Good Bye to London, UK and Europe

All good things must come to an end. After six months we have completed our extended touring holiday with four weeks staying in London courtesy of the mother of one of our daughter's friends.
We both enjoyed this wind down period after months of travelling. Whilst we were based in London, we visited some museums and archives as well as made some day trips out of town.

Day trip to York and NorthYorkshire

River scene late afternoon in York Sept 2011 Photo number 1776
Gary managed two trips to Yorkshire to further consult with various archives for his family history research. These involved a trip on the underground (tube) to Kings Cross mainline station and then a train trip up the east coast mainline railway to York and in one case on to Northallerton.

Day trip to Hampton Court Palace

We spent a day visiting Hampton Court Palace, which is set on the banks of the Thames River upstream from London. King Henry VIII's home at Hampton Court Palace was specially open for the London Open House weekend. This meant that additional parts of the palace were open to the public on that weekend. Here King Henry VIII^th ruled England and married some of his wives. The stand out on our visit was the enormous kitchen that was part of the palace.  In the food preparation area there were baskets of fresh vegies for the children to handle and sort into meals. The kitchen had the largest fireplace we have ever seen.  What made it special was the fireplace actually had a fire roaring in it.  A supervisor was stoking the fire from the huge wood pile which was stacked along the wall in the kitchen.  Nearby were the wine cellar and many dozens of wine casks (probably empty now). 

 Day trip to Watercress Line, Alton

Loco 34007 runs around its train after arriving at Alton  Photo number 1603
Gary made a day trip to the Mid Hants preserved steam railway, otherwise known as the Watercress line. It was quite conveneient as a day trip out from our accommodation to catch a tube from Southfields to Wimbledon, then a SouthWest train to Sorbiton and change to a local train to Alton. There it is a convenient cross platform interchange to the Watercress line steam trains. The trip on the Watercress line to Alresford is quite a pleasant run even if the English summer was not good weatherwise.

Day trip to Greenwich

The boat ride from Westminister along the Thames river takes us passed the tower of London as well as the bridge.  To the lovely open space of Greenwich.  This is the place where time began (G.M.T.) with the Royal Observatory on the hill surrounded by parkland and along the river banks is the Naval college.  We visited the 'Queens House', Greenwich, built by Queen Anne which has a most beautiful spiral staircase.

Walking tour of Bermondsley, south side of river Thames, London

London Bridge and River Thames from the south side near Bermondsley photo number 1680
W did an evening walk with about 50 other people around Bermondsley. The highlight of the walk for Gary was a visit to  the Brunel museum and the chance to go down the shaft built by the Brunels as the entrance to the first tunnel under the Thames river. After the walk we travelled throught the tunnel in the London Overground underground train! This was formerly part of the East London line.

Victoria and Albert museum
 

It took Dorothy 3 visits to the museum before she found the official entrance to the V&A (there are numerous side entrances to the museum). The entrance is impressive. The old large entrance doorway is encircled with a wooden modern spiral.  Walking through to the entrance hall where you see the old wooden panels and new style glass chandelier with combination of green/yellow lighting. This is a museum that has a bit of everything.  The museum has displays of glassware, silverware, furniture and sculpture this is just a small sample of what the museum houses.  Dorothy's favourite spot was the ornate afternoon tea rooms.  She enjoyed a couple of visits always in time for tea and scones!

The chandelier at the V&A entrance

This room had a display of beautiful silverware

We then spent a day or so packing and throwing out all the clothing that was travel weary.

So now we are home in time to celebrate our daughters birthday and catching up with family and friends. Also coping with all the day to day dramas of life at home. We hope you have enjoyed the travel blog as we shared our experiences on our extended holiday.

The intrepid travellers in France - photo 2082

LONDON St Pauls Cathedral

One of the icons of the tourist traps in London is St Pauls Cathedral, Sir Christopher Wrens masterpiece. It was built after the great fire of London burnt many of the churches of the time.

St Pauls Cathedral on  rare sunny summer day in London. Photo no 1546




Many will have seen the iconic second world war photos of St Pauls with London burning around it.
The lady of the house where we are staying in London took us out to Richmond park to show us an unusual view of St Pauls. It would take a camera with a very long lens to show it, but there is a spectacular view from 15 miles away on Richmond hill along a specially protected corridor through the Richmond Park vegetation and the buildings to London to see St Pauls in the distance. Its quite impressive to see St Pauls from that distance.

During our wanderings around London, we visited the inside of St Pauls. No photography is allowed inside the church but it is magnificent!
We then climbed up the 257 steps to the Whispering gallery. Lots of people try to whisper and be heard around the other side of the dome, it really works.
We then climbed a further 119 steps to the stone gallery. The view from there is brilliant and photography is allowed.

