fillingthegaps

There is a myth that abounds, that the French are a proud and rather ‘snooty’ race, disdaining to speak English and despising anyone who cannot speak their language. In fact I am sure that I contributed to this myth in days past, having received less-than-cordial treatment from some French people when visiting France some 30 years ago, on business. But I have to explode the myth: since we have been in this country (all of 5 days!) we have received courteous and friendly treatment – from strangers in the street to shopkeepers to fellow-campers. And wherever you meet someone, they will greet you with a friendly ‘bon jour’. The averted eyes and the silent passage of two strangers as in NZ is unthinkable in this country. To not greet another person with a ‘bon jour’ on meeting, and a parting ‘au‘voir’ if you have had a brief conversation with them, would be decidedly boorish. I like it.

I said we have only been in France for 5 days but we have covered a fair few miles  (approx. 800km) and have seen a fair bit of the countryside – and we are captivated by it. We left England, having been almost driven out by persistent heavy rain, gale-force winds and cold temperatures over the last 2 weeks. (typical English summer some would say!) We awoke in France to clear blue skies and warmer temperatures. The wind persisted for a couple of days, but as we pressed on southwards, the wind dropped, the sky got bluer and the thermometer continued to rise. What a happy combination. The flat golden wheat-fields of the north have given way to  rolling wooded hillsides, which seem to be heralding the onset of the Pyrenees.

Now we are resting up in an historic village named Uzerche: another idyllic spot found, yet again, almost by accident. Our ‘chefs de mission’ pick our destinations based on facilities available and possible interest in the locality. These two factors are given various weighting depending on where we are in the course of our journey. This place was chosen because it had the facilities and it was on our proposed route and it was about the right distance from the previous spot. We had no idea it would prove to be such a gem.

We arrived here at the end of a marathon 500km hike. We do not normally choose to do such a distance in one day, but our planners reasoned  that the roads would be good, the weather was fine and the further we headed south the better the weather would be. They were right on all counts and here we are, basking under an impossibly-blue sky, thankful for the shade the trees above us are providing and enjoying the mid- to high-20’s temperature.

I must admit that we were not so happy when we first drove into the village: we had followed the gps directions and it had led us into the village, under a very picturesque arched bridge and up a steep hill. THEN we swung right, into an impossibly narrow street, still going upwards.

The street led us through a narrow stone archway

– the ancient gateway to the old fortified town, But we were not thinking about that at the time. Squeezing through the gateway, we followed the big van ever upwards, the streets getting even narrower and more twisty. Finally we crested the top – surrounded by chateaux, ancient houses and an old church. Down past a group of elderly dames enjoying the sun

No sign of a van park up here! We certainly could not go back, so on we went, plunging down the other side of this steep hill, road narrow and twisty until with relief we found ourselves coming out onto a normal width road once more. It only took a moment to realise that we had just completed ‘le grand tor’ coming out exactly where we had started! The big van swung abruptly into an opportune carpark and we scrambled in after them. Time to re-group and consult book and GPS. All seemed in order, except that there was obviously no van park in the middle of an ancient town on top of a steep hill! It was then that we realised that we were parked in the carpark reserved for customers of a pharmacy, adjacent to the park. With a courage born of desperation, we entered the pharmacy armed with the camp-site book, and haltingly asked if the person could help us to find this place. Ah! here was another of our friendly French people. Yes she knew the place and proceeded to give us rapid directions in perfectly good French, as to how to find the place. After struggling for some time – we to understand her, and she to understand the tortured French, she smiled and took pity on us, and told us how to find the place in very nice English! And the park was actually just around the corner.

The van park is actually the forecourt of an old, long-defunct, railway station. But it has all the facilities we need, and is absolutely free.

The rail tracks that led into and out of the station are now delightful, shaded walking/biking tracks.

At the edge of the park the bank drops steeply down to the river, and on the other side of the river, on an equally steep hillside sits the township that we drove through with such skill and courage a little earlier on.

We have since been on a walking exploration of the town and  have loved it. The cobbled streets, the narrow staircases,

the old buildings,

the intriguing door-knocker,

the old church,

 and the marvelous views

Ahhhh.. la Belle France!

the last post was from Vancouver. This post comes from a little seaside town in France, and in between there has been about a week of some fairly hectic activity. Let me re-cap, for those who might be vaguely interested.

