Blighty 2025 - Some British Reflections

Almost a month in the UK, and while family dominated, we did get around a bit. Here are a few observations on the trip.

England is a busy place. We arrived on the Friday that the school's half-term holiday started, and the M25, London's orbital motorway, was jammed solid at noon. Fortunately my local knowledge allowed us to take the scenic route to our accommodation in Oxfordshire. I was then forcibly reacquainted with the narrowness of the roads, the ones with no shoulder, but with hedges, trees and assorted greenery growing right up to the road's edge. Add the readjustment required to drive a stick-shift car again after a long lay off, and it was a challenging trip. A tip for would be visitors to the UK from Canada; make sure you get a small rental car. You'll find out why soon enough.

We were staying in the central England area known as the Cotswolds. Pretty, charming and very, very monied. The clear choice of cars for the people now living there is the Range Rover or the Land Rover. Wealthy Londoners out in the country, imagining that they really do need a four-wheel-drive monster just because they have to drive past fields on the asphalted roads. Goodness how those Chelsea tractors came unstuck on the single-track roads that link some of the villages. There is an almost constant traffic jam in the pretty town of Burford, and it's not an exaggeration to to say that 25% of the cars in the line ups were of the Rover SUV type. Numpties.

Never, ever, visit Bourton-on-the-Water on a bank holiday.

English grocery stores are a trial. They're small but have twice as many people in them as those at home. The people shopping in them all know what they want and rush around, and that makes browsing in an unfamiliar shop all the more difficult. Most of the big stores operate loyalty cards, and offer lower prices to the holders of such cards. Sadly, people not resident in the UK can't have a card, so we were reduced to asking other people at the checkout if we could borrow theirs. It's all to the good because they get the points, while we get the discount, but it's still a pain having to ask. We half cracked it by getting my nephew's girlfriend to send us a screenshot of her card, but she only had the Sainsbury's Nectar Card and not the Tesco Clubcard - see, only half cracked it.

Parking anywhere other than big grocery stores and it costs an arm and leg to leave your car in a parking lot. £8 here, £7.50 there, it all mounts up. I reckon we paid out hundreds of GBP. To add insult to injury, I was accused of not paying at Charlbury Station, although my credit card says otherwise. The fine is £100, but I'm not paying it. I did have to pay the car rental company an admin charge of £40 for handling the paperwork, as agreed in the contract, but I'll try to get that back from the parking people as well. I haven't heard from the same parking company about overstaying on a paid parking ticket at Didcot Parkway train station. I'm not sure, but I may have underpaid, possibly because I misunderstood the instructions on the machine. If they get me for that then I'll pay. At least nearly all of the paid parking was done with a contactless card this time; nowhere forced a phone app on me.

I may have picked a speeding fine, too. Speed limits are strictly policed in the UK, and as I was coming out of Stow-on-the-Wold doing perhaps 35mph in the 30mph zone, when I noticed I was driving straight at a camera van. I slowed quickly and may not have triggered the camera at all, but you never know. I'd been particularly careful about not speeding, so if I do get a fine then I'll be royally pissed.

When you pay for gas in the UK, you nearly always have to go into the little shop, there being no "pay at the pump" option. The UK is no slouch when it comes to retail technology, it was years ahead of Canada with Chip and Pin, and contactless, but this gas pump thing was a mystery. Or was it? The little shops are actually convenience stores that sell everything from coffee, to newspapers, to bread, to lightbulbs. If you pay at the pump then you don't go into the shop and you don't get tempted by that discount bag of Wine Gums. Going into the shop to pay is clearly a ruse to get you to spend more money. Don't fall for it!

Talking of gas, when people in Canada say they are the most highly taxed nation in the world, they're wrong. Additional UK taxes make gas there about 70% more expensive than in Canada. Another reason to get a small rental car.

In the UK, people don't generally tip wait staff. Most Point of Sale terminals don't include a tipping facility, and most servers look quite surprised when you do offer them a tip. While a goodly proportion of establishments take only card payments these days, if you wish to tip, have a bit of cash handy. British wait staff, while surprised, will always be happy to accept any reward for good service. Some places will make a mandatory service charge for large parties, but they're rare.

This may be a well worn bit of advice, but in British pubs, whether you stand at the bar or sit at a table, you have to order your drinks at the bar and take them to wherever you're sitting or standing. No one will come to your table to take your order. Things are changing a bit, and there's a bit of crossover between restaurants and pubs. If you're in any doubt, order at the bar. People still like to queue in the UK, that is stand in line and wait for their turn. If you're at the bar, don't jump the queue, even if there isn't an obvious queue. There are only a few things worse than jumping a queue in Britain; no, scratch that, there is NOTHING worse than jumping a queue.

Public transport is pretty good in the UK, with trains and buses being fast, frequent and generally affordable. Big cities like London are bringing all their transport providers under a single authority and controlling prices and services, which makes for excellent fares. The UK's trains are good across the country, even with the alarming rise of cancelled trains, often with no notice. The fares are labyrinthine, but if you research and you travel outside of the morning and evening rush, then it's all quite reasonable. We were paying £19 for a day return from Didcot to London, which for an hour's trip on fast train is pretty good. If you're young or old, you can get special discount cards, as well. Kids under 5 travel free on trains, and in London kids under 12 travel free on all buses, trains and underground, which we took advantage of extensively.

There are a lot of cars in the UK, and on certain days and at certain times it can seem like they're all out on the roads at the same time. It takes very little to gum up the road system, and it can be something as simple as a some traffic lights not phased properly, as we found out in Weymouth on a Friday afternoon. It's a fairly small seaside town, but it was gridlocked, all because there were three sets of traffic lights quite close together, but their phasing was out of wack.

I was reminded once again that the drivers in England are usually a very cooperative bunch. They'll let you out onto a busy road, yield when they don't have to, and generally don't behave like entitled dicks. Because speed limits are enforced, you don't get tailgaters, not often anyway, trying to push slower cars onwards, and you don't hear too much grumbling when people are running at below the speed limit. Not everyone plays the game, of course, but driving in England, even with the heavier traffic, can be a far more pleasant experience than driving in Ontario.

...and that was it, that was Blighty 2025. I'm sure there's a lot more that I could write, but this post is far too long already. It must surely be time to revert to the Airstream Annals.

