey. I’d seen the series on television, although that was no help as the series had been filmed in Hungary.
First stop was the Tourist Information Office to find somewhere to stay for the night, and mission accomplished, I wandered around the town, a delightful place on the River Severn, with more Tudor properties than I have seen anywhere other than Stratford upon Avon. There is a maze of alleyways known as shuts, the local name for narrow lanes, passages or wynds which run between and connect streets. It’s quite hilly which played havoc with my knees, a constant source of concern these days.
The B&B, Anton House, was on the outskirts of the town and is a large Victorian house. The owner was very welcoming, I was even offered a cup of tea, and he made a recommendation for a restaurant for dinner opposite the Abbey called the Peach Tree, which is where I had dinner, a juicy fillet steak and chips. The service was a little indifferent which was surprising as the place was almost empty, but the food was good.
Off to Wales this morning, but not before stopping by to see Shrewsbury Abbey, the setting for the Cadfael stories. The Abbey didn't survive the dissolution intact and the only reason that it did survive at all was because it was also the parish church for the town, although quite a bit of it was demolished which explained the ragged external stonework of the transepts. Some was restored in the late 19th century but they didn't have the money to complete the work. I bought an Ellis Peters novel, the first Cadfael book, just because, and a little teddy bear dressed in a monk’s habit who I promptly Christened Cadfael, of course.
Not surprisingly, the lady who served me asked whether I was a fan of Cadfael and she then proceeded to give me a personal tour of the Abbey to point out the Cadfael references, which was very kind of her. I spent a very interesting hour at the Abbey, the time always flies by when I'm absorbed.
At last, off to Wales, a hazy day, the sky was white and the light flat with an occasional sprinkle of rain. Crossing the border into Wales, the countryside is very mountainous, not just hilly but majestic soaring peaks, some treed, others covered in a patchwork of green fields, and very white sheep with long tails but very few cattle. I took the scenic route, stopping at Llangollen, a pretty village on the River Dee, with an attractive and old-fashioned looking railway station. I had a most welcome cup of coffee and was drawn into an appetising delicatessen. I couldn’t resist the olives or the most divine olive oil dispenser.
From Llangollen to Ruthin, another pretty village, and over the Horseshoe Pass where I passed a gigantic slate slag heap. Well I suppose technically speaking it wasn’t slag, but it was a massive pile of slate waste, little bits of slate of no commercial value and more properly a slate tip. And there was a lone sheep grazing on the side of the road. As I drove I passed many more sheep, just wandering around grazing, oblivious to passing cars but terrified of humans who have the temerity to get out of their vehicle to take a photo of them whereupon they scuttle across the road without looking left then right then left again, the stupid animals.
I eventually arrived at Colwyn Bay, and although I hadn’t arranged anywhere to stay for the evening, Llandudno (what a glorious name), is a seaside resort and I found somewhere to stay without any difficulty. I then headed off to explore the town and somewhat to my surprise there is a dry (i.e. non-snow) ski slope complete with poma tow. Why? I think the highlight of the town is the wonderful 700 metre long Victorian pier, extremely well maintained and beautifully painted in blue and white. But what I found most extraordinary were the wind turbines, dozens of them, out in the middle of Colwyn Bay. I’ve never seen wind turbines out at sea, only ever on the top of windswept hills. The sky had changed from a flat white to a wonderful palette of greys, and as the light began to fail, I collected Mimi and returned to the B&B for a quiet night.
The first thing that strikes you about Wales is that all the signage is in both English and Welsh which is very endearing because only 20% of Welsh people actually speak the language, although apparently the number is increasing. The language is related to Breton and Cornish and I'm somewhat surprised by the amount of Welsh I've heard spoken by young people, I had assumed that it would mainly be spoken by older people, so it’s very much a living language, I think avoiding potential extinction, it seems to me that there has been a concerted effort to resuscitate the language, fairly successfully I’d say.
The other thing is that the dragon symbol is everywhere, which is sort of counter-intuitive given that the patron saint of England is St George, famous for slaying a dragon, and the Welsh, like the Irish and Scots, were at war with England for centuries. There is even a brand of Dragon butter. I love the story of the Welsh company that was forced by the Powys Council’s trading standards people to explain that its hot spicy dragon sausages did not actually contain dragon meat because otherwise it could face legal action for misleading people! The company was required to include the word 'pork' in the name of the product, even though pork was included on the list of ingredients on the label and dragons are obviously mythical. Well done Powys Country Council, bureaucracy gone mad.
I know I keep saying I'm all castled out, but I don’t think I really mean it, because I'm drawn to castles like a moth to light. Llandudno is just down the road from Conwy, a medieval walled town with a castle built by Edward I to keep the Welsh in line. As I drove towards the town I was struck by the size of the Castle which dominates the town, and when I pulled into a “short-term” car park which only allowed me to stay for four hours, I had realised that four hours wouldn’t be anywhere enough time to do the town justice so I had to waste time trying to get back to the “long term” car part which allowed me to stay for a maximum of eight hours. And after all that messing about, it only cost me £2 which seemed like an awful lot of trouble for not very much.
My first stop was Conwy Castle, a World Heritage Site perched on a hill above the car park, and because I'm an English Heritage member, I got in half price, (CADW is the Welsh equivalent of English Heritage). It's in remarkably good nick notwithstanding that it was built between 1283 and 1287 and in 1655 it was rendered “indefensible” and subsequently fell into disrepair; the roof has gone but for all that it’s it much better condition than many of the castles I’ve seen elsewhere, especially in Scotland. The views from the towers are stunning, right across the small walled town and the estuary, it immediately found favour with me when I discovered that William Turner had painted it, having toured north Wales in 1798-99.
I must have spent a good couple of hours wandering around the Castle, it always seems somehow disrespectful to rush through and not give some thought to the history of the place or the people who built and lived there. I had a Walter Mitty moment when I thought of the soldiers defending the Castle with bows and arrows being besieged by modern soldiers, dropped into the castle by helicopter and carrying modern assault rifles. It was all a bit surreal. There was an exhibition on Chapels in Castles and the importance of religion in mediaeval life which I always find fascinating. The mediaeval period interests me particularly, it is so very removed from our lives today.
The town also boasts an elegant Telford-designed suspension bridge which was the only road bridge across the river at Conwy until 1958, although there are now three bridges, a new road bridge, a Stevenson-designed rail bridge and the Telford bridge which is now owned by the National Trust and now only carries pedestrian traffic.
Conwy is a walled medieval market town and is one of the few remaining walled towns where the walls are still largely intact. I explored the small town including the waterfront and visited the smallest house in Great Britain which is only 3.05 metres x 1.8 metres. Extraordinarily it was in continuous occupation from the 16th century (and at one time was even inhabited by a family), until 1900 when the owner, a 6’3” tall fisherman (who was too small to stand upright), was forced to move out when the Council declared the building wasn’t fit for habitation. Apparently the house is still owned by his descendants today and can be viewed on payment £1. Given the size of the house, it didn't take long to see all there was to see, so now I've seen the smallest house and the shortest street in Britain. What next?
I had a light lunch, Welsh Rarebit, well what else would you eat in Wales, anywhere else and it would be cheese on toast, and a pot of tea, and gave my legs a much needed rest. After lunch I spent some time visiting Plas Mawr, a wealthy Elizabethan merchant’s house that has been painstakingly restored by CADW. It’s amazing the restoration work they do to some of these places, it must cost an absolute fortune. What I didn't get to see was Aberconwy House, the oldest surviving medieval house in Conwy, perhaps tomorrow, but before leaving the town I walked across the Telford Bridge and visited the Toll Keeper’s House which was very small, nowhere near as small as the smallest house, but very neat. The position of toll keeper must have been a highly sought after job if the house went with the job, small though it was.
Dinner tonight was a local Llandudno restaurant, sword fish with salad followed by baklava, there was a distinct Greek influence to the menu.
I decided not to stay any longer at the B&B at Llandudno because I couldn’t get on with the weird hot water system. You can’t just have a shower in Britain by turning on the taps, you have to have a power shower to deliver the water because in Britain the water companies have their water pressure so much lower than we do in Melbourne because their pipes are so old and there are so many leaks that they couldn’t afford the water losses if they increased the pressure, hence the need for power showers to pump water through the shower at an acceptable pressure. The only problem is that there is not a uniform type of power shower machine, they are all different and sometimes I think you need a degree in engineering to work out how to use them. That can be bad enough, but this one is impossible to calibrate, the water is either scalding hot or cold, nothing in between, so after two frustrating mornings I've decided to move on to Caernarfon, even though it’s only a few miles down the road.
Because I didn't have time yesterday to see Aberconwy House, the oldest house in Conwy, I decided to drive back to Conwy and spend a couple more hours there before moving on. I arrived at 10.00 a.m. only to discover that it didn't open until 11.00 a.m. so I had another look around the town. The weather was distinctly better than yesterday, cool but with blue skies. I had a coffee at Pen-y-Bryn, Welsh for “At the Top of the Hill”, built in 1575 and one of the oldest buildings in Conwy. It's been a public house, a home and now tea rooms. The rooms were tiny tiny and very quaint.
Aberconwy House, the only remaining medieval merchant's house in Conwy built circa 1300, is a National Trust house and as usual well preserved and well presented. It's not large but there was a good video. After the house I also took in the Royal Cambrian Academy, an art gallery with an exhibition of work by a Welsh artist I hadn’t heard of before called Harry Hughes Williams, whose work I liked very much. Upstairs there was a children’s art class being carried on in the middle of the exhibition, I loved the idea of introducing children to art in this way and at such an early age.
I drove south taking a detour at Bangor which was a real disappointment (I was somehow drawn to the name, it amused me), and didn't bother to stop except to pick up some fruit and something to drink at Tesco. I then found the B&B, a large Victorian house in the countryside, just outside Caernarfon, arriving mid-afternoon. I was feeling very tired and did something I don’t normally do, I had a nap. It’s important to listen to your body and when it says it needs a rest, have a rest. So I did.
Caernarfon Castle was used for the investiture of the Prince of Wales in 1969, I can remember seeing it on the television all those years ago. Caernarfon Castle was one of several castles built by Edward I along the coast in North Wales, Conwy being one of the others. Like Conwy, Caernarfon Castle was a medieval walled town and the castle is large and imposing and in reasonably good condition, although from the photos there has been quite a bit of restoration work over recent years.
The weather was very cold and breezy, I was wearing four layers plus my ski jacket and I wished I’d remembered to take my gloves. Being a Sunday it was very quiet in the town, I almost had the place to myself. Caernarfon Castle is managed by CADW, the Welsh equivalent of English Heritage, but I don’t think the castle was as user friendly from a tourists’ point of view. On arrival you don’t get a map of the castle, the information boards are few and far between and there didn't seem to be a recommended walking route through the grounds which I think is very poor. However, there was an excellent exhibition on the history of the Princes of Wales, and another of the castle itself as well as a video which, so CADW partially redeemed itself. In any event, I managed to spend a couple of hours getting lost along dark and dimly lit corridors, many of them going nowhere in particular.
I had a wander through the town, still very quiet even at lunchtime. Caernarfon isn't a very attractive place and if it weren’t for the Castle I wouldn’t even be there, it’s certainly not as pretty or as interesting as Conwy which I really liked. From Caernarfon I drove over to Anglesey Island because I wanted to cross the Menai Straits on one of the first suspension bridges in the world. It was designed by Thomas Telford who also designed the suspension bridge in Conwy; before the bridge was completed in 1826 the only way from the mainland to Anglesey Island was by ferry although apparently at low tide you can walk across, at a pinch.
The village of Beaumaris on Anglesey has another of Edward I’s castles but I resisted the temptation to go inside. I had a stroll around the village, lots of old buildings and a grand Victorian terrace on the waterfront, but it was blowing a gale so in the end I scuttled back to Mimi and drove back to Caernarfon.
One last stop, Caernarfon was a Roman fort when the town was called Segontium and the ruins, such as they are, are open to the public. I had a quick look but as the light was failing and I was getting cold and very tired so I decided to call it a day.
The one thing that has surprised me is the number of English people who live in Wales, there aren’t that many Welsh accents in evidence and I read something recently complaining about the number of English people who have moved to Wales and pushed up the property prices, which is pricing out the locals.
Another grey morning, very depressing and I was feeling very flat this morning, I think my biorhythms are low, whatever that means, it’s just something we say, isn't it?
Today I was slated to drive through the Snowdonia National Park to see Snowdon, the highest peak in Wales and England, although not Scotland, and the first stop on the round trip I had planned was Llanberis, the gateway to the National Park and the home of the National Slate Museum, formerly the Dinorwig Quarry. I was a little put off by the cost of the car park, £3, and I prevaricated for a few moments but the museum was free and I thought it would be an interesting hour or so. I am so glad I decided to have a look, the museum is fabulous. Now it has to be said that I am fascinated by this sort of thing, not because I'm mechanically-minded, I'm not, but I can’t get enough of industrial architecture and history. The woman in the shop suggested that I start with the slate splitting demonstration that was about to begin and then she put my name down for the tour, so I was well organised.
There was no-one in the demonstration room except Daffyd Davies, the demonstrator, so I chatted with him for a few minutes and we were joined by another couple and we chatted some more. It was really interesting and Daffyd even made me a slate heart which I watched him make. He explained how the slate has to remain damp to be split, once it dries out it becomes brittle and difficult to work, and he showed us samples of the different colours that slate comes in, I just thought it was grey! I also didn't realise that slate is essentially compressed mud or clay. He also talked about his career in the slate industry, he began his five-year apprenticeship when he was just 15 years old and has worked in the industry ever since, some 40 years, including his time at the Museum.
From Daffyd to Peredur Hughes who took us on the guided tour, “What’s wood got to do with it?”, quite a lot as it happens. I commented that the name looked French and he explained that Welsh is related to Breton and the English equivalent of Peredur is Percival.
The Dinorwig Quarry has the largest waterwheel in Britain which powered all the machinery on the site when it was a working quarry, so it had very green credentials going back to 1870, well ahead of its time! It still works perfectly 140 years after it was built, it’s very impressive.
We also saw the pattern loft room where they house over 2,000 exquisitely made wooden patterns used in the cast iron process which I learnt all about, it was very educational. Most of the patterns were made by three men, father, son and grandson, the slate industry was very much a trade that was passed from father to son. I took heaps of photos (how unusual), because I was drawn to the shapes and patterns of the slate, tools and machinery. There were also the most dense cobwebs in the windows.
As part of the museum there was a terrace of workers’ cottages that had been scheduled for demolition and were reprieved, dismantled stone by stone, and reassembled at the museum. Such small houses, the way people used to live, with no toilets, not just no internal toilets, no toilets. I was also bemused to see a teas maid in the 1960’s house. I remember Mum and Dad had one when we lived in England, quite why people can’t make a cup of tea once they get up I can’t imagine!
I got into conversation with one of the quarrymen about my camera, such a good conversation starter. Then he demonstrated splitting slate so fine it was no more than a millimetre thick. They use these thin slices of slate to make decorated fans which they sell in the shop for £50, recognition of the amount of work and craftsmanship that goes into them.
I had lunch at the Museum, a delicious tomato and red lentil soup with just the right amount of texture, i.e. not over-blended, and a cup of tea. Following lunch I explored the rest of the buildings and saw a video, “To steal a mountain”, about the Welsh slate industry in the 19th century when it was at its height, although slate has been quarried in North Wales since Roman times. By the time I left the Museum I had been there five hours, I don’t know how that happened but there was so much to see and it was all so very interesting. It was a gem of a Museum and I was totally absorbed.
It had been drizzling on and off all day, spits and spots as it’s called here, so the skies were very low and grey but I wanted to see Snowdon and more of the National Park, so despite the fact that it was now gone 3.00 p.m. I headed for Betws-Y-Coed which I can’t begin to pronounce so don’t ask. On the way I passed a little stone built house called the Ugly House which looked very pretty to me, and then on to Betws-Y-Coed. What a beautiful place this is and ranks high on the fripperies scale with a terrific art gallery selling local paintings and jewellery.
The village is near the peaks of Snowdonia and has been the hill-walking centre since the 19th century, with many fine buildings. The River Llugwy runs through the town and there is a lovely stone bridge and a small waterfall. I was quite taken with the place but it was getting late and dark so rather than drive back to Caernarfon for dinner where there isn't anywhere decent to eat anyway, I had dinner at the Gwydr Hotel in Betws-Y-Coed. Roast lamb with mint sauce and vegetables, as good as Mum made apart from the parsnips. We never had parsnips at home, no idea why, presumably either or both Mum and Dad didn't like them. I do know why we never had pumpkin at home though, because according to my father, “pumpkin isn't an English vegetable”. Actually neither are potatoes which also originate from South America, Francis Drake introduced potatoes into England in 1580, nonetheless we ate tons of potatoes. Dad wasn’t strong on logic.
Back to the B&B in the increasing gloom of the early evening. The weather forecast for tomorrow isn't promising, there’s a cold front on the way. Great, today I was wearing four layers, my ski jacket and gloves and it’s about to get colder. Things can only get worse, and the clocks haven’t even gone back yet so I'm yet to live with the reality of short days. That’s something to look forward to, isn't it?
Continuing my tour of North Wales, I left Caernarfon this morning with the intention of revisiting Snowdonia before driving to Talsarnau, between Harlech and Porthmadog, where I am booked in for the next couple of nights. I drove through Beddgelert, a lovely little village with a pretty bridge so I decided to stop for a stroll but almost as soon as I left the car it started to rain and rain and rain, and of course I’d left my umbrella in the car, compounded with the freezing cold. When I got back to the car, my ski jacket dripping wet, I discovered that the umbrella had been in my rucksack all along.
I wanted to drive back to Betws-Y-Coed because I wanted to see the countryside again but it was pouring with rain the whole way and visibility was so poor that my photo opportunities were curtailed. I drove through the village where I had dinner last night and headed for the Waterloo Bridge, another Telford designed bridge that was erected in 1815 to celebrate the victory against Napoleon.
On to Blaenau Ffestiniog which is in my guide book for some unknown reason. It was a rather unattractive slate town and as it was still raining it looked even more depressing than it probably was, needless to say I decided not to stop and pressed on. However, that's not to say that I didn't see some beautiful countryside on the way. I passed a number of lakes bathed in sunlight and on one of my stops I had a chat with two chaps who were about to go scuba diving. I can’t imagine why, it was soooo cold, even if they did have wetsuits. Somewhat extraordinarily, one asked me if I knew how deep the lake was; why he thought I might know something as arcane as that I can’t imagine.
Perhaps the most beautiful spot I passed today was Nant Gwynant, a valley in Snowdonia with a picturesque lake, Llyn Gwynant, (Llyn is Welsh for lake). High on the upper section looking down onto the lake I stopped to take some (more) photos, the sun was shining and the clouds were dense but by no means threatening. While it was very cold, without warning it started to rain and on getting back in the car it began to hail! I didn't think it was that cold and I was surprised by how suddenly the weather changed.
On to Harlech and yet another of Edward I’s castles. As I arrived it started to rain, again, so I sat in the car and listened to the radio (an interesting programme about Peggy Guggenheim and her dysfunctional relationship with her daughter against the backdrop of her house on the Grand Canal in Venice and her art collection). Harlech didn't really grip my attention and I couldn’t find anywhere to eat so I decided to drive to Porthmadog, (I just love the name). An interesting place with an attractive harbour, but I couldn’t find anywhere suitable to eat so I ended up buying some food in Tesco to have a picnic dinner, something I've done a couple of times since I've been in Wales. Good restaurants appear to be few and far between here, perhaps I just haven't been looking in the right places.
Final destination was Gwrach Ynys, the B&B I had booked last night, a lovely Victorian house in the country with wonderful views. Deborah, the owner, offered me a cup of tea on arrival which I gratefully accepted, and while enjoying my tea I browsed through a large book Deborah lent me of photos of the coast of Celtic nations: Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Cornwall, the Isle of Man, Breton and two places on the Iberian Peninsula. I was surprised how many places in the book in Scotland, Ireland, Wales and Cornwall that I had visited. I may not be widely travelled but I do travel intensively, and I hadn’t realised how many Celtic nations I had visited. It has struck me this year that England was and I think remains, surrounded by its enemies. The Scots and Welsh now have partial devolution as does Ireland. Only Cornwall remains part of England, although I was bemused when I was in Launceston where I read a local guide book that referred to the main road as “the road to England”!
Wales is divided, geographically speaking, into North Wales and (Old) South Wales, and I’ve been surprised by the amount of Welsh I’ve heard spoken. I had assumed, quite wrongly, that Welsh was a dying language that was only spoken by older people, but to my surprise a lot of young people speak it among themselves and are effectively bi-lingual. I'm very impressed that Welsh is indeed a living language, good for them.
Today was devoted to Portmeirion, a self-contained village built on the estuary of the River Dwyryd between 1925 and 1975 by Sir Clough Williams-Ellis, an architect who wanted to design a coastal village to prove that not only houses but towns should be well designed.
On first appearance the village is a little weird, the buildings a pastiche of different styles and although it has a Mediterranean feel about it, it’s a strange mix of styles and although it has been described as Italianate, there are so many other influences it would be easy to dismiss the place as an early theme park and nothing more, which would be very unfair. It was only when I saw the video that I began to understand what Williams-Ellis was trying to achieve, and he described the village as a home for fallen buildings. During the first half of the 20th century Britain was demolishing its stately homes and other historic buildings at an alarming rate, and Williams-Ellis incorporated some of those buildings into the fabric of the village.
The original house that Williams-Ellis bought was been turned into an hotel to fund the building of the village and I had a late lunch there while reading the guide book which filled in a lot of the gaps. The estate wasn’t originally called Portmeirion, in fact it’s a made-up name, it was originally called Glacial Estuary (in Welsh), but William-Ellis sensibly changed it to Portmeirion (meaning Port of Merioneth, the then name of the county). I had been curious as to why the Botanic Garden pottery was named Portmeirion when it’s made in Stoke-on-Trent in the Black Country and the answer is quite simple, William-Ellis’s daughter was an artist and she established the pottery company with her husband.
I recall Portmeirion for its starring role in The Prisoner in 1966, I can remember watching it with Mum and Dad and the consensus at the time was that it was weird, although it is now regarded as a cult classic. I’ve never seen it again and I'm now very curious having seen where it was filmed. It was also in the last episode of one of my all-time favourite television programmes, Cold Feet, but it has other claims to fame. Frank Lloyd Wright visited it in 1956 and Noel Coward wrote Blithe Spirit while staying there.
The location is beautiful, looking out across the water to the hills beyond, it is so peaceful and quiet, with wide silty beaches when the tide is out. I was entranced with its location and walked along the many paths through the trees and down onto the beach. Because the sand is very silty you sink quite a bit which is a strange feeling, the sand isn't hard as you would expect, and from the ripples left in the sand from the retreating tide, it must be quite a strong current and potentially dangerous. The weather was glorious today and quite unlike the dismal wet weather of the last couple of days; although it was cold the sky was deep blue and I had no need of my umbrella, despite carrying it with me everywhere today.
I had a scrumptious lunch in the hotel and sat reading for over an hour, it was such a lovely spot I felt no need to rush. Portmeirion is North Wales’s most popular tourist attraction with over 240,000 visitors a year, although thankfully most of them weren’t there today. Now well into October things are much quieter and although I didn't have the place to myself, it certainly didn't feel at all crowded. There’s a lot to be said for holidaying out of season, provided the weather behaves itself as it did today.
I think it’s an extraordinary place and I'm glad I decided to visit, at first I couldn’t understand what it was all about but as I learnt more about the thinking behind the village, it grew on me. It was the life work of Williams-Ellis who died in 1978 just weeks short of his 95th birthday, and while a successful architecture, he was also actively involved in the preservation of rural life in England and Wales and referred to beauty as “that strange necessity”. Beauty of itself does nothing other than enrich the soul and is therefore, I suppose, a necessity (man cannot live by bread alone). The quote reminds me of William Morris’s famous line to “have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful”.
* Famous quote from The Prisoner
With great sadness I left North Wales this morning, I have enjoyed my time here, it is such a beautiful place, but time to move on. Today was largely spent driving south with no particular objective and no B&B booking for the night.
I followed the coast passing through Barmouth, a charming village on the coast, and on to Aberystwyth, a university town with little to recommend it. I took a couple of photos of the promenade and ruined castle but moved on quickly.
The countryside is all green rolling hills and a picturesque patchwork of fields with white long tailed sheep, why am I surprised that sheep have long tails? I just don’t recall seeing sheep with tails in Australia and although I don’t think I've ever thought about it before, sheep in Australia are usually docked to reduce fly strike so seeing sheep with tails is so unexpected and surprising. It’s funny the things you notice, isn't it? Some fields have mixed grazing, white sheep, sometimes brown sheep, sometimes black-faced sheep, and cattle, and at a higher density than I am used to seeing in Australia where the grass is nowhere near as lush, the fields here at the moment are emerald green. The countryside is largely given over to grazing, there is very little arable land in Wales, and nearly 80% of Wales is used for agriculture, although I wonder whether this figure allows for the vast National Parks, Snowdonia and the Brecon Beacons?