I arrived back from Canada at Heath Row, England, at about 2.30 in the afternoon. There I grabbed a courtesy shuttle bus which took me to the car rental company on the other side of the airport. (very efficient) At the depot  I picked up my pre-booked car: I had ordered a Ford Fiesta (the cheapest deal I could find) but as with the previous car rental, found myself up-graded into a new Peugeot 207. Who was I to complain? My plan was to visit a few friends and relations before re-joining The Tribe in the two Camper vans, (who were ‘somewhere up North’)

So the first move was to get up to a cousin’s place just north of Derby. I got away from Heath Row by about 3.30pm, which was a bit late in the day to be starting a 250km drive. However this was the plan,  so off I set. The car drove beautifully but the navigator was definitely average, finding himself in a tangle of roundabouts, road signs and general traffic mayhem, trying to get through Leicester. After a hour or so I popped our the other side and regained some momentum, arriving at my pre-booked hostelry at about 8.0pm.

I finally found my cousin’s house at about 9.0 pm and had a most pleasant re-union, but by near-midnight my recent spate of activity started catching up, and I returned for a sound sleep at the pub.

After a good English breakfast, I took off for London again, and had a great run until I reached the  outskirts of that seat of civilization.

I should pause here to try and describe the British motoring scene, in any city in this fair land. Britain is criss-crossed with an infinite number of small roads, connecting all villages and towns. These roads were developed during the hey-days of the horse and carriage, and were a comfortable width for one such vehicle. As time progressed and towns grew into cities, some of these roads developed into highways. Now and again the roads were widened a fraction to make things easier, but by band large they remained almost untouched for nearly a 100 years. When England started to get organized they gave the main highways numbers, and so the ‘A” road numbers arrived.

A long time after the second world war, it was realised that the ‘A’ roads were not coping with the traffic, and so the ‘M” motorway roads were built. These highways took the straightest line between two cities, only occasionally allowing other roads to connect into the system. It is in the connecting of these roads that British roading engineers managed to devise a system of round-abouts that confuse the sharpest of minds, and the most skillful of divers. These ‘roundabouts’ are not round but usually oval in layout. They frequently have 6 or7 junctions spread around the circuit, often having traffic lights. There can be up to 4 lanes of traffic hurtling around the circuit. The trick is to know which lane you are supposed to be in to be able to escape into your desired exit. Your required lane is painted on the road in large letters. The problem is that the letters are obscured (usually) by even larger trucks. Of course there are the signs to help you too. These list the route numbers of the various exits, plus the route numbers of roads they will eventually lead to, plus the names of the next few towns (but not the main city you are looking for) etc etc. A total confusion to the driver with no local knowledge. The result is that invariably you take the wrong exit, leaving you no option but to drive 10-15 km down the road until you can find a turn off, whereupon you can return the the roulette wheel and try your chances again. Add to this mix the fact that every car that was ever made seems to be either driving on the roads or, in any town at all, parked nose-to-tail on the roadside. The final little bit of fiendish thinking is to make all rotes in a town a ‘red  route’. This means no stopping at any time except for busses. So if you are lost, you cannot find anywhere to pull over and get your bearings.

Do you get the impression that driving in the cities and on the main roads is a frustrating and harrowing business? I hope so – because I was a fairly frazzled specimen by the time I finished my rounds and finally ended up in a peaceful haven at my cousin’s place in the south of England. What bliss!

The next day my racing around was over and I made my way at a leisurely pace to a midday rendezvous with the vans in Reading.

The vans had already covered a fair distance that day, but a booking had been made to catch the Dover ferry in a couple of days time – so on they pressed. I sank gratefully back into the passenger’s seat and relaxed and enjoyed. That day we got to Folkstone – just a stone’s throw from Dover, but the intrepid duo really had been driving long enough for one day.

We found a Sainsbury’s, huge super markets with equally huge parking lots. Previous experience had shown that when asked, the Authorities would permit us to park overnight. Which we did (with grateful thanks to the Management)

The next day we were up bright and early, with the rain pouring down. After a quick breakfast we were off to Dover – intending to spend most of the day at the Castle. Our initial momentum quickly came to a grinding halt as we joined the traffic on the motorway to Dover.