Photo of the bell tower from the golden gallery.

Then we climbed the additional 144 wrought iron steps to the golden gallery at the top (that's a total of 528 steps or 85metres).  From the top of these steps, before stepping outside, there is a small viewing hole which gives a view down to the cathedral floor -  this just confirms how far up you have actually climbed.

Photo of a windswept lady in red jacket on the golden gallery. Photo number 1596
The River Thames in the background.

Having done all that climbing up and down we then went to the crypt.  There are many tombs of past mililtary heros among them are Nelson and the Duke of Wellington.  Also there is a display of pictures of British events that have happened over the life of St Pauls.

Parish Churches of Engalnd

During our travels around England these last few weeks we have seen many of the beautiful local parish churches in the villages.   

Photo of All Saints Braham, Yorkshire number 1307
This church is an example of many English parish churches, built on the top of the hill above the village of Braham (which is just off the A1(M0 in Yorkshire. The use of the name All Saints implies that there was an earlier pagan church on the site before the christian church was built there.

The first church we went to was in Cornwall. This was an old church near where we were staying and was the church in which the author Daphne du Maurier was married.

photo number 1192 of St Wyllows Note the beautiful wooden ceiling, quite unusual.

When we were driving around Yorkshire following the footsteps of our ancestors, we saw many beautiful parish churches. Some have had time and money spent on them to clear out the vegetation that had overgrown the churchyard. an example would be St Columba where locals on community service orders have been put to work in painting the inside of the church hall and clearing the graveyard of vegetation.

Photo of St Columba, Topcliffe photo 1392

In others such as All Saints Braham, there are notices that say the cemetery will not be mown more than twice a year to "preserve" the native plants and animals. This causes problems for people including locals wanting to maintain graves of ancesters.

All Saints churchyard becoming overgrown.

Not all parish churches are in great condition. The parish church of St John the Baptist in Chester has been shortened over the years and parts of it are in ruins. Photo 0631

Photo of St Michael and all Angels church Coxwold ,Howardian Hills, North Yorkshire photo 1463. There has been a christian church on this site since 720AD and a pagan shrine before that. The current church (photographed) was built in the perpendicular style with an octagonal tower in about 1420.

Photo of All Saints church, Settrington, photo 1477
This church is unusual in that the main entrance to the church is directly under the tower. So when entering the church one passes under the belltower, past and between the ropes for tolling the bells.

Photo of St John's Dalton church photo number  1397
Unfortunatley this church was locked when we were there, so we do not have any more information

Photo of the inside of St John the Baptist, Kirby Wiske, near Pickering Yorkshire. photo number 1430 Note the unusual wooden box pews with doors. These were quite common in earlier times. The ones in this church have been cut down from the full size ones, possibly in the early 20th century.

Photo of St Michael and all Angels church, Maunby, Yorkshire  number 1425
There was a great building spree of churches in the 14th century in England. The traditional parish church of England dates from that period. However many of the Roman Catholic churches date from the late Victorian period when the law was changed so that catholics could worship in their own churches.This church in Maunby, Yorkshire is a Victorian era Church of Engaland brick built church, this village did not have a Church of England until about 1890

Finally one of the churches with strong family connections for Gary, All Saints Terrington, North Yorkshire. Photo 3354
It is thought that there has been a church on this site since the 7th or 8th century. Certainly there are parts of this church that date form the time of the Norman conquest. This church in common with many has a war memorial inside to honour the men associated with the village who served in the great war.

Yorkshire

Yorkshire the family history connection

Since leaving Oxford we have been travelling around Yorkshire.  We went visiting the villages that had some family connections for each of our families; yes even Dorothy has some Yorkshire roots…somewhere.

 We have been visiting the places where Great (great, great even great) grandparents were lived and were christened, married or were buried in the village church and graveyard.

Two photos of the inside of the Holy Trinity church in Hull, the colourful ceiling is quite striking in this large church.

The stained glass window at the Holy Trinity church Hull.  Photo 3309d & 3304

 Reading the headstones can be quite difficult but we were looking just on the chance that a family name maybe resting there somewhere.   Many of the church grounds are over- run with long grass and no easy access to wander around.  

This photo was taken from the church yard at Laxton, East Riding of Yorkshire. It shows in the distance a line of hay stacks in the neighbouring field.    Photo 3266d

 In sharp contrast we have come across three churches that are well organised for any visiting family history buffs (like ourselves).  Inside each of these churches there is a large plan of the graveyard showing the layout of the graves.  Then to accompany the plan is a booklet listing the surnames and their grave number.  For family history buffs it is seventh heaven to find this sort of information.