Having been here since February I have been through winter, spring, summer and now autumn, so the trees are starting to shed their leaves, crunching underfoot, and the skeletons of the trees are once again beginning to reveal themselves, which pleases me greatly because I love trees when they are “undressed”.
Next stop, Aberaeron, another small coastal town with a small and pretty harbour looking out onto Cardigan Bay, I passed through Fishguard and on towards St David’s, my last stop for the day. I found somewhere to stay without difficulty, a nice double room at the top of a Grade II listed building built in 1882, and the owners, Rob and Gloria have the most delightful spaniel, yet another rescue dog. I am forever meeting people who have dogs I stop to have a chat with, the dog that is, and sometimes the owner, and I discover so many of them are rescue dogs. How can people dump these lovely animals? It makes me want to cry.
The reason I came to St David’s was the cathedral, established in approximately 550 AD by St David, and was a popular place of pilgrimage in the middle ages. St David is the smallest city in Britain; I have seen the smallest street and the smallest house, so it seemed appropriate to visit the smallest city. It is a cathedral city but in reality it couldn’t be called a small town let alone a small city, at best it is a large village, but never a city. St David’s was awarded The Best Kept Small Town in the District in 1989 and the status of city was only technically bestowed in 1995, although because it has a Cathedral apparently it has always been a City.
I first became aware of St David’s when it appeared in an Owen Archer novel written by Candace Robb. It's one of the series of historical detective novels I read, this one usually set on York in the 14th century, but in one of them Owen went on pilgrimage with his father-in-law to St David’s and he became embroiled in the Welsh rebellions against the Norman rulers. I recall Owain Glyndŵr, made an appearance, a name that keeps cropping up in my travels here in Wales.
Adjacent to the cathedral, one of the smallest I have seen, are the ruins of the Bishop’s Palace, a massive structure, and I imagine back in the 14th century St David’s was a prosperous town, it just never grew like the other major cathedral cities in Britain. It does however have some charming streets and lanes and lots of little shops, although I didn't get a chance to explore them too much today, although I did visit the Cathedral and walked around the ruins, the Bishop’s Palace was closed by the time I arrived, but I will revisit them tomorrow. I also saw my first Tabernacle, the Presbyterian Church of Wales, in St David’s, which looked just like an ordinary church to me, although I'm not even sure what a tabernacle is.
Dinner at The Farmers Arms, a very tasty Turkish lamb stew with new potatoes, aubergine, chick peas and black olives with a garlic yoghurt sauce. Not very Welsh of course, but it was Welsh lamb which is some compensation.
St David’s is such a quiet spot, although popular with walkers and surfers if the shops are any guide. It has its fair share of shops selling fripperies as well as cafés and restaurants, but for a city it’s ridiculously small. I packed up and left my bag at the B&B while I went for a walk and to visit the Bishop’s Palace that had been closed yesterday afternoon. It is now one of the many ruins that litter the country but not because of the dissolution of the monasteries in 1537, after all, it wasn’t a monastery, but it was allowed to fall into disrepair when the lead was stripped from the roof by the Bishop of the day, although at the same time as the dissolution. It’s not clear whether the two were related but the once magnificent medieval Bishop’s Palace is now a shell, although impressive for all that with the benefit of comprehensive display panels, a couple of exhibitions and a good imagination.
I popped into the Cathedral for some quiet reflection and prayer, and then wandered back to the B&B to collect my bags, although not before buying a Dunoon Wales flag cup (complete with Dragon rather than the flag of St David), to add to my collection of Dunoon cups which include a St George flag, the Union Jack and the Saltire (flag of St Andrew). I'm missing a cup with the Cross of St Patrick, a trip to Ireland would appear to be called for, but perhaps not this year.
I headed east towards Swansea, although I have discovered that SatNav Jane is incapable of recognising Welsh place names except when rendered in Welsh, so I couldn’t get Jane to plot a course for Swansea, but she would recognise Abertawe. Now, who knew that Swansea is called Abertawe??? And to make matters worse, Swansea has a complicated one-way system of which Jane appears to be entirely ignorant, she repeatedly tried to send me the wrong way down one way streets. A very difficult city to navigate.
I drove through Tenby, an ugly industrial town, and on to Kidwelly that I also couldn’t get Jane to recognise because the Welsh name is Cydweli, which is pretty unsatisfactory if you don’t know how to spell the Welsh name. I knew the name Kidwelly because it appeared in the Owen Archer set in Wales when Owen went on pilgrimage with his father-in-law to St David’s. It bemuses me that my itinerary seems to be informed by the books I read and television programmes I watch! There is yet another ruined castle in Kidwelly/Cydweli, and so I had a quick look through. I should be bored by castles by now but something keeps drawing me to them.
And finally on to Swansea. The only thing I know about Swansea is that the Vehicle Licensing Authority is based there, a bit like Traralgon being the processing centre for ASIC. There is precious little to recommend the town but I couldn’t find anywhere else to stay because it’s the weekend and all the B&Bs are booked out, so I decided to use Swansea as a base and visit the Gower Peninsula tomorrow.
Very tired after so much driving I settled into my room and had (another) a quiet night.
Swansea isn't much of a city and the fact that it was raining when I woke this morning didn't endear me to the place. The only reason I was in Swansea was because, being the weekend, I couldn’t find anywhere to stay in Cardiff, so Swansea was the booby prize. But that didn't seem such a bad idea as the Gower Peninsula had been recommended to me so I planned to drive to the Mumbles (Mwmbwls in Welsh), which looks out over the water towards the city of Swansea. As I pulled in to a car park for a stroll the skies opened and Swansea disappeared behind a curtain of impenetrable rain. And to make matters worse, it was cold, no more than 8° Celcius, so today wasn’t turning out well.
Undeterred I decided to drive along the cost of the Gower Peninsula (Penrhyn Gŵyr), the first area in the UK designated an area of outstanding natural beauty, which I saw through a rain spattered windscreen. Although the rain did ease and at one point I even saw some blue sky, it remained very cold. I drove to Port Eynon and then Rhossili and the views I could glimpse of the coastline with their wide sandy beaches were stunning, but it was too cold and windy to venture out of the car. Exasperated with the weather I drove back to The Mumbles for lunch, I’d skipped breakfast as I hadn’t been hungry earlier, most unusual for me to skip breakfast but I'm feeling bloated and lumpy at the moment, travelling isn't good for the waistline.
The Mumbles is a seaside town, a bit like an older Lorne, and I had lunch at an Italian restaurant on the seafront with a view over the water to Swansea. Following lunch I decided to drive around Swansea and try and find the art gallery. Frustrated by the one-way system and lack of anywhere to park, I gave up trying to find somewhere to park near the gallery, but I did have a look at the Marina and the docklands with a new housing complex, uninspired blocks of flats with no character, a bit like Docklands in Melbourne but without any of the restaurants or the public art, so pretty dull. If you think I don’t much like Swansea, you would be right. I gave up on the day in frustration and went back to my room and watched some television and put my feet up.
I gladly left Swansea first thing this morning, pleased to be leaving a city of no charm.
First stop was Barry Island, seen on Gavin and Stacey (and as we now know, where Julia Gillard was born, although I won’t hold that against it. Query, does Gillard ever say, “what’s occurring?” like Ness in Gavin & Stacey, or does she prefer to sound like something out of the Kath & Kim?). I like Barry very much, it’s just outside Cardiff, a seaside resort and its proximity to Cardiff suggests that it’s a commuter town for Cardiff given the houses I saw, very neat homes and very middle class.
They are so obsessed with class here in Britain, the big debate at the moment is the difference between working class and middle class. According to something I heard on the radio the other day, if you keep your tomato sauce in the pantry you are working class, if you keep it in the fridge you are middle class and if you don’t know where your housekeeper keeps it you are upper class. Well that's cleared it up for me, I'm obviously working class. What tosh.
I wanted to have a stroll around Barry Island and stretch my legs but surprise, surprise, I couldn’t find anywhere to park and after driving around the area three times, I gave it up as a bad job and drove on to Cardiff and the B&B I had booked on Cathedral Road, an easy walk into central Cardiff. The B&B is a wonderful Victorian terrace house in a street of identical Victorian terraces, all neatly maintained, although a good many have been converted into hotels and guest houses or used for other business purposes. My single room was compact with a modern bathroom and the room was very warm, but the B&B (or perhaps it was more properly a Guest House?), wasn’t very homey and was rather anonymous with no atmosphere, which was a bit disappointing. I prefer B&Bs because they are more intimate and welcoming, the larger the establishment, the more impersonal the service.
Cardiff, unlike Swansea, is an attractive city and I spent a couple of hours walking around the central area around the castle (yes, another castle). Cardiff has two focal points, the centre made up of Victorian and Edwardian streets and gardens, with the usual collection of civic buildings, shopping malls and covered markets. Being Sunday the city was very and everything was largely closed, although a few shops were open.
I wanted linner and couldn’t find a restaurant that I liked the look of, so I walked back to the B&B and picked Mimi and drove to the docklands because I knew there would be a good selection of restaurants there. The Millennium Centre is located in the Cardiff Bay area and I have long wanted to see it because it features prominently in Torchwood. The Torchwood Hub is located immediately below the Roald Dahl Plass and I couldn’t help myself, I just had to stand on the spot of the concealed entrance to the Hub, with the sound of the Torchwood theme tune running through my head; it’s all a bit of harmless fun.
The plaza was formerly a dock servicing Cardiff’s thriving coal export industry during the 19th and early 20th centuries but the whole area has been part of a major rejuvenation programme. Cardiff’s Docklands area is spookily like Melbourne’s Docklands, lots of good restaurants, public sculptures and water views. I found a bistro that was serving Sunday roasts, an institution that continues in Britain, so I had linner (a late lunch/early dinner).
The weather today is glorious, lots of blue sky but quite cool. The overnight forecast is 0° Celcius which doesn’t thrill me, I do hate the cold, just so long as it doesn’t rain.
My goodness it was cold this morning. The steering wheel was freezing and I had to pull my fingerless gloves right up over my fingers. The car thermometer was flashing 3° Celsius and an ice warning was displayed! I’ve never seen that before, I'm glad I brought my ski jacket with me.
I make no secret of the fact that I am an obsessed Doctor Who fan, so it’s no surprise that my first stop today was the Doctor Who “Up Close” Exhibition; Doctor Who, Torchwood and the Sarah Jane Adventures are all filmed here in Cardiff. The advantage of starting with the exhibition was that parking was free if I got my parking ticket validated, and it was the Cardiff Bay area that I intended to spend most of the day.
The car park was virtually empty when I arrived at 10 a.m., and although the exhibition isn't that big, because I was there bright and early there was no queue and no crowds, so I had a good walk around the exhibition twice. I was a little disappointed that it wasn’t bigger or as up to date as it could have been, one of the computer displays still had David Tennant as the current Doctor, but I'm being picky. There were lots of Daleks and Cybermen and Kylie Minogue’s costume from Voyage of the Damned, a lot of fun for big kids as well as small. I was very tempted to buy a small Dalek for my desk, but decided my desk is cluttered enough as it is without more novelty toys.
Across the road is Craft in the Bay where I stopped off for a coffee and then a stroll through the gallery which showcases works from members of the Makers Guild in Wales. The current exhibition is teapots, wonderful flights of fancy, totally impractical but colourful and quirky. I ended up buying an embossed picture of a tree and all that is revealed is the skeleton. It’s white on white, stark and sculptural and very subtle but I couldn’t resist it and wanted something from Wales to add to my collection.
Behind the Millennium Centre is the Senedd, the Welsh Assembly Building House. It’s not as spectacular or as large as the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, but it is a modern, sustainable building, totally transparent, all glass. It’s open to the public and I was made very welcome. The Welsh are a quiet and dignified people, whereas the Scots are more vocal about their national identity and take enormous pride in the history of Scotland invention and discovery. There are many books devoted solely to the subject, as well as scores of websites listing Scottish inventions and discoveries. I’ve never seen a list of Welsh inventions, or indeed English or Australian inventions, it’s a peculiarly Scottish hubris. And the Scots seem to harbour an endless resentment towards the English, that isn't evident in Wales even though their history is similarly one of oppression.
Next to the Millennium Centre and the Senedd is the Pierhead Building, a Grade 1 listed building built in 1897 right on the waterfront. From photos I've seen, docks almost entirely surrounded when it was first built but some of the docks have been filled in and the Roald Dahl Plas and Millennium Centre are now built on this reclaimed land. The Pierhead building is open to the public and there’s a good video on the history of the coal trade and the port of Cardiff, it was originally the headquarters of the Bute Dock Company. It’s only been open as a museum since earlier this year and it’s quite a small museum, I think they could have done more with the space but it’s free and an easy place to spend an hour, although without the video I'm not sure I would have been as enamoured of the place.
Next stop had to be a late lunch. I seemed to spend ages making up my mind where I wanted to eat but in the end, as the French restaurant I had spied yesterday was closed and eschewing the many Italian restaurants, I decided to give Café Rouge another chance, notwithstanding my disappointing meal in Edinburgh. I had fishcakes again, but this time I checked to make sure they weren’t swimming in sauce.
The weather remained cool but fine with deep blue skies and I toyed with the idea of going to see the Barrage but I didn't want to walk because my knees are not very happy with me at the moment. There were two options, a land train that on enquiry wasn’t running out to the Barrage today, or a boat trip around the bay. In the end I decided to walk because I was told it would only take about 20 minutes, and I needed the exercise.
The Cardiff Bay Barrage lies across the mouth of Cardiff Bay. The concept of a barrage for Cardiff was first suggested in the 1980s to help regenerate Cardiff's largely disused docklands and was designed to create a large freshwater lake to attract investment into the docklands. The bay has, or had, the second largest tidal range in the world and as a result, for half of the day the bay was empty of water, leaving exposed large unappealing mudflats. There are sluices that drain the fresh river water into the bay beyond the barrage as well as three locks to allow smaller craft access to the bay. There was considerable opposition to the Barrage from locals and environmentalists at the time but there can be no doubt that Cardiff would not be the attractive city it is today if the bay didn't have any water in it for most of the day!
Nonetheless, there are still vast tracks of industrial wasteland around the bay and there is some construction work going on, it will be interesting to see what the place looks like in ten years time.
On the way out to the Barrage I passed an interesting exhibition on the fateful Scott Antarctic Expedition which left Cardiff Bay in June 1910, this is the centenary year. I hadn’t realised that the expedition passed through Melbourne on its way south. Once I reached the Barrage I was lucky enough to watch three vessels pass through one of the locks and into the Bay, I'm endlessly fascinated by this sort of thing, I don’t know why, especially as I'm in no way mechanical. Such fun.
I keep walking around Cardiff with Shirley Bassey singing “Diamonds are Forever” ringing in my head (Shirley was born in Cardiff). I had the most wonderful day and didn't pick the car up until nearly 6.00 p.m.. Had I not gone to see the Doctor Who exhibition the car parking would have cost me £10, as it is it effectively cost £6.50 and the Doctor Who exhibition was free! At the end of the day I can rationalise anything.
Rain, rain, rain. I woke to the sound of rain, and rain, and rain, which accompanied me all the way out to the Big Pit Mine Museum. The weather was dire, cold and wet. Jane had a problem getting me there, occasionally she has her moments, at one stage I thought she had taken me to the wrong place and that the postcode was wrong, but it all ended happily.
For over a century the major industry of Wales was coal mining, now virtually all the mines have closed, although the memory of the miners’ strike in 1984 lingers (see the photo of the caravan parked on site). The Big Pit Mining Museum is in Blaenafon, some 50 kilometres from Cardiff, and is a former working mine that closed in 1980 and subsequently converted to a museum. Visitors can take a tour of the mine itself, kitted out with helmets and lamps. The batteries for the lamps are really heavy, weighing 5kg, and they are strapped around your waist, with the lamp itself attached to the helmet. No lighters, matches or batteries (i.e. no mobile phones, cameras, or car keys), are allowed down into the pit.
We descended 90 meters in a lift with a former miner who was guiding my group, a dozen people of all ages, mums and dads, children, retirees, a cross-section of people who had braved the dreadful weather to get there. I had rationalised that the mine was a good choice to spend today because it wouldn’t be raining underground!
I had been concerned that there may be some trepidation on descending deep into the mine given the recent rescue of the Chilean miners, but everyone seemed calm and unworried. British mines have an excellent safety record, unlike the Chinese, apparently thousands of Chinese miners still die in pits in China every year. Now largely mechanised, the miners of old worked long and arduous hours in dreadful conditions for poor money. Their living conditions were not a good deal better but perhaps surprisingly, wives had a shorter life expectancy than their miner husbands, owing to the perils of childbirth and the drudgery of domestic duties.
It was certainly cold and unbelievably dark when we all turned our lights off to experience the pitch blackness. Apparently small boys, no more than eight or nine years of age, would be responsible for opening and closing the doors between the various parts of the mine, and spent most of their time on their own in the dark and cold. In 1842 a law was passed to prohibit females and boys under the age of 10 from working in the mines, although it was not vigorously enforced and it was up to 20 years before the law was fully complied with. But perhaps the most surprising thing was the pit ponies. Pit ponies lived 50 weeks a year underground before being given two weeks off during the miners’ annual holiday in July each year. And even more extraordinary was that ponies were in use in the mines until as recently as 1999, I say extraordinary because I would have expected mechanisation and the RSPCA to have put a stop to it long before then.
Above ground there is the blacksmith’s forge, workshops, engine house and the pit head showers and museum. Perhaps not as engaging as the slate museum, although the weather didn't help. What a miserable day today, rain and low grey skies, and my new Union Jack umbrella didn't last long, I think that's my third umbrella this year: one lost, two died.
I had wanted to spend the afternoon at the National Roman Legion Museum at Caerleon but the weather was so bad I decided to drive back to Cardiff and find an indoor activity for the rest of the day. The National Museum is an impressive civic building with two Turners, a Canaletto and a small collection of impressionists’ works so I spent a few hours in the gallery before returning to the B&B, still raining and cold.
Off to Hay-on-Wye today, home of the annual Literary Festival, I took the scenic route over the Brecon Beacons, but my first stop was to pay my respects at Aberfan, the scene of a national tragedy in October 1966 when, after continuous rain a slag heap slipped down the hill, sliding into a primary school. 116 children and 28 adults died. I was only eight years old at the time but Aberfan is a name that has stayed with me all these 44 years; many of the victims were my age. There is a small but immaculately maintained memorial garden to remember the lost children. It was very moving.
From Aberfan I continued to drive north through the Beacon Beacons, eschewing the main roads and taking a route that took me past Pontsticill and Pentwyn Reservoirs. Stopping to take some photos I passed a group of friendly cyclists who were making a day of it. Britain is very popular with walkers and to a lesser degree, cyclists. There are so many walking paths that criss-cross the country, helped by ancient rights of way, meaning hikers can walk across private land as of right. Single track roads, similar to Scotland, are everywhere here in Wales but now autumn is here, the trees are golden and the thinning foliage allows a line of sight through to the countryside beyond, quite beautiful, with sheep grazing everywhere, wandering across the road Plenty of photo opportunities here for Claire. I also love this time of the year, with the smell of fallen leaves underfoot, an evocative smell reminding me of my childhood.
I stopped at Brecon for a bite of lunch. It’s a pleasant market town and from there over the Epynt Way, I felt like I was driving over the roof of Wales. The most magnificent views, although I didn't realise that an army training facility and firing range were nearby, there are red flags and warning signs everywhere, so best not to stroll away from the road!
Having a little time to kill before arriving at Hay-on-Wye I drove a bit further north to Llandrindod Well because it looked like a pleasant place in my guide book, although it was something of a disappointment, so I made my way to Hay-on-Wye. I spent an hour wandering around the village before finding the B&B, a lovely house just outside Hay in a village called Cusop, technically in England being just the other side of the border. I had stumbled upon a gallery, The Hayloft, finding some interesting lithographs. I ended up buying three, all by the same female artist, as well as two handmade felt tea cosies and a wire bird.
I was given a recommendation to have dinner at The Old Black Lion, a pub built in 1640 although a public house has stood on the site since the mid-14th century. Hay-on-Wye was originally a walled medieval town and apparently The Old Black Lion was near the Lion Gate. I had a delicious meal, guinea fowl stuffed with spiced Moroccan lamb on a bed of sauteed potatoes followed by Drambuie bread and butter pudding. Yum.
The Cedars, the B&B where I'm staying is one of the best I’ve stayed, my bedroom is large with a wonderful view of the hills beyond, and a large garden between the house and the road. When it gets dark in the evening it is truly dark, no street lighting to illuminate the sky. Total darkness. The bathroom is bigger than many rooms I've stayed, with a deep bath and separate shower the size of my shower at home. Such luxury.
The house is currently on the market as the owner, Bridget Jones (no really, her name is Bridget Jones), and her husband have another house the other side of Wye that Bridget inherited from her mother. They were sheep farmers but they lost their flock during the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak and have since diversified. They no longer farm although they have a kelpie called Eddie, born and bred in Tenby, Pembroke, but surprisingly registered in Australia! He is full of energy and my new best friend.
I strolled into town, it was only a short walk from the Cedars and it’s easier to walk than try to find somewhere to park. Bridget had told me that there was a sheep market every Thursday at the Cattle Market but I couldn’t find it but I did find the motte, although the bailey has long since disappeared, and next door is St Mary’s Church, built in 1833. It’s a pleasant parish church, part of the Church in Wales, and I spent some time in prayer and reflection. It was there I decided to wipe the slate clean and start again. It’s that old Eleanor Roosevelt quotation: Yesterday is history, tomorrow is mystery, today is a gift. I can’t change the past, it’s gone and can’t be changed.
I really like Hay, it’s a real village, small and compact although deceptively hilly, on the “hillometer”, i.e. my bad knee, I can gauge how hilly somewhere is by the strain it puts on my right knee. It rates high on the fripperies index and is obviously a wealthy area bringing in a lot of tourists, especially during the Book Festival in July when some 60,000 people descend on the village. It’s hard to imagine how so many people cram into such a small village or where they hold the various talks and discussions. I’d love to come back and visit when the festival is in full swing, although how I would cope with the crowds goodness knows! Bridget tells me that all the accommodation is booked up before people leave the year before. I would have to book now for 2012 because there would be no accommodation available for next year! Talk about forward planning.
Today it was overcast and rained intermittently but there is plenty to see and do. First, the bookshops. There are over 30 bookshops in and around Hay and the town is famous for its bookshops. At one stage they were all owned by a man called Richard Booth, and without doubt the best bookshop in town is still names after him although Bridget tells me that he no longer owns any of the shops, he is quite elderly and ill. His eponymous bookshop is now owned by Americans. I really loved it, upstairs there are comfy sofas and armchairs adorned with two large cats fast asleep. It is said to be the largest second-hand bookshop in world, it was certainly very large although to my eye it didn't seem to be much larger than Barter Books in Alnwick. There was a lovely new café that had only opened a couple of weeks ago and in the afternoon I had a refreshing cup of tea and, in the spirit of the village, I sat and read my Alexander McCall Smith book.
The trouble with all these bookshops and the hundreds of thousands of books is that it’s difficult to find anything unless you have something specific in mind, it’s difficult to just browse because your eyes just glaze over after a while. However, I did find a P G Wodehouse book I hadn’t read, “The Girl in Blue”, and a Ladybird book on Churches and Cathedrals. I had this book when I was a little girl and it’s possible I still have it somewhere in one of the boxes in the basement, but I wanted to make sure and for £3.95 I couldn’t pass it up. And I have seen many of the cathedrals featured in the book including Salisbury Cathedral which featured on the cover, so I couldn’t resist. The third book I bought was only £2, How to Pray. I had to buy a few books in Hay, despite my promise to myself to stop buying books until I’ve made a dent in my existing pile.
But Hay is more than its bookshops. There is a weekly market selling fruit and vegetable, as well as a fish market and poultry, and there are a couple of art galleries selling handmade crafts and art work from local artists. And to cater for all the tourists, there are plenty of places to eat or stop for a coffee or pot of tea. I'm glad I made the effort to come to Hay-on-Wye, even though it was a little out of my way.
A four hour and uneventful drive back to Portsmouth. I was pleased to have the opportunity to drive over one of the two Severn Bridges, a stunning suspension bridge, and arrive just before Angela, Claire, Amelia and Megan arrived home. It was lovely to see the girls again, Megan is almost walking and becoming more animated. Amelia was, as always, a delight, she is so full of life, very bright and inquisitive.
