On travelling, Joyce and the Inspector

TotS Irish Adventure: Days One and Two

July 30th and 31st.

Never having been people to do things by half, the first part of this morning is spent cleaning our house at Michigan Close ready for an inspection by the landlord. As well as going on holiday, we are also moving house to a property at Hailey Hall School. However, the house is still occupied by the previous resident until August 18th, so at the moment we are moving into Wayne’s classroom at the school. For the last 2 days, since we decided that this was the best course of action to take, we have been moving all our possessions into the room. We have also had to acquire some furniture, as the new house is unfurnished where our old house had everything bar a bed for Quinn. To complicate things still further, Meg also has an interview with the new Deputy and Head of Maths (they are one and the same person) regarding what will be expected of her in the maths department. In case you had missed the news, Meg is now working at Hailey Hall also.

The final moving of possessions out of the way, Meg’s interview having been conducted successfully, and the property inspection concluded relatively satisfactorily (the agent is too much of a pig to let the opportunity go by to try and rip us off some more) we jump in the car and head for the M1. In order to get to Ireland we first have to drive to Holyhead in Wales (a couple of hundred miles to the North West). This means that by the end of the trip Meg, Brock and Quinn will have been to 3 countries they had never set foot in previously. Wayne has been to Wales twice before, both 25 years ago and 2 weeks prior, so it will only be 2 new countries for him.

There is a reasonable amount of traffic flowing north, but nothing that will cause us any particular delays. We have been this way before, as far as Nottingham, but this time we will be turning off onto the M6 in order to skirt around Birmingham and up towards Manchester and Liverpool. The other option that we had been considering was to travel from Stranraer in Scotland, which would have involved much the same journey but without the left hand turn around Chester to take us into Wales and with a couple of extra hours travel time. The main other difference is that leaving from Holyhead will take us into Dublin, whereas leaving from Stranraer would have taken us into Belfast.

Both boys grabbed the opportunity to get a few hours sleep in the first part of the drive and missed the opportunity to see both Coventry’s Ricoh stadium and the home ground for Walsall F.C. (which are both next to the motorway). Meg was more impressed by the enormous shopping complexes we sighted north of Birmingham, and the fact that we managed to avoid the enormous toll on the motorway without too much disruption to our journey (even though there was lots of roadwork taking place). Everyone was awake, however, for the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it crossing of the border and excited by the change in signs to include the Welsh language on the top of each signpost. We were particularly tickled by the fact that the word for ‘Out’ in Welsh is ‘Allan’ so we made a stop late in the journey to photograph the contempt that the Welsh bear for all our friends named Allan.

Crossing into North Wales also gave Wayne the chance to relive his Snowdon adventure of a few weeks earlier (you might have to check the Blog if you are interested in finding out more, because of the busy-ness of the last few weeks the details of that trip were not sent out by email). As we drove down the coast through Colwyn Bay and Llandudno to Conwy it was decided to make a detour via Betws-y-coed. Basically, we were running very, very early for the ferry and Wayne had enjoyed that little town so much that he wanted to take Meg and the boys and show them. The weather was grey and overcast, so Snowdon itself wasn’t visible from the road, but the town was as gorgeous as Wayne had described. We decided to have dinner there, so wandered through the village to buy some fish and chips and then crossed over a bridge to eat by the river that flows through the town.

Betws-y-coed was one of the main links on the old stage route between London and Holyhead back in the days when horse and carriage was the fastest route, and then also a stop on the railway line that used to run over the same basic path. Nowadays it is primarily a spot from which climbers leave to attempt Snowdon, so the town was full of Climbing Equipment shops and climbers. However, its history has also made it beloved of tourists, so there were also a considerable number of backpackers among the crowds that were going to be making their home there for the evening. We enjoyed listening to some of the accents, watching the river rushing over the rocks, and laughing at the daredevils who were launching themselves off the old stone bridge into the rapidly flowing waters below.