 We did not know it immediately but we learned that a computer breakdown at bthe ferry terminal was causing huge hold ups as all traffic was manually processed onto the ferries. Memories of our 7hr holdup outside Antwerp came flooding back, but fortunately we inched our way forward to a turn-off, and were able to escape onto a minor road to Dover. We were in no hurry for the ferry –our booking was for 9.30pm but we did want to see the castle.

And see it we did.

It stopped raining, but the gale winds continued to tear at us. The castle is situated on the highest hill in Dover, and even a zephyr breeze would be able to nip at you unhindered on top of that hill.

We had a really interesting time (did I tell you we are still not sick of castles – even if you are sick of hearing about them!?) crawling up, over and under the battlements, and then descended to Castle Street to enjoy a ritualistic Last Dinner on British soil –  Fish’n’Chips!

Being aware of the chaos throughout the day we got down to the wharf fairly early and got ourselves at the front of a queue, waiting for the 9.30 boat.

As good fortune would have it, there was space on an earlier sailing and so we found ourselves steaming out into the Channel at 9.00pm.

We were anticipating a rough ride, due to the gale that was still blowing, but in fact the 1 1/2 hr trip was very smooth, and we were berthed and discharged with amazing speed and efficiency.

A quick drive around the darkened streets and we finally found a park, which was full! a few hundred meters away was an ordinary car park and a  hesitant enquiry to a local gave us the assurance that it was ok to park there. So here we are in France!

Leaving the trans-Canada train after 3 1/2 days

and catching a short hop on the Skytrain

to the YWCA where I am staying, Vancouver has proved to be a marvelous place to relax and stretch the legs. And the weather has certainly helped. I have been here 3 days (I leave tomorrow afternoon) and each day has been a perfect summer’s day. Great for walking and biking and I have been doing quite a bit of both.

Downtown Vancouver is virtually an island, encircled by the sea on all sides except for  a narrow isthmus. Situated on top of a hill, the city slopes down from the center, to the sea no matter which way you walk.

And an attractive city it is. Full of well-designed high-rise blocks of hotels, offices and shopping malls, it could be like any other city, but somehow they have managed to create a feeling of space, orderliness and relaxation which is hard to define. Maybe it is the proximity of the sea, and the profusion of sidewalk cafes that lends to this impression.

I have to say ‘though, that I have been surprised to see many beggars in the city streets: people with a paper cup in hand, asking for money, and quite a few trundling their worldly possession in a trolley of some sort. Canada would be a very expensive place to try and exist on hand-outs. And I was further surprised by what I encountered this morning when I went for a walk after breakfast. I went to have another look at the Steam Clock (and forgot to take my camera!) which is like a grandfather clock whose driving weight is lifted by steam power, and whose ‘chimes’ are blown by steam on a series of whistles. Moving on from there I went in search of China Town and in so doing, wandered through an older part of the city.

This part was from another world: the shops were dingy or boarded up and populating the streets were an assortment of people from ‘the other side’: someone high on something, unsteadily jiving to a tune only he could hear; someone climbing out of a waste bin with an armful of ‘trophies’; a bedraggled old lady pushing a cart of belongings; a brightly painted lady saying hi to anyone who walked past; and all over the place people of all shapes, sizes and ages just sitting on the sidewalk or hanging around, obviously with no purpose in mind for the day. It was depressing. I wondered what sorry set of circumstances would lead to people ending up in this hopeless condition? And who is at fault? And what could be done about it?  To be honest, I was pleased to be out of the area, not having any real answers in my head.

I hired a bike for the day and managed to take in quite a lot of the city and the nearby parks and museums. The city has a great network of bike/walking trails which enable you to get around to most places without fighting the traffic. The views of the city were attractive, as you can see.

I made it to the Vancouver Museum too,

where they were staging an exhibition celebrating Vancouver’s involvement with the Cycling revolution. A good display of bikes of all sorts plus a history of the City’s growing acceptance and promotion of cycling as a means of transport. Interesting.

Canada, more than most countries, has a real need for float planes, because of the endless lakes which cover the country, and Vancouver has a busy float plane airport right next to the main shipping terminal. Fascinating to watch boats and aircraft all seemingly sharing the same space on the harbour!