If you remember “To the Manor Born”, a 1980s English sitcom, you will remember Penelope Keith and Peter Bowles. Fast forward 30 years and reunited for the first time since To the Manor Born, they are appearing together in a revival of the Sheridan play The Rivals at the Chichester Festival Theatre. Angela and Rod joined me and we had a most entertaining evening. The play is receiving good reviews before transferring to the West End. 9/10
Despite Portsmouth being so close to the Isle of Wight it wasn’t until today that I made it over to the island just a hop skip and jump from Portsmouth, a short 40 minute ferry ride to Fishbourne (at a cost of £17 each way). Angela and I went over on the car ferry with Mimi on the 9.00 a.m. sailing, a smooth and uneventful voyage.
Unfortunately Osbourne House, Queen Victoria’s holiday home, was closed today, but taking advantage of the fine weather forecast and Angela not working at the moment, we decided to go nonetheless. We drove through Ryde on the north of island, and decided to circumnavigate the island. The countryside to the east is similar to Hampshire, green rolling hills and quaint villages. And I saw my very first woodpecker, I'm only used to seeing them on bottles of cider!
One village in particular, Godshill, has the most exquisite thatched roofed cottages, but we couldn’t find anywhere we liked the look of to have lunch, so we headed off to the Garlic Farm. Surprisingly, the Isle of Wight produces more garlic than France! There is an excellent café and Angela and although we hadn’t booked a table, we eventually got a table, it was remarkably busy out of season and on a Tuesday. We were lucky to see a red squirrel while we were having lunch, the Isle of Wight is one of the few places in Britain that has red squirrels in any numbers, as well as a peahen parading herself in the grounds.
The farm shop sells a whole range of different types of garlic, including elephant garlic, a huge bulb of garlic. I couldn’t resist buying one which Angela and I plan to roast. It should be very yummy. Apart from the garlic, the farm also has a small herd of highland cattle, larger indeed than all the highland cattle I saw in Scotland a couple of months ago. Those horns look seriously dangerous and I wouldn’t want to be on the wrong end of them!
From the Garlic Farm we drove west and the countryside changed noticeably. Chalk faced cliffs towering over the sea and windswept treeless hills. By this time the weather was beginning to close in, and at one photo stop the wind was howling. I noticed that the shoreline around the island is under erosion, some of the car park had collapsed and slipped down the cliff face. The clocks went back on Sunday morning so it’s now getting darker earlier and by 5.00 p.m. the light was failing, so Angela and I drove back to Fishbourne for the 6.00 p.m. ferry, with the hope that perhaps we could catch an earlier ferry. Unfortunately we had just missed the 5.00 p.m. sailing and the next wasn’t until 6.00 p.m.. The crossing back to Portsmouth wasn’t as smooth as the outward journey and although I'm a notoriously poor sailor, thankfully we docked at Portsmouth without incident.
Angela and I had a lovely day cruising around the Isle of Wight. It’s a very small island and easily circumnavigated in a day, especially this time of the year; I expect that during summer and school holidays it’s much more crowded the roads more congested than it was today.
A day to explore Richmond; Richmond Surrey that is, not Richmond in Yorkshire. I wanted to spend the day with Shirley so I drove up to Camberley to pick her up and we drove up to London for the day. First stop was the Petersham Nursery right by the Thames. The nursery is literally in the back garden of the owners’ beautiful Georgian house boasting neighbours including Jerry Hall, so no prizes for concluding that it’s a very expensive suburb. I had booked but we had arrived a little early so we had a look through the nursery and gift shop. They certainly know how to charge! They had some rather plain frosted glass vases, Shirley thought they were £9.25. Sadly, not. They were £925 and they were nothing special. I bought some small Christmas decorations to add to my collection. It has to be said that the decor is odd, the restaurant is in an old glass house with a rammed earth floor, and the furniture is either old distressed furniture or old distressed garden furniture. I don’t think shabby chic covers it, it’s just shabby.
The chef at the Petersham Nursery restaurant has written several cooking books; she’s an Australian and the daughter of Kim Gyngell and has lived in England for years. Okay, Jerry Hall wasn’t there today, but at £28.50 for the main course, who else can afford to eat there regularly? Shirley and I both had the halibut with white beans, pernod, tarragon and something called Datterini (an obscure type of tomato), which was very nice despite the cost, and as it was somewhere I had wanted to visit I’ve now been able to tick it off the list.
After lunch we went for a stroll along the Thames and past what remains of Richmond Palace, home to Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. Very little of it remains today, but it had a wonderful riverside position. If I were to live in England I would want to live in the Richmond area, although very expensive I could afford to buy a house if I sold my house in Melbourne. Not an option without a job I'm afraid.
With the clocks going back on the weekend it was dark by the time we had a late afternoon tea at Newens Maids of Honour, tea room opposite Kew Gardens famous for producing the original Maids of Honour. The cakes date back to the reign of Henry VIII and the recipe was a closely held secret until 1951 when it was made public on television on a programme about historic dishes of Britain. We each had a pot of tea and a Maid of Honour, a type of small custard tart, quite tasty but unremarkable. The tea rooms were surprisingly busy despite the time, it was close to 5.00 p.m. by the time we had found somewhere to park.
Before dropping Shirley back home we stopped off to visit Aunty Hilda who is now in a nursing home. She was much more responsive than when I last saw her in hospital a couple of months again. I keep her in my prayers.
I remember seeing Pam Ayres perform in Melbourne so long ago I can't remember exactly when but it was back in the late 1970s or possibly the early 1980s. I'm pretty sure I went with Mum and it was probably at the Dallas Brookes Hall, as so much was in those days. I met Pam, briefly, at a book signing, a rare brush with fame! Fast-forward 35 years and Pam is in the middle of her 35th Anniversary Tour. This afternoon Angela and I drove over to Chichester for the matinee performance, a bit of a last minute decision and we were lucky to get seats as the house was virtually full.
We laughed and laughed and laughed. Pam Ayres is a very easy and natural entertainer and she kept the audience in stitches. Unsurprisingly I was one of the youngest in the audience, it was very much a stroll down memory lane but Angela and I loved every moment. 10/10.
It is so cold and I really need a warm winter coat. Apart from my ski jacket (too sporty), and my winter white overcoat (too dressy and not very practical on a daily basis), I don’t have anything warm enough now that it’s getting cold, so I decided I needed to buy a coat to get me through the next few months. I found a wonderful faux fur coat at T K Maxx, quite like the one I have at home, only this one is black (and therefore much more practical than my overcoat). The one I have at home was Mum’s and is a genuine 1960s coat with delicious a soft satin lining. Apparently faux fur is the hot new fashion fabric this year, even Karl Lagerfeld has included it in his ready to wear collection this season (apparently he calls it fantasy fur), so that has surely legitimised wearing acrylic in the 21st century!
And just for a bit of fun I bought a cerise hat. I don’t normally like myself in hats but this one was rather smart and looked good with my new furry coat. So now I'm set for winter with some new black leather gloves from M&S.
Another day in London, another day with Shirley. The earliest off-peak train I can take up to London is the 8.40 a.m. service to Waterloo. I was a little perplexed to be handed a ticket for Emsworth rather than Havant, but was told this was because it included access to the Underground and buses in London which would normally cost £4 more than the £28.50 (A$50) I paid. Train fares here are ridiculously expensive.
Shirley and I met at Waterloo and caught the Tube to Charing Cross because we planned to spend the day in the Trafalgar Square area. There were a few things we planned to do before going to the theatre in the evening so we started at the National Portrait Gallery where there is an exhibition of Mary McCartney’s photographic portraits. As we reached street level it was raining which pretty much set the tone for the day, so we had a coffee at the NPG to warm up.
I was a little disappointed with the exhibition because there were only about six photos on display in a small the basement area, and although I loved the portraits of Helen Mirren and Vanessa Redgrave, I had expected more. However, despite having visited the NPG several times I never tire of seeing the Tudor portraits, Elizabeth I, Henry VIII and all the rest of them. For my gratuitous Jane Austen reference we also saw Cassandra’s portrait of the Divine Jane. I had to ask where it was because it was so small I had walked past it, it is in a small display case and easy to miss.
As usual I bought a few postcards to add to my collection and then I saw it, a faux fur muff. It’s so cold and bleak at the moment, I just couldn’t resist and I had to have it. Before I came to England several people asked me how I would cope with the cold and because I had spent Christmas here on two previous occasions, I didn't think it would be a problem, but it's only early November and already I'm finding it all a bit too much, there will only be so many layers I can put on before I look like the Michelin man!
Lunch at the NPG, there is a fab restaurant on the third floor with 180° views across Trafalgar Square and up Whitehall to the Palace of Westminster. And the food was excellent, I had pheasant and Shirley with her olive oil allergy was unable to have the venison so she had the fish. Unexpectedly the restaurant was full but we were able to get seats at the bar and perched on bar stools we could enjoy the wonderful uninterrupted view. I would certainly go back but would book a window table in advance.
From the NPG we crossed the road to St Martins in the Field, my favourite London church. The bells were tolling and a queue of people were slowly filing into the church for a Remembrance Day service. We went into the crypt for a few minutes before crossing back to the National Gallery to see the Canaletto Exhibition. The exhibition is titled “Canaletto and his Rivals” and there is the most wonderful collection of Canaletto’s Venice paintings as well as paintings by his nephew and pupil and Gaudi. Many views were painted by all three and it was interesting to see the different treatments of the same view. We spent a good hour and a half wandering around the exhibition with the benefit of the audio guide.
By the time we left the Gallery it was dark and gone 5.00 p.m. and we had over two hours to kill before the play so we wandered up the Haymarket and found a Thai restaurant where we had dinner; nothing special but inexpensive.
The play we saw was “The Country Girl” starring the always wonderful Martin Shaw and co-starring Jenny Seagrove with whom he appeared in Judge John Deed on television a few years ago. I am a huge fan of Martin Shaw and saw him on the West End a couple of years ago in “A Man for all Seasons”, although I remember being very jet-lagged at the time and on that occasion struggled to stay awake. It was a good play, very well staged and the acting was first class. Martin Shaw was of course absolutely fabulous, it was a very powerful performance. I enjoyed it hugely, although I was somewhat surprised that, even though it was a Tuesday, the theatre was almost empty, only the stalls were full. It’s hard to imagine such a performance in Melbourne playing to near empty houses.
A quick dash back to Waterloo and I was able to catch the 10.30 p.m. train back to Havant, getting home just after midnight. A very full but enjoyable day with Shirley.
My trips are now determined by the weather forecast, and today I woke to a cold but sunny day. I have long wanted to visit Stourhead in Wiltshire for its iconic garden. It’s one of those gardens that appears in every guidebook on England and the view across the lake to the Pantheon is serene. There is also a Palladian Mansion built some 250 years ago, but disappointingly it’s now closed until next March. Most National Trust properties close at the end of October, so I’ve missed the boat for the rest of my stay. Anyway, it was the gardens that I wanted to see, after all, I've seen plenty of Palladian Mansions this year, my personal favourite being Holkham Hall in Norfolk, so I didn't mind missing out on the house.
Stourhead is a good two hour drive from Portsmouth, but I was delighted that SatNav Jane plotted a route that took me past Stonehenge, I made a mental note to come back the same way to see if I could take some photos with the setting sun behind, as I did in 1986.
The village of Stourton is very small and has been owned by the National Trust since 1947. I think it’s very sad that the original families of so many houses had to give away their homes to the National Trust, often to satisfy that pernicious envy tax, death duties. Britain’s tall poppy syndrome is based on the “it’s not fair” syndrome, it’s not fair that someone has something I don’t have. The benefits culture here is unbelievable, there are people who have never worked because it’s more lucrative to live off the public purse than get a job. There is something here called the rent allowance, where low income people are paid anything up to £80-100k per annum to allow then to live in expensive suburbs. I actually heard someone on the radio the other day, I don’t know whether he was a politician or a commentator, who claimed that it wasn’t fair that some people can’t afford to live in expensive suburbs! No wonder Cameron is trying to change the benefits here, I can’t understand how this country has been able to afford this over-generous system for so long, something has to give. No wonder the deficit is the size of some countries’ GDP!
I arrived about midday and had a bowl of soup before taking the recommended circuit around the garden. The trees are all now all russet and brown, with many newly bare of leaves. The air was crisp but it wasn’t cold. The views across the lake provide a magnificent vista towards various garden features, the Pantheon, the Temple of Apollo, the Temple of Flora and the Palladian Bridge. All very picturesque. I took my usual quota of photos.
I had planned to go up to London tomorrow to have lunch with Shariffa at Canary Wharf but the weather forecast is dire, very much an indoors day tomorrow I think, so I’ve deferred lunch to another time.
I know we have ANZAC Day, but Britain really does come to a standstill at 11.00 a.m. on 11th November. Angela and Rod tell me that English workplaces literally stop work at 11 a.m. for two minutes. I don’t recall that ever happening in any workplace I’ve worked in Australia, although we do wear poppies. The difference is that we have a public holiday for ANZAC Day and Britain doesn’t have a public holiday for Armistice Day, despite the various ceremonies throughout the country. With so many troops in Iraq and Afghanistan at the moment, younger people here are much more attuned to the sacrifice of the armed forces so it’s not just a WW1 and WW2 commemoration.
I've very mixed emotions about the day, the country seems to be swamped in mawkish sentimentality and I am troubled that this does nothing more than glorifying war. And on the other hand there are so many people in this country who have no British identity despite their residence (and sometimes even their birthplace), and notwithstanding the mass media hysteria surrounding the remembrance day ceremonies, I find it impossible to read the mood of the country. It’s as if the British people have surrendered their identity out of a fear of offending the politically correct. It matters not that migrants benefit from everything that Britain offers in terms of safety and the generous social security doled out by the government to all comers, they take without giving anything back or making any attempt to assimilate or accept the social mores of their adopted country. It seems to be a one-way street.
Another play at the Chichester Festival Theatre, this time a one-hander about the life of Robert Hooke. I first came across Hooke when reading “An Instance of the Fingerpost”, one of the many real characters in the book. Although it was my least favourite book of the five we had to read, it was fascinating in its way and was peppered with many historical facts and people including the geniuses of the age. Robert Hooke was a true polymath, Christopher Wren loved him and Isaac Newton loathed him, the implication is that Isaac Newton stole his theory of gravity. After his death he was effectively written out of history, his notes and even his portrait disappeared. And then in 2006 his notes were discovered and are now in the ownership of the Royal Society where he had been Curator of Experiments for over 20 years. His place in history is now being recognised and his notes are now available on the Royal Society’s website.
Interestingly, when Shirley and I went to the National Portrait Gallery the other day, there is a small room displaying photos of my favourite, Samuel Pepys, John Evelyn, Christopher Wren, Isaac Newton and [not Hooke but the other guy], celebrating the 350th anniversary of the founding of the Royal Society. Of course, there was no portrait of Hooke.
This play was written shortly before the discovery and is brilliantly performed by an actor called Chris Barnes, one of those plays you would expect to see at the Edinburgh Fringe. It was extremely well received by the typically middle-class MTC-like audience; a terrific performance and I enjoyed it enormously. 10/10
I make no secret of the fact that I can’t abide musicals, I can only just tolerate the opera provided it’s Mozart, otherwise it’s the legitimate theatre for me. I can’t explain the one exception. Written by the ABBA boys, Benny and Bjorn, together with Tim Rice, in 1986, I saw Chess on the West End in July 1986. On the same trip, my very first trip back to England after emigrating to Australia in 1968, I also saw Cats (pretty ordinary and hard to get excited about it), and Starlight Express (a spectacle rather than a musical but worth seeing for all that, just don’t ask me to hum any of the tunes). But Chess was special. In 1986 it had just opened on the West End and I saw starring Elaine Paige and Barbara Dickson, Murray Head and Dennis Quilley perform, I loved it so much I even bought the CD. I've never bought the CD for a musical, before or since.
I can’t explain what is so special about Chess, other than to say that the music is very orchestral, the story compelling, and the singing, at least as I recall with the benefit of seeing Elaine Paige, first class. It certainly captured my imagination all those years ago and hasn’t let go. I’ve never seen it again, until now.
This production is by Craig Revel Horwood (allegedly an Australian from Ballarat although he sounds like a POM). Okay, I’ve never heard of him either, but he is the nasty judge on Strictly Come Dancing. I think we have an Australian version but I don’t think it’s called Strictly Come Dancing. His production of Chess was different to the one I saw in 1986, more extravagant, more bling, but excellent for all that. It was very enjoyable and I loved every minute. 9/10 (marked down because they changed the order of the songs from the CD).
A wet drive up to Yately to visit Pam and Vic, old family friends. It was good to catch up with them for a chat, they always make me very welcome. We had lunch at a lovely nearby local pub called The Ely.
It’s days like today that I remember why I love London; I can never tire of London and today was no exception. If only I could find a job I would never want to leave. Ironically, 200,000 POMS migrated to Australia last year, more than at any time since the post-war migration boom. What would my parents think, they migrated to Australia for a better life for their children, am I being ungrateful? And could I really live with this weather??? It is sooooo cold.
The weather forecast for today was cold with fog (but thankfully no rain), and when I went out to the car at 8.00 a.m. there was a thick layer of frost on the windscreen which I had to scrape away; I haven't had to do that since I lived in my little villa unit in Elwood more than 20 years ago which sadly had no off-street parking. Once parked at Havant Station car park and paid and displayed (£5), the ticket booth at the station wasn’t open although there were three ticket collectors who directed me to the machine. I asked for help and so begrudgingly one of them issued me a ticket from a handheld device. He wanted to charge me £38.50 for the same ticket I had paid £28.50 just last week! Because I had asked for the ticket to be issued for a return to Havant (which is where I was) and not Emsworth (which is where I wasn’t), it was going to cost me an additional £10! Anyway, he issued me the cheaper return ticket, to Emsworth. What a con, there is a total lack of transparency with the cost of train tickets here.
From Waterloo Station I walked east along the Embankment towards the Tate Modern. As it is nearing Christmas there are stalls along the Thames outside the National Theatre selling Christmas and touristy gifts. There’s always something to separate you from your money here.
My first stop for the day was the Bankside Gallery next door to the Tate Modern on the South Bank because it had an exhibition of art from the gallery I had visited in Norfolk, St Judes Gallery. There is quite a large exhibition space and many interesting pieces, I particularly liked the Mark Hearld pieces but they are very expensive and large and anyway, the one I really liked had been sold already (at £1,450 I wasn’t really in the market as much as I liked it). Even the lithograph I like is £300 which is a bit steep. There were a number of Angie Lewin pieces including the piece I’d bought in Norfolk, but nothing really caught my eye apart from the one of St Paul’s Cathedral with fireworks.
What I did find were two new artists I hadn’t heard of before, John Duffin and Glynn Thomas. I am particularly taken with John Duffin’s work because he was born in Barrow-in-Furness and worked as a ships’ draftsman at Vickers, just as my cousin Susan had done (perhaps she knew him, I must check). I’ve subsequently researched his work and he has a large body of work of Barrow including two books of his Barrow paintings, although he now lives in London. Some of his paintings of tradesmen (workers on the docks in Barrow?), have a look of Soviet art of the 1920s and 1930s, and some of his cityscapes have a look of L.S.Lowry with his trademark matchstick figures (I must try and get up to Manchester to visit the galleries there). I'm really quite taken with Duffin’s work. The other artist, Glynn Thomas (what a wonderful Welsh name), he has a very different style, very detailed with an aerial view of places such as Venice and Norfolk.
I popped into the Tate Modern to see the Ai Weiwei installation of 100 million handmade individual pumpkin seeds. It is described by the Tate as a sculpture and each piece is a part of the whole, a commentary on the relationship between the individual and the masses. The work is supposed to challenging questions: What does it mean to be an individual in today's society? Are we insignificant or powerless unless we act together? What do our increasing desires, materialism and number mean for society, the environment and the future?"
I love the exhibition space at the Tate Modern, although I don’t always like the art collection within the gallery, and I'm particularly perplexed by installation art, I can’t get a handle on it. Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin leave me cold, I just don’t get it. Favourite artists are Turner (the first impressionist), Hogarth, Canaletto, Corot, L.S.Lowry, Grimshaw. What am I missing? Query, is it too late to study history of art?
From the Tate I walked across the Millennium/Wobbly Bridge over to St Paul’s Cathedral. I know I’ve been there countless times over the years, but I never tire of seeing it. I had a sandwich lunch (courtesy of M&S Simply Food, an expensive sandwich, a tub of pineapple and a fizzy grape drink set me back £7.20 which seemed like an awful lot of money for what it was). I sat on the steps of St Paul’s and watched the world drift by. Surprisingly it wasn’t cold and the sky was blue and clear although my bottom did start to get a bit cold on the hard stone step. I popped into the Cathedral for a few minutes of reflection and thanks and then caught the tube to Russell Square for the Foundling Museum.
I only became aware of the Foundling Museum when it was featured on Simon Sharma’s History of Britain a few years ago, it was only opened in 2004 in Coram’s Fields and even now for some reason it still doesn’t appear in my D&K guidebook. The original orphanage was demolished in 1926 and part of the grounds have been converted into a playing field for children; an adult can only enter the ground when accompanied by a child. I love that idea.
The tragedy of the Foundling Hospital is best told elsewhere, but it is very moving. Apart from Thomas Coram the home was established by two of my favourite men of the 18th century, William Hogarth and Frederick Handle. There is a large art collection including several Hogarths, a Reynolds and a Gainsborough as well as a Canaletto (okay, school of), in fact the Foundling Home was the first public art gallery in the world. Upstairs there is a collection of Handle memorabilia including a room with four winged armchairs with speakers set into the wings so that you can listen to Handle’s music. I spent a very pleasant half an hour resting my legs, dozing and listening to Handle. Perfect.
By the time I left the museum it was 4.00 p.m. and very gloomy, and I knew it would be dark by 4.30 p.m., which it was. I wandered around The Brunswick, a 1960s shopping centre and cinema complex with terraced flats above, somewhat surprisingly a Grade II building given its age. It's quite incongruous to see such a modern development right in the middle of Bloomsbury, home of the British Museum and opposite a row of Georgian terraces. Nearby is Mecklenberg Square, home to Harriet Vane before she married Lord Peter Wimsey. Harriet wouldn’t recognise much of it today, although the heart remains, I quite liked the feel of Bloomsbury, it doesn’t have the bustle and crowds of Knightsbridge or Chelsea but nonetheless seems quite genteel.
The Brunswick boasts a Carluccio shop and restaurant and although I wanted to eat before I went to the theatre over on the South Bank, it was still too early for dinner. I bought a tiny tiny terracotta pot for saffron at Carluccios and asked for details of other Carluccio restaurants in the West End. I was directed to Garrick Street in Covent Garden, so I headed off to nearby Covent Garden. By now it was quite dark but there are always lots of people around so I felt perfectly safe. The train station at Russell Square has lifts down to the platforms rather than escalators and the queue was huge, so I followed the herd and took the stairs, all 173 of them. I'm convinced I got there quicker than had I waited for the lift. The problem is that I knew I had the reverse problem at Covent Garden where again there is no escalator, and no way was I going to walk up to street level, especially as the walk up is the equivalent of a 15 story building!
Although dark when I arrived at Covent Garden, if you will forgive the pun, it was lit up like a Christmas tree. I remember the Christmas decorations from previous visits and they are magic. Today I had my camera so I was able to take a few photos which pleased me. I found the Carluccio restaurant without difficulty and was able to get a table without waiting. I had a delicious meal, spag marinara with a green salad followed by a Bicerin, a traditional drink from Turino (aka Turin). They bring to your table three small jugs, one of expresso coffee (big mistake, it kept me awake for hours), one of liquid chocolate and one of cream, so that you can mix your drink yourself. It was like a Koko Black hot chocolate mocha (my favourite), and just as good. Pure bliss and no need for desert.
I stood in the street, on the corner of Garrick Street and King Street and stopped and imagined the people who had passed along the street 200/250 years ago, the people, the smells, the sounds, of so long ago. I could see Hogarth and Handle and their contemporaries walking along the street, it was an interesting moment and the reason that any trip to London is so special to me; it’s the history and people and the way they lived that come together to make this city so extraordinary. London isn't pretty like Venice nor particularly friendly, what large city is? But I love the soul of the place, the art, the history, shops, theatre, restaurants, teeming with life and the Thames, how I do love being by the Thames. If only the weather was better!
From Covent Garden I hopped onto the Tube for Waterloo and the Old Vic Theatre, very close to Waterloo which was handy for the train back to Havant (not Emsworth). The Old Vic is a wonderful theatre alive with the ghosts of Olivier, Richardson, Burton, et al. It’s hard not to love London, despite the weather and the expense, I will never tire of the history, the art and the culture. If only London were Melbourne, how do I reconcile my love of both? Sadly my dilemma is irreconcilable. Live in Melbourne and holiday in London, that seems to be the only solution. In the 21st century surely that’s not so difficult to manage?