Photo of Headstone with family history buff looking on! Photo 1389

Using the information in one of the churches we found the headstone for Gary’s great great, great grandparents. The headstone was in quite good condition for being one hundred and thirty years old. Luckily for us this graveyard had just been cleaned up and the growth removed.

Isle of Wight, Oxford and York

After leaving Cornwall, we travelled to the Isle of Wight by ferry from the south coast of England. It was only a 35 minute car ferry ride on a lovely summer’s day.  There were two attractions to see; ‘Osborne House’ and the tourist steam railway. 

Osborne house was built as the family home for Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.  Here they could live as a family with their 9 children for 3 months of the year. At Osborne House the family could be away from the palace routine and resume a more normal family life.  On display are plenty of family paintings and the original furnishings are still in the house. Including the bed in which Queen Victoria died in while staying at Osborne House.  In the nursery are a collection of family trees for each child.  The tree shows how Queen Victoria arranged the marriages of her children they were all married off to various heads of European Royal families.  Today in many of Europe’s noble or royal families are great great grandchildren of Queen Victoria including Prince Phillip and Queen Elizabeth II.

Photo 3135 Osborne House

The beaches along the Isle of Wight have beach huts for hire as this sign explains

Photo 3152d

Isle of Wight Railways

There were quite a number of railway lines at the height of the railway age on the Isle of Wight. All that is left is one electrified passenger line along the coast and an adjoining steam tourist line.

Photo `1246 Isle of Wight Steam Railway
The Isle of Wight steam railway runs one or two train sets along a branch line that junctions to the electrified passenger line at Smalltown junction.

The “suburban” electrified line uses ex London Transport underground trains that have been pensioned off into the sunshine above ground. This is an extreme example of re-cycling!

Island Line train Photo 1268

  Oxford

 From the Isle of Wight we travelled back to the mainland and then on to Oxford.
One of the first things we noticed on our visit to Oxford was the hundreds of students and their push bikes. We decided the best way to see Oxford was on a 90 minute walking tour. The walk took us into 3 colleges; New College, Exeter and Lincoln, each of these colleges have their own church (chapel), dining room and library

Photo 1282 Inside quadrangel of an Oxford college
Our guide explained college life and tradition as well as showing us the tree filmed in the 4^th Harry Potter film. We also visited the college that was the setting where Inspector Morse (of the BBC TV series) had his fatal heart attack in the final episode. 

Photo 3215d  This photo shows the entrance to the Bodelain library.

It is here on graduation day that around 200 students walk from the library to the next building which is the theatre were they receive their honours.  We were not able to see the library as the public can only see the library on a library run tour and they were all full for the day. Overall the town of Oxford is best seen by walking around.

  We visit a ‘Cold War’ Bunker in the suburbs of York

Between 1961 and 1991 England built many bunkers across the country. This was as a reaction to the tense relationship between Communist Russia (USSR), the USA and the rest of the Western World referred to as the ‘Cold War’ period. The one we visited had been built in the suburbs of York.

Photo 3223
The bunkers were staffed by trained volunteer observer personal. The purpose of the bunkers was to monitor the effect of the blast and fallout of radiation if (when) a nuclear bomb was dropped on England. The information gathered would be forwarded onto the authorities. The bunker had a communication, and a decontamination room designed to seal off the bunker on or after any devastation from the outside world. All of this was sitting in the backyard of many English suburbs, it did look out of place and from a bygone era.

We settle down for a week in Polruan, Cornwall

We were lucky to be invited to share a cottage in Cornwall by a long time work friend of Gary.

Photo of Polruan from top of hill photo 2910

This cottage is in the idyllic village of Polruan on the deep water Fowey River in Cornwall. The views from the first floor lounge room windows over the river towards Fowey are very pleasant, especially as some of the days have been sunny and charming. 

Photo  3025 d

This village was a fishing and boat building port, now very much into tourism. 

Photo of quay area 1041g

The one downside of this idyllic village is that as the houses are built on the side of the hill sloping down to the river, car parking is very problematic. The car park is a pay and display one on the top of a hill on a Second World War bomb site (thank you Herr Hitler) and ten minutes of hard walking up hill from the cottage.

Photo of St Ives beach 1135

We have used Polruan as a base and visited other parts of Cornwall such as St Austell, Penzance, Lands’ End and St Ives.  They are all within easy reach of Polruan for a day out. For St ives we parked in a Park and Ride car park and caught the local train into St Ives station. The town was buzzing with lots of tourists, not all speaking English!

