Yorkshire and Wales

Lytham and The Lake District (June 30 to July 3)

We picked up a rental car at Manchester Airport and drove to Lytham St Annes with the rain pouring down.  We checked in to the Glendower Hotel for one night. As it had been a long day, we ate in the hotel and had an early night.

Next day, we checked out of the hotel and Kris went to meet her sister Carol at St Cuthbert's Church, which is where we were married and where her mum's ashes are interred. John and I made ourselves scarce so they could chat in peace and I went back an hour later to pick up Kristine. I saw Carol briefly and we said our farewells. 

We then drove to Hincaster in the Lake District to stay with Kris's old friend, Lindsey.

Next day, we visited Carnforth Station, where "Brief Encounter" was filmed in 1945. Carnforth was chosen because the war wasn't yet over but blackout regulations had been relaxed in the North.

Lindsey recommended that we visit Levens Hall, a manor house nearby, much of which dates to the Elizabethan era. It also has an extemsive and quite famous topiary, which was started 1689 by the gardener to King James II and has survived remarkably intact.

Having explored the gardens, we took a self guided tour of the impressive interior.

On the last night, John and Sharon drove over for dinner. Lindsey had never met John, so I guess she was curious. We had a very pleasant evening together. Lindsey was the charming host and John the charming guest.

We spent three very pleasant days with Lindsey and at times, the rest of her family before it was time to leave for Yorkshire.

The Yorkshire Dales and Northumberland - July 4 to 24

We drove across the Pennines, making a brief stop at The Courtyard Dairy in Settle.

Then on to Coverdale Cottage in Carlton, which was to be our home for the next three weeks.

Our first outing was to Ilkley to visit Tom, Jodie and Addie. We spent some time at their "new" house before heading into the center of the town for an early dinner. It was very hot! We had planned on eating at an Italian restaurant, but it wasn't air conditioned, so we went next door to a Sri Lankan Tapas restaurant which was much cooler. Although we were the only customers in the restaurant (which suited Kris just fine) we had a very pleasant meal. After dinner, we said our goodbyes and headed back to Coverdale.

Our next side trip was to visit June in West Scrafton. As always, she looked as though she was expecting visitors and we had a nice chat - mostly about her many ailments and her problems getting treated. I guess that's what old people talk about!

After about forty five minutes, we made our excuses, as we were planning to climb Great Roova Crags. It's been a tradition of mine for over fifty years.

Belfast July 15

Sarah couldn't make it over to Yorkshire to stay with us - she couldn't find anywhere to take her dog - so we decided to fly over for the day.  She met us at Belfast City airport and we went to her house for a chat.

Later, we met up with Emma and her partner Erin for lunch. It was a hot day! After lunch, we went back to Sarah's for more chatting before flying back to Leeds / Bradford in the early evening

Another day, we had lunch with Felicity and Peter, old friends from many years ago. In this picture, we are at The Foresters Arms in Carlton, where we had lunch, but we also met up with them on two other occasions, once at our cottage and once at their house in Wensley.

Another day, we took a trip to Malham Cove, one of the better known beauty spots in The Dales, but a place where neither of us had ever been. It was a long and twisty road to get there but it is certainly a unique spot.

High above Malham Cove is Malham Tarn. Much less visited than the Cove, it's an unexpected glacial lake body at a high elevation.

Northumberland and Lindisfarne - July 21 and 22

Our one trip away from Yorkshire was to Lindisfarne or Holy Island and Bamburgh. We drove up in the morning, knowing that the causeway to Lindisfarne opened at 11:30 and we arrived right on time.  The island is the supposed cradle of christianity in the UK as it was an important center for celtic christianity in the 6th century.

There's a ruined abbey dating from the Norman period and a nice church which is still in use today.

There is also a castle, which we walked to, but didn't go in as we were planning to visit Bamburgh Castle the next day.

Next day, we went straight to Bamburgh Castle. This time, we did go inside. Although the castle is old, it fell into ruin in the 17th century, but was extensively rebuilt in the Victorian era by industrialist William Armstrong. Parts of the castle are original, but most of the public rooms were rebuilt to suit the tastes of the owner.

After leaving the castle, we had a drive around Bamburgh, which is only a small town. Kris's  son John has purchased a static caravan in Bamburgh and is talking about retiring there one day, so Kris was interested in visiting the area. Although beautiful, we really didn't see what advantages Bamburgh had over the Lake District or the Yorkshire Dales.