I remember seeing a play at the Old Vic some years ago, although I can’t remember what I saw on that occasion. Tonight’s play has rave reviews and played to full houses. It’s a Noel Coward play, although not one I was familiar with. Design for Living was written in 1932 and was initially banned because of its portrayal of the classic eternal triangle, Gilda loves Otto and Leo, Leo and Otto both love Gilda and each other: why should people judge and censor the way others live their lives if it hurts no-one else? That’s the basic premise of the play, with a good deal of humour along the way. The sets were wonderful and the three lead actors were first class. Andrew Scott played Leo, last seen as the effete but nonetheless menacing Moriarty in the best programme on television this year, Sherlock. He has a very powerful presence. Tom Burke as Otto was in State of Play and a recent episode of Poirot, I don’t think I’ve seen Lisa Dillon before. It was very enjoyable and I loved everything about it. 10/10 Late train back to Havant.
I'm not a great opera fan but everyone knows the name of Maria Callas, opera diva and spurned mistress of Aristotle Onassis. Master Class is a play about the master classes that Callas ran in New York in the 1970s. Stephanie Beacham plays Callas, all jet black wig and laboured Greek accent, and a passing resemblance to Callas.
It was an interesting interpretation, portraying the last few years of her life and the tragedy of her lost love to Jackie Kennedy. The house was nearly full, another typical Chichester Festival Theatre audience out on a cold clear night. I can see that I'm in for a very cold winter.
Lunch today with Rodger and Maureen in Crawley Down; Rodger is my father’s half-brother and Rod’s brother. My father, Rod and Rodger all had the same father, Lillian, Rod and Rodger’s mother was, together with Aunty Hilda, my Godmother, something I didn't know until I was confirmed in 2007.
It’s a bit of a drive from Portsmouth across country to Rodger and Maureen’s house in Crawley Down. It was my first visit and Rodger had very kindly sorted out a pile of photos for me to look through. There was only one photo of Dad but two of me when I was about three. I recognised one of the photos but I hadn’t seen the other one before, me with my beloved Best Ted. I look and I look and I look and all I can see is a quiet little girl with her teddy bear, so very long ago. It was nearly 50 years ago which is such a long time ago.
We had lunch at a lovely nearby pub and chatted until it started to get dark, nowadays about three’ish. I’ve asked Rodger to scan a couple of the photos including some of his parents, my grandfather and godmother, and Rodger very kindly gave me the photo of me with Best Ted. I can’t believe how woolly Best Ted was and how much I've worn him away with cuddles over the years.
Best Ted is my much loved teddy bear and lifelong companion and deserves a mention, he was given to me when I was born and we’ve been together ever since. This is his first trip back to England since he emigrated to Australia in 1968 and he now sits her in Portsmouth on my bedside table with Cadfael Bear (which I bought at Shrewsbury in October). I’ve had to stop cuddling Best Ted because he is seriously starting to fall to bits. I would be sad but I’ve decided that it shows how much he has been loved; it’s better to be loved bear than an unloved bear.
And it was lovely to Maureen and Rodger again, I do hope we don’t leave it so long next time.
Up to London again on the first off-peak train of the day to spend a day with Shirley in London. Mimi was covered in frost and I had to scrape the ice from the windows before I could even set off to the railway station. This is a sign of things to come, the weather has deteriorated markedly over the last few days and is forecast to get colder. Oh dear.
Shirley and I met at Waterloo as usual and we headed off to Piccadilly. Our first stop was a coffee and Florentine at a coffee house called Richoux where Shirley and Mum had enjoyed a cup of coffee on one of Mum’s many trips back to England. It is so cold and both Shirley and I were well rugged up, me with my fabo faux fur coat and pink mohair trilby.
We strolled along Piccadilly, I was delighted to see a Routemaster bus outside Burlington Arcade (see photo). We walked along the Burlington Arcade, so many yummy shops, lots of jewellers, cashmere and handbag shops, before we crossed the road to Fortnum and Mason, we were drawn in by the Christmas window displays of old masters remade. They had the biggest pomegranates I have ever seen, all the way from Israel and a snip at £2.50. Despite not wanting to carry any shopping I ended up buying one of the huge pomegranates, a stilton cheese in a ceramic jar (a Christmas tradition here, I also have one from Sainsbury’s and Shirley has a Marks and Spencer one that she is going to give me, so I seem to have unwittingly started a collection of stilton jars, I do love blue cheese), as well as a ceramic jar of gentlemen’s relish, in the trademark Fortnum and Mason turquoise blue.
We went in search of Simpson’s on the Strand but couldn’t find it, it has been replaced with a huge Waterstone’s book shop. There’s a restaurant on the top floor with views over the London skyline, a bit like the restaurant at the National Portrait Gallery and although the views weren’t as good, the food was.
I suggested to Shirley that we visit either the British Museum or the Museum of London. Given this evening is all about Samuel Pepys, we agreed that the Museum of London was the best option so we caught the Tube over to Barbican and walked from there. The Museum of London is one of the many free museums in England and it’s changed considerably since I was last there, I think it was being refurbished the last time I visited. The refurb is sensational, covering the history of London from pre-history (lots of mammoth skulls and flint axe heads), through Roman London before moving onto the 16th century and then through to the 21st century. Unfortunately we started to run out of time as we were due at St Olaves by 6.30 p.m., so we had to cut the visit short (note to myself to return for a further visit another time).
St Olaves is a medieval church in the City of London which survived the Great Fire of London in 1666 but not Hitler’s bombs and was quite badly damaged in 1941. I started attending St Olaves when I first went to London for work back in early 2006, Oliver Ross is the lovely vicar (or is that rector?), of St Olaves. The relevance of Samuel Pepys is that St Olaves was the church Samuel Pepys and his wife Elizabeth attended for 14 years when he worked in the Navy Office in Seething Lane; Pepys and Elizabeth are both buried in the churchyard. When I first travelled to London for work in 2006 I stayed at an hotel in Seething Lane, the whole area is redolent hundreds of years of history.
Over the last couple of years there have been monthly evening events at St Olaves about Pepys and his contemporaries, with readings and music and I was lucky to be able to attend a couple of them on my occasional visits to London. One evening I even met Amanda Root who was reading some extracts from something or other. I love Amanda Root, to me she’s the definitive Ann Elliot (in the 1995 production of “Persuasion”). I had a lovely chat with her, she’s such a diminutive person and she even made me feel tall!
Being on the mailing list for St Olaves I recently receive an email from Oliver about the world premier of The Pepys Motet, a work for 40 soloists based on Samuel Pepys diary; knowing Shirley is interested in English history and music I asked her to come with me. It was a fabulous performance in what is a tiny church, in fact one of the smallest in the City, with all different voices, some officers from the Navy in dress uniform including very smart swords, some Gospel singers, and lots of others, many in costumes. It was a spectacle for the eyes and a joy for the ears. Both Shirley and I enjoyed the performance enormously, it was then followed by a performance of a song called Oranges and Lemons, based on the famous nursery rhyme which; if anything I think that was even better. We both put our names down for the CDs when they become available.
From St Olaves Shirley and I walked back through the City so that we could see Lloyds of London, Leadenhall Market and the Swiss Re building (otherwise known as the Gherkin), all lit up and looking quite wonderful. We walked past Hastings’ office, through Devonshire Square and on to Liverpool Street Station but not before stopping for a light supper at the Great Eastern Hotel (now improbably called Andaz, a Scrabble name if ever there was), which is where I used to stay when I visited London for work.
We took the Tube back to Waterloo for the 90 minute train trip back to Portsmouth. Thank goodness I had a good book to read; Colleen, my wonderful vicar in Melbourne, had recommended “One Good Turn” by Kate Atkinson, a book set in Edinburgh during the Festival, which I started this morning. It’s a cracking good read and highly recommended. As usual, a day in London is a long day and I didn't get home before midnight but as always, it was a day full of interesting things to see and do.
Shirley and Colin drove down to Portsmouth for the day and we spent most of the day at Gunwharf Quays. When Shirley and Angela wandered off to Marks and Spencer for a spot of retail therapy, I couldn’t face the crowds so Colin, Rod and I, keen to get out of the cold (my toes were starting to go numb), found a nearby pub, the old Portsmouth Customs House. I had a good chat with Rod and Colin, relaxing on comfy sofas while we kept the cold out with a couple of glasses of merlot. As Shirley and Angela spent 30 minutes just queuing at M&S, I think I made the right call!
Angela, Rodney and I will be joined this Christmas day by Shirley and Colin which will be a lovely way to spend Christmas. We had a late lunch at Giraffe and discussed arrangements for Christmas day, the menu and who would be bringing what. Christmas is gearing up to be a good day.
The weather forecast is dire, it’s getting colder and colder and the north of Britain is covered in snow. Portsmouth, being on the south coast, is usually immune to snow but the whole of England was covered in snow on 6th January 2010, weeks before I arrived, and there is every chance that we will see the same again. In the 20 years Angela and Rod have lived in Portsmouth they haven’t seen snow like it. Snow in November is rare indeed and the north of the country has all but come to a standstill. From an Australian’s perspective it’s hard to understand how England can be taken by surprise by snow, but there are insufficient snow ploughs to clear the roads and the POMS aren’t used to snow on this scale nor so early in the season, after all, it’s still technically autumn. There are several feet of snow in the north of England and many roads are closed, the traffic is almost at a standstill and even plane and train services are affected.
Today Angela was “sent home early” because a snow storm was on the way and Angela’s employer encouraged everyone to leave work early and avoid being snowed in. The forecast for tomorrow is a top of -1 Celsius, with an overnight low of -3. I now have two doonas on my bed, the new winter weight doona that Angela bought for me a couple of weeks ago, and the summer weight doona I had been using all year. Add to that my two hot water bottles (those microwaveable warmers), and I am comfortable overnight.
With the weather so cold, apparently it won’t snow because it can be “too cold to snow”, which sounds counter-intuitive. I don’t begin to understand how it can be too cold, but there you are, that’s the received wisdom here. How am I going to manage for the next three months before I return home at the beginning of March? Only time will tell. Watch this space.
Last night the snow was still falling and it continued to fall today. Angela was unable to go to work because she couldn’t get her car out of the driveway because of the snow, so we walked to the local shops, which was such fun. We also walked to Sainsbury’s for some groceries and in the afternoon I walked over to Cosham to post my Christmas cards. I really enjoyed the experience of walking in the snow, and as Billy Connolly says, there’s no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes. I am so glad I went skiing earlier this year because I have plenty of cold weather gear with me including my ear muffs, ski jacket, merino long johns and sturdy snow boots.
The country isn't used to such an early dump of snow, indeed England hasn’t seen snow this far south for many years and no-one seems to have snow chains, let alone snow tires. I'm struggling to remember snow in my childhood although I'm sure I did live here when snow was more common. So much for global warming, Angela agrees that it’s colder than normal for this time of the year.
Thousands of schools have been closed, trains aren’t running and several airports, including Gatwick, are closed, so much of the south of England is closed to business. The Hampshire Council and Police Force counselled people not to go to work or school today so the cost to the economy must be enormous.
When it rains the snow dissolves so today there is no snow left and it has been replaced with hoar frost. It sounds like a joke but some ditzy woman was reported as having phoned the emergency services on 999 to report her stolen snowman.
First there was snow and now there are freezing fogs and black ice, so although I was planning to go to London today to catch up with Jackie who is in London at the moment, I wasn’t able to go because the roads are so treacherous and I'm not used to driving in these conditions. The Met Office was warning that all roads are prone to icy conditions, i.e. black ice.
Mimi was covered in a thick frost this morning and even walking across the road was slippery, driving on them would be beyond dangerous. Angela and Rod agreed that it was best I not drive in these conditions especially as I'm not used to it. Although I usually catch the train up to London, I have to drive a few miles to Havant railway station and coming home late the car would be iced over, which doesn’t thrill me, so I had to stay at home, which rather defeats the purpose of being in England if I can’t go up to London whenever I want to. The cold snap sweeping the country at the moment is colder than unusual but that’s no consolation to me, I'm just not used to it.
And just to make matters worse, I woke this morning with a sore throat and I’ve been fighting off a cold all day.
Very sad news, Colin rang to tell me that Aunty Hilda had died earlier this morning. She was Mum’s favourite cousin and despite the fact that she’s been in hospital for some months following several small strokes, it was still a shock. All the links with my past are slowly melting away like the snow. Such news is always sobering and a reminder of our own mortality. Very sad day. Now I have two funerals to go to before Christmas, Graham, Angela’s much-loved cousin who was only 57, and Aunty Hilda, who would have been 91 on Boxing Day. When I was here two Christmas’s ago we had to attend a family funeral on Christmas Eve, this cold weather is very hard on the elderly and sick.
Today I caught up with Jackie in London before she flies back to Melbourne this evening. I had to defer catching up on Monday because of the weather and ice on the roads, but today I was able to catch the train up to Waterloo. Despite slightly improved weather conditions, the road was white first thing this morning, not with snow, but a hard frost. I had to de-ice the windows on the car, a harder process than I expected because the ice was rock hard and even with the chemical de-icer sprayed on the windscreen, I still had to scrape away to clear it. I’ve no idea what’s in the spray, presumably some type of anti-freeze, but I'm wary of getting it on my skin.
Once I got onto the main road there was scant evidence of ice or frost on the road, which was a relief as I’ve no experience driving in such difficult conditions and I live in dread of hitting a patch of black ice and sliding out of control. On the train up to London I was surprised by the remnant snow still lying by the train tracks and the surrounding fields, it’s all but disappeared in Portsmouth. On the train I started a new book, "Nella Last’s War”, the diary of a Barrow-in-Furness housewife during WWII, but I didn't feel that well on the train and couldn’t concentrate that well, I felt a little woozy and travel sick.
I’ve been reading quite a bit lately because I've been housebound with the cold weather, dangerous driving conditions and my cold. I keep having to remind myself that this year is supposed to be a rest and I don’t have to be haring about all the time. I’ve just finished “One Good Turn” by Kate Atkinson, recommended by Colleen because it’s set during the Edinburgh Festival. It was excellent and I'm now going to read some of her other books. I've also just finished the second Stieg Larsson. A cracking good read but nowhere near as well written as the Kate Atkinson book.
First stop this morning was the Bankside Gallery to buy the John Duffin lithograph of the Thames and St Paul’s Cathedral I’d seen a couple of weeks ago, but when I got there I decided against the obvious tourist image and bought something entirely different. I would like to be able to buy some of his images of Barrow-in-Furness, but there isn't that much of his original work available at the moment, I will have to contact him and see if he has something suitable to capture Mum’s experience of Barrow.
I wanted to catch the 344 bus into the City and waited patiently on Southwick Bridge; I had just missed a bus but the service was supposed to run every 4-7 minutes. The lights were green for no more than nine seconds and remained red for 90 seconds and the traffic was banked up across the bridge and moving at a snail’s pace. No wonder London spends so much time in gridlock, in the end, with no bus in sight, I had to walk into the City even though it was cold and I was trying to conserve my energy. I had a couple of Christmas presents to buy at Leadenhall Market and then hopped on a bus back to the Embankment to met Jackie at the Courtauld Gallery at Somerset House and I sat on the coveted front seat upstairs on the bus watching the world glide by.
Somerset House was the first ever purpose-built office building in London and when originally built the Thames flowed directly past the building as it still does today at the Palace of Westminster (House of Parliament), but when the Embankment was built in the mid 19th century, the course of the Thames was altered, and the three great arches facing south, now partially below street level, were originally designed to allow boats and barges to moor at the landing places within the building itself.
The building now houses the Courtauld Gallery and in the winter the central courtyard is home to an open air ice rink while in summer there is a large fountain with vertical jets of water rising to random heights where children can be seen running through the jets during the warmer summer months. However, at the moment there’s the icerink which I think was the first to appear in London during the winter months, although there are now several including the Tower of London, The Natural History Museum and Hampton Court Palace. It was cold but entertaining watching the rubbish skaters edging their way around the perimeter of the rink, some clearly not enjoying themselves. It’s really expensive, £11.80 for adults and £8.45 for children (£14.35 for adults and £9.60 for children in the evening), although that does include the price of skate hire, it’s a pretty expensive option but nonetheless popular. You get a strict one hour on the ice and at the end of your hour everyone is ushered off the ice, the surface is swept and the next session takes to the ice.
Jackie and I had a sandwich lunch and chatted and chatted and chatted in the warmth of one of the cafés within Somerset House. In fact we chatted for so long that I started to lose my voice (a remnant of the cold I had earlier in the week). Jackie had to leave by 4.00 p.m. as she had to go home and pack before her late evening flight, and I wandered off to Covent Garden for dinner. In the Piazza I saw Pete Dobbin performing, he was the kilt wearing, Rubik’s cube solving, sword juggling, ladder climbing entertainer I had seen on the High Street in Edinburgh in August. His show hasn’t change much and despite the cold weather he was still stripped down to his underpants (see photo!).
I went back it “my usual”, i.e. Carluccio’s, because I had enjoyed my meal last time, calamari fritti and salad was just what I needed, something light and simple, although this time I eschewed the Bicerin I had last time because the expresso coffee had kept me awake half the night. I had decided I wouldn’t have a desert at all, I've put on so much weight in the last few months, an English winter diet is not the best thing for the waistline, but in the end I relented when I saw they had vin santo with cantucci, which I had discovered when I was in Tuscany last year and enjoy at the end of a meal.
From Leicester Square I caught the tube over to Waterloo for the short walk over to the Old Vic to see the Feydeau play, “A Flea in her Ear”, a classic French farce. All very silly utilising the classic Shakespearean device of mistaken identity/dopplegängers added to with the French predilection for adultery (there’s a bit of racial stereotyping for you!). It had a good cast including Tom Hollander whom I had so enjoyed in BBC’s “Rev” about a London vicar in a rundown East London parish. Very funny and only occasionally irreverent. There was also Jonathan Cake, Oliver Cotton (seen in Henry IV Parts I and II), and Lisa Dillon (Gilda in “Design for Living”). I was a bit perplexed by the curtain call at the end, four characters appeared to take the curtain who I'm positive weren’t in the play, perhaps I fell asleep and missed something ? But no, a quick check on Wikipedia and all the characters I could remember were noted but not the gendarme, maid and other two. Very odd. 7½/10.
I caught the 10.30 p.m. back to Havant for another late night. I awoke during the night to see Brother Fox making a return visit to the back garden, no doubt in search of food. He looked a little dissolute and not at all sleek and trim as I remember. Perhaps he was wearing his shaggier winter coat?
Off to London again today, I had a ticket to see the recording of a radio programme at BBC Broadcasting House in Portland Place, somewhere I've never been before, so another adventure. The cold I came down with last week still has hold and I have a rather nasty hacking cough, but I didn't want to miss the recording so made sure I was well rugged up, doubly essential because of the snow forecast. Of course, I don’t think standing in the cold watching the ice skaters the other day did me any favours!
The weather forecast is for more snow and I was a little uneasy about leaving the car at Havant Station, expecting to find it covered in show when I returned at midnight. Reading “Nella Last’s War” which I had started last week, I learnt that the winter of 1939-40 was the coldest in 45 years, with water pipes freezing solid, rivers and even Morecombe Bay freezing over. They had to melt snow just to fill the kettle! My hardships, such as they are, are meagre by comparison.
A warming coffee at Costa, I haven’t had a coffee for days. I do love being in London, just saying the name makes me feel all warm inside and sometimes I feel as if I should pinch myself to remind myself that I'm really here. I will leave England at the beginning of February as I arrived 12 months earlier, caught between my love of England and my love of Australia. I'm destined to shuttle between the two on an endless loop. How lucky am I to have the option and be able to have the best of both worlds. There is no perfect solution, home is Melbourne and heart is London, disproving the old adage that home is where the heart is.
I realised I should have taken my umbrella with me, I had left it in Mimi, and although I had my hat, gloves, scarf and faux fur coat, nonetheless it was raining quite heavily when I left Costa, so I popped into Boots to buy (yet another), umbrella, this time houndstooth check and at £12, not cheap. I hope it lasts better than some of the others I've bought recently, all have died an ignominious death and dispatched to the rubbish bin. In fact, I’ve lost count of the number of umbrellas I've bought this year, this is getting expensive. Perhaps I should buy them in bulk???
I walked past All Souls, Langham Place, designed by John Nash to complement Regent’s Street to the south and Regent’s Park to the north. If I remember rightly it was the church where David and Diane worshipped when they first met in London, so I popped in for a few moments but there was a Christmas service in progress so I didn't linger. Anyway, I wanted to get to Broadcasting House on time because apparently they over ticket the event and consequently don’t guarantee you a seat.
I found it easily enough and on arrival was given a sticker (095), and was ushered into a small cafeteria, or should that be herded? There was a typical BBC Radio 4 audience, it's a distinct type, largely middle-class and well-educated, a broad range of ages from teenagers to retirees. There were lots of black-garbed BBC Radio types with headsets and radios lurking in the corridor, presumably to keep us under control, although hard to imagine an outbreak of unruly behaviour from a Radio 4 audience.
I applied for the ticket for the “Front Row Quiz” without any clear idea what the programme was about, it was more curiosity than interest that prompted me to apply (it’s balloted so applying doesn’t guarantee a ticket), that and having an excuse to come up to London. The BBC Radio Theatre isn't a huge auditorium, a surprisingly intact art deco space, it probably holds between 200 and 300 people and has been recently refurbished as part of a major redevelopment of the site. There are dozens of microphones hanging down from the ceiling. Nonetheless, it filled up quickly but I still managed to score a front-row seat (the price of reward for being prompt), but with some misgivings. Given that the radio programme is called “Front Row”, I was a little nervous that the title of the programme may contain a warning, but as it turned out I needn’t have been concerned.
It turns out that “Front Row” is a magazine programme on the world of arts, literature, film, media and music, hosted by Mark Lawson. It isn't usually recorded before a live audience but this was designed as a cultural quiz between two teams. I had no idea who to expect, but as it turned out one team consisted of Lady Antonia Fraser (author), Mark Billington (another author), and John Harris (journalist – never heard of him). The other team consisted Henry Goodman (actor, last seen as Sir Henry Appleby in “Yes, Prime Minister”), Natalie Haynes (critic – never heard of her) and Soweto Kinch (jazz musician – never heard of him). Mark Lawson was the Chairman and Hugh Bailey read various quotes. Such fun. I think this quiz-style format is a peculiarly English conceit (i.e. look how cleaver I am), and although I enjoyed it enormously it was amusing rather than funny, and not as funny as “The News Quiz”. However, I do so enjoy attending things like this, it’s this sort of thing that I will miss when I leave England and the reason I always love being here.
From Broadcasting House I strolled through Marylebone and the rain, an area of London I'm not really familiar with. I walked along Park Crescent, a magnificent sweep of stuccoed terraced houses on the edge of Regent’s Park. I passed the office of ICSA (The Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators), the international qualifying and membership body for Chartered Company Secretaries, of which I am a Fellow. I felt obliged to take a photo, for the album.
My destination was the Sherlock Holmes Museum, unsurprisingly located at 221B, Baker Street. I passed Madam Tussaud’s, just around the corner. I've never been to Madam Tussaud’s and never will. I can’t understand the enduring popularity of the world famous waxworks. 124 years ago, seeing a wax effigy of someone famous or infamous was revolutionary and passed for entertainment, but in the 21st century, it’s anachronistic and as far as I'm concerned, a parody of itself.
While I've never been that interested in the Sherlock Holmes industry, my interest has been whetted following the magnificent Stephen Moffat BBC television series earlier this year (on a par with Life on Mars and Doctor Who as ground breaking television). The museum is a small house decorated in Victorian style and is a small house museum with a Sherlock Holmes theme, similar in size and scale to Dennis Severs’ house in Spitalfields, and essentially a museum of domesticity with some Sherlock Holmes memorabilia. It was quite an interesting place and evocative of the era, the only thing missing was the kitchen; I always enjoy seeing the “domestic offices”. The museum was quite busy despite the inclement weather, (cold and wet), but I thought it worth the price of admission because I was in the area, although not perhaps worth making a special trip.
Also in the area is the Wallace Collection, donated to the nation in 1897, on the proviso that the collection remained intact and on display to the public, they can't even lend an item to another exhibition. Surprisingly, it is free although a £5 donation is requested, which I gladly paid. Without donations, collections like this will not survive.
It’s interesting how my tastes have changed over the years. While the Wallace Collection is a significant collection boasting a Canaletto, lots of Reynolds and Gainsborough’s (sadly no Turners), there is also the famous Laughing Cavalier, Fragonard’s Swinging Girl and Boucher’s Madam Pompadour, two paintings by Titian, four Rembrandts, three Rubens, four Van Dycks, twenty-two Canalettos, nineteen Bouchers, masterpieces by Frans Hals, nine Murillos, two Velázquez and paintings by Thomas Gainsborough, Joshua Reynolds, Antoine Watteau, Jan Steen, Aelbert Cuyp and nine Guardis., as well as a lot of Boulle furniture. Apart from the Canaletto very little was to my taste, much of it was sentimental (not exactly painted kittens and small children, but nearly).