The last part of this journey was through some awe-inducing mountain scenery before heading back down to the coast and over the Menai Bridge to the island of Anglesea. Holyhead is in the far North-West corner of the island, but far more interesting to us was the town of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch which was just over the bridge. This town has the longest name of any in Britain and it means “St Mary’s Church, in the hollow of the white hazel, near to the rapid whirlpool of Llantysilio of the red cave”. Finally, we made the last part of the journey into Holyhead, arriving at the port at 9pm (still daylight in Britain’s summer) in good time to board the ferry at 12:30am ready to depart at 2:30am. We were at the head of the queue (unsurprisingly) and now just had to find a way to kill some time until we were allowed to board. This largely consisted of reading, wandering backwards and forwards to the Ferry Terminal, dozing, and watching as more cars (and even more trucks and buses) arrived to take their place in the queue.

Midnight came and went before the gates opened and the excitement of getting Kylie and ourselves onto the ferry was really starting to build. Unfortunately, this first surge was anti-climactic, as all we did was drive a couple of kilometres through the port only to stop at the head of another queue. As it turned out, this was because the trucks were boarding the ferry before cars, but soon enough we were able to drive up the long ramp and on board the ferry, park the car, and move up into the main part of the ship. We had been a little unsure what to expect aboard a car transporting ferry, but were pleasantly surprised at how well decked out it was. Wayne and Meg were reminded of their honeymoon cruise ship and the boys and Wayne went off to explore while Meg staked out some ground which would become our sleeping area that evening.

The ferry, Irish Ferries’ ‘Ulysses’, had a number of bars, a restaurant, a movie theatre, an extensive Duty Free shop, as well as cafes and games rooms. Because we had not booked sleeping quarters, once the various features had been explored we made ourselves comfortable on some of the lounge chairs which were throughout the main passenger deck. Meg and Quinn slept on a long bench seat which ran around a significant part of the cabin. Brock slept with most of his body on one lounge chair and his feet on another. Wayne slept on the floor below Meg. Sleep wasn’t easy for most of us but was enlivened by an incident involving Quinn and the gentleman who was next along on the bench seat. As far as we can tell Quinn stretched out and inched along the bench in his sleep so that eventually his feet were all over the posterior of the man. After a period of this, Quinn (still fast asleep) started trying to push the man off and then kicked him hard on the bottom. This was when the rest of the family realised what was happening, wakening to find a six foot tall dark skinned gentleman abusing poor, befuddled Quinn. Things settled down however and we were able to doze for a little longer before getting ready to leave the ship at 5:55 am.

Leaving the ship provided more excitement than we had expected (and Meg actually wanted). After we had climbed dozily back into Kylie, the horizontal metal ramp on which we had been parked started to drop, and then tilt to join itself onto another ramp within the ship. This provided a partial explanation for why the signs had encouraged us to make sure that the park brake was securely on, but didn’t decrease the amount of shock that Meg felt. After a short wait while other vehicles moved from below us, we were able to start our engine and drive out onto a dock of the port of Dublin in the Republic of Ireland. We had reached Ireland and were extremely excited, enough to mitigate the slightly depressing fact that it the weather was showery and we were now in a bit of a traffic jam in the port area (not Dublin’s most attractive). We soon left the traffic behind and were wowed by early morning in Dublin town. There is a wonderful mix of very old and very new buildings on the banks of the River Dee and 6:30am is the best time to be driving through. Much to Brock’s amazement there were some people arriving at work, but the traffic was not as heavy as we would experience later.

Two tasks occupied us. Kylie needed fuel and so did we. The first was dealt with by stopping at a suburban service station where Wayne also made (what we were later to find out was) a mistake in not picking up a street directory. The second, at the behest of Brock and Quinn, we attempted to alleviate by stopping at McDonalds. Unfortunately, the first one we went to was not open, nor was the second, nor the third. By this time we were in the southern suburbs of Dublin and it was after 7am so we were somewhat confused. However, by getting out of the car and investigating we worked out that McDonalds in Ireland don’t open until 8am. With a bit of a wait (and the purchase of a newspaper) the breakfast dilemma was solved.

With this we headed south on the motorway towards the first of our stops for today, the town of Wicklow in the County of the same name. Although the hostel we would be staying in for the next two nights was relatively close to Dublin, we had decided to use this first day to take a look at the south eastern coast of the country and Wicklow is the first county south of Dublin. We were all quite tired, so we pulled up in a car park just outside the Old Wicklow Gaol to nap for a few minutes. This turned in to over an hour, much to the amusement of some of the locals who would pull up next to us to walk to the newsagent and buy the morning paper, glance at Kylie and her occupants, then do a double take. Eventually, however, we felt awake enough to get out of the car and take a look around.