Blighty 2025 - Britain's Ocean City

We made the second of two trips to Plymouth yesterday, on family business.

It's 180 miles from Shipton-under-Wychwood to our location in north Plymouth. The city is labelled "Britain's Ocean City", positioned as it is on the Western Approaches to the English Channel, with its historic, deep-water harbour. Google said three hours, and if you discount the stops we made (Sedgemoor Services being almost exactly half way), then that was pretty accurate. On both trips, the traffic was heavy, but moving, which was a relief given our limited time.

This trip, outside of family business, Emma and I took Charlie to Plymouth Hoe to visit Smeaton's Tower, the fourth Eddystone Lighthouse, dismantled from its sea-bound perch on the Eddystone Rocks, thirteen miles south, and rebuilt on The Hoe. It's Plymouth's own iconic monument, and one that I know well from my childhood, so it was quite a pleasure to take my step-daughter and grandson there, even if the original one penny admission charge had increased somewhat.

The Hoe commands a brilliant view of Plymouth Sound, the Breakwater, and the English Channel beyond. It helped that the weather was good, and all the nautical activity out in the Sound all added to the ambience. There were lots of young people strewn about on the grass (this is a burgeoning University town) enjoying the sunshine, and of course tourist types like us.

Rather than type out stuff about Smeaton's Tower, if you have time you can read about it here.

I discovered that the tower is now looked after by "The Box", Plymouth's own museum trust. I was able to negotiate some concessionary prices for admission, and listened avidly as the young man issuing the tickets gave us a safety talk, which was welcome given that lighthouses are not roomy and have an awful lot of steps.

We made or way up the granite spiral stairs, which became narrower as the tower itself narrowed, then tackled the series of four ladders, or more like four really steep sets of stairs, that took you up through the various levels. Halfway up a young woman was stationed to answer questions and, more probably, to give support to people panicking as they made their way down the steep steps. She was friendly and helpful, so top marks to The Box. 

The lighthouse was built in 1759, so the light room wasn't equipped with a big lamp or a rotating lens, just two great big cast-iron rings onto which had been fastened candles; quite the contrast to the modern, working lighthouse at Portland Bill. The view from within the light was excellent, but given the fine weather, it was very hot in there, so we ventured out onto the balcony that goes all the way around the top of the light. It may have been sunny, but it was windy out there, and even though there was a sturdy and high railing all the way around, stood holding my camera with two hands, my normally good head for heights was betraying me. It was fine when I held the railing, or pressed back against the wall, but just standing there, hands-free as it were, and I was starting to get a bit wobbly. Still, I got some photos, and a glorious view of Plymouth. Just for good measure, we could see the modern-day Eddystone Lighthouse, out on the horizon, and could just make out the original base of the very tower we were standing on, still anchored to the Eddystone Rocks. Nice.

The rest of the visit was with the family, and we eventually started home nearer 7pm than the 5pm we'd planned on. Again, it was a good run, although I have to raise a proper grumble about the fact that many of the food outlets at Motorway Service Stations close far too early in the evening. I know staff have to be paid, but there was a lot of business going begging at only a little past 8pm.

It was a long day, but we arrived home safely, and were reminded just how far north we are here compared with our home in Canada as it wasn't completely dark at 10:30pm. English summers, eh?

Blighty 2025 - All aboard the Skylark!

Today was Dear Wife's birthday and she elected to hire a small "Day Boat" on the southern section of the Stratford Canal in Warwickshire. What a capital idea, we all thought.

Weather is important on a canal boat, not least because someone has to stand out in the open and steer the thing, so it wasn't looking good as we headed north to Chipping Norton, and beyond, in rain and blustery winds. But, as we booked months ago, we couldn't really do much about it.

English "A" roads are rarely dull for the North American driver. There is always plenty to look at, including the twists, turns, ups, and downs that you encounter, and the sheer amount of other vehicles using them. It's all good as they wend their way through the countryside and through pretty little villages, but it can get frustrating when you get caught behind someone who doesn't like to get above 40mph. We did this wet morning, and given the lack of straightness in these roads, unless you're willing to take risks, you get stuck. I do understand why people drive slowly, especially in the bad weather, but as I said, when there are miles to be eaten up, it can get frustrating.

For all that, we arrived at the boatyard in Wootton Wawen only ten minutes behind schedule. Anglo-Welsh Cruisers has been around for years and hire out some very nice boats that you can stay on for weeks at a time. The English and Welsh canal system is extensive and you can, given time, explore some amazing scenery in the heart of the country. Because the canal system is well in excess of 200 years old in most places, these canals do not take big craft. On this canal, the maximum width of a boat is seven feet, and the maximum length is seventy feet, so that locks could be kept small for cost and water usage reasons. They're long and narrow, which is why they're called Narrow Boats (as opposed to barges). Our narrow boat for the day was only thirty feet long, and wasn't equipped with beds and the like. It did have a toilet, a sink and a stove, but it was designed for just day use, and that was what we were doing. Our boat was called Charlie.

Driving a canal boat has its challenges, but it's not too difficult. A nice young man called Luke gave us the lowdown on how things worked, including locks, and prised it out from a plethora of other boats in the basin, He then let me steer it up the canal for a few hundred yards, just to get the feel of it, before we turned around in a "Winding Hole", a specially cut, wide section in the canal to allow boats to turn, then back to the yard to drop him off, and away we chugged, very slowly, towards our destination, Wilmslow, about two hours cruising time to the south. 

I've driven narrow boats before, so it was more a case of remembering how to do things than learning new. You stand on the stern and operate a tiller, which means you push the tiller to the left and the bow goes right, and vice-versa. It's actually quite intuitive, and when you realise that the boat pivots in the middle, it's really quite easy. What's not quite so intuitive is the time that it takes for the bow to respond to tiller movement, it's quite a heavy beast, and the fact that you have to counter any any inputs with a counter-input. That means that if you straighten the tiller after a turn, the boat will keep turning for some time, so you have to counter that by pushing the tiller the opposite way. Still, it didn't take long to get back into the swing of it. 