The surprise was the armoury collection, one of the largest and most important in Britain. Armoury is something I'm not usually interested in but this has a significant collection of Persian, Indian and European weapons and armour demonstrating exquisite craftsmanship. The armour made for horses was extraordinary and intricately made, there were swords and daggers and I was quite transfixed by the beauty of the design and quality of the craftsmanship. It’s hard to imagine anyone waxing lyrical about the design and manufacture of an AK-49 or a flak jacket, but these weapons are, aside from their more prosaic purpose, works of art, many I suspect ceremonial rather than practical. No-one is ever going to say that about a Harrier jet or a Leopard tank.
On leaving it was gloomy and nearing darkness, and it was only 3.00 p.m.! I walked towards Oxford Street, through St Christopher’s Place (I remember having dinner at Carluccio’s with Lynne Beale when we visited London for work back in 2007). I enjoyed seeing the famous Oxford Street Christmas lights and the hustle and bustle of Christmas shoppers (although in reality Oxford Street seems to be busy all year). Across to Molton Street, a pedestrianised retail area (I sometimes think Britain is one big shopping centre), over to Regents Street, through to Carnaby Street (their Christmas decorations aren’t as good as two years ago when there were giant snowmen suspended across the street).
By now my legs were very tired as I hadn’t stopped since I’d left Broadcasting House and hadn’t even stopped for lunch, I was feeling both tired and hungry. I continued to walk towards the West End despite the failing light, darkness and rain, and eventually found what I was looking for, Jaime Oliver’s Italian restaurant in Upper St Martins Lane, for a very late lunch or was that a very early dinner? I got a table without any trouble and I ordered the porcini mushroom risotto followed by the grilled south coast mackerel served with new potatoes, rocket salad and lemon dressing. Very tasty. The service is really very good and the food is delicious and reasonably priced. They even had Vin Santo but oh no, no cantucci, only small amaretti which just doesn’t cut it. You can’t dunk amaretti biscuits without them falling to bits in your drink. Very disappointing. Jamie, take note. Not good enough.
Oh my goodness, it’s snowing! I looked out of the window and could see snow flakes falling through the street light. I do hope this doesn’t mean that Mimi will be buried in a snow drift when I get back to Havant at midnight. I even contemplated leaving London and catching the train immediately and missing the play I had a ticket for, but decided to take my chances. On leaving the restaurant I was more than a little surprised not to find a fine blanket of snow on the ground, but it seemed to have melted either before reaching the ground or on touching the surface, although on reflection I wasn’t that surprised because it wasn’t really cold cold, if you know what I mean; not warm but not icy either, just cool. It remains to be seen what the weather will be like when I get back to Havant.
The Noel Coward theatre was a few hundred metres down the road from the restaurant and I collected my ticket and found a seat in the foyer as I was a little early (plays in England generally start at 7.30 p.m. rather than 8.00 p.m. as they do at home).
I was surprised that for a Thursday the theatre wasn’t full, the stalls were perhaps ⅔ full and there seemed to be a lot of Americans in the audience, which is not so surprising as “Deathtrap” is by an American playwright and although the reviews of the play hadn’t been that good, the reason I had wanted to see the play was I wanted to see Simon Russell Beale, described as the greatest actor of his generation. Most recently he’s played the Home Secretary in Season 9 of “Spooks”, but I first remember him as Charles Musgrove in the definitive 1995 production of “Persuasion” (a long overdue and entirely gratuitous Jane Austen reference). I also wanted to see Claire Skinner (the well-meaning but permanently frustrated mother in “Outnumbered”, thank you Andy Hamilton).
I was very disappointed with the play. For what it’s worth it was a good production, but the play itself is very weak (a poor-man’s Sleuth), and explained the poor house numbers. It just goes to prove that even first-class actors can appear in the occasional dud. 3/10
On the 10.30 p.m. back to Havant I was watching anxiously for signs of snow fall. As we drew up at various railway stations on the trip back south I could see cars coated in thick ice but no snow, and when I eventually got back to Havant, Mimi was coated in a thick layer of ice. At least I was able to drive home, albeit slowly.
Christmas week began on a very sad note. On Monday Angela, Rod and I attended a funeral in Worthing of Angela’s much loved cousin Graham who died a couple of weeks ago, very suddenly and far too young, (he was only 57). The funeral was held at the Parish Church of Tarring, a pretty little village just outside Worthing. The eulogy was very funny, a celebration of the life of someone much loved by his friends and family. He will be greatly missed.
I have attended very few funerals, the first I ever attended was Dad’s followed only a few years later by my poor sister Nicola. On reflection I've only ever attended six funerals, four of them family and two friends; dad, Nicola, Mum, Aunty Nancy, Jan Perryman a lovely lady and fellow lawyer who died tragically young from breast cancer (I will always remember her funeral as a joyous humanist ceremony at Ripponlea), and Neville, a very funny man and old friend of John’s who died unexpectedly from a heart attack in his early 50’s.
This was the very first time I attended an interment and I found standing by the graveside on an icy, windswept and snow covered hill, a very chilling experience in more ways than one. The vicar was there to make the usual incantation, followed by a handful of soil and flowers thrown onto the coffin after it’s been lowered into the grave. Staring into the depths of the grave is very sobering, quite frightening really. I think Mum had the right idea, cremation and scattered ashes, no fixed memorial. We come to it all in the end, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
The second funeral this week was today at St Mary’s in Sunbury-on-Thames for dear Aunty Hilda, who would have been 91 on Boxing Day. I read one of the readings. I had offered to read the poem I had read at Mum’s funeral but instead read “A time for everything” from Ecclesiastes:
There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
What does the worker gain from his toil?
I have seen the burden God has laid on men.
He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and to do good while they live.
That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil—this is the gift of God.
I know that everything God does will endure for ever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that men will revere Him.
Following the service we attended the interment and then back to the Parish Hall for some refreshments. Sadly, like Graeme’s funeral, there are some fractured family relationships here that not even a death in the family can mend, which made it awkward for everyone. Life’s too short to harbour such resentments, and with no immediate family it saddens me even more.
Angela, Uncles Rod & Rodger, Cousin Shirley and Colin and I met up at The Magpie, my grandfather’s hotel. Rodger gave me a disc with some of the photos he had shown me last month, mainly of my grandfather and godmother, Rod and Rodger’s mother and father, and one of my father with Rodger and Rod on a beach somewhere. Scarily, Dad had a cigarette in his hand. How times change.
From this point we tried to put behind us the sadness of the funerals as today is Rod’s birthday. This is the second time in five years that Rod has attended a funeral on his birthday; cold winters are particularly hard on the old and sick, two years ago I attended a family funeral here in England on Christmas Eve. I'm concerned about Aunty Lily in Barrow-in-Furness, who has recently been moved into some sort of assisted accommodation following a couple of falls. I’ve been in touch with the facility where she’s now living and will call her on Christmas Day for a chat. I really want to visit her before I go home, provided the roads are clear of snow. Being 330 miles north of Portsmouth, the weather is much colder and they’ve had more snow than we’ve had here in the south, so I hope the roads will be clear during January.
From The Magpie (an old English term for a half pint), we drove down the road to Yatley to visit Pam and Vic before Christmas, as I wanted to wish them a very happy Christmas. We had a cup of tea and a lovely chat before heading back to Portsmouth.
We had booked a table for 7.00 p.m. at the Red Lion in Southwick (the name of over 600 pubs here in England!), just up in the hills behind Portsmouth. Southwick is a beautiful little village I’ve never visited during daylight as I only ever go for dinner at the Red Lion. Although it’s an old pub, in reality it’s really a restaurant with a very small bar. Smoking was banned in pubs and restaurants in England in 2007 and is blamed for the decline in English pubs, closing at a frightening rate of one a week. I have to say that the majority of pubs I've visited are wonderful with good food and an acceptable although limited range of wines, many have an interesting range of ciders to make up for the wine, although I’ve never been a beer drinker.
We had a lovely dinner and dropped by at the Conservative Social Club where Rod is a committee member for a nightcap. Happy birthday Rod!
Midnight mass at the local Church of England in Havant, the Church of the Resurrection. We had some lovely carols, “Once in Royal David’s City”, “Silent Night”, “While Shepherds Watched”, (or as I recall the version we sang as children, “As Shepherds washed their socks by night”), “The First Noel”, and my favourite carol, “Oh come all yea faithful” (very rousing). It was lovely to attend communion again, I regret that I have been rather irregular in my observance this year, I have missed St George’s in Malvern and I'm looking forward to going back.
This is my third Christmas in England in four years. Although the idea of a white Christmas is very romantic, the reality is far different as it makes life very difficult for everyone because travel is compromised. Needless to say, we were relieved when we woke to a snow-free day, confident that Shirley and Colin would be able to drive down from Camberley to spend the day with us.
I had a lovely family day with Angela and Rod, Shirley and Colin, together with little Archie, the Himalayan Spaniel. Archie is such a love, a very gentle and placid dog, with soft silky ears and the fluffiest tail I've ever seen, a cascade of long white hair. I was again disappointed that Helen, Angela and Rod’s daughter, had decided she preferred to spend Christmas with a girlfriend in Falmouth rather than with her family in Portsmouth, but James and Claire, together with their gorgeous daughters, Amelia and Megan, joined us for afternoon tea. Of course, by this time we were stuffed to the gills with turkey, roast potatoes and parsnip, brussel sprouts and chestnuts, and all the trimmings. In the end we couldn’t face the Christmas pudding simply because no-one had any room!
When James, Claire and the girls arrived we unwrapped our pressies, there was wrapping paper everywhere. Father Christmas was very kind to me and within a twinkling of the eye, all that planning, all that buying and wrapping, and all that cooking and eating, and it was over.
Happy Christmas everyone!
As I count down to my return to Melbourne, today is my last trip to London this year. It’s surprisingly mild despite the dire forecast of only a few weeks ago of freezing weather this winter, it was a balmy 6°C as I drove to Havant. The station car park and train were almost empty, people obviously still on leave until the New Year. In Portsmouth all the snow has melted away at long last, although when Angela, Rodney and I took Archie for a walk along the sea front the other day, one of the ornamental ponds near Southsea Castle was frozen over with an inch thick of ice, but from the warmth of the train carriage I could still see fields covered in snow, whereas elsewhere there was no sign of snow at all, even within a mile or two, which I couldn’t fathom.
I'm still reading “Nella Last’s War”, the diary of a Barrow housewife during WWII, and I'm finding the sense of despair and dread quite chilling. I hadn’t realised that women between the ages of 16 and 49 had to register as “mobile” if they had no children living with them and could be directed to any work the government deemed essential. These domestic details were always overlooked in the post-war glorification I grew up with during the 1960s and 1970s when the focus was on battles and POW camps. The horrors of home life were glossed over. Poor Nella had to beg her husband to give her more money for the housekeeping, prices skyrocketed during the war but she was expected to manage on her pre-war housekeeping money. Little wonder that Nella Last eventually came to compare marriage to slavery and that Mum, seeing her mother live under much more straightened circumstances and no more than a mile or so from where Nella Last lived (and just around the corner from where I was born on Abbey Road), encouraged me to have a career.
I am finding the book quite distressing and upsetting. The dread Nella felt makes me realise how terrifying living in a city being bombed must have been for children such as my mother who was only nine when the war started. I can remember she always said that the sound of an air raid warning, even years later, made her blood run cold. I am beginning to understand the terror she must have felt.
The irony of Nella Last’s story is that after the war her son moved to Australia and lived in Melbourne where he became a sculpture. I'm sorry that Mum was never aware of the book, she would have found it fascinating, although perhaps a little close to the bone.
I hopped on the Jubilee Line from Waterloo to Green Park and then down to Pimlico. I have a theory that nowhere on the tube is more than one change away, although sometimes the shortest distance and direct route may not necessarily be the quickest because of the time spent changing trains.
I set today aside to explore the Tate Britain. It’s a long time since I went to the Tate Britain, the Tate Modern is much more accessible, close to the Globe Theatre and next to the Millennium Bridge. Visiting the Tate Britain takes an effort because it’s not near anything in particular. I wanted to see the Turner collection (the works found in Turner’s studio after his death in 1856 were accepted by the nation as the ‘Turner Bequest’, a collection comprised of nearly 300 oil paintings and around 30,000 sketches and watercolours including 300 sketchbooks).
I was somewhat surprised by how much modern art there is at the Tate Britain. I had assumed, wrongly as it turns out, that the point of the Tate Modern is that it houses modern art and the Tate Britain houses anything painted before then.
When I visited the Wallace Museum a couple of weeks ago, I recall observing that I couldn’t imagine anyone considering an AK-30 or a Harrier Jet as a work of art. Well, I’ve had those preconceptions challenged today. In the Duveen Galleries, suspended from the ceiling is a Sea Harrier Jet and a recumbent Jaguar plane, belly up, all shiny and reflective. Neither are designed for aesthetic considerations but they are quite compelling, although everything is context and in the context of the art gallery rather than a theatre of war, they are almost appealing, or am I being contrary? They certainly attracted a lot of attention. I'm still not convinced that they are beautiful or have any important aesthetic qualities, but they certainly challenge you to see them in a different light.
I had a quick sandwich lunch and got chatting with a lady from Taiwan who speaks very good English, she has just spent three months learning to speak English in Ireland (yes, Ireland). She recommended the National Gallery and the Wallace Collection to me and in turn I recommended the National Portrait Gallery and the Courtauld Gallery to her.
Apart from the Turners (which are always wonderful), there were some Hogarths, quite a few Constables and a few Lucian Freuds (although surely they should have been in the Tate Modern?). The iconic Christmas tree in the foyer this year was decorated by Giorgio Sadotti whose decoration amounted to no decoration at all. Just a plain tree. By presenting it ‘undressed’, Sadotti asks us to contemplate the tree’s true beauty and invest it with potential. Is the Tate losing its way?
It was a cold, wet and very grey day and I walked along the Thames towards Chelsea because I wanted to visit the Kings Road before I leave England. I couldn’t resist taking a few photos of the that icon of the Thames, the Battersea Power Station. I drifted into Zara and Radley, but I think the moment has passed and they no longer have the appeal they had a couple of years ago. I walked the length of the King’s Road and despite needing the exercise, the pounding of the London streets was taking its toll on my dodgy knee which was stiffening up, so by about 4.00 p.m. as it was getting dark, I hopped onto the #19 bus. Good advice from Fred some years ago that one of the cheapest and best ways to see London is to sit upstairs on a bus and be chauffeur driven around London. The traffic in London can best be described as dreadful so we spent a good deal of the trip stationary, which suited me just fine because it allowed me to rest my weary legs.
By the time I reached the West End it was dark and cool but by no means cold. I walked past a shop on what can best be described as a back alley called Beadworks and I just couldn’t resist, ever hopeful I would find something special that I can’t get at home. Mostly it was same old/same old but I managed to buy a few trinkets to add to my jewellery making collection. I had bought some glass beads in Venice as well so I will be busy when I get home.
I strolled along Charing Cross Road in the direction of Jaime’s Italian, but there was a one hour wait for a table and I wasn’t prepared to wait, I was tired and hungry, so I wandered across the road to an inviting Italian bistro called Rossopomodoro. Cheap and cheerful yes, but sadly it didn't have the ambience or class of either Jamie’s Italian or Carluccio’s.
With an hour to spare I walked through Covent Garden, all the stalls were closing up but it was, as always, bustling. To finish off the evening tonight I had tickets for the J B Priestly play, “When we are married”, with Maureen Lipman, Michele Dotrice and Roy Hudd, amongst others, at the Garrick Theatre on Charing Cross Road, an easy walk to Leicester Square Tube Station for a quick exit at the end of the evening. I only booked the ticket last night and had limited choice and even had to pay full price at £55.25. I think I’ve been to the Garrick Theatre before, but I didn't remember the constant rumble of the tube trains rumbling below and seemed very close to us.
The play was a revival of a 1938 J B Priestley play and while extremely well produced and acted, I think it could best be described as a safe play in capable hands, it was neither adventurous nor groundbreaking. I wasn’t that impressed. In large part the staple of the London West End seems to be interminable musicals and revivals of Noel Coward and Oscar Wilde, with some Shakespeare thrown in for good measure. There seem to be very few new plays, the MTC has a much more adventurous programme supporting new playwrights. The only advantage of the West End from my perspective is seeing actors and actresses I would only otherwise see on television or the cinema.
There are a few more plays I would like to see in London before I go home and there are a couple more I would like to see that don’t start until after I leave, but that can't be helped. My trips to London are now numbered, so I'm taking advantage of my few remaining opportunities.
I caught the 10.00 p.m. back to Havant and home before midnight.
I had a quiet New Year’s Eve in Portsmouth with Angela and Rodney, Shirley and Colin. We simultaneously watched the fireworks over the Thames as Big Ben chimed in the New Year, and at the same time the ad hoc neighbourhood fireworks display in Angela & Rod’s back garden. Fireworks in England can be bought over the counter so there were fireworks going off in all directions causing Archie much distress. Angela and I were entranced by the floating Chinese lanterns drifting higher and higher and out to sea on the light breeze.
I woke to a sunny morning and so decided to use my Portsmouth Historic Dockyards pass to see the HMS Warrior which I hadn’t had time to see in June. Unfortunately the weather was deceptive and by the time I got to the Dockyards it was very cold and grey and I didn't have my gloves with me, a big mistake. It was very cold, even with four layers.
The Warrior was the first iron clad ship and only surviving example of its type. It was very interesting and although deserted, hardly surprising that so few people were willing to venture outside on such an increasingly cold and miserable day. I took refuge in the Costa coffee shop for a warming cup of coffee and then wandered down to see HMS Ark Royal, now de-commissioned because of the austerity cuts, which is a great shame and, I think, a mistake. The two aircraft carriers on order (a Labour Government decision to create employment in Glasgow) won’t be ready until 2014 at the earliest, but that’s okay because the Harrier Jump Jets have also been decommissioned and there won’t be any planes to land on the new aircraft carriers until at least 2020 when they arrive. Then again, given the asymmetrical nature of international conflict and warfare these days, it does beg the question whether a small island just off the coast of Europe really needs an aircraft carrier at all.
I was a little surprised by the size of the Ark Royal, it was big but I had expected humungous, it just wasn’t as long as I had expected. It certainly didn't look all that impressive from my vantage point dockside.
By this stage I was frozen through so went home.
Up to London, not so bright but still early, cold and wet and gloomy. My first shock was that the cost of the car park has risen from an already exorbitant £5 to £5.50 (a 10% increase), and then the train fare had also increased from £28.50 to £31.30 (AU$50), an increase of nearly 10% which is outrageous given the last time fares went up was last January, so this wasn’t a case of catch-up. It’s not as if train fares weren’t excessive to begin with. And I'm just quoting the off-peak fares from Havant to London Waterloo. It costs twice as much to travel during peak hour. I always catch the 8.40 a.m. to London Waterloo, but if I took the 8.34 a.m. (a whole six minutes earlier), it would cost an eye-watering £59.90 (AU$95), and first class would cost £100.40 (AU$159)!
Given that there are people who commute from Portsmouth to London on a daily basis and wages here aren’t as high as at home (at least for lawyers and Company Secretaries), I don’t know how people manage. The train fare increases have been a big issue here in the media, with some saying they will have to reconsider how they get to work, even suggesting getting work closer to home, always assuming that such a thing is feasible. Of course, these increases are compounded by the increase of VAT (GST) from an already exorbitant 17.5% to 20%, so the price of petrol is now well over £1.20 per litre, so people can’t afford the cost of petrol either. What a mess this place is in.
I'm starting to look forward to going home and I'm now in countdown mode. The cold is a little wearing, although Angela assured me that it’s positively mild this morning. Nonetheless, I woke up cold and remain cold. Today I'm wearing four layers plus gloves, hat and scarf, I just hope that’s enough.
My first stop this morning was Kensington to spend the day at the Victoria & Albert Museum, one of my favourite museums. It used to be my favourite museum but I have to confess that the Louvre knocked it off the top spot. I travelled from Waterloo to the Victoria & Albert Museum without getting my feet wet, there’s a subway from South Kensington tube station to the Victoria & Albert Museum without the need to brave the elements.
I spent a good 4½ hours wandering through the many and varied galleries. I hadn’t visited the V&A since June, and a visit was overdue, especially as it will probably be my last visit for a while. I even found some galleries I hadn’t visited before. A light lunch of carrot, lentil and coriander soup and a rest for my weary legs, and then back to wandering around the galleries.
I even discovered the V&A has four Turners and several Constables. I don’t normally like Constable, I find his work too overblown and sentimental, but his seascapes are lighter and his cloud studies are a delight. I hadn’t realised he had spent time in Brighton, Hove and Rottingdean where my paternal grandmother had lived when I was a little girl. The V&A has an exhibition of Turner and Constable landscapes and although Turner is unsurpassed in my opinion, I liked a number of the Constable studies. Unsurprisingly the Tate Britain also has a collection of his works as well as the Turner bequest. The V&A also has an exhibition of Beatrix Potter’s drawings of Peter Rabbit and a massive jewellery collection stretching over 2,000 years, an extraordinary collection.
There’s always something new to see at the V&A and I never tire of visiting it. My legs don’t agree, but as a reward I promised them an early dinner at Harvey Nichols so they could rest. It was raining when I left the V&A but fortunately this morning I’d remembered to bring my umbrella. A stroll along Brompton Road, past Harrods (best avoided, especially on Saturdays, the crush is ridiculous). It’s more a tourist attraction than a shop. I haven’t been inside since Al Fayed sold it, perhaps it’s changed? Anyway, my object this afternoon was Harvey Nics. I spied a luscious grey cashmere scarf trimmed with fur in one of those cashmere shops that exist to service the Japanese market (otherwise why do they exclusively employ Japanese shop assistants?). The scarf was a snip at only £399, a trifle more than it was worth, so I decided to pass.
Harvey Nics isn't a shop I know well, a bit too Ab Fab for my tastes, so I took the express lift up to the 5th Floor Café and didn't hesitate to order a glass of Sancerre (at a ridiculous £10 a glass), but struggled to decide between the tuna, the lamb curry and the cheese burger. The curry won out and was a good choice as was the Sancerre. Also on the 5th Floor is a small food hall and one of those automated Japanese conveyor belt restaurants. I’d love to try it but I can’t stand Japanese food. As they say, sushi is alright so long as it’s well cooked. It's hardly surprising that the majority of the customers were women.
Queuing up to get into BBC Broadcasting House for a recording of The News Quiz, a 35 year old panel game (Just a Minute has been going for an astonishing 44 years), it took nearly 40 minutes just to get inside the building and then through airport style security, belts off, boots scanned and checked. One chap, just ahead of me, didn't have a ticket and wasn’t allowed in, access is only via an email application. According to the man behind me, they always have a few extra seats in reserve in the event of over-subscription, but according to the women in front of me, sometimes they can ticket up to four times the number of places available, especially if it’s a new show and they don’t have any idea how many will actually turn up. My ticket number was 175. Once in the building we were herded into a café serving coffee, beer and wine.
I had queued for 40 minutes outside and then wait another 20 minutes inside, standing all the time, before we were herded into the theatre to discover that it was already ¾ full. I’ve no idea why the audience was split in two or where the rest of the audience had been waiting, next time I will make sure I arrive by 6.00 p.m. The things I do! Nonetheless, I still had a good view of the stage even though I was near the back.
Sandi Toksvig came out on stage, a very short 4 feet 11 inches tall. She welcomed the audience and explained that Frances Wheen, one of the regular panellists, hadn’t turned up and was missing in action so another panellist had been engaged at very short (i.e. no notice), and was on his way in a taxi from Bloomsbury. The only problem was that he hadn’t read the newspapers this week, so it will be interesting to see whether that is a disadvantage to playing the game!.
Sandi explained that the recording would take until approximately 9.00 p.m. Apparently they record a lot more than the 28 minutes that they actually broadcast so that they can edit out the defamatory and inappropriate content!
The newsreader was Peter Donaldson and the three panellists who had arrived were introduced, Phil Jupitus (I don’t like him because he says rude things about Melbourne apparently because a Melbourne audience once had the temerity to boo him), Miles Jupp, (who played the Curate in Rev last year with Tom Hollander), and the always entertaining Jeremy Hardy. I frequently agree with him although I don’t always agree with his anti-Tory vitriol which seems to be a hallmark of all British comedy. Politics here are so polarised in a mealy-mouthed “it’s not fair” view of the world, where being called “posh” is deemed an insult. Posh, I ask you! It always makes me laugh whenever I hear it, it's used like a schoolyard insult. Eventually the final contestant arrived, Justin Edwards. I recognised him but couldn’t say what I’d seen him in before.
Recording started at 7.50 p.m. and didn't finish until 9.00 p.m. which allowed me sufficient time to get back to Waterloo in time to catch the 9.30 back to Portsmouth.