Vancouver has been quite a treat to visit – a very pleasant end to my ‘Canadian Experience’. But I have to confess I am quite keen to re-join the Camper vans and resume our wanderings across the UK and Europe

Well, here I am in Vancouver, 3 1/2 days after boarding ‘The Canada’ in  Toronto.

And a most enjoyable train journey it was. The wonder is, that I am not 10 kilos heavier than when I set out! I have never been on a Cruise Ship but from what I hear there are opportunities to keep eating all day, should you so desire. And the ‘Canada’ seems to attempt to emulate the Cruise ships. Included  in the ticket price were 3 meals a day, plus tea,coffee, juices, muffins biscuits etc. available more or less continuously. The meals were sumptuous, beautifully prepared and nicely presented, in the dining car. In a way it was fortunate that the train was a very long train and so the hike to and from the dining car certainly represented a significant walk!

So here I am in Vancouver: an attractive, compact city which I shall be exploring very soon.

But first  a report on the train journey. Three and a half days travelling through lush forests, pristine lakes, green prairies and soaring mountains. An abundant land indeed. When I think back to the desolate landscape of Mongolia and the Gobi, I can’t help wondering about the contrasts on this earth, and more significantly, the chance  that places a family in any particular spot on the earth. No doubt each country has its own particular challenges, and the human spirit being what it is, people learn to adapt and overcome and even go on to love the country of their birth. Some of course, if they are able, move on to new challenges in another country.

Suffice to say that Canada appears to be a land full of promise and potential. It’s a vast country (and many a Canadian has pointed out to me that Canada is the third largest country in the world) carrying a relatively small population. And like Australia and and New Zealand, most of the population is concentrated in just a few cities. So in Canada there are vast stretches with nary a soul in sight.

Starting out from Ontario the train meandered slowly through the usual endless suburban/industrial sprawl:not pretty and not particularly interesting. I discovered that Canada’s rail tracks have been around for quite a long time – and it shows. The train jolts and jiggles its way along and writing when in motion is impossible. I told a few passengers about the smooth-as-silk Chinese trains and they looked at me in dis-belief. Obviously thought I was exaggerating!

The train was pulled by a couple  of huge diesel/electric  motors

(unlike the the steam engines of yesteryear, seen at a stop-off in Jaspeer)

The carriages had  an intriguing mix of  layouts. I was in a short section of single-berth cabins: each had a fold-down bed set in one end

a wash-stand and a WC.

When the bed was up, a double bench seat was available. When the bed was down, it covered the seat and the WC, so it was time for bed! It was a compact and quite efficient use of the space. The cabins opened out onto a narrow corridor-only just one  person in width. In the same carriage there was a non-sleeper section: Two rows of double seats with a passage-way down the middle. Consequently the passage-way dodged from side to middle and back again in the strangest manner. At the ends of the carriage were toilets and a very well set up shower room. This had lots of space and abundant hot water-quite a luxury on a train.

There was also a section set up as a games room with board games, books, jig-saw puzzles etc, with coffee, tea and snacks nearby. And above the games room was what they called ‘the dome’ – an observation lounge with a glass roof and comfortable air-line type seats. There were 3 or 4 of these domes along the train so usually it was easy enough to find a seat for a change of perspective.

Getting a photo record was not easy with all shots having to be taken through dirty glass with the inevitable reflection and focus challenges.

I was amazed at the amount of water laying around in Canada: we travelled for hundreds of kilometers through a seemingly endless lake district.

And at the edges of the lakes, the terrain looked like swamp country. Amazingly, trees and shrubs seem to flourish in these conditions and frequently large stands of trees seemed to be standing in water.  It was evident too, that mosquitoes and midges loved this environment too. We passed a clearing (in the middle of nowhere) where a bunch of teenagers were playing baseball. We were parked for a few minutes and I noticed that the most exercise the kids were getting was swatting insects off themselves.

The only time the water more or less disappeared was on the prairies, yet even here water seemed to be laying in large puddles here and there. There was certainly no sign of a drought! But gone were the hills that had been with us for much of the time,

and we were not to see them again until we approached the Rocky Mountains. Grassland and vast areas of Canola plants, shining gold in the sunlight were a real sight to behold.

Stops were few and far between, the first one  being Winnipeg (where I had time to walk a brisk circuit taking in some bridges and the cathedral.)