There's a speed limit of 4mph on English and Welsh canals, to prevent the banks being washed away. Even when I'd cranked the throttle up a bit, we were still going more slowly than people walking on the bank, which is how it should be. That is the way to enjoy the scenery. If you can't hack that leisurely pace then canals are not for you.

The first few yards of the canal were on an aqueduct over a road. Just eight feet wide, it was odd to be on water above the cars below. Then the canal opened up and we were into the lush Warwickshire countryside, in among the sheep and the wildlife. Sadly, it was pouring with rain.

Dear Wife stood out with me on the stern, holding an umbrella we'd borrowed, and we got wet together. The life-jacketed Charlie was whizzing about all over the place, and it was quite the trauma trying to stop him from going overboard. It's not that he'd drown, although the propeller of the boat isn't something you want to come into contact with; the canal is usually only about four feet deep, but we didn't want a soggy child to deal with. 

As the rain died down, Dear Wife took the tiller, but didn't find the steering at all intuitive, so it was back to me. Where there are bridges over the canal, the channel is narrowed down to 7'6", so in a 7' wide boat, that gives you 3" either side, so inevitably you do come into contact with the brick pillars at some point. The trick is to take it slowly and avoid a direct hit. Standing at the tiller, the front of the boat wasn't visible, so it was a case of lining up the cleat in the centre of the boat's roof with the centre of the bridge. It worked reasonably well.

Our first obstacle was a lock, with a drop of about eight feet. The lock was full and the top gate open as we approached, which was handy as I could drive straight in (the lock chamber is 75' long and 7'6" wide). My crew got off to operate the lock (shut the gate, operate the gate paddle on the lower gate, then open the gate when the water level was the same as the lower canal and close it behind the boat as I drove out). Getting the crew to do all the hard work is the Skipper's privilege.

Before long, we were on to the Edstone Aqueduct, a 475' long cast iron trough that carries the canal over a road, a river and railway line, albeit that the aqueduct was there before the railway. It's the longest cast iron canal trough in England, so that's a fun fact to store away. My crew had been a bit nervous about crossing the valley in a boat, but actually they all enjoyed the experience.

After the aqueduct, we had a long chug down to Wilmslow and lunch. My First Mate, Emma, took the tiller and drove for much of the time, which was nice. Charlie was the chief distraction, but we neither crashed into the bank, or lost the little shaver overboard. We saw many sheep, ducks and Moorhens, and just the one Coote. We also saw an enormous Heron sat on the towpath, and he/she obligingly took to the air as we approached. It was also curious on this trip that we hadn't encountered any other craft on water, at least not moving craft, but more about that later.

At Wilmslow, our destination, I went past the winding hole, which turned out to be an error on my part. We tied up against the towpath and broke out the extensive lunch that Dear Wife had prepared the day before. The weather had perked up and it was quite nice just sat there on the water munching our way through a very large lunch. I was mulling over how to turn the boat around and thought I might do it right there, but then I made my second mistake by consulting Google Maps about how far down the canal the next turning point might be. Thinking it'd be a simple matter, we set off southwards again, but came up short when we found that not only was there a flight of locks between us and the winding hole, but the top lock was closed for a gate replacement. Bugger, I thought, and it dawned on me then why we'd not seen any other boats. I don't remember anyone at the boatyard mentioning that the lock was closed, and the people on their moored boat failed to mention it as we drove by. Ho hum.

Given the flight of locks, I'd have had to turned the boat around above the lock anyway as we'd not have enough time to go down five locks and come back up them again as the boat was due back at four pm. So with Emma at the helm, I secured the bow rope to a bollard on the bank and she used the propeller to swing the boat around. The canal was just wide enough to allow us to do that, thank goodness. Then with me fretting about getting the boat back on time, we struck north again.

Emma did manage to ground the boat on the shallow side of the canal after Charlie had attempted to navigate, but some deft use of the pole that was provided for that very job, I pushed her off the mud and we were off again. A thankfully largely uneventful run back to Wotton Wawen was made with ten minutes to spare, although we did slow down a bit after negotiating the lock again. We did have a bit of bother with the bottom gate on the lock, though, as it kept swing open after we'd driven the boat into the chamber. You can't open the top paddles unless the bottom gate is at least partially closed (the inflow water into the lock will close it if it's part closed already), so I jumped off the boat and held the gate closed as Emma lifted one of the top paddles. Meanwhile, the deck hand, Dear Wife, took the engine controls and switched the propeller forward and astern as needed, in order to keep the boat central in the lock chamber as the water rushed in from the top culvert. When we'd opened the top gate and nosed the boat out of the lock, Emma closed the gate after us and while I held the boat up against the now closed top gate, she stepped aboard. A real team effort I felt.

If you're after an introduction to a canal holiday, the Day Boat is good fun, and cost us a round £100, which was bad for a day's entertainment for up to six people. It wasn't the best appointed vessel on the canal, but it did the job, and we all had a fabulous time in the Warwickshire countryside. If I had any complaint at all it was the noise of the engine, and the smell of the diesel fumes, but these are trifling matters in the grand scheme of things.

After the boating expedition, we drove into Stratford-upon-Avon for some supper and a mooch around Shakespeare's birthplace. It was a nice walking around as most of the tourists had gone home for the night, and despite it being quite cool, it was good to spend some time there. I doubt Charlie will remember the trip, but we have the photos.

As a kind of postscript is that I was so tired after the day standing up that I went to bed before 10pm, which is almost unheard of.

Blighty 2025 - Friday Travels

This fine Friday, we set off for Lulworth Cove, and a family birthday celebration. 

The roads in England tend to fan out from London, and this trip was north to south, crossing the M4, A3, A303, A35, and many, many more, which makes driving distances quite awkward. Add to the mix the fact that it was fine weather and it being the last Friday of the half term holiday, we knew the traffic would be horrible, and we weren't wrong. Indeed, the first holdup came just south of Burford with people lining up to get into the Cotswold Wildlife Park, so we knew what was coming. 

We were travelling slightly off track to visit the visit the village of Holt, just outside Trowbridge, where Dear Wife's paternal grandmother is buried. The family tree people, Ancestry, threw up the precise location and as it was sort of on the way, we decided to pay a call. 