I have to say that the unedited version is nowhere near as crisp or pacy as the edited broadcast version of the programme. Whereas every minute of a recording of Just a Minute is funny, the same can’t be said for The News Quiz which is not uniformly funny and nowhere near as funny as the edited version that is broadcast. l will be interested to hear what makes it into the final version when it’s broadcast tomorrow evening.
Undeterred by the weather forecast, with snow expected in Scotland and Edinburgh Airport closed, I was nonetheless determined to drive north to visit Aunty Lily. The forecast yesterday for Barrow-in-Furness was light snow but by this morning that had changed to heavy rain and above zero temperatures, so Mimi and I set off at 10.00 a.m. for the 380 mile, 5¼ hour drive north.
The weather was very changeable, by turns raining and bright blue skies with fluffy white clouds. I had one pit-stop on the road for a sandwich and pressed on, turning west off the motorway onto the Furness Peninsula and through the southernmost part of the Lake District National Park. The weather up here in the north is glorious, with bright blue skies and naked, leafless trees silhouetted against the skyline. Having turned off the M6, driving east I had an awe-inspiring glimpse of distant mountains capped with snow, an unexpected delight.
I took the coastal road into Barrow and was rewarded with sweeping views over Morecambe Bay towards Morecambe, which seems to be featuring a lot at the moment with several recent television programmes about Morecambe and Wise. Because Barrow-in-Furness has long been an industrial town, it’s easy to forget that it is nestled amidst the most beautiful countryside with wonderful views across the water. I had forgotten how stunning the countryside is hereabouts. I stopped to take some photos with the sun setting and although it was cold, I was very comfortable and snug in my M&S padded gilet. It remains to be seen whether I will ever be able to wear it in Melbourne where single digit temperatures are relatively rare!
I had investigated on the internet a couple of B&Bs located on Abbey Road, but I didn't like the look of any of them including the Gables House B&B (which was my first home a long time ago before the house became a B&B), so I decided to go back to the Chetwynd Hotel where I’d stayed in April. Coincidentally, the owner lives down the road from Drayton in Bosham and Angela had worked with him at BAE Systems! It’s such a small world.
By this stage it was dark and still only 4.30 p.m. and too early to have dinner, so I decided to watch “Housewife, 49”, the Victoria Wood dramatisation of Nella Last’s war diaries, which I'm currently reading. I thought it was appropriate that I should watch it here, a very emotional experience which made me very sad. I wish Mum was here with me now, I do miss her. She could be such an irritating woman sometimes and she often drove me nuts, but I still miss her. It was only now that I realise how alike we are, which explains a good deal. And I am magnetically drawn to Barrow, my birthplace and Mum’s childhood home. I think I feel drawn to the town, not I think because I was born here, but because Mum grew up here.
Dinner at the Customs House where I had eaten last time I was here. I did try to find somewhere different but without success, you don’t come to Barrow for the food, it’s not that sort of place.
I woke cold this morning, it was a meagre 14 °C in my bedroom. I sometimes think I will never be warm again. It had rained all night but by this morning I was welcomed by bright blue skies. My first stop today and indeed the reason for my visit here in Barrow is to see Aunty Lily. I had to find Station View because I hadn’t been there before, a new retirement facility that has only been open five months. As Aunty Lily says, she’s blessed, not lucky, to have a place there. She has a very roomy suite of rooms, a living/dining area with kitchen, a large bedroom and large bathroom. She has everything she needs, all her meals are provided and the staff is on call to help her 24 hours a day.
We had a good chat, she told me about Barrow during the war and she’s seven years older than Mum her experience of the war years was somewhat different to Mum’s. I asked her how the family dealt with the air-raids on Barrow. Apparently they either rode their bikes up the shore to the black huts, only a couple of miles away but out of danger, or stayed in the town and sheltered in the Anderson shelter in the back yard. I'm not sure how sheltering inside a tin shed was considered safer than being inside one’s home, but that’s what they did. This is consistent with Nella Last’s account of the air-raids where the bombing was so intense that people would walk out into the surrounding countryside and sleep in the fields and hedgerows to escape the bombs rather than stay in their homes. It must have been terrifying.
Aunty Lily very kindly gave me four old broaches, a little teddy bear, a small photo album of Nicola’s wedding (photos that I had taken), and a postcard that my grandmother Clara’s brother had sent to Clara from Egypt during WWI, a real treasure.
It was so good to see Aunty Lily again and especially to see her so bright and well, I had been very concerned when I hadn’t been able to make contact with her just before Christmas. Susan didn't able to help but fortunately Shirley contacted John, one of Lily’s sons who lives near Shirley in Camberley, who had Aunty Lily’s new address.
From Station View, unsurprisingly named because it overlooks the Barrow-in-Furness Railway Station, pretty much destroyed during WWII and now replaced with something modern, I headed off to the Dock Museum because I wanted to see if I could buy John Duffin’s books (the Barrow-born artist I discovered recently – entries for 19th November and 10th December), but I was out of luck, they hadn’t had any of his books since the beginning of the year, although they did have a calendar featuring his paintings, so I was at least able to buy that.
I had a light lunch (an indifferent ham salad), and rugged up against the elements with six, yes six layers, four wool jumpers of varying thicknesses, a padded gilet and my ski jacket (I looked like a lime green Michelin Man). I drove to Lousy Point because I wanted to walk over to the Black Huts again or, as Mum always called it, “up the shore”.
I had the foresight to bring with me my walking boots, the unmade road is not passable by two-wheel drive Mimi, it was very muddy and full of deep potholes. Even from a distance I could hear the waves crashing onto the stone strewn beach the other side of the point. I passed several people walking their dogs including a lady with two dogs, one of whom was a wired-haired terrier called Ossie, four years old and with a docked tail. He was very friendly and we had a pleasant chat. For some reason, the wire-haired terrier is no longer a very popular breed which is a pity, they are affectionate and loyal pets, the Burmese of the dog world. (I read somewhere recently that the Burmese is the dog of the cat world which from my experience couldn’t be a truer statement.) I'm so looking forward to being able to replace my lovely Tam cat.
The walk took me along a quiet curved inlet, but on the other side of the point, the waves could be heard crashing against the large pebbles, (more stones than pebbles), that litter the beach. I had an enjoyable trudge along the track and up through the sand-dunes, imaging the sounds of Mum, Aunty Lily, Uncle Tommy and Johnny, playing in the dunes as children, splashing in the shallow, undoubtedly freezing, waters, squealing with delight, as children do. Mum always said the happiest time of her life was the time she spent “up the shore” as a child.
I was somewhat surprised to see a new hut is in the process of being built because I thought the huts were built on council land, although Aunty Lily said the land belongs to the Duke of Cavendish who owns nearby Holker Hall (which I visited in April). Although small, the huts are more substantial than conventional beach boxes and are very rudimentary, old-fashioned holiday houses.
On my return walk, the sun was sinking fast, bathing the countryside with an orange/pinky glow. Cows were grazing by the side of the road and the whole area was very serene, with magnificent mountains towering in the distance. The light started to fail as I drove away, although strangely, given that I am so much further north, it seems to be lighter later. I'm sure that can’t be right, perhaps I'm imaging it.
I stopped off at the 24 hour Tesco for some water and fresh fruit at about 4.30 p.m. only to discover that it wasn’t really a 24 hour store at all. In fact it’s only open for 24 hours on four days of the week, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. On Sunday it’s only open between 10.00 a.m. and 4.00 p.m., just six hours, so passing itself off as a 24 hour store is nothing short of misleading.
I drove around Barrow for a while, keen to get a feel for the place and ensure a strong imprint of the town on my memory, and passed Nella Last’s house at 9, Ilkley Road, literally just around the round from Abbey Road; I was astonished to discover that she was living just a few hundred meters from where I was born at the Risedale Maternity Hospital on Abbey Road. I took a few more photos, again visited 29 Osborne Road and as darkness fell, drove back to the Chetwynd Hotel only to discover that my plastic door key had somehow detached from my key ring and was now lost. Apparently the key card system here is very old and is difficult to replace. Oh dear.
I had planned to go to Evensong at St James’s Church where Mum had worshipped as a child, but because of the delays in getting into my room caused by the lost room key, I didn't arrive at the church until well after 6.30 p.m. and the service had already begun. I snuck in quietly and was disappointed to discover the congregation consisted of only two plus the minister, who were all standing at the altar. I was too self-conscious to join them, being so late, so I sat at the back and looked at what is undeniably a huge and impressive church, built in 1867. Churches here in England are almost always locked when not in use, which is very irritating, so at least I was able to see inside St James’s. I gave up any the idea of attending the service properly and went in search of somewhere to eat. I found an Indian restaurant on Dalton Road called Mithali which looked inviting enough and had a light meal. I couldn’t resist the pistachio kulfi.
Back to the Chetwynd for a relaxing bath, I had bought some rose-scented bath crystals in the morning, and then watched Zen with the very yummy Rufus Sewell, my current favourite television programme (admittedly that has more to do with Rufus Sewell than everything else), but it is set in Roma so it and Rufus are very easy on the eye.
To ward off the cold I had left the electric heater on in my room all night so this morning it was a balmy 23°C. Oh so nice. Abbey Road is a handsome boulevard with what used to be called a gentleman’s residences, and the Chetwynd is no exception, set in generous grounds, in its day it would have been magnificent. Now those generous grounds are tarmaced over for car parking, and my bedroom, at the very top of the house, would have been the maid’s room. No wonder it’s so cold, no heating for the servants. Although a comfortable hotel, I'm saddened by the house’s descent from a home to something so much less appealing, although that’s not to suggest that there is anything wrong with the hotel.
It was grey and wet this morning and I'm glad I had taken my walk up the shore yesterday afternoon. I wanted to say my good-byes to Aunty Lily, conscious that I may not see her again, she’s 89 at the end of the month. I gave her a colourful blanket and matching cushion that she can use while sitting watching television, about the only thing she can do these days as she’s entirely housebound. I do hope she uses the things I gave her, as well as the bathroom smellies and chocolates I gave her yesterday.
We had a lovely chat about Mum and life and family and things, I got a bit emotional, Barrow always affects me like this, a totally inexplicable reaction to my home town. What a wuss I am.
On taking my leave of Aunty Lily I went and paid my respects to my grandmother Clara and laid some flowers on her grave, white roses and freesias. I was so cold, and it was damp and windswept, looking out over the cemetery perched high on a hill and looking out towards the Devonshire Dock Hall which now dominates the skyline, a massive blot on the landscape. No-one could ever describe Barrow as an attractive town, it was referred to in 2008 as the most working class location in the UK.
I drove around town for a little, struggling to bring myself to leave, knowing that it will be a long time indeed before I'm back in Barrow, but it was raining and it was still very cold so I saw no point in lingering longer and decided to call it a day and head out of town, as much as I wanted to find a pretext to stay longer. Barrow has such a strong and emotional hold on me, I am very proud of my roots, which perhaps explains why I am so drawn to John Duffin’s paintings, he obviously has a similar relationship with the town, although in his case he did actually grow up in Barrow, which obviously I didn't. Of course, I couldn’t live there, it’s too cold for one thing, and there’s no work for me, but it's important for me not to forget where I come from and be grateful for what I have.
I took a few photos in the rain. Nothing special but I wanted to catch the atmosphere of the place. I don’t know when I'll be back in Barrow, hopefully sometime soon, I still have to scatter Mum’s ashes (sorry Mum, I screwed up this year, but I will do it, I know you understand).
I left Barrow, still raining, and drove through the southern edge of the Lake District and decided to take a detour and visit Morecambe. I think this has more to do with the recent Morecombe and Wise bio-pic and other programmes that were on the television over Christmas, and I found the statue of Eric Morecambe (née Bartholomew along the waterfront). In summer I expect Morecambe is worth a visit, looking out over Morecambe Bay towards Barrow-in-Furness, but today it was cold and windswept.
Another detour through Lancaster, famous for its red roses (haha!). I didn't stop, just drove through the town which reminded me a little of Durham. And now for something completely different, I decided to take a look at Blackpool, quite why I'm not sure, it’s just one of those places I’ve heard about all my life but never actually visited, and for good reason. It’s pretty dire, and even though I was seeing it on a wet and cold winter’s day, I didn't get the impression it would improve much in summer.
I finally drove into Chester, a town much famed for its ancient city centre. I found a B&B without difficulty, The Limes, at £30 per night, very reasonable for a large twin room and en-suite bathroom including a bath. I drove into the city centre, looking for somewhere to have dinner, but in the dark it was a difficult, complicated mess. I do hope the centre of Chester is more appealing in daylight. Tonight it was cold and wet and dark but within walking distance of the B&B I eventually found somewhere to have dinner, a Chinese restaurant, not a cuisine I would normally select, but I couldn’t find anywhere else apart from the ubiquitous pub-grub which I didn't fancy.
When I picked up my emails this evening I received a delightful email from John Duffin, my favourite Barrow-born artist, attaching some paintings of Barrow he thought might be of interest. I’ve selected three images that resonate with me, all attached. The painting of Victoria Fields is a view taken from Newby Terrace, the very spot where quite coincidentally I took a photo this morning, so it definitely has my name on it. Barrow Rooftops has the claustrophobic feel of the 2 up/2 down back-to-back house that Mum grew up in on Osborne Street, tucked behind St James’s Church, and is very evocative of the old Coronation Street opening titles I remember as a child.
John is exhibiting these two small oils at the Dock Museum in Barrow in March but Black Combe and Roanhead from the Quarry is available immediately. This image captures the area Mum always referred to as “up the shore”, and the small black dots represent the Black Huts that I visited yesterday. John tells me that he did the painting a few years ago showing The Quarry, with Sandscale and Walney Channel as it goes out towards Black Combe, viewed by moonlight. He rightly describes it as a magnificent view showing the coastal dynamic of the area where his Grandmother has farmed for 70 years, so he knows and loves this area himself. I must have it.
The problem with Chester is that the vandals (aka the developers and town planners) mangled the city in the 1960s, destroying much of the character of the city by running main roads and flyovers straight through the centre of what was a small, compact and ancient city. It's an absolute disgrace and although the central shopping area has since been pedestrianised and you can actually walk along the top of the northern section of the old wall, hundreds of ancient buildings were demolished to make way for the main road.
In the 1920s they discovered a Roman amphitheatre, apparently the largest in Britain, and it took intervention from Westminster to stop the local council from running another road right over the top of that! Things have changed and I think the city burgers have aspirations of gaining World Heritage Listing for the city, although to my mind too much damage has been done to the fabric of the town to warrant listing.
Chester is famous for its half-timbered rows of shops and, taken together with the Cathedral and city walls, you can be forgiven for thinking this is a perfectly preserved medieval city but in reality the Rows are not authentic Tudor buildings at all but mid-Victorian replicas. Although described in the local guidebook as unique and 700 years old, (parts may have originally been built in the 13th and 14th centuries), it was with the advent of the railway and tourism that the Victorian passion for antiquities took hold and these replicas were built, so it’s a bit of a con.
I started the day with a coffee and a leisurely read of The Times newspaper, about the only newspaper worth reading in Britain, before heading off to the Cathedral, 1,000 years old and remarkably intact, having survived that tyrant Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries by being converted from a Benedictine monastery to a Cathedral in the then newly created diocese. The Cathedral boasts a fine organ and beautifully carved misericords in the Quire. Not as fine as Salisbury Cathedral (which was apparently the template for Ken Follet’s Pillars of the Earth, worth watching if only for the delicious Rufus Sewell and Matthew Macfadyen), but more impressive than St David’s Cathedral in South Wales. Nonetheless, there’s something about churches and cathedrals in general that imbue me with a sense of peace and stillness, it doesn’t matter how many I visit, I always leave them in a better frame of mind than when I arrive. I lit my candles, said my prayers and gave thanks for my good fortune.
From the Cathedral I made my way outside the city walls to see what’s left of the amphitheatre, not much as it turns out, there’s an indentation where it once stood but the walls and seating are long gone. Apparently it would have held 7,000 spectators and from the drawings it would have been quite something in its day. Next to the amphitheatre is St John’s Church which has Anglo-Saxon origins, all rounded Romanesque arches. It was rather forlorn, quiet and empty. The upside was that it was open in a country where so many churches are locked except when in use, which is a crying shame as far as I'm concerned. Churches are a place of sanctuary and peace and should be accessible to everyone.
St John’s is perched high above the River Dee which flows through Chester, originally a busy port before the river started to silt up during the Tudor era. I walked through the churchyard, over-run by grey squirrels, very tame and inquisitive. They came right up to me expecting to be fed and intrigued by the sound of my camera’s shutter. They certainly put on a show for me, posing for pictures and scampering about; they are like rats with bushy tails, and much smaller than possums.
There’s a handsome suspension bridge over the River Dee built in 1923 which linked Chester with the affluent suburbs the other side of the river, now a foot bridge with commanding views up and down the river. It’s an attractive riverside area with a bandstand and riverside pubs, understandably under-utilised this time of the year, but it was a fine clear day with ravishing blue skies, the sun reflecting off the river and a few locals taking the air and walking their dogs.
I walked along the river outside the city walls and headed for Telford’s Warehouse which I’d seen in the local guidebook. It was a bit of a slog and my inbuilt “hillometer” was telling me that there was a steep climb, i.e. my right knee was complaining, which slowed me down quite a bit. I'm fine on the flat, but the merest hint of an incline and the hillometer starts to register. Today it was off the scale. I eventually found Telford’s Warehouse only to discover that it was just a pub-cum-restaurant, and as I didn't want a drink and I wasn’t hungry, I was very disappointed. However, I did find the canal basin and the residential development along the northern perimeter of the old city. During summer I'm sure it’s a lovely spot and Chester itself is obviously a prosperous and well-to-do city, registering high on my fripperies scale.
It was at this point that I discovered that I could either walk along the canal or along the top of the city wall, so I took the city wall option as it afforded good views of the city, especially around the back of the Cathedral. As the afternoon was slipping away I walked back across the city to the Grosvenor Museum, dedicated to the history of Chester, which was worth the detour. There was an excellent video tracing Chester’s history from prehistoric times through to the present and beyond, and there are some rooms reconstructed in various eras, although nothing I hadn’t seen before.
Chester has an excellent cheese shop on Northgate Street called, yes you guessed it, The Cheese Shop, and was compelled (is compelled the right word?), to buy some cheese. I went in and said, “I know this sounds corny, but do you have any Cheshire cheese?”, (Chester being in the county of Cheshire). Cheshire cheese was Mum’s favourite and certainly one of my favs, although it’s fair to say my absolute favourite cheese is blue cheese, any blue cheese. I’ve eaten a mountain of Stilton in the last few weeks. Here in England at Christmastime they produce Stilton in earthenware jars and somehow, I'm not sure how this happened, but I seem to have started a collection of Stilton jars. I have one from Fortnum and Mason, another from Sainsbury’s, one from Marks and Spencer and a fourth from Cropwell Bishop Creamery. All delicious, I can make a meal just out of blue cheese. Anyway, I selected two cheeses, 4⅝ ozs. of Helers Blue Cheshire, made in Nantwich from pasteurised cows’ milk and matured for three months (£6.36 per lb., bizarrely still sold by the pound, Britain stubbornly refuses to accept metrication even though it was introduced 20 years ago, it was a very half-hearted adoption), and 4½ ozs. of Bournes, a farm-made Cheshire by Mr. and Mrs. Bourne, a full fat cheese made traditionally with pasteurised cows’ milk (£6.50 per lb.), or so the labels say. The Helers Blue ticked all the boxes for me, it was blue, it was Cheshire cheese and it was locally produced, what more could I ask for? (Verdict: delicious.)
I also bought some French olives stuffed with garlic, some locally made water biscuits, a small panforte from Sienna and a couple of cheese knives. So without trying I managed to spend over £30, but worth every penny. No desert for me tonight, I'll be having cheese!
By this time the light was beginning to fail and I hadn’t stopped for lunch as I had planned to have “linner” at Chez Jules. I had dinner at a Chez Jules restaurant in Edinburgh a couple of times and hadn’t realised that it was part of a chain, this is the first time I’ve seen another. Britain is littered with chains of restaurants, it’s extraordinary how many there are, indeed trying to find decent independent restaurants here that aren’t Chinese or Indian can be something of a challenge. Although there’s a Carluccio’s restaurant nearer to the museum and the car park and my knee was playing up, I persevered and walked back across the city for the umpteenth time, only to discover that Chez Jules didn't open for dinner until 6.00 p.m. and it was only 5.00 p.m. Bugger.
So after all that, linner today was at Carluccio’s, which of course was no hardship, apart from my complaining knee, as I always like the food. Fettuccine with wild bore ragu and a green salad with shaved parmesan. Yum. And I just had to buy two ravioli cutters (one square and the other round), and two olive oil pourers. I can’t help myself, I'm a magnet for kitchen things. Goodness knows where I'm going to put everything when I get home, but I do love collecting my bits and pieces.
All in all a good day, lots of fresh air, walking, photos and cheese, what more can I ask for?
I woke this morning to rain. I drove from Chester to Worcester, a drive of two and a bit hours, entirely in the rain, and I drove from Worcester to Portsmouth, another 2½ hour drive, through more driving rain. My stop off in Worcester was to have lunch with Margaret, whom I had met in Paris in 1986. On that, my first trip to England, I spent seven weeks in England and one in Paris, where I met Margaret. She was holidaying with some girlfriends and I was on my own, so I tagged along with them. I can’t remember everyone’s names, after all it was 25 years ago (where does the time go?).
Margaret and I have stayed in touch, exchanging Christmas cards and annual letters ever since, and today was the first time we have caught up in all those years. She had very kindly invited me to have lunch with her at her home, and I met George, her husband of nearly 50 years. It was good to be able to put a face to a name at long last, and he was very easy to talk to.
Margaret and I had a good chat and I really enjoyed myself. I was very appreciative of her hospitality and it was lovely to catch up with her again. By 4.00 p.m. it was time to hit the road because I still had a drive of 140 miles back to Portsmouth, in the rain and in the dark, not my favourite driving conditions. I filled the petrol tank at an eye-watering £1.2999 per litre, and got back to Portsmouth about 7.00 p.m..
Archie was very pleased to see me, and I’d only been away for five days! He is going to miss me when I go home.
Up early and off to London again for the second recording of The News Quiz. As usual I caught the first off peak train at 8.40 a.m.. The train was noticeably more crowded than recent visits, the holiday season is definitely over.
From Waterloo I hopped onto the Jubilee Line for a quick trip to Canary Wharf, a super-modern station which spews out workers into the hub of the financial services industry in the regenerated docklands. I was meeting Shariffa for lunch. I first met Shariffa in Melbourne when she was working for PricewaterhouseCoopers, having transferred from the London office. She is an expert in the FSA and helped me with the licence application we made to the FSA for authorisation to operate in the UK.
Unfortunately Shariffa decided to return to England where her family, parents, brother, nieces and nephews, all live. It was a shame because Shariffa likes Melbourne and I like Shariffa, but we kept in touch and we reconnected recently on LinkedIn. I was astonished that she had been with Northern Trust for four years, when we last had lunch in London she was still at PricewaterhouseCoopers. I thought it was a couple of years ago, how time flies. We had lunch at Carluccios, one of my favourite restaurants here in England, consistently good quality Italian food.
We had a good chat and Shariffa convinced me to explore contracting in compliance where the money is much better and contracting is more tax efficient, and now that bonuses are in the process of being paid, she anticipates that the job market will start to move again. She’s going to email to me the names of some compliance head-hunters. Apparently you can work for a maximum of 44 weeks on contract, with attendant tax breaks, which makes the prospect of staying more appealing because the money here isn't that good. Something to explore before I go home. Who knows, perhaps I will stay? 50% of me wants to stay and 50% wants to go home, my eternal conundrum. My ideal solution is to live six months in London and six months in Melbourne (avoiding winter all together!). Contracting could offer the ideal solution. Time will tell.
It was certainly lovely to see Shariffa again after all this time, and her advice was invaluable. Sadly she had to go back to work, so I caught the train over to White City as I had an afternoon to kill before the recording of The News Quiz. I thought I’d have a quick look at the Westfield Shopping Centre which opened in 2008, although I don’t much care for mega-shopping centres; Chadstone may be the largest shopping centre in the southern hemisphere and just around the corner from home, but I avoid it like the plague. The problem with shopping centres is that they are all alike, the same selection of high street shops. Seen one Body Shop/House of Fraser/Zara/Hobbs/L K Bennett/Lush/M&S/Debenhams/John Lewis, you’ve seen them all. And I didn't think Westfield is as attractive as Chadstone, nor is it as large and neither does it have free parking as there is at Chadstone (query: where is there free parking in England?). The visit was nonetheless made worthwhile by seeing BBC Television Centre which is just across the road.