The houses reminded me of NZ with a lot of single-story weatherboard dwellings. No doubt these are suitably proofed against the winter (Double-glazing, heavy insulation and central heating driven by ‘furnaces’ seem to be the norm.)  which can be really severe in this country. Winnipeg was an attractive looking city.

The next real stop was Jasper which is promoted as the gateway to the Rockies. A very tourist-oriented little town, but attractive for all of that.

A quick stretch of the legs and it was time to get going again. Heaeding for the Rockies!

The final run in to Vancouver was very pretty with the rail track following (yet another) river/lake system with high hills as a backdrop, for many kilometers. 

But Vancouver has yet to be discovered so that will be another story.

After the inevitable strictures placed on space, quietude, and diet consistent with living with a family of 10 in two motor homes, the past week in Canada has been almost surreal. In the most pleasant of ways!

Pre-conditioning for the time in Canada was achieved by spending 2 days alone with Eldest Daughter, zipping up to York (UK) and back to Heath Row, using a very swish hire car and staying in very comfortable accommodation. Then we flew to Ottawa and were met there by L’s old school friend, & whisked away to her parent’s spacious home in a delightful, tranquil, wooded and rather exclusive part of that city.

There I was given the exclusive use of a large bedroom complete with sauna and en suite and a large library to dip into! What luxury! Our hosts were erudite and entertaining; their hospitality gracious; their conversation wide-ranging and enlightening. It was a really relaxing and enjoyable time. And I even managed to get in a short bike ride, alongside a quiet bike path beside the river.

But that was just the beginning. From Ottawa we drove several hundred kms to the Grandparent’s  “seaside cottage”. We had been warned that this was not exactly a cottage in the British sense of the word – but the reality still hit us smack between the eyes and left us reeling in semi-dis-belief.  This ‘cottage’ turned out to be a beautiful mansion, part Mediterranean-Italian, part art-deco in appearance, set at the upper end of  gracefully sloping farm and woodlands.

Well-manicured lawns, shrubs and flower beds gave the grounds a park-like appearance and the croaking of frogs from the nearby swimming swimming pond provided a rural soundtrack as a backdrop to this little corner of Paradise. We did not see them but we were told that the local wild life often drops by to keep an eye on things: fox, wolves, deer, an occasional moose, not to mention squirrel, chipmunk and moles.

And again I found I was assigned a large bedroom all to myself with a balcony overlooking the garden, the woodlands and stretching out to the Georgian Bay part of Lake Huron. This area is prime Vacation Land in this part of Canada, and it is easy to why. In the summer, sailing, windsurfing, fishing, golf, tramping and cycling are all available within a short distance. The facilities are superb and the people warm and welcoming.

Good coffee is to be had in cosy coffee shops and superb ice cream is also available!

Nearby orchards provide a plentiful supply of fruit in season: apples, pears, nectarines, cherries, strawberries  and blueberries. Local entrepreneurs bake these up into the most delectable pies. If I wax rather lyrical it is because this really is a blessed corner of the world and it was a joy to be immersed in it for a while.

And again our hosts showered us with blessings. I have been quite happy to sleep on the floor of a Mongolian Yert, a Kowloon couch, the hard bunk of a train in China, the seat of an all-night bus to Berlin, the floor of an attic in Estonia and so on – but who can deny the pleasure of having a large comfortable bed all to yourself and to be woken by sun streaming in across the walls of a large, beautifully-decorated room, with the prospect of descending to a sunny breakfast room replete with anything your taste-buds could desire? Yes we have really been blessed by this marvelous interval.

Now I have left Daughter: I am on the Trans-Canada train

heading for Vancouver (in 3 days time) and D is spending another week with OSF and then heading back to NZ (and WORK) I am just a day into this trip and am having a great time. I have a little one-man cabin – most ingeniously designed and very comfortable.

I have 3 meals provided – good meals too, I might add. And  as much tea or coffee and muffins as I may care to eat in the interim! I have already met such interesting people at the dining table – what extra-orrdinary tales the most ordinary-looking people have to tell!