Holt is a lovely little Wiltshire village, and the graveyard we were seeking was one of three that surround the Anglican Parish Church of St Katherines. The grave was duly visited, and we decided to stop for our picnic lunch, and it was then that we met a vary nice lady who may have gone by the title "Church Warden", or she may not, but had the church open and invited us in. The good people of Holt had removed all the pews and replaced them with tables and chairs. There was a childrens playgroup area and three audio visual systems to make the place usuable in so many more ways that a simple Sunday service. I also noticed a lot of musical instruments up towards the altar, so it was also a refuge for musicians. I'm not a religious person, but I couldn't help thinking that these people were making so much more of their church, and that it would remain the centre of village life, and I like that.

The nice lady also invited up to sit in the church's outside area, under the Yew trees in the oldest part of the graveyard. Far from being buggy, it was a cool and pleasant, and make for a lovely picnic setting. But we had to get back on the road.

We wriggled and twisted, went up hill and downhill, and at one point I commented that it was a good job that Charlie didn't suffer with travel sickness, but almost immediately he said he was feeling unwell. He cuddled up with him mum, as best as he could while in his car seat, and I slowed a little and tried to take it easy, and he dozed off. When he woke, he said he felt much better. Upset avoided.

The traffic was heavy, but we nosed our way south, although not directly to Lulworth Cove. We were on a mission to visit the lighthouse at Portland Bill, although the slowness of the traffic, particularly through Weymouth, was cutting down our usable time. I don't recall ever having been to Portland, although while there I was getting the occasional flashbacks. Portland is a s block land that pokes out into the English Channel and forms the eastern edge of Lyme Bay. Out on the "Bill", what the place is known as, it's wild and wooly, and almost completely devoid of trees thanks to the almost constant winds. If you're worldly wise, you might have heard of Portland Stone, or Portland Cement, both products hailing from this little outcrop of rock.

We did arrive at the lighthouse in good time, and how magnificent it looked, all red and white stripes against the blue of the sea. Where the tides meet, immediately south of the Bill, the sea was all churned up and rough looking, an area that is known as the Portland Race and not much loved by mariners.

Three of us took the tour of the lighthouse, which involved climbing 155 steps to the top. It's a working lighthouse, but is now fully automated and runs just two LED lamps rum though doughnut-shaped lenses, rather than the massive rotating lenses that were a feature of lighthouses of the past. It still gives out the same "Character", four flashes every twenty seconds, but in a very modern manner. Of course the view from the top was fabulous, especially given the great weather.

We finally set course for Lulworth Cove, but didn't anticipate the traffic in Weymouth being at a complete standstill. Again, it was the Friday blues.

We pitched up in Lulworth about half-an-hour off schedule, which probably wasn't too bad given the roads and the time of day. I hadn't been to Lulworth in a fair few years, but it was just as pretty as I remembered it.

The family portion of the visit isn't for the blog, so I'll pick this up again after we've been to visit the Swanage Railway on Saturday.

Blighty 2025 - Full Steam Ahead, and other silly sayings

Today we made the fairly short trip to the Cotswold village of Broadway, and the Gloucestershire and Warwickshire Steam Railway, better known as the GWSR. For my North American readers that's the "Glostershure and Worrickshure Steam Railway".

Broadway is better known for it's idyllic main street, broad and lined with Cotswold Stone buildings, albeit that it's all gone a bit high-priced and touristy these days. But at the bottom of that street is the old Cheltenham to Stratford-Upon-Avon railway line, raised from the dead by a dedicated band of volunteers and now running regular jaunts between Broadway and Cheltenham Racecourse, with trains normally hauled by steam locomotives. Heritage railways are on the up in the UK, and the GWSR is an excellent example of how to do it correctly.

There is a good history of the line on the GWSR website, from it's original inception in 1899, to the present day, and you can read about it here.

Our drive over there through the pretty, if twisty, roads of the Cotswolds was easy, and the weather was set fair as well. There's a car park next to Broadway Station, operated by the local council, and it was there that we pulled in and I went to pay. Now parking in the UK is expensive, and these days dominated by parking apps for mobile phones; witness the parking at British Rail stations. But here it was either coins, of which I had none, or a parking app that I didn't have on my phone. I loaded the app using the data only e-sim I've been using to avoid the scandalous charges by my Canadian cell phone provider, but of course the app wanted to confirm the phone number by sending me an SMS message. OK, I switched e-sims and fired up Rogers Canada, only to find no signal. Bugger, I thought.

Dear Wife legged it on up to the station to buy our GWSR train tickets, while I nipped into a little petrol station on the roadside and bought a chocolate bar with a £10 note, asking for my change in £1 coins. Oh my goodness, you'd have thought I'd have asked him to sign his daughter into slavery! What a face on the man! Still, he did cough up the requisite coins. Back at the car park, I shovelled five coins into the machine and received two tickets, one to go on the dashboard of the car, and one to exchange at the station ticket office for a £3 discount on the train fare. Result. I was a wee bit crestfallen when Dear Wife and Emma expressed surprised that I'd had the gumption to read the tickets and bring one up to the station, how nice it is that people have confidence in my abilities.

The train was standing in the station, big green Merchant Navy Class locomotive at the front, Peninsular and Oriental (P&O for the ordinary folks), number 35006, ready to haul us down to Cheltenham Racecourse. The carriages, or cars, were not new but were considerably newer than the loco, and took myself and Dear Wife back in time to when we were taken on train trips as kids ourselves. Charlie of course was ecstatic.

The loco huffed and puffed and we set off south through the lush, and I mean lush, Cotswold countryside. The rail line has a lot of infrastructure that has to be maintained, stations, bridges, viaducts and tunnels, and everything looked so well cared for. The stations on the line had more or less been demolished when British Rail closed the line, but the GWSR has brought them back, from rebuilt signal boxes, to new platforms and old station buildings, and right down to some period signage and posters. For a train nerd, it is absolute heaven, and for us oldies, it really stirred some memories.

We had traditional card tickets, which were duly "clipped" by the train's guard part way through the trip. The sound and smell of the steam loco was magical and our stately progress allowed us to soak up the Vale of Evesham and the Severn Valley views, and the hills of Malvern and beyond. The weather was bright and sunny, and that added to the enjoyment.