Still at a loose end and not in the slightest interested in the shopping centre, I hopped back on the Tube for Liverpool Street Station because I wanted to catch the 344 bus to Clapham Junction. Not to become the (wo)man on the Clapham Omnibus but to check out the view from the top of the bus. That may sound a little peculiar, actually I think it is peculiar, but there is a reason, of sorts. I was curious to determine whether the Gherkin and Lloyds of London were both visible at the same time from the top of the bus. They aren’t, which is what I thought, so I probably won’t buy the lithograph I had seen that incorporated both architectural icons . As I said, I had time to kill and curiosity satisfied, I headed off to Oxford Circus, the nearest tube station to BBC Broadcasting House.
Surfacing from the bowels of the tube network it was pouring with rain. Fortunately I’d brought the umbrella I’d bought last week and wandered along Regent Street. More of the ubiquitous High Street brands, I wandered into Liberty, one of the few standalone shops on Regent Street. I love the interior of Liberty and the somewhat quirky and expensive merchandise, and it doesn’t cost anything to look.
Leaving Liberty, it was raining even more heavily. Stopping to pick up a sandwich and tangerine from Prêt a Manger, I headed off to Broadcasting House to join the queue. Because I was early I didn't expect there to be much of a queue, if any, so much to my surprise and despite the heavy rain, there was still quite a queue. I spent 45 minutes huddled under my umbrella, munching my sandwich and cursing my boots that appear to be leaking and very damp. The things I do to indulge my obsessions, but I do love The News Quiz and I may never have another opportunity to attend a recording, so I have to take advantage of the opportunities when they arise. I have been to several Radio 4 recordings over the years, two episodes of Just a Minute in 2002, one episode in 2010, the Front Row Quiz, also in 2010, and now these two episodes of The News Quiz.
We were again ushered into a holding pen to wait, but at least I was warm and dry (apart from my feet), and I was able to find a seat, so happily sat and wrote up my blog while waiting. Finally, we were seated in the recording theatre and I had a seat five rows from the front, next to a lady who was at least 100 and smelt unpleasantly of old lady. The middle-aged man in front of me wore a ponytail, an earring and a T-shirt held together with safety pins. I'm not sure what a typical Radio 4 audience is, I think eclectic is the only description, especially given the very pronounced left-leaning bias of the panellists.
My News Quiz dream team is:
* Sandi Toksvig – Chairman
* Harriet Cass – news reader (I love her voice)
* Andy Hamilton – an absolute favourite (Drop the Dead Donkey, Old Harry’s Game, Trevor’s World of Sport, and most recently the brilliant Outnumbered), a very funny man
* Jeremy Hardy – he’s as red as a baboons’ backside, but very intelligent and I frequently find myself agreeing with him, despite his lefty politics
* Frances Wheen – an old regular together with the much missed Alan Coren; and
* Sue Perkins – a very articulate and funny woman, especially when working with Giles Coren (Alan Coren’s son).
What we got was:
* Sandi Toksvig – Chairman
* Neil Sleet – news reader
* Henning Venn – a German-born comedian who has lived in England for the last eight years and still speaks with a heavy accent and is frequently unintelligible. I’ve heard him on David Mitchell’s Unbelievable Truth and is not as funny as he thinks
* Jeremy Hardy
* Susan Calman – seen in Edinburgh (see review for 28th August); and
* Sue Perkins.
Not a bad outcome, I am at least familiar with everyone on the stage and I like being able to put a face to the voices I’ve heard before. The time for the start of the recording, 7.30 p.m., came and went and it finally started at 7.50 p.m. and didn't finish until 9.15 p.m.. So 85 minutes of material, much of it waffle, undisciplined and rambling and quite frankly unfunny and largely unbroadcastable (if there is such a word). A judicious edit will see 28 minutes broadcast tomorrow evening.
There’s a television programme here called Location, Location, Location, hosted by Phil and Kirstie, whose job is to find a suitable home based on a specified criteria for (usually), a couple. I’ve seen the show a few times and it’s mildly entertaining, watching the dynamics between Phil, Kristie and the couple concerned, and taps into that desire to have a stickybeak into other peoples’ homes.
A new series started tonight with Phil using the same format for six couples emigrating to Australia. It turns out that Phil is married to a Melbourne girl and has visited Australia many times, so he’s familiar with the property market. The first episode was in Melbourne where a couple from Manchester have moved and are looking to buy a house on the Mornington Peninsula in Frankston South, near where Mum lived. I burst into tears. I’ve been missing my little home for some time now but I hadn’t realised how much I have been missing Melbourne. Showcased were Degraves Street, for coffee of course, Flinders Street Station, trams and other landmarks including (for some reason), the Federal Court. Phil spoke with some ex-pat POMS about their experience of moving to Australia.
The show highlighted the higher salaries in Australia, the booming economy and demand for skilled workers, the better weather and the fact that Melbourne is one of the most liveable cities in the world. The irony is that today is the 42nd anniversary of the day we arrived in Melbourne in 1969, a date that as a family we always celebrated.
Good fun tonight, Angela, Rodney and I went to a quiz night at Margaret’s local church, St Cuthburt’s in Baffins, a suburb of Portsmouth. The sound barrier question was the first question of the evening. We called our five man team of Angela, Rodney, Margaret and Margaret’s brother David, plus me of course, Melbourne (well we couldn’t think of anything else at short notice. Other team names included “Six Bomb” and “The Clever Corner”).
We started really well and would have won, had we not crashed and burned on the round dedicated to questions on Hampshire. I knew the answer to the first question, where is Jane Austen’s house and museum (readers of this blog will remember I visited Chawton in June), but I had no idea about the other 13 questions. Unfortunately neither did the rest of our team and we scored a pathetic 5 out of 14, so you can imagine we were disappointed to come second overall, losing the top spot by only two points. Oh well, it’s only a game, and we did have a lot of fun and helped to raise funds for the Church restoration.
* the whip
My last trip before returning to Melbourne, today I drove up to Manchester for a look-see. I've never been to Manchester before and it has a couple of things I want to see, the Lowry Centre and the iconic matchstick men paintings by L S Lowry, (paintings I have long wanted to see), and Daniel Libeskind’s Imperial War Museum, more for its architecture than anything else, although if the London Imperial War Museum is a gauge, this one will be worth visiting as well.
Also, I would like to catch up with Michael (Annemarie and Perrian’s son and my travel agent), and his wife Eleanor who moved from Melbourne to Manchester earlier last year, flying from Melbourne to Singapore and then travelling overland to England via Asia and Russia (see: http://www.getjealous.com/Swangaff). I'm hoping to have dinner with them later this week.
The B&B is very nice, a large twin room with the tiniest bathroom I have ever seen, it’s the size of a wardrobe! But there is a problem and a real problem which has irritated me. The Ivy Mount Guest House website specifies that it has internet access and I had booked the room on that basis but on arrival I discovered that I had to pay for my internet connection, something that has never happened at any other B&B or Guest House. And to add insult to injury I have been entirely unable to access the web because it is not user-friendly and despite trying to pay with both my credit and debit cards, it just won’t process them. Not happy. I’ve left it with the proprietor to resolve but I'm not optimistic. Hopeless and I think their website misrepresents the situation.
Paul, the proprietor, had recommended a local restaurant called Smiths but I discovered it was closed on Monday evenings, so I drove to Salford Quays where I knew I would be able to find plenty of restaurants, which I did. Again the usual collection of restaurant chains which seem to dominate towns in England, I settled on Café Rouge. It’s not brilliant food but when you are on the road you can at least know what you are going to get. There doesn’t seem to be the same vibrant restaurant culture in England that we take for granted in Melbourne.
Cold Feet, one of my all-time favourite television programmes, was filmed in Manchester and it will be interesting to drive around tomorrow and see if it lives up to my expectations. When I spoke with Michael the other day he tells me that Manchester is very like Melbourne, it has a vibrancy like Melbourne. Time will tell, my initial reaction following a drive through the centre of the city after dinner is a little lukewarm, but I'm prepared to suspend judgement until tomorrow when I can have a look-see during daylight.
The two things I want to see here in Manchester are on opposite sides of the Manchester Canal in Salford, where I had dinner last night, rather than Manchester proper. The first was the Lowry Gallery and the other was the Imperial War Museum North. Specifically I wanted to see L S Lowry’s paintings and the Daniel Libeskind designed Museum.
Salford Quays is the huge urban regeneration project of Manchester’s derelict port, not unlike London’s Canary Wharf or Melbourne’s Docklands. Like so many attempts at regenerated blighted urban landscapes, Salford Quays is a soulless place and I think the photos flatter it. What I hadn’t appreciated was that Manchester had a dock area at all given that it’s thirty miles from the coast (i.e. Liverpool). What I hadn’t allowed for was that the canal system that criss-crosses England pre-dated the advent of the railway and for many years was the main means of transporting Manchester’s manufactured goods around the country and further afield. It’s no coincidence that the term Manchester is synonymous in Australia with cotton merchandise, despite England’s obvious inability to actually grow cotton.
It was cool this morning but I’ve been able to shed two layers and today I only had four layers rather than the customary six, despite the temperature still being in single figures, at least there was no wind.
First stop was the Lowry Centre to see the paintings, only to discover that the gallery didn't actually open until 11.00 a.m. (11.00 a.m. for goodness sake!!!). Fortunately there was a 20 minute film on the life of the artist and his work which was very interesting as I didn't know that much about Lowry, a very solitary man who died in 1976. He was definitely a very odd man but I do like his paintings. There was also an exhibition of photos from the 1960s by Harry Hammond, an English photographer who specialised in photographing rock and roll artists. The exhibition featured photos of an impossibly young Cliff Richard, Adam Faith and Shirley Bassey, as well as Nat King Cole and Ella Fitzgerald.
By the time I had finished viewing the photos, (on loan from the Victoria & Albert Museum), the Lowry Gallery was open. I was perhaps a trifle disappointed that there were only two galleries of his painting on display, but they featured fine examples of Lowry’s work and coupled with the film I had already seen, I was happy with what I saw. There was also an exhibition on ballet and Ninette de Valois which held no interest for me whatsoever. I'm not sure the drive up here just to see the Lowry’s would be warranted, but hey ho, he is one of my favourite artists and I'm here now.
There is one of those characterless shopping outlet malls next to the Lowry Centre, monuments to unbridled consumerism and not one of my favourite places, but I was hoping that they would have a coffee shop with wi fi. Yes to the coffee shop, but no to the wi-fi. V irritating given that my B&B has failed to deliver on its representation that wi-fi is available.
The Imperial War Museum boasts an iconic building designed by Daniel Libeskind, which opened in July 2002 and won a RIBA International Award. It was featured on a recent series of programmes called “Climbing Great Buildings”; of the 15 featured buildings, I've seen 12 of them, although of course I haven’t climbed any of them, perhaps with the exception of St Paul’s Cathedral, although I took stairs rather than climbing the outside of the building.
The Imperial War Museum is a first class with a number of interesting exhibitions including an exhibition on War at Sea. I had lunch at the museum overlooking the Manchester Canal and then wandered through the six silos that make up the permanent exhibition. Each is a separate area with a different themed look at war in the 20th and 21st Century, including women's work in wartime and war reporting and propaganda. There was a video made as recently as 1976 on precautions to take in the event of a nuclear attack, including the chilling sound of the WWII air-raid siren which gives me the willies; it’s little wonder that Mum said the sound distressed her for all her life, having grown up with the sound as a child during WWII.
The Museum was largely empty today, and before leaving I took the lift up inside the Shard for the expansive views of Salford and Manchester. It was cold and eerie and I felt sorry for the guard stuck up there all day in the cold, with few visitors to break the monotony. A walk around the Quays was unedifying and cold and I gave it up as a bad job. The area was largely deserted so Mimi and I went for a drive into the centre of Manchester for a look-see. I was surprised, considering the amount of damage wrought by the Luftwaffe during WWII, how much of the Victorian architecture must have been rebuilt because a video I had seen at the Imperial War Museum of the air-raids showed damaged and destroyed buildings that still seem to be there.
Manchester is a big sprawling mess of a city with a fine university. In some ways it reminds me of Melbourne with its trams and blend of old and new, but essentially it’s an old industrial city with minimal charm. I suspect it's one of those places you learn to love through familiarity.
Dinner at Smiths, as recommended by Paul at the B&B, complete with live music. The early bird dinner is obviously very popular, the restaurant was packed by 6.45 p.m.
Footnote: today the blog breaks the 150,000 word barrier, making it longer than Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice at 122,000 words but shorter than Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations at 185,500 words.
Coming to the conclusion that I had seen all that Manchester had to offer of interest, to decided to visit Liverpool, home of The Fab Four (aka The Beatles), Gerry and the Pacemakers, Cilla Black, Billy Fury, etc., etc., etc..
I had the option of taking a canal cruise along the Manchester Canal to Liverpool, a one-way trip of six hours. It’s probably very relaxing on a warm summer’s day, but not today, so instead I drove the 30 miles to the west of Manchester. Liverpool, like Manchester, is on the cusp of a regeneration but at the moment remains a rather down at heel city. Standing by the Mersey opportunity the Liver Building I could hear Gerry and the Pacemakers singing their iconic Liverpool song, Ferry Cross the Mersey, that I remember from 1964. I even have an original 45 r.p.m. single of it. I did toy briefly with taking the ferry across the Mersey but it was too cold and dreary so I had a coffee instead.
Jane excelled herself this morning, I had plotted a course from Eccles to The Strand, the main waterfront area in Liverpool which was where I planned to start my day’s exploration, and she asked did I want to avoid the tolls. As usual I elected to pay them, assuming that meant I would get there quicker, but what did Jane do? She only sent me through the Mersey tunnel at a cost of £1.40 and across to the other side, and then had me turn around and drive back through the same tunnel for another £ 1.40. Half way along the return trip (I was fuming at this stage), and without any signage or warning, the road forked. Instinct told me to take the left route, because I was in a tunnel of course Jane was no help whatsoever. I then found myself on The Strand, but could have achieved the same result without spending £2.80 and driving across and back through the two mile tunnel which was completed in 1934 at a cost of £8 million. At the time it was the longest underwater tunnel in the world and held that title for 24 years. Had I just followed the directional street signage instead of listening to Jane I would probably have got there just as quickly and without tolls, but had wrongly assumed that Jane knew what she was talking about. Wrong. Today was by far her most ludicrous mis-direction yet. I couldn’t use SatNav in Melbourne, it would drive me nuts being directed to take nonsensical routes that I know to be the worst route (have you ever been in a taxi with a driver who (a) doesn’t speak English, and (b) doesn’t know Melbourne and is totally reliant on his SatNav, and been taken on a magical mystery tour via the busiest and slowest route to your destination? I have and it’s soooooo frustrating.
Then I had to find a car park which wasn’t a lot of fun either. I’d left Eccles at 9.10 a.m. for an allegedly 40 minute drive and finally found somewhere to park by 10.30 a.m.
A few interesting facts about Liverpool:
* approximately 9 million Britons left Europe for the New World from Liverpool docks;
* the Diocese of Liverpool is home to 50% of Britain’s Catholics; and
* Liverpool has the oldest European Chinese community in Europe.
Liverpool is also home to one of the four Tate galleries and having visited the other three, I wanted to complete the quadrella but I have to confess to being disappointed. The paintings were good and the sculptures of the human form from antiquity to the modern day was an interesting contrast of changing styles over the centuries, but how can three basketballs suspended in a fish tank be art? Okay, so I'm an art philistine, I know nothing about art but I know what I like. I also know what I don’t like and I don’t like modern sculpture, if that’s what it’s called. Barbara Hepworth, yes. Henry Moore, yes. Damien Hirst, no. Tracey Emin, no. Sorry, not for me.
My guidebook recommended the museum of Liverpool Life but I discovered the museum closed in June 2006 and the new Liverpool Museum, due to open last year, still isn't finished. I have no doubt that when it’s finished it will be sensational, from one angle (see photo), it looks like a gigantic prow of a ship. Sadly, it still isn't finished. I could have visited the Maritime and Slavery Museum but quite frankly by this stage I was all museum-ed out, so after a sandwich lunch at the Tate I decided to take one of those open-topped, hop on, hop off buses that tour around the city pointing out the relevant landmarks. Let’s have a reality check, it’s January and freezing cold, but I was tired and wanted to rest my legs, so the bus seemed like a good idea. Apart from the cold, it was worthwhile. I saw the Catholic Cathedral (über-modern), the Church of England Cathedral which is the longest Cathedral in the world, the Craven Club had been before they demolished it, the cultural quarter (magnificent Victorian museums, galleries and concert halls indicating the city was once extremely wealthy), and back to the docklands.
Liverpool, like London, Manchester, Coventry, etc., was badly damaged during WWII. Nonetheless, Liverpool has the most listed buildings (i.e. a building that has been placed on the Statutory List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest. It is a widely used status here, applied to around half a million buildings), outside London which I think is staggering.
By mid-afternoon I was frozen to the marrow and tired, so liberated Mimi from the car park and drove back to mc, exhausted, where I had a bit of a snooze before driving over to Chorlton to have dinner with Michael and Eleanor. I’ve know Michael’s parents, the lovely Annemarie and Perrian, since 1988, and Michael is my travel agent, but he and his English wife have recently moved to Manchester from Melbourne where they are now settled.
We had had dinner in Melbourne, Annemarie, Perrian, Eleanor, Michael and I, just before they set off on their five month odyssey overland from Asia to England, a month before I left Melbourne, taking the more direct air option.
It is always good to see friends from Melbourne, my homesickness is really starting to kick in. We had dinner at the most dog-friendly pub in England, the Horse & Jockey, on Chorlton Green, a picturesque little pub in a delightful village setting. We had a lovely dinner and I enjoyed chatting with Eleanor and Michael. I also saw a part of Manchester I would not have otherwise seen, Chorlton is a very pretty little village. Australia doesn’t do villages, we have suburbs and towns but no villages. England has hamlets and villages and towns and cities, a city being defined as a town with a Cathedral, hence St. David’s in Wales is technically a city even though it’s the size of a large village. All very artificial, but hey, they’ve always done it like that.
* Gerry and the Pacemakers – 1964
I checked out of the B&B, slipping and falling down the dangerously wet and icy steps of the B&B, fortunately without injuring myself. Mimi was encrusted with a thick hoarfrost, de-icer to the rescue. I had decided that rather than drive directly back to Portsmouth today, I’d take a diversion to Hereford Cathedral to see the Mappa Mundi, the largest medieval map known to exist. There have been several television programmes on maps generally and the Mappa Mundi specifically in recent times so I wanted to see something that is both unique and ancient.
Now, if I’d had internet access at the Ivy Mount B&B, which I didn't, (a very sore point), I could have checked to confirm that (a) the Cathedral was open, and (b) that the Mappa Mundi was on display. Because I couldn’t check I made the mistake of assuming it would be okay and drove the 140 miles to Hereford, taking me considerably out of my way by some 40 miles, only to discover that the Mappa Mundi and the Chained Library are closed for restoration until 24th January. Not happy.
Having said that, by taking the scenic route through Hereford I saw some beautiful countryside. The fields were coated with a white ghostly hoarfrost for much of the drive, and although I should have stopped to take some photos, it was too cold to get out of the car, and being those typically narrow, windy English country roads, there weren't many safe places to stop.
The Cathedral isn't that large and is like so many that I have seen over the past 12 months, so I didn't linger apart from a quick lunch of sweet corn and courgette soup and a bread roll. Pretty basic, just fuel to get me home to Portsmouth, a drive of a further 140+ miles. I got back to Portsmouth mid-afternoon, very tired, and then had to go through 97 emails that had backed up while I’d been off-line.
Despite being tired from the 680 mile round trip to Manchester, when I eventually went to bed I was tired but not sleepy. Bummer, I have to get up early to go up to London tomorrow.
Despite getting only two hours sleep I was up at 7.00 a.m. to go to London today to have lunch with Margaret, my fantastic framer (The Frame Spot – 130 Burke Road, Malvern East). Margaret has been framing for me for at least 20 years, ever since I moved to Belson Street, and I will be keeping her very busy when I get home!
I walked from Sloane Square tube station via the Kings Road (another five-layer day with gloves and scarf, sooo cold), and my fav boutiques, but they unfortunately I didn’t see anything I couldn't live without, so no clothes-shopping for Claire today. Margaret and I met in the foyer of the V&A outside the shop and after a review of the exquisite but always expensive merchandise we went to have an early lunch at Patisserie Valerie on Brompton Road (an old favourite). It was exactly as I remember it but nowhere near as busy, perhaps because it’s January and all the local yummy mummies who usually frequent it are away skiing in Italy or sunning themselves on Mustique?
Margaret and I had a good chat before wandering back to the V&A. We saw the National Art Library together (see photos), before leaving Margaret to explore on her own and I walked along Brompton Road towards Apsley House, known in its day as Number 1 London because it was the first home inside the Knightsbridge Toll Gate. I've long wanted to see the house, given to the Nation by the 7th Duke of Wellington in 1947. The State Rooms which are open to the public are sumptuous, with a large collection of art, silver and hand-painted Sèvre dinner services. It has expansive views over Hyde Park to the north and would have been a des-res (desirable residence) in its day. There aren’t that many rooms open to the public but it’s an English Heritage property so it didn’t cost me anything to visit.
Across the road is the Wellington Arch that I visited a couple of years ago with Jane, Ian and Robbie. I climbed to the top of the triumphal arch for the 360° views over Apsley House and Hyde Park Corner and the Australian and New Zealand war memorials.
The sun was starting to set as I walked along Constitution Hill past Buckingham Palace and along The Mall and under the Admiralty Arch and into Trafalgar Square, taking photos as I went (of course). By this stage it was very very cold and it was quite dark but I was able to take some photos, my Canon takes great photos even in poor light. I popped into St Martin-in-the-Fields and was rewarded with a rehearsal for tonight’s performance. I was lucky to hear them practising the first two movements of Vivaldi’s Winter from the Four Seasons (a perennial favourite, every pun intended!). I do love St Martin-in-the-Fields, I haven’t been to a performance for some time. Tomorrow there is a performance of Mozart’s Requiem by Candlelight and Vivaldi’s Gloria, Handel’s Zadok the Priest and Arrival of the Queen of Sheba. I saw a performance of the same programme in 2007, or was it 2008?, it was pure magic to hear Lacrimosa sung in such a sublime setting. I would love to hear another performance but I'm too tired to go back up to London two days in a row, travelling up to London from Portsmouth is exhausting.
I had a light dinner (two entrees) at Carluccios, and then wandered off to the Strand to find the Vaudeville Theatre and collect the ticket I'd booked online last night. It was (yet another) revival, this time of an Oscar Wilde play, An Ideal Husband, starring Samantha Bond (Mizz Liz Probert from Rumpole), Rachel Stirling (Emma Peel’s daughter) and Elliot Cowan. I saw Samantha Bond on stage in the Michael Frayn play Donkeys’ Years in 2006. My seat was in the back row of the Dress Circle but as a last minute booking the ticket was hugely discounted so I wasn’t complaining. It was a solid and enjoyable performance with all the classic wit and wisdom we expect of Wilde, ending a bit later than expected so I missed the 10.45 p.m. train and had to wait until 11.15 p.m. for the next train, so it was a very late night. I did my best to get some sleep on the train, fortunately it emptied out quite a bit at Guildford and the carriage became very quiet. I don’t know how people can commute to London from Portsmouth every day, it’s just too exhausting, not to mention expensive. I imagine a season ticket is the only cost-effective way of doing it.
Arriving at Havant gone midnight I stepped off the train into cold cold air. Mimi was covered in a thick frost and I had to de-ice her before gingerly driving home, concerned the roads would be icy as well. I slept until 10.00 a.m. and woke to find Archie on the foot of my bed. I was so tired I had slept all night and didn’t get up once to go to the bathroom. That is so unusual that it’s noteworthy!!!
Given all the hype and press speculation about Colin (Mr Darcy) Firth’s chances of winning an Oscar, Angela and I went to see The King’s Speech at Port Solent. I have to say it was one of the best films I have seen in a long time. Engrossing, fascinating and compelling, it’s little wonder that the Queen Mother despised Wallace Simpson and blamed her for the early death of her husband, the Queen’s father. The stress and strain of monarchy on such a man was palpable and his battle with his speech problems was symptomatic of that struggle. No-one could leave the cinema without feeling both sympathy and respect for George VI and his sense of duty.
The cinema was uncharacteristically full for a mid-Sunday afternoon and you could hear a pin drop when he was making his speech, the audience was so engrossed. I was initially peeved to see Jennifer (Elizabeth Bennett) Ehle playing Geoffrey Rush’s Australian wife (with, I have to confess, a credible Australian accent), until I realised that the Prince of Wales/Edward VIII was played by the delicious Guy Pearce, so that was an acceptable trade-off.
I do hope Colin Firth (who must be a nice guy, we share the same initials), wins the Oscar, it would be richly deserved.
Probably my last trip up to London this year, Shirley and I were catching up for our last girls’-day-out together. These early mornings by train up to London can be very tiring. I don’t know how some people can commute every day from Portsmouth to London. Apart from the horrendous cost (have I mentioned how expensive it is?), the time it takes would really take its toll.