And so the journey continues. I am looking forward to the rest of this train trip, then a  few days in Vancouver, and then back to the UK to take up where I left off, with the Intrepid Travelers, back to the Motor Homes. Bye-bye luxury – hello more adventures!

in recent weeks we had become accustomed to moving seamlessly from country to  country: Germany, Switzerland, France, Holland, Belgium, England etc. with barely a pause in our perambulations. But a few days ago daughter L and I made a giant leap across a very big ditch and ended up in Ottawa, Canada. (reason for the visit: for daughter – to visit an old school friend. For me ; because I wanted to do the trans-Canadian rail trip)

We are being looked after by Linda’s long-time college friend, and in turn by the friend’s parents. Such a gracious, hospitable family – we are being overwhelmed with kindness. And I find myself allocated to a huge bedroom with en suite all to myself!

The arrival in Canada was routine until I went to pass through Customs. “excuse me sir, would you mind taking the left lane please?” I was happy to oblige, thinking that would be the ‘nothing to declare’ lane. Wrong! I had been ‘randomly selected’ for the full customs search procedure. Half an hour later I was declared clean and allowed to trail out to a deserted arrival lounge! Well it is all Experience I suppose, but I am beginning to think I must have a criminal appearance.

Back in Bangkok I was apprehended by the USA military after I took an innocent picture of  their Embassy. On that occasion I was detained while they checked out my passport and made sure I deleted the picture from my digital camera. Now here in Ottawa I am again treated as an undesirable. But wait-there’s more. The following day, after the airport incident I was again pounced on by security in Ottawa’s Art Museum.

My crime this time was to be carrying a small plastic bag into the gallery. This had to be deposited in the secure locker section. (as it happened, daughter came to the rescue and offered to carry the offending bag in her capacious handbag, which was apparently acceptable. Logic???)

So what is it about me? The beetling eyebrows? the scruffy clothes? the worried look as I try to decipher noises around me and turn them into sentences? Who knows = the fact is I am a marked man.

But as usual, I digress. Here we are in Ottawa Canada and ready to see and taste another country, another culture. Canada is rather similar to NZ in that it was populated by an indigenous people many hundreds of years ago, and subsequently ‘settled’ by Westerners much later – with all the accompanying historic baggage that goes with the process. And like NZ they are still dealing with grievances. But the settling of Canada happened a few hundred years earlier than NZ and so the Capital does not have the raw  edge that NZ has. There are many gracious old buildings and the city has many fine buildings to give it an air of permanence and prosperity.

The city was a delight to discover with majestic parliament buildings,

character-filled streets, a beautiful river with impressive bridges

and an intriguing mix of French and English cultures.

Across the river lies the province of Quebec – that fiercely independent region that insists on observing its French heritage.

Here we saw toffee-apples de-luxe,

 and sampled ‘beaver tails’ – an elongated pancake with an endless variety of fillings and flavours.

 We also had Frittes (chips) French style – mixed with clotted cheese and topped with brown gravy. An interesting blend, but I confess to preferring my chips ‘straight’ with plenty of salt.

The Museum of Canadian Civilization was a magnificent structure, and the displays and artifacts it contained, equally impressive.

I found the Art Gallery of equal interest and was rather surprised to find myself really enjoying the experience, ( however, my host and I found that we shared the saame attention span disorder: after about 2 hours in a museum the eyes start to get a glazed-over appearance, and it becomes more and more difficult to discreetly hide a jaw-cracking yawn)

We are being hosted by my daughter’s friend’s family and again I am struck by the good fortune that keeps following us. We have been hosted by some incredibly generous people and have been fortunate to stay in some superb places. The generosity of people continues to amaze me, and fills me with a desire to return the good favours we have received. I feel a little guilty in this respect because I am aware that not too many people will be dashing off to NZ and even if they do, our part of West Auckland is not the easiest area to reach.

Our hosts then left the parents home and took us on to an Aunts ‘sea-side cottage’ which turned out to be a genuine mansion set in rolling countryside overlooking Lake Huron. But more of that in a later blog. On the way to the cottage (about a 250km drive, I suspect) we drove through magniicent countryside – woods laced with hundreds of lakes. We stopped  off to stretch legs and take in the peace and tranquility of this enormous country.

Earlier we had stopped off at a church serving a Polish community – again an oasis of tranquility , seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Set high on rolling hills, it had a commanding view over the surrounding countryside.

more later……..