At the Racecourse we alighted and watched the loco uncouple from the front of the train and trundle around to the back, to be coupled on there and be ready for the return trip to Broadway. We availed ourselves of snacks from the outlet on the station, which bore more than a passing resemblance to a garden shed, and boarded the train once again for the slow run north.

Back at Broadway, we watched the loco get relocated from one end of the train to the other again, only this time, when the loco was ready and they were waiting for the signal, the driver let Charlie, and a couple of other kids, up onto the footplate. You can imagine how delighted the little fellow was to be standing on a real, fired up and working steam engine. That was such a nice touch at the end of a day when everyone associated with the railway had been so lovely.

Heading home, we climbed (in the car) the very steep Fish Hill, and paused at the top to visit Broadway Tower, a folly built right on the edge of the escarpment and commanding amazing views. Of course it was just closing up for the day, but we stopped for a few minutes in the car park and took in the view, which was breathtaking, at least in a bucolic, English way. We were actually chivvied out of the car park by an anxious worker there, keen to lock the gates, so we climbed back into the Carrot and headed home. 

When the the lady in the Satnav became unexpectedly quiet at a key intersection, I naturally took the wrong road of the two available, but we enjoyed a short and pretty diversion through the tiny village of Upper Oddington which, apart from having the narrowest roads in the UK, was really nice.

A quiet evening in was capped by watching our beloved Chelsea Football Club win the UEFA Europa Conference League final, streamed for free through Discovery+, and shown through a nice TV in the cottage using a "borrowed" HDMI cable (I put it back when the game was over). A good day, I think.

Blighty 2025 - In another country

 

It was a late start for us today. Well, not for me, I was wide awake at 6:45 in the morning, but no one else surfaced before 11am. I was being very calm, though, and the plan for the day looked like it may have to be limited, but we could still do the main part.

We set a course for Raglan Castle, near Raglan, Monmouthshire. Those with a keen eye for geography will know that Monmouthshire is in Wales (just), and is another country.

Our Satnav set us on a cross-country route that avoided any centre of population, except Stow-on-the-Wold, and had us go north on the M5 for a bit, then south west for quite a while on the M50. The route was a little longer than the more direct A40, but the motorway sections made it quite a bit quicker. It was a good choice of route, too.

The run to Stow was certainly bucolic; mile after mile of narrow lanes, twists and turns, and a few small hills and dales. The countryside around these parts is wonderful, with mature woodland, hedgerows and small hillocky hills. If you know about this part of the world then you'll also know that it's famed for its wool, and even now the hillsides were dotted with sheep. Burford, Stowe, and the rest, may have lost their trade in wool, but it's still being produced in these parts, which was quite reassuring.

The only thing that didn't quite ring true was the overwhelming evidence of money. Farmers can be wealthy, for sure, but there were too many Aston Martins, Porsches, Mercedes Benz, Range/Land Rovers about to belong to the farmers. Then there were the big, expensive houses dotted around, none with sheep sheds or tactors. I recently heard the Cotswolds described as Britain's answer to the Hamptons in the USA, and I'd say that was becoming a fair statement. Stow-on-the-Wold was teeming with expensive cars and expensive looking people (it's the long weekend here). I guess they have to live somewhere.

The run over towards the M5, a few miles north of Cheltenham, was a little less like the Hamptons, but just as enjoyable as the run up to Stow.

I had never been on the M50 before today. It's a short, two-lane motorway running down to Ross-on-Wye, where it links up with the A40 heading west into South Wales. This being a long weekend, there was plenty of traffic, but we made good time and were rolling up the access road to Raglan Castle pretty much on schedule, despite the late start.

I won't go on about the castle too much, except to say that it was established in the 1200s to help with the defence of England (from the Welsh), and had been in constant use as a big home rather than a defensive stronghold, right up until its partial demolition by Oliver Cromwell's Parliamentarians after the end of the English Civil War in 1653. It now stands as a craftily restored ruin, and is as beautiful a ruined castle as you'll ever see.

Because it was the long weekend, there was lots of other "stuff" going on at the castle, including a Medieval Murder Mystery, with people dressed up in period costumes and demonstrating some period crafts. Personally I'm not much into this dressing up thing, but it certainly added a bit of colour.

We wandered around the castle, went up to the top of the Keep and enjoyed a splendid view, then ate our picnic lunch in the castle grounds, which was all most enjoyable, despite the blustery wind. I should also mention the Swallows whizzing about the ruins. I had never seen a proper British Barn Swallow before going to Raglan some years ago, and here were the Swallows, almost certainly related to the ones I'd seen before, rushing in and out of the ancient building. Excellent stuff.

Obviously we raided the gift shop before leaving, it would be impolite not to, and kept Cadw, the castle's stewards, going for a few more months. 

We had planned to maybe visit Goodrich Castle, a "proper" fortification built on a cliff above the River Wye, but were really short on time, so we headed south down through the steep-side valley cut by that same river, and made our way to Tintern Abbey. There are quite a few ruined abbeys in the Britain, set up by various orders of monks, then sacked by King Henry the Eighth as part of his break with the Holy Roman Church. Tintern is one, and goodness is it ever a beautiful place? On a bend in the river, the ruins stand tall against the steep valley sides and look just fabulous. We hadn't planned on going in, it was just closing up for the day anyway, but just to admire the place from the pub garden next door (with a pint of Welsh beer in hand, of course) was enough.

Then it was time to head home. We made our way back into England on the old Severn Bridge, with no toll going eastwards. The Bristol Channel is impressive, but it was seriously windy out in the middle. On the M4, outside Swindon, we stopped at a motorway service station and the girls topped up vegan pasty and sausage roll supplies from Greggs and the West Cornwall Pasty Company. Service stations are not the most exciting places on earth, but when the shops like Greggs are very much a novelty for the overseas visitor, they seem quite exotic. Not so much excitement for the petrol, of course, because it was a full twenty-five pence a litre more expensive than anywhere else - that hasn't changed since my days in England.

On the way home we stopped for a very bland take-out pizza at Dominoes in Carterton, well it is the long weekend, and rolled back into Shipton at around seven in the evening. A long day, for sure, but really very interesting, and successful given the late start. And it didn't rain!

Tomorrow, as they say, is another day.