Photo of young Australian tourist standing at Lands End 1144g

Lands’ end was cold and windy as expected and everything closed up at 5pm, not very tourist friendly when it is still daylight until after 9pm.

Gary’s friend works as volunteer at a nearby preserved standard gauge steam railway, so we have also visited the Bodmin and Wenford railway. The weather on that day was the usual British summer conditions, overcast with intermittent showers and drizzle but not cold!

Photo of ex-GWR preserved loco and  train at Bodmin Central 1032g

Just across the river from Polruan and accessible by separate foot and car ferries is the better known town of Fowey.

Photo of Fowey 2868d

There are also some lovely villages found along the lanes on the way to other places in Cornwall.

Photo of Lerryn Photo  1043g

One such village is Lerryn on the upper reaches of the Fowey River. There is a sign in the car park warning that in very high tides the car park floods! Luckily it is a free car park.  Or the church at Lanteglos where author Daphne du Maurier married, she also wrote many of her novels while she lived in the Cornwall area.

We bid a sad farewell to Polruan and headed to the Isle of Wight, that is our next blog.

Trip toBonny Scotland - the Highlands and Islands of Scotland

Since leaving the excitement of London and waving farewell to Wimbledon we have driven up to the wilds of Scotland (an area known as the Highlands & Islands) to meet a distant male second cousin of Gary’s on his father’s side.

We travelled via Chester, Hexham, Glasgow, Applecrosss  and Oban.

View over Applecross, Scotland Photo 2766

Having seen a BBC TV series on Applecross, it was exicting to be able to see the place.  Driving there was a challenge it was on a single lane road (goat track) with signs stating the road was not suitable for caravans and closed during winter.  Any on-coming traffic could only be passed at the passing points, spaced every half a mile.  Adding to that was the fog so  visablity was poor especially when naviagating the hair pin bends.  The views of Applecross as we came down the hills were magnificant.  Especially as there was no fog over that side of the mountain.  It is a small village with one long road that runs along the beach front with small houses and a couple of shops. 

Further on we stopped off at Oban for lunch

Photo of Oban town, photo 938  Oban is a beautiful fishing town now taken over by tourism.

Eventually we arrived in Badcaul.  Gary has corresponded with the cousin’s wife for a number of years about family history but has never met either of them. Gary and his second cousins wife have been in deep discussions for a couple of days over the family tree in Yorkshire and exchanging family photos. 

Photo looking over Loch Broom from front of the Gary's cousins house 977 g

The house in which they live and we stayed overlooks a lovely sea Loch - Little Loch Broom on the west coast of Scotland. It has been in glorious sunshine and a high temperature of 18 (a bit too warm for the locals).

With Gary’s relatives and their dog, we visited three of the local attractions in the highlands and islands region of Scotland.

Photo of tall ship in Ullapool Photo no 998 g

Ullapool is the nearest civilisation or town of any size.  It was Tall Ships weekend in Ullapool, heralded by a bagpipes parade with a craft market of local products. some of the tall sailing ships that were racing from Glasgow to the Shetland islands put into Ullapool for the weekend.

For lunch we all had lovely fresh fish (black pudding –Gary) and chips from the local shop on the dockside.

Photo of salmon leaping Falls of Shin 2774 d

The other local attraction we visited was the Falls of Shin. Here you can see the salmon swimming upstream.  The salmon leap up high out of the water in an effort to get over the falls, it is a sight to see. Although we were at the falls well before the high season, we still saw 6 to 10 salmon in a period of 15 to 20 minutes. It is of course quite easy to see them leap but not so easy to snap on the digital camera. Dorothy did a good job as shown here.

Photo of Fort George entrance drawbridge with tourist on the phone photo 982 g

Near Inverness and quite next door to the golf course that staged this year’s Scottish Open is a British military fort. Following the 1746 defeat at Culloden of Bonnie Prince Charlie, George II created the ultimate defence against further Jacobite unrest. The result, Fort George, is the mightiest artillery fortification in Britain, if not Europe. It is the only ancient momument in Scotland still serving its intended pupose,a working millitary barracks. It is still in use by the military so security is tighter than at normal tourism places but the fort is well worth the visit.

Photo of Fort George Chapel photo 986 g

It is a perfectly kept example of Georgian military construction.   There is not a blade of grass out of place.  On display are various examples of the life of the military soldier, from the 1760s through to WW1.  There was little noticeable change over that period for the Scottish foot soldier. 

Some detail in the text above was  sourced from the Historic Scotland - Fort George web site (as they expalin the history much better!)