After returning to Carlton, we spent the rest of our time just enjoying the beautiful Yorkshire Dales.

After three weeks in Yorkshire, we moved on to our next stop.

Liverpool - July 25

 We drove from Carlton to Liverpool and checked in to our hotel, which was right on the waterfront. The hotel, The Leonardo, was very modern and efficient but had a very stained carpet in our room. The front desk offered to change our room but as we were only there for one night, we didn't bother to move. The receptionist kindly gave us drinks vouchers as compensation!

It  was quite cool and very windy. We had time to have a wander around the area before our Beatles tour.

Later in the afternoon, we joined our Magical Mystery Tour, although we didn't have a painted bus like this one. They said our bus had broken down. Sure!

The bus took us all over Liverpool and we stopped to see the early home of Paul McCartney.

We saw the homes of John Lennon and Ringo Starr from a distance, but we didn't stop, so no pictures.  Our final stop was Strawberry Field which was an orphanage until 2005. 

After our tour, we decided to take a break and went back to our hotel. In the evening, we walked to The Picturehouse cinema, where they were showing "The Odyssey" in 70mm. It was a long movie and we walked back through a very busy nightclub scene. Lots of young people dressed up and obviously out for a night on the town. Quite a scene! When we arrived back at the hotel we exchanged our free drinks vouchers for two gin and tonics.

Betws-y-Coed  - July 26 to 29

Next day, we drove from Liverpool to Betws-y-Coed in Wales. Our first stop was Conwy (formally Conway) which is famous for it's castle. It is quite impressive. As you can see from the photo, the weather had improved, although it was still very windy.

We didn't go inside, as we knew we had several other castles to see over the next few days.

We also had a walk around the town and the port, both of which were very pretty and quaint and very much a tourist attraction.

We drove from Conwy to Llandudno, a place we had both heard of but had never visited. It turned our to be a very elegant resort with a wide beach and a short pier at one end and an upmarket shopping center.

A highlight was an old fashioned Punch and Judy show. We both remember Punch and Judy shows from our childhood, but it must be over sixty years since either of us had seen one in person. A traditional Punch and Judy puppet show features a core cast of chaotic characters, led by the anarchic, hook-nosed Mr. Punch and his wife Judy, alongside recurring figures like the Baby, Toby the Dog, and a snapping Crocodile 

A Punch and Judy show needs the audience (usually of kids) to participate. I'm not sure modern audiences "get it" but I certainly had fun joining in.

After Llandudno, we drove to Betws-y-Coed and checked in to our hotel, The Royal Oak,  which was a coaching inn dating back to 1861.

Art historian Peter Lord, in his book Betws-y-Coed Artists’ Colony 1844-1914, writes that cartoons and verses disparaging tourists were left in the Royal Oak’s visitors’ book, including:

I used to come to Bettws

Nigh twenty years ago…

But then no restless Tourists

Were rushing to and fro. 

Apparently, even 100 years ago, there were too many tourists for some people.

We spent the late afternoon wandering around the town, which isn't very big. Just down the road is St Mary's Church,  built in 1973 to replace an older church from the 14th century.

Betws-y-Coed also has a railway station, which is nicely kept.

Next day, we headed to Carnarfon (or Carnarvon as it used to be called). Carnarfon Castle is the big attraction and we did pay to walk around inside. It's pretty much a shell now, but still very impressive. 

It was built by Edward I starting from 1283 to 1330 and was intended to keep the local Welsh population under control. Although it was not well maintained after Edward's death, it was used during several later wars, including the English Civil War. In recent years, in 1969, the then Prince Charles was invested as Prince of Wales by his mother, the Queen. This seems to have been the last time a significant event took place in the castle.

After a couple of hours wandering round the castle, it was time for a break and Kristine was wishing for traditional scones, jam and clotted cream. Her wish was answered at a local cafe, although we had to wait for the scones to come out of the oven.

Our next stop should have been a highlight of our stay in Wales - a trip to the top of Snowden. Sadly, the weather was terrible and once we left the station all we could see was fog. It was also cold and draughty on the train. Kris did NOT enjoy the ride..

At the top, we could at least get out of the train and warm up with a very expensive cup of hot chocolate.

The summit was just above the cafeteria but was enshouded with fog. I climbed up but there was nothing to see and it was VERY cold and windy. I took a picture of the cairn just to prove I had actually made it.