Blighty 2025 - The Beginning

A long time in the planning, a significant family birthday is our prime motivation for yet another grand tour of our joint fatherland, England. This is a long one, just on four weeks, and is costing not only an arm and a leg, but the foot and the hand as well.

Planning started over a year ago, and we'd booked three weeks in a charming little house in the centre of the Cotswold town of Burford. Why Burford? Well, it's central, it's pretty, and is far enough away from our usual haunts that it makes this trip a little different.

The only trouble was that, a month out from departure and we are on the hook for the full accommodation cost, but we discovered to our horror that the cottage we had booked had been removed from the cottage rental agency's booking calendar, but no one had thought to mention this small detail to us. Given how close this was to departure, and we'd already paid in full for the air fares and the rental car, there was no backing out, and an awful lot of panic on our part. Step up Gardeners Cottage, in the almost as pretty Cotswold village of Shipton-under-Wychwood, just a few miles north of Burford. A place that had all the Burford place had, and more, and was available for the three weeks that we needed it. A quick booking, and a shed load of money, later and Bingo! The deposit we'd paid on the first cottage was fully refunded, naturally.

So, it was a long a fraught morning that we waited at home before setting off for Toronto's Lester Pearson airport and our overnight flight to London. It was fraught because the British Airways computer had decided to schedule a different aircraft and the seats we had paid a King's ransom to reserve didn't exist on the new aircraft. Again, without anyone actually telling us, we had been allocated different seats, none of them close to a window. Sure, a seat is a seat, but why pay a ton of cash for a specific seat and then have it whipped away from you on the morning of the flight? Decisive action was called for, so I put in a claim for the refund of the money paid to reserve the seats; take that BA!

The drive up to the airport wasn't great. The weather was horrible, low cloud and rain for most of it, and of course given the hour of the day and multiple collisions on our route, our four hour journey ran into five. It was a good job that we'd allowed so much extra time.

Check in at the valet parking was simple, as was checking in for the flight, so bagless, thank goodness, we made our way through security and into the vastness of Terminal 3. I've moaned before about the removal of most of the regular seating there, in favour of tables aimed at food and drink service from a number of outlets recently installed. Ordering food and drink isn't mandatory if you use the tables, but I still prefer a proper "comfy" chair and a good view out of the window, both of which were achieved, thank without having to settle for the table arrangement. The food and drink outlets are scarily expensive, as are all of the shops and whatnot in the terminal building; there are a lot of people making a lot of profit from their captive audience, and I object to that. 

The aircraft due to take us to London arrived late thanks to the weather, so was late in loading and late in departing. We pushed back about thirty minutes behind schedule, and the aircraft's pilots bolted for the runway. I commented to DW on how fast we were taxiing, and as we turned onto the runway, we promptly turned off it again and parked on one of the runway exits. This wasn't looking so good. After about ten minutes, the Captain came on to say that one of the aircrafts brakes was overheating so they had to wait until it cooled off before making a second attempt at getting to the runway. Curiously, I wasn't surprised at this news. Anyway, at the second attempt we took off, very smoothly it has to be said, and headed east into the night. 

The inflight food was OK, in as much as any inflight food is OK. I had Macaroni and tomato sauce, which wasn't too too horrible. Then it was time to achieve the almost impossible, some sleep. The seats on the Airbus A350 are not comfortable, and while dozed through Singing in the Rain, and a Harry Potter audio book, I didn't feel very rested as I awoke properly somewhere over Northern Ireland. We were served one of those odd aircraft "light snacks", a kind of pastry filled with tomato sauce, and to go with it, a very small cup of coffee. It was a strange snack, but we'd paid for it, so it was all dutifully consumed.

We arrived more or less back on schedule in a warm and sunny London, and Heathrow Terminal 5 wasn't too awful. We made our way to the Sofitel Hotel, just outside the Terminal, where Sixt car rental have a desk, and went through the usual "upsell" routine with one of the agents there. On a twenty-seven day rental I didn't really want to be upsold, despite the agent pretending that there was no way our luggage would fit in the type of car I'd already paid for. She set us up with a Skoda Karoq, or "Carrott" as it will be known for the next four weeks, and guess what? The luggage fitted in. Just.

I haven't driven a manual car for a while, but took to it quite easily. You never forget clutch control. Modern cars no longer have a manual handbrake, so I was having to get used to the electric version, and learn to trust it when it released automatically, but it was all fine. Our official route to Oxfordshire had us on the dreaded Orbital motorway, the M25, for a few miles. But this was Friday afternoon, at the start of the schools' half-term holiday week, so the normally busy road was doubly-busy. I opted to avoid the stopped traffic and made for the slightly less busy M4, and a cross-country route, despite the protestations of the lady in the Satnav. 

We came off the M4 at Theale, made our way through Pangbourne and Streatley, then skirted the Berkshire downs, took a detour through the village of Blewbury, my home for fifteen years, then onto the A34 to Abingdon, and across country to Witney, just a few miles short of our destination. We were some hours ahead of schedule, so stopped to pick up some supplies at Waitrose, the excellent grocery arm of the John Lewis group. Far from picking up "a few bits", eighty-five great British Pounds later we struggled to fit our many purchases into the already well packed Skoda.

What should have been a fifteen minute drive to the cottage took nearer forty as we crept through Burford in gridlocked traffic, victims once again of half-term Friday. There's a bridge across the River Windrush at the bottom of the hill in Burford, so narrow that it's controlled by traffic lights, and that was the cause of the delay, at least in terms of how the really heavy traffic coped with those traffic lights. I'm hoping that it's not so bad on other days. The slight upside of the hold up was that we arrived at our home for the next three weeks, more or less at the time we were supposed to.

I'll write about the cottage in another post, but it really is a nice place to be, right on the edge of the Cotswolds. 

And so to bed. Everyone was dazed and confused after the (mostly) sleepless overnight flight, so tempers were beginning to fray, and I couldn't find the car keys which didn't help the general mood. Still, a good night's sleep will surely sort me out.

Plymouth (The Original One) 2024 - The Accommodation

 Here in sunny Devon (very, very wet Devon if I'm truthful), we're staying in a nice little house on Plymouth's historic Barbican, the old port area and point at which the Mayflower sailed for the New World. Allegedly.