I am writing this at about 35000ft in the air, moving at very close to the speed of sound. And taking it all quite for granted. But in the last few days we re-visited one of the places of my childhood- in the days when 300 mph for a fighter aircraft was really something – and flying at the speed of sound (or over, as many now do) was not even thought about. (well, maybe by the boffins)

We had left the wild beauty of Tintagel and Clovelley and made our way back East to the more prosaic Weston-Super-Mare and now moved on towards Stratford on Avon, heading to the Midlands. But on the way we purposed to visit some spots I had fond memories of, as a teenager. First was the house of my aunt, in Chippenham in Wiltshire, where a whole bunch of cousins stayed when things got a bit too dangerous back on the edge of London where we were living. 3 families: 9 children plus their mothers, plus a lodger all crammed into a fairly small 3-bedroom semi-detached home. We stayed there a couple  of times, once for about a year and also for a holiday, if my memory serves me right. Well we were passing close by, and with the aid of Rob’s trusty GPS we found the street once more. It seems that every house we have lived in is left to decay in later years. A neighbour informed us that the gentleman that used to live there had just gone into a home as the place was too much for him. As clearly it was, with peeling paint and weed-infested front garden. But this was the place of many childhood memories and it was rather nice to see that it was still there, and likely to be so for many a year to come.

Then on to another place of happy memories – Cheddar Gorge, which I had cycled up a few times while bike-touring with good mates, and had later cycled up again in training as a racing cyclist while in the RAF at Locking, near Weston-S-Mare. It was even more of a gorge than I remembered and we were all quite spell-bound by the magnitude of it.

Then on to the famous caves at Wookey Hole, but oh, what a disappointment! The place has now been turned into an Entertainment complex, with the caves and the hand paper-making almost an add-on to the games parlour etc. And the charges were exorbitant. So, we gave the caves a miss, and consoled ourselves with an ice-cream instead.

One last place before we turned North? Yes we would Make the time, and so we pressed on to the cathedral city of Wells.

We and a picnic lunch on the green sward in front of the Cathedral and took in the beauty of this ancient town.

Finally we headed North and made our way to the home of Bill Shakespeare – Stratford-on-Avon. Fascinating to walk up old cobble-stone streets and see houses that were built 400 years ago, still going strong. A little bent here and there and a sag or two evident – but at my age I can relate to that with sympathy.

The incongranuity of the Asian Ice-cream seller next to William Shakespear’s birth[lace struck us forcefully

We stayed in the front yard of another friendly couch-surfing family who let us use all their ‘civilised’ facilities. The next day my daughter and I were scheduled to leave the happy band of vanners and drive a hire-car to York. Meanwhile the tribe were scheduled to go and visit Warwick Castle on the same day. But overnight the heavens opened up and the morning dawned grey and very wet. Our trip to York was still on, but the Tribe were left to re-schedule their activities.

Rob drove us to the car hire place where I was expecting to pick up the smallest, cheapest, Ford they had on the books. But when I checked in I discovered that they had no record of my on-line booking. The only car they had available was a streamlined rocket  – a VW Sirocco. And it was virtually brand-new! (sorry – no picture) The increase in cost was minimal and the rain was still pouring down, so I did not argue!

Our plan was to head East until we connected with the M1 and then high-tail it Northwards to York. I thought it might take about 4 hrs max. But we are getting quite used to our progress on the road being frustrated by circumstances, and this day was no exception. It rained and rained and with the rain came slow driving and accidents. We didn’t actually see any accidents but we encountered slow traffic and detours all the way up’ We had hoped to arrive at about 3.0pm. Instead we finally checked in to our B & B at about 6!

The only good thing was that it had finally stopped raining, so after a quick cuppa we were off to explore the city. And an intriguing, historic city it is. With the Minster

With a sturdy Wall encircling the old city,

with ancient buildings leaning crazily towards each other

and ancient cobbled streets

and fascinating architecture on every corner

we were totally enraptured by York.

Then the tummies started to rumble and so we had a bite to eat. Coming out of the restaurant at about 9.0pm, we looked up and down the narrow streets and made a guess as to which way was ‘home’. We both agreed on a direction and started walking. To cut a long story short, after we had passed the same three bridges 4 times, and found a helpful bill-board map, we wearily reached home at about 11.0 pm. It had been  a long day!