We were happy to get back on the train and head down the mountain to Llanberis and then back to Betws-y-Coed.

Next day, the weather had improved a little,a although it was still windy. We drove to Porthmadog to take another old train, this time steam pulled. We had a hard time finding parking and I almost missed the train, but we made it by a couple of minutes. The train ran along a pretty valley with trees along the line. As the website says: "Step back to the 1960s aboard the Woodland Wanderer, travelling in beautifully preserved heritage carriages through the heart of Eryri (Snowdonia National Park) to picturesque Tan-y-Bwlch station"

We then drove on to Portmeirion, a colorful, privately owned tourist-style Italianate village located on the estuary of the River Dwyryd in Gwynedd, North Wales. It's probably best know as the location for "The Prisoner", a TV show filmed here in the 1960's.  It was smaller than I had expected and it didn't take us long to make it down to the hotel, where we stopped for a drink.

Our destination was Beaumaris Castle, another castle built by Edward the First  to control the welsh population, but never finished.

After seeing the castle, we wandered around the small town of Beamaris. We then drove around the coast of Anglesey before making our way back to Betws-y-Coed.

The Snowdonia scenery can be very impressive.

Powys July 30 and 31

We drove from Betws-y-Coed to Powys, about half way to Bristol, our next stop. We stayed in the annex to a private home near the small town of Llanidloes. It was a very pleasant stay. The annex did have a private hot tub, which was very relaxing.

There wasn't much to do in the area unless you wanted to hike, which we didn't. We did visit a nearby dam and took a short walk along the river.

Bristol - August 1

Kristine had lived in Bristol as a child and was keen to see her childhood home. I was interested in the ship, the SS Great Britain, which was built in Bristol, abandoned in the Falkland Islands and brought back to Bristol to be restored. 

We crossed into Bristol over the Clifton Suspension Bridge. The Clifton Suspension Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the River Avon. Since opening in 1864, it has been a toll bridge, the income from which provides funds for its maintenance.

After checking in to our hotel, we strolled along the river to find the SS Great Britain. The river is a very lively place with many restaurants, pubs and bars. After a short walk, we arrived at the SS Great Britain.

The largest passenger ship in the world from 1845 to 1853, she was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806–1859), for the Great Western Steamship Company's transatlantic service between Bristol and New York City. While other ships had previously been built of iron or equipped with a screw propeller, Great Britain was the first to combine these features in a large ocean-going ship, making her one of the most technologically advanced ships of her time. She was the first iron steamer to cross the Atlantic Ocean, which she did in 1845, in 14 days.

The ship is now in dry dock, which is a good thing because the hull is full of holes. It's a miracle the ship ever made it back to Bristol.

Leaving Bristol the next day, we found Kristine's old home. As were looking at the house and taking pictures, the owner came out and we introduced ourselves. She graciously offered to let us see the inside and Kristine was fascinated by the changes she could see during the many years since she had lived there.

We then drove on the London, stopping  in Virginia Waters at a pub ("The Wheatsheaf") to have lunch with Kristine's grandson Aaron and his wife Anna.  Unfortunately we forgot to take a picture. 

Gatwick Airport August 2 & 3

We stayed at the Sofitel Hotel at London Airport, as we knew we had to catch a flight to Orlando on the August 4th. We returned the rental car (slightly scratched) so we had no transport of our own. The next day, we took the train into London and visited what used to be Battersea Power station.  It's now a very upmarket shopping and residential area.

We took the "Chimney Lift" to the top of one the old chimneys which gives spectacular views of the city, especially on a clear day, as this was.

We also went to a nearby exhibition ""Ramses and the Pharaohs’ Gold".  The exhibition consists of 180 priceless original artefacts from the Grand Egyptian Museum.  Many have never travelled beyond Egypt before. (We still want to visit Cairo, nonetheless). 

It was nice and quiet and we really had a chance to look at all the beautiful items without being disturbed, even though a school group came through while we were there.

We left Battersea and took the tube to The Strand, where we met our friends Jackie and Terry for dinner at Simpsons in the Strand. We were joined by Elizabeth, their daughter.

After a very expensive dinner, we said our farewells to Jackie and Terry and made tenative plans to meet them in Southampton next year. Then we took the train back to Gatwick and next day, flew home uneventfully to Orlando. Home Sweet Home!