We've stayed down on the Barbican before, and because it's so central to the city, you really don't need your own transport while here. Everything you require is quite close by, and there's never anywhere to park anyway. The Barbican also boasts more pubs and fish and chip shops per square mile than anywhere I've ever been. The place is thronging with people, especially at the weekends, and it makes the whole area seem very lively. I have to say that we don't search out lively usually, but this part of the city has always been a hive of activity, so it all fits. In centuries past it was ships and sailors, today it's students and tourists, but either way it's vibrant. I mentioned the pubs, but looking at some 150 year-old maps, there are only a fraction of the number of pubs now compared to then, but the place is still full of them. 

 

Our house is on Stokes Lane, one block back from the quayside, and would have been home to stores and warehouses at some point. The present house dates to the Georgian period, but the stone walls that make up the rear of the house tell of earlier habitation. It's three stories high, four if you include the cellar, an is only about twenty feet across at the front. The door opens straight on to the street, and that itself can't be much more than twenty feet across. According to the little potted history of the house that's in the information folder, the artist Robert Lenkiewicz (1941-2002) lived in the house at some point in his life, and boy does that man have a history. I'm certain that the house also was home to many a salty old sea dog over the years, and if you looked, I'm sure the deeds would show up a "Sea Captain" or two, which seems to be a code for anyone associated with ships. The cellar, off limits to visitors, may have been used to store contraband, smuggled goods, in years gone by, although I'm certain that most houses in these parts would make that claim.

When we looked at the house on Google StreetView, it looked a bit different to the blurb on the VRBO website, but we worked out that it's undergone some significant refurbishment recently. The owner has updated the place without losing it's essential structure, so we are in a narrow, old house, but with all modern conveniences, and very comfortable it is too. I don't think it's on the list of Scheduled Buildings, or Listed in anyway, which would explain the blue frontage and modern windows. That said, there is a bit of a musty smell to the place, which is understandable, and it takes a bit of heating to take the edge off the chill. England can feel damp at the best of times, especially when just yards from the sea, and in an old stone house. Thank goodness for Natural Gas and some nice radiators.

 

The reason we're here at all is family related, not least because this is DW's home town. Family tree research has linked my family to the City as well, one of my Great-Grandmothers being born in a house just on the other side of the harbour, not more than a quarter of a mile from where I'm typing this. Family tree research isn't our reason to visit, but we'll definitely do a little looking around while we're here.

Given that it's raining stair rods out there at the moment, we won't be off exploring the area today, but when the rain does ease off then I'll document our travels.

Plymouth (The Original One) 2024 - The Arriving

 Another trip eastwards and across the ocean for us, this time to DW's ancestral home Plymouth. Not the Plymouth of Massachusetts, but the one in Devon from whence the Mayflower sailed. We haven't brought the Airstream, obviously, but I thought I'd document the trip here, especially given that we might have been camping were we not in Merrie Olde England.

Travelling to England is always expensive, and always a chore. We'd booked the best price seats we could manage given that we wanted a full service airline, Premium Economy seats, and a direct flight (so not cheap), and placed our faith in British Airways from Toronto's Pearson Airport to London Heathrow. That of course meant a drive up the dreaded Highway 401. It's construction season on Canada's roads right now, and we knew that there were around six or seven different construction sites between home and the airport, and because we were travelling on a Friday afternoon we decided to allow ourselves plenty of time. It was a good job that we did.

We were about twenty-five minutes past our target leaving time, and immediately hit a snag when the train crossing lights started flashing on LaCroix Street in town, and we spent five minutes watching one of those never ending freight trains pass by, although the angst was slightly offset watching a couple of drivers ahead of us panic when then realised they'd stopped so close to the tracks that the barriers would likely hit their cars when they came down. I mean, there's half a dozen trains through there daily, so it's not like it's a rare event, but still they stop on the tracks. But I digress.

 

On the 401 it was busy. Wall-to-wall trucks, but at least it was moving. That lasted up until Colonel Talbot Road when we hit the first of many, many slow-downs. On a trip that should take just on three hours door-to-door, it took us over four hours. The Friday afternoon traffic likely made things worse, but that run up was the worst I'd experienced in my fifteen years in Canada. But in this case, we'd left so much slack in the schedule that we were not even mildly late for our flight.

Toronto's Pearson airport isn't the best place to be on a Friday evening, but then it's not the worst, either. The check-in area in Terminal 3 isn't really big enough to accommodate the number of people that use it, but then again, neither is the same space in Terminal 1. We dumped our bags in fairly short order and made our way through security screening without too much of a fuss. Airside, things have changed a little from when I first started travelling regularly through the airport. Firstly you're forced to walk through a big duty-free perfume selling store (which was new), and the long departure gate arm now has many more retail outlets than it used to have. It certainly gives the place a livelier feel, but they are all, without exception, hugely over-priced. London's Heathrow airport has long been known as "Thief-row" thanks to the high prices levied on airside clients, and Pearson Airport is catching up. We were in Terminal 3 last November but things had changed even since then, with most of the regular seating removed and replaced by tables, with a central restaurant and bar in the centre. In T1 there are I-Pads on the tables through which you can order your over-priced food and drink to be delivered to your table. Now it's just a QR code etched on a metal plate on the table and you can order the same over-priced food and drink from your cell phone. I don't think I'd mind too much if the tabled area formed only part of the departures seating, but it doesn't, it's all encompassing. You don't have to make an order when you're sat at the tables, but it's kind of implied. It's not as if any of this is essential for the travelling public because pretty much every flight out of there gives you a meal within an hour of takeoff anyway. My cynical mind tells me it's all about profit, and I'm never in the mood to voluntarily help the GTAA (Greater Toronto Airport Authority) get rich. We, being the ever economical souls that we are, brought home made sandwiches. I did spoil things by going to buy an over-priced cup of coffee from Starbucks, but walked away from the line waiting when the three people serving seemed that talking among themselves was more important than moving the line and actually selling coffee. In my annoyance I bought a bottle of water and KitKat for the eye-watering sum of $9.38, which was three times what I'd have spent at Starbucks. But hey, principles are principles.