Shirley and I met at Waterloo and caught the tube over the Russell Square to spend the day at the British Museum. There is so much to see, and after a reviving coffee we started to explore the many galleries, starting with an exhibition on personal adornment (i.e. clothing and jewellery), from Oman.
We lunched at the Courtyard Restaurant. I had the dips followed by a delicious tagine, whereas Shirley, with her olive oil allergy, had something specially prepared by the kitchen. They were very accommodating. We then wandered through the Egyptian rooms (mummies of all shapes and sizes – people, falcons, cats, calves and crocodiles). I particularly wanted to see the Sutton Hoo mask, the Lewis Chessmen (the rest are in Edinburgh), the Rosetta Stone and the Elgin Marbles. I’ve seen them all before, but they are so iconic and who knows when I will see them again?
There was an interesting exhibition of watches (surprisingly first invented in the early 16th century), and money (unsurprisingly courtesy of HSBC). The museum is a huge place and more to see than time allowed. By the time Shirley and I left, they were closing the museum and chucking everyone out and as we emerged into the cold and dark, and it had been raining. A fascinating day but by 5.30 p.m. both of us were flagging so we walked very slowly back to the tube station and took the train to Covent Garden. As we had an hour or so to kill before the concert, we found a couple of comfy armchairs in the Crusting Pipe and enjoyed my last bottle of Sancerre for a while (£29.95) and had a few nibbles, as we were still both full following lunch.
We wandered down St Martin’s Lane towards St Martin-in-the-Fields for a concert of music by Bach and Mozart, performed by Sir James Galway and his very glamorous flute-playing wife. I can never get enough of St Martin-in-the-Fields and never miss the opportunity to attend a service or concert there, sitting beneath its magnificent modern window. The acoustics are exceptional.
I then had a nightmare trip home. There had been several trains cancelled when Shirley and I arrived back at Waterloo, and there was a huge crowd of Portsmouth-bound travellers milling around beneath the monitors waiting, waiting, waiting ...
At last they announced the Portsmouth train had arrived on Platform 7 so we all hared off. It was a real scrum but I fought my way to a seat and then we sat waiting, waiting, waiting ... I could see what was coming. After waiting an age, they then announced that we had to get off the train as our train was waiting for us on Platform 13. Of course, this time I wasn’t so lucky and didn't get a seat. We were packed in like the proverbial sardines and someone passed out, it was so hot and stuffy. I had to stand all the way to Guildford before the train emptied out sufficiently for me to get a seat, and I didn't get home until gone 1 p.m.
An unfortunate end to my last trip to London for a while. Oh well, it was the only real problem I had with the trains in 12 months, so I shouldn’t complain, it was just very tiring.
I’ve spoken before about discovering the Barrow-in-Furness born artist John Duffin. Today he very kindly met me as I had bought one of his oil paintings of a Barrow landscape and wanted to collect it from him personally.
I arranged to meet John at the Dulwich Art Gallery, the first purpose built public art gallery in the world. It was founded in 1811 when Sir Francis Bourgeois bequeathed his collection of old masters “for the inspection of the public” to the Dulwich College (after the British Museum failed to show appropriate appreciation for the offer). Bourgeois left another condition in his will, that the architect for the new gallery should be his friend and regency architect, Sir John Soane (I visited his house in Lincoln’s Fields in London back in October). The brief was not just to build a gallery for the pictures, but also almshouses for six old ladies (now exhibition rooms) and a mausoleum for its founders (a bit creepy having a tomb in the middle of an art gallery). There are lots of cube and double cube galleries (very Robert Adams as per Syon House).
The Dulwich Gallery now houses one of the world’s most important collections of European old masters of the 17th and 18th centuries and provides a perfect introduction to art in the age of Baroque. The outstanding collection includes major works by Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Murillo, Poussin, Watteau, Gainsborough, Rubens, Tiepolo and my personal favourite, Canaletto. About three hundred and fifty works are on permanent display and as with any other gallery, it mounts temporary exhibitions. At the moment there’s an exhibition of Norman Rockwell’s pictures, uncharacteristic of the gallery’s old master style. It’s an extensive collection from America including all 323 of Rockwell’s The Saturday Evening Post covers created between 1916 and 1963, along with illustrations for advertisements, magazines and books providing a comprehensive look at his career. Somewhat sentimental and formulaic, I nonetheless really liked the exhibition including the bridge game (see photo).
John and I had arranged to meet at 3.00 p.m. in the Gallery Cafe, he lives nearby. I’d had a light lunch earlier in the Gallery Cafe as it had been a bit drizzly so I didn't venture far. It’s only a small cafe-style place but they wouldn't serve us tea because, they claimed, they were still serving lunch (at 2.55 p.m.!); so pretentious. Dulwich appears to be a seriously well-to-do suburb (think Camberwell in Melbourne), not so much “ladies who lunch” but more like “matrons who lunch”. Maybe they just don’t like Barrovians. Undeterred we went down the road to the nearby pub, the Crown and Greyhound, and had a couple of glasses of wine and chatted for nearly four hours! It was one of the most pleasant afternoons I have had this year. Meeting and talking with a fellow Barrovian, it was so refreshing to talk with someone so insightful and warm and it was very generous of John to find the time to meet with me. A seemingly solitary and complex man who gave very little away about himself – his painting and drawings say much, much more. I was very intrigued by the man I met and I can see I will continue to follow his work for a long time to come.
John’s work resonates with a number of themes, solitude and isolation, the loneliness of the big city, leaving your roots (in John’s case Barrow, in mine, England), and the fraught dynamics of relationships. His work really speaks to me, with shades of John Atkinson Grimshaw, a bit of LS Lowry and a touch of Canaletto thrown in for good measure, (it’s all about perspective and scale). And what is evident is his obvious affection for Barrow-in-Furness. Coincidentally, we were both born at the Risedale Maternity Hospital on Abbey Road and both our birth certificates, indeed all birth certificates of the time, were signed by Eric Pratt, then Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages. Sometimes it’s the small details of our lives that bring us together.
The painting and etchings I collected from John were very securely wrapped and I’m sure they will get back to Melbourne safely. I just love his painting of the shoreline in Barrow with the black huts, bought in memory of Mum who always said that the happiest days of her life were spent “up the shore”.
I dropped John off at his home, not far from Dulwich in Lewisham, and then had the long drive back to Portsmouth. I wish the Hindhead tunnel would open before I go home, just so that I can drive through it once, it’s caused me enough delays over the last year, but it’s not scheduled to open until later this year.
Angela very kindly arranged a farewell lunch and invited Uncle Rodger and Maureen, Shirley and Colin, James, Claire, Amelia and Megan, Claire’s parents, Julie and Derek, Angela’s friend Margaret. Unfortunately, Rodney had to work today and wasn’t able to change his roster. It was lovely to see everyone for the last time before I leave for Melbourne on Wednesday. I was very touched that Julie and Derek gave me a gift, a lovely bag with the iconic Union Jack. James, Claire and the girls gave me a wooden box with another Union Jack, and Margaret gave me a calendar featuring places in Hampshire.
Angela had prepared a delicious lasagne with lashings of cheese (my weakness), and some beef chilli with my favourite red kidney beans and rice. Shirley provided the desert, pears poached in red wine, and a yummy looking cake, although as I had drowned my pear in cream, I resisted a slice of the cake.
Amelia was in good form, always delightful and for the first time I saw Megan walking and more engaging than she has been before. She even let me pick her up without bursting into tears, which greatly endeared her to me!!!
It was great to see everyone for the last time. Everyone has been great and it’s going to be very sad to leave.
This morning I had a long chat with Kelly Stewart, the artist I bought some etchings from when I was in Edinburgh.
Kelly is originally a Sydney girl but has lived in Edinburgh for the last ten years (a seriously beautiful city but oh so cold). She also knows Cat Outram, one of the other artists whose work I bought in Edinburgh, the wonderful etching of Bruntsfield Links and one of my favourite images of Edinburgh, just around the corner from where I had been staying during the Edinburgh Festival (one of the best two weeks of my life, ever). Kelly’s father was born in Scotland, so like me she had two passports and her aesthetic sensibilities love Scotland and Europe generally rather than Sydney and I understand where she’s coming from. I have lived with this conundrum since 1969. I can’t help it, I just love the look of England, Scotland and Wales, all green rolling hills and ancient landscapes.
I do so admire artistic people, Kelly, like John Duffin, are very lucky to be able to make a living doing something that is both creative and gives pleasure to others. The closest I can get to this level of creativity is with my photography.
Boxes, boxes, boxes. Eleven of them to be precise. Clothes and books and stuff, lots of stuff. All packed and dispatched for their ten week voyage home. I can’t believe I’ve collected so much over the last year, although I should have guessed, my bedroom had become very small. Angela said she knew my initial estimate of four tea-chest sized boxes was a bit off, but when it’s a gradual increment, it’s easy to miscalculate.
Dinner tonight with Angela & Rod at the Red Lion in Southwick, always a lovely meal and one of my favourite places. And for my last night a special treat, Archie is allowed to sleep in my room on the end of my bed. Bliss.
Up early for an 8 a.m. departure for Heathrow. It was so cold and my dressing gowns were in one of the boxes, so I put my overcoat on over my nightdress to ward off the cold until I had my bath! One last hug for Archie and my farewells to my bedroom of the last 12 months and Mimi, the unsung hero of the year, who drove me 15,500 miles without a hiccup. She did me proud.
Then a two hour drive to Heathrow, leaving Mimi in the capable hands of Angela & Rod. It took a good two hours, running the gamut of the Hindhead road works, which should be completed by Summer 2011, sadly too late for me.
We arrived at Heathrow about the same time as Shirley and Colin, bearing my farewell pressie of a Stilton spoon (to add to my new collection of Stilton jars). I checked into First Class, all 68 kg, plus my carry-on luggage of 20 kg (my camera case alone weighs 15 kg). I've never been known to travel light and after 12 months I seem to have acquired a few things. I've inherited Mum’s knack of over-packing and had to rebalance my bags because they weighed in at more than 32 kg, apparently the maximum that can be allowed under OH&S. Qantas very kindly waived any excess charges (God bless them, the first class seat paid for itself there and then).
The five of us, Angela & Rod, Shirley & Colin, and me, had coffee at Costas, Americano with cold milk for me (when I get home I will have to order coffee telling them I want a single shot long black with cold milk on the side, because they don’t know what an Americano is). It was great to chat with Angela & Rod, Shirley & Colin, one last time. Then lots of hugs and farewells and I slipped through security and headed off to the First Class Lounge to distract myself.
Sad to say goodbye to Angela & Rodney, Shirley & Colin who came to Heathrow to make sure I left the country!
Later -
OMG! It’s all over. Here I am sitting on a Boeing 747 in first class, QF30, winging my way back to Melbourne. Home, sweet home, but parting is such sweet sorrow (how many clichés was that?). The advantages of sacrificing 190,000 Frequent Flyer points was the increased luggage allowance and the Taittinger Champagne served with tiny black olives. Yum. It’s a better class of champagne in first class (in future I’ll drink nothing else).
Now for the safety procedures. It seems rude not to pay attention, even though there are only three of us in the first class cabin (all the more champagne for me!). I had flown first class once before thanks to an upgrade, goodness knows I would never pay for first class myself, I even object to paying the premium they charge for business class, preferring to spend the money on the ground, but somehow it seemed fitting to be returning to Australia in first class luxury. How lucky am I? Despite my tribulations of recent years, I am a very lucky person, born in the right place at the right time, I was educated and live in the right place, Marvellous Melbourne. I am one very lucky sausage.
John Brennan is the pilot, such an Aussie accent. I had to laugh, I’ve missed Australia so much more than I had expected. That’s not to say I didn't want to stay in England, of course I did, but I was going home.
Even in first class the trip does seem to drag but movies on demand make the time go by and the food is certainly a lot better than economy, with a Rockpool designed menu.
Now over China and heading for Hong Kong I had intended to read but was very tired, I find flying, indeed all forms of travel, very soporific. In the first class cabin there are only three of us and the other two are asleep. Nearing midnight GMT I’ll sleep on the next leg from Hong Kong to Melbourne, so I decided to keep watching the movies.
I decided to watch some movies and started with Animal Kingdom, a truly unpleasant film, not enjoyable at all, a story about a bunch of psychopathic nutters in the Melbourne criminal underworld. It doesn’t end happily. Having said that, the acting (including Jackie Weaver who was tipped for an Oscar), was exceptional and the only reason I even considered watching it was to see Jackie Weaver’s performance which I had read about.
I then started to watch The Girl Who Played with Fire, but couldn't read the Swedish sub-titles on the small screen so gave up the idea and flicked over to watch Wild Target with Bill Nighy, Rupert Grint and Martin Freeman. I hadn’t heard of the movie but Bill Nighy is in it so that’s good enough for me. It was actually very good in a light, low budget way.
My final film was Made in Dagenham about the fight for equal pay in England in 1968 at the Ford motor factory. Equal pay was a dream then and by and large remains a dream today with a considerable gap between the income of men and women, even now women earn still earn a fraction of their male counterparts. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. Having said that, I can’t complain, I’ve always been well paid.
The first leg to Hong Kong is about 12 hours and the flight got into Hong Kong about midnight GMT. As I’m rarely asleep before midnight my strategy was to stay awake and then sleep on the second leg from Hong Kong to Melbourne. Stopover in Hong Kong in the first class lounge, slowly falling asleep because it was gone midnight GMT, compounded by the fact that my flight was delayed with a maintenance problem, so the 90 minute stopover stretched to three hours. The Captain personally introduced himself to me in the First Class Lounge to explain the delay, the perks of first class travel!
The upshot was that we didn't leave Hong Kong until 11.35 a.m. local time, having arrived just after breakfast at 8.30 a.m. so I was really tired. There were a few more people in the first class cabin on the second leg, all five of us, with two cabin crew devoted to our every whim (actually I didn't have any whims apart from asking for several bottles of water during the flight). When the seat belt sign went out I immediately stretched out the flat bed and even though the Flight Attendant offered to make the bed up for me with sheets and blankets, I was so exhausted I went straight to sleep. I had a good five hours sleep and woke to have a very late dinner of a steak sandwich as I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. It’s about 9 p.m. Melbourne time, I will have to start getting my body used to the new time zone.
Teddy and I are going home, my year living in England will hopefully satisfy my Anglophilia, for a while at least. Was My Gap Year everything I had expected? What have I learned? Well, the year didn't pan out quite as expected in as much as it was less a Grand Tour of Europe and more a Grand Tour of Britain, with a bit of Italy and France thrown in for continental flavour. But that’s okay, it was always meant to unfold spontaneously. Forever the planner, even I have to let go sometimes and just go with the flow.
Why did the focus of the trip change from an exploration of Europe to a Roots-like personal exploration of England. And why didn't I stay? Put simply, my instincts told me it just wasn’t right. I would have to give up too much i.e. the wonderful life I have in Australia. Working in London would have given me access to travel in Europe, (photos, photos, art, theatre, food, photos, etc.), but would be such hard work and I would miss Melbourne too much.
Did I make the right decision? In any sporting competition, if England is competing against Australia, I want Australia to win. If England is competing against the rest of the world, I want England to win. Talking to Kelly Stewart the other day, we discussed, what is home? Home for me is Melbourne and has been since the 1970’s. England is some mythic place I know I see through rose-tinted glasses.
There were a number of factors at play that led to my decision to return home. I came to the conclusion in mid-2010 that finding a job in England was not going to be a realistic option for a few reasons:
1. with high unemployment in Britain, employers are always going to give preference to local candidates (and rightly so, I would too);
2. given that I am an unknown quantity in London I wasn’t going to find a job that would be a good use of my skills and experience and consequently I would earn considerably less than I could earn at home, and living in London isn't cheap, rent alone is horrendous, so it would be financially irresponsible; and finally
3. it didn't feel right. I just couldn't quite see myself settling in England, I think it was always a pipedream. I could only live in England if I won the lottery and didn't have to work and even then, I would want to spend half my time in Melbourne.
I have long said I only work to pay for my holidays. So the upshot is that I would rather live in Melbourne and work to fund my next trip than earn so much less in England and have less available discretionary spending for my holidays and expensive hobby (i.e. photography).
This last year has been such an emotional trip in many ways but at the end of the day, staying wasn’t the right thing to do. Although it means I leave dear family behind (and the last year has given me the opportunity to really bond with them), the world is so much smaller than it was when we set sail from Southampton on Friday 13th December 1968. Technology has shrunk the planet and thanks to the internet I can access England from Melbourne with a few keystrokes, and with a better climate. And don’t get me started on the weather. I said in 1988 when I gave up the opportunity to live in Perth (that’s Perth Western Australia, not Perth, Scotland), that I would never complain about Melbourne weather again, but I hadn’t allowed for climate change. I used to be able to could cope with Melbourne’s weather but when I left home in February 2010, Melbourne had progressively become so hot that even I was beginning to find it intolerable, and the lack of water was seriously worrying me. The dams had dropped to 30% full so I couldn't see that living in a city without water was sustainable.
Unfortunately the cloud cover over England meant that once we climbed up and over Heathrow I lost all sight of this green and pleasant land. I love being in England but at the same time I have to go home. As we took off there was a tear in my eye. What a contrary beast I am, cognitive dissonance at work.
Australia is so many things to me. Everything is the same in England but ever so slightly different, and I had to question every assumption about how things work and operate. It’s so easy to take things for granted when you know the rules and without that comfort zone it makes everything just a little bit stressful and difficult. In England, if there’s an easy way to do something and a difficult way to do it, they will pick the most inefficient option because, “that’s the way we do things here” and “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” which is the worst argument I’ve ever heard against change and progress. Goodness knows how women got the vote, indeed how male suffrage was achieved, if you accept this as a proposition; as an argument, it’s so lame. But them, why does Britain resist metric and insist on Imperial measurement when it makes no sense? Britain is supposed to be part of the EU and has partially metricated, but the speed limits are still in miles after all these years. It drives me nuts.
Life in Melbourne to me is so much easier because I understand how it works. I think that’s the lawyer in me, I see the world in legal and political structures. I suspect that the way Australia does things is no better or worse than Britain, it’s just that I’m used to the Australian way and most things have a rational (rather than historic) basis, because I’ve been trained to think that way and also because, I suspect, Australians are less resistant to change and more open to fresh ideas, so if something doesn’t make sense, there’s a cheaper or more efficient way to do it, we change it. And we aren’t afraid to adopt new technology. I think Britain culturally has a problem with moving from the traditional way of doing things, no matter how half-baked or irrelevant and even when the original reason for doing it a particular way has long since been forgotten. That really irritated me. Registering the car was a classic example of that.
And then there’s the class system. I know we all acknowledge that England is obsessed with class, but I think we say it without really appreciating how it has seeped into the national psyche. Politically the country is riven by class divisions based on politics and class and money and the politics of envy. Everyone defines themselves in terms of their class, no Parkinson interview is ever complete without a reference to one’s family background. Posh is used as an insult while to me it sounds like a childish school yard taunt. I sympathise with David Cameron trying to turn around a country of malcontents and whingers; it looks nigh on impossible. The British appear to have no aspiration, they want everything to stay the same and for their lives to remain the same. The idea of upward social mobility is sneered at.
I love England to bits but there are a whole lot of things I don’t like. Being socialised as an Australian has influenced the way I see things. Pointless exercise though it is, I sometimes wonder how my life would have turned out had my parents not decided to emigrate in 1968. Would I have had the first class education I have been so lucky to have? I was the first member of my family to ever go to university. And the opportunities to travel (Mum’s genes, she had the travel bug as well and was the independent traveller I have become), and photography (Dad’s genes, he fancied himself as a bit of a photographer).
Now, sitting above the cloud line, all blue skies with fluffy white clouds below, I ponder what I have learnt. I’m not sure I have a definitive answer to that one. I have continued to develop my love of the visual arts and during the year I even considered studying history of art, since I started travelling to Italy in 2008 I have come to recognise how important it is to me to live with beauty. It was only when I first visited Venice in 2008 that I came to realise this and this last year has only served to confirm it.
W. H. Auden once suggested that to understand your own country you need to have lived in at least two others. I’ve now had my year in England (plus a month in Venice), learning how the locals live. I know I’m biased but Australia is best, it just doesn’t satisfy my aesthetic sensibilities, which is exactly what Kelly Stewart, now living in Edinburgh, said to me the other day. Is living in Melbourne such a compromise or just my way of dealing with the cognitive dissonance? Of course it must be, every decision we make in life is a trade-off and I've had to make mine over recent years. Most people don’t have the choice that I have, to live in Australia as well as anywhere in the EU. Emigrating to Australia in 1968 was the best decision my parents ever made and gave me these options, a first-class education, two passports, a lifestyle most people can only dream of and an earning capacity my education has granted me. So what’s the problem?
For all my trials and tribulations over the last five years, I could not have been blessed with My Gap Year had my life not been turned on its head. It was not of my making but I have pushed through and made the most of my new-found freedom. How many places have I visited and photos taken (numbering in the tens of thousands) that would not have been possible had things not changed.
I am so looking forward to seeing my little house in Malvern, my home and my haven. All that remains to make it complete will be my Tam Cats, the collective noun for the two Burmese kittens I will buy on my return. I’ve already sussed out several breeders in Victoria, the real challenge will be how do I replace my beloved Tam? Like children, no two pets are ever alike. My kittens, already named Koko & Milo, will be a welcome addition to my home.
All I have to do is find a job which I suspect will be easier said than done. I’m slightly uneasy about finding a job after more than a year out of the workforce, and I have allowed myself six months to find a new job. Time will tell and I foresee I will have to be flexible about my options. I think a chat with Sharon is called for.
Hopefully I return more at peace with myself than I have been for a long, long time. Returning home clearly marks the next phase in my life, re-establishing myself, reconnecting with so many good friends, settling into my home again and burning around Melbourne in Martha and Midge (with the roof down of course). I’ve missed my hairdresser Elena, my trainer Liz, and my coach Sharon. In many ways it’s been the little things I’ve missed the most like Vital Rye bread (I couldn't find anything like it), PhysiCal milk, Vita-Weat biscuits, Melbourne’s wide roads and the warm weather.
And what have I learnt? I think my self-awareness is such that I didn't learn much about myself that I didn't already know, that I’m quite content to spend time on my own and potter about. Just as well given that I live on my own and invariably travel on my own. As I’ve said many times, I prefer to travel with friends than on my own but I’d rather travel on my own than not at all. I got that streak of independence from Mum.
I know what will happen when we touch down at Tullamarine, I will burst into tears, thankful for a safe return and to be back home. Much has changed in my life but much remains the same. That’s one of the things I’ve learnt, I am what I am and I’m not going to change that much. Did I find contentment? Did I expect to? There are no magic bullets, so long as I live by the adage “no regrets”, onwards towards the next chapter in my life, whatever that may be. As always, my life will, to a large extent, be determined by my work, whatever I do next and I will continue to enjoy My Gap Year until I start work again, whatever that may entail. This is a rare treat, an extended break from work, so I should continue to make the most of it.
I think it’s fitting to return to Australia in style, first class all the way. I can see the extra leg room and personal service is very nice, but I didn't lay out the eye-watering $13,000 that it costs. I think the sacrifice of 192,000 frequent flyer points well worthwhile, if only for the additional luggage allowance (68 kg checked in plus a further 20 kg that I carried on, my camera case is very heavy). First Class is very nice but I wouldn't pay for it, I was very lucky to have the frequent flyer points, Hastings has paid for My Gap Year from beginning to end. Thank you Gail Kelly.
When we touched down in Melbourne I was expecting to be a bit emotional, coming home after a year, but while I was relieved to have arrived safely, my bags and painting by John Duffin all cleared customs without a blip and despite declaring the food (coffee and tea) and wooden articles (book stand and artists model), I hopped in a taxi and was home by midnight.
I’m somewhat perturbed by the damp and dank smell emanating from the basement, I will have to explore the cause tomorrow when I have more energy. The reason I had someone house sitting for me was to identify any problems with the house and deal with them promptly. Hey ho, as Angela would say.
My first job was to unpack and unroll my pictures, well over 20 etchings and prints, and lay them flat on the dining table. I emptied the suitcases, a ritual I always follow when I get home from a holiday regardless of the time, and in the morning I will give the cars a run, buy some food and get the phone reconnected.
I eventually got to bed about 3 a.m. but woke up some little time later. I got up to go to the bathroom and stood at the door of my bedroom, swaying a little and trying to get accustomed to the darkness. It was very quiet and almost eerie. I stood there for a few moments thinking to myself, where the hell and I? My memory quickly rewound the last couple of days and it dawned on me where I was. “Oh, that’s right. I’m home”, I said to myself. It was a truly weird and disorienting moment but tinged with relief that I was safely back in my little house. As Mum used to say, it's nice to go away but it's nice to come home.