Our aircraft for the flight was an Airbus A350, wide-bodied mediocrity and indistinguishable from any other in its class. The Premium Economy cabin is over the wing so my two windows, one slightly behind me and one slightly in front, were not going to be of much use. The two overhead storage bins above us were marked "Crew Only", so I heaved our bags into one on the other side of the aisle, much to the consternation of the people sitting below it. Being English, the woman made a quiet comment about not using "their bins", but made her feelings truly known with the fixed stare she gave me.

Our seats were not the most comfortable I've ever sat in, but were so far from the seat in front that the tray table was mounted in the arm rest of our seats and not on the back of the seats in front. The seats also reclined with a leg support coming up from below. I like to sit up so didn't use that function, and nor did the woman sitting in front of me, which was fortunate. As is normal though, the person sitting in front of DW did recline, fully, so she was forced to recline as well, although as she was intended on a goodly nap, that was OK. Me climbing over DW while the seats were reclined was pure comedy, but when you have to go, you have to go.

The meal served about an hour into the flight was, well, not my thing. The choices were Cod with Polenta, or Curry. I have a feeling it was the same choice on the flight we took to London last year. When it was served, the fish was OK, but the Polenta was horrible and the little bowl of ricey stuff that was on the side looked and smelled like the sort of thing I would pay not to eat. I don't know why British Airways insist on serving food that they think might look a "a bit jazzy", and pretty much always contain a curry option. Air Transat did the same for a while, but reverted to more standard fare when people like me moaned about it. The best meal on a 'plane I ever had was on a charter flight from Kephalonia to London, and it was a beef stew. If the charter people can do it, surely the major airlines can. The "hot snack" served before landing was a "hot mess", and again I ask why? Trying too hard to be too fancy really doesn't work.

I couldn't get comfortable during the flight, even when resorting to the old standard sleep aid of watching Bridget Jones' Diary for the umpteenth time, and as a consequence didn't sleep much. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield had suggested some good Northern Lights viewing that night, but nothing. Curse that Astronaut. It was thick cloud cover as the day dawned and we flew over my other ancestral home, Ireland, and it stayed cloudy pretty much until we popped out of the clouds a few miles from Heathrow. All in all, it was a bit of a manky flight. That said, it left Toronto bang on time, and arrived in London ahead of schedule, so well done BA.

Terminal 5 at Heathrow is a wondrous place, but when you get dropped at a gate far from the terminal you have a choice of a long walk, or get crammed onto and all too infrequent shuttle train that runs to the terminal. Every time we've been presented with the shuttle option it's been overcrowded beyond belief, so we decided on the walk this fine morning. There were a few of those moving sidewalk things, but still a fair bit of walking, although having been sat still for six hours or so, it was not a bad thing.

 

The bags came out quite quickly at the luggage reclaim, and we made our way down to the Heathrow Express train, which was no mean feat with me hauling two big cases. The Heathrow Express is one of three rail-based options to get into London from the airport, is the fastest by far, and the most expensive. The Elizabeth Line is a new rail line across London and would take us into Paddington railway station directly, if a little more slowly. The Underground's Piccadilly Line would get us to Paddington with a change of trains at Gloucester Road, but is a seriously slow way of travelling given that there are many, many stops on the line. While the Express may have been expensive, I bought the tickets online, ahead of time, and with our rail discount card, the price was only around £6 each for the single fare, as opposed to the regular £25 if you buy on the day without a discount card. When the train starts its run into Paddington, you soon realise why it's called the Express, because that thing really flies. It takes fifteen minutes from Terminal 1 & 2 to Paddington, compared to over an hour on the Underground, which is quite impressive.

At Paddington, we had a wait before picking up our train to Plymouth. About a three hour wait. To get a well priced ticket on British trains, you have to plump for a specific train, and book seats. Doing that, and using the discount card, we were able to afford First Class tickets, which in this case worked very well for us as we were able to use the First Class Lounge at Paddington Station. The lounge is three rooms, two with sofas and the like, and one with tables and chairs. Snacks and drinks, non-alcoholic of course, are complimentary, so we hunkered down for the duration, just happy to shake off the rigours of the journey so far. It being Saturday, the station was busy with non-commuters, many heading to football matches. I took a quick walk up onto Praed Street, just outside the station, and surveyed the very familiar scene. A student nurse of my acquaintance worked at St. Mary's Hospital just next door to the station, and while she didn't merit a Blue Plaque on the wall, Sir Alexander Fleming did his groundbreaking work on Penicillin there and has a Blue Plaque, and the royal princes William and Harry were born there. Like so many other streets in London, notable things have happened there. While up on the street, I came across a heap of London Black Cabs, all purring along using electric motors rather than the old chug-chug diesel engines of the past. It turns out that the cabs are hybrids and do have their internal combustion engines, but a lot of the time run noiselessly and smokelessly on battery power. What with the hybrid buses as well, London's air is getting so much more breathable.

 

When it was time to board our train (they notify you of the appropriate platform only minutes before departure), we looked in vain for Coach K, where our booked seats were located. A quick question to one of the train's crew revealed that they were short of a few coaches and there definitely wasn't a Coach K. All seat bookings had been cancelled as a result, so it was sit anywhere. Fortunately the train wasn't terribly full, so we found a couple of seats and settled in for the run down to the Westcountry. Like the aircraft we'd flown in, the seats here were not the most comfortable, but there was plenty of room. And, like the lounge at the station, snacks and drinks were complementary. Similar to the Heathrow Express, this train took off like a scalded rabbit and we were quickly pelting through west London at a serious clip and heading to Reading. The weather was OK and the scenery getting greener as we crossed and recrossed the River Thames. Reading, Taunton, Tiverton, Exeter, Newton Abbot, Totnes and finally Plymouth, took us a little over three hours. The weather closed in, the sea was battering the sea wall at Dawlish, and by the time we reached Plymouth, the rain was coming down, but then this is the Westcountry in October, so nothing unusual about that.

 

A short taxi ride from the station and we were on Plymouth's famous Barbican, and opening up Number One, Stokes Lane, our home for the next two weeks. We were both shattered, but did manage to get out to the Co-Op for some essential supplies, dodge the many young people out in the wet streets, and buy some proper English fish and chip shop chips, which is surely the best way to end what was a long and uncomfortable trip.

I'll write a little about our accommodation in the next instalment, and about the purpose of the trip, but for now, I'll round off this very long post by saying it was very nice to be back in Devon.