Wicklow Gaol was built back in 1702 and over time has housed prisoners who were then transported to Australia for relatively minor offences, as well as political prisoners involved in the Irish Rebellion. As we walked into the waiting area for our tour to begin, Meg was given a fright by what she had thought was a wax dummy of a guard. It turned out that this was our tour guide, and he questioned us all as to our origins and what crimes we had committed in order to be sent to prison here. Meg made the mistake of saying that we were living in the United Kingdom (Irish people generally don’t refer to it that way) and became a target for this man’s sense of humour for the rest of the tour. Apart from this, the tour itself was fascinating, particularly as we thought that the ancestors of people we knew in Australia might have been housed here before they were transported. The conditions weren’t nice, as you might expect, so it was quite a sobering way to begin our time in Ireland.

Just out from the town of Wicklow is the easternmost point of the Republic, so we drove around the coast to see it (it was very beautiful, and had a golf course) before heading south to the county of Wexford which is in the south eastern corner of Ireland. The weather was a little overcast as we drove through Gorey, Ferns, Enniscorthy and Oilgate to try and find lunch in Wexford itself. This proved to be more difficult than we imagined as Wexford seemed to be a town with no supermarket to buy food, nor anywhere to park so that we could investigate further. We later found that this is not unusual in Irish towns (as with a number of English ones) where parking is really at a premium. So we grabbed a bite at a service station and set out to explore the rest of the county.

Our first port of call was the Irish National Heritage Park, just north of Wexford itself, which attempts to recreate 9000 years of Irish history in a park. This means you wander from one section of the park to another, with each section depicting a different era in Irish history. We ventured in, but there were two things which prevented us spending more time here. Firstly, there were bus loads of people participating in a Heritage convention, wearing National Costumes from their native countries, who had essentially taken over the park (and particularly its Entrance building). Secondly, just as we arrived it began to pour with rain. We would eventually find that Ireland’s weather is even more variable than Melbourne; brilliant sunshine giving way to grey skies, freezing winds and torrential rains in a matter of moments, before clearing to totally different conditions an hour later. Now, however, we chose to move on.

Many of you will know that John F Kennedy’s family hailed from Ireland. In particular, they originated in County Wexford, just south of a town named New Ross (we never did find out what happened to Old Ross). The old Kennedy homestead and a John F Kennedy memorial arboretum are both in this part of the world and we thought that we would visit them. Unfortunately, the signage in Ireland tends to follow a similar pattern to that in England. There will be an initial sign on the motorway indicating that you can turn off to find a particular place. You will drive a number of miles along a road, before coming to an intersection where there is no signage at all about the place for which you are headed. At this point, you have one of three options, you can:
a) pick the right direction, drive a few more miles, perhaps even go through a few more intersections and, as if by magic, find yourself at the place for which you are headed
b) pick the wrong direction, drive a few miles, perhaps even go through a few more intersections and find yourself somewhere interesting, but totally unrelated to the place you intended to go
c) turn around, go back to the highway, continue in the direction you were originally heading and perhaps come across an easier route
On this day we seemed to keep choosing d) drive round in circles, trying to follow signposts which seem to point us back in the direction we have just come and get hopelessly lost.

We did eventually find both the Arboretum and the Memorial Homestead, but both were going to cost money to visit and the weather was so inclement as to make it seem like a foolish move. The fact that we had no idea where we were or how exactly we had got there also made life more interesting. Consequently, when we drove a little way down the road and found ourselves at Dunbrody Abbey and Castle we were somewhat relieved. Dunbrody Abbey is a Cistercian abbey founded in 1170 by Herve de Montmorency on the instruction of Stongbow de Montmorency (more about him on another day). It was dissolved by Henry VIII and fell into disrepair, but the visitor centre is run by the current Marquess of Donegall and has one of only two full sized hedge mazes in Ireland. Sadly, the rain prevented us from traversing the maze, but we received instruction on how to get back to the motorway and decided to make our way to our accomodation for the evening, a hostel in the village of Rathdrum, County Wicklow.

Even this proved a thing of difficulty. As we drove up the N30 toward Enniscorthy, then back on to the N11 heading for Dublin, we took the first turning which was signposted toward Rathdrum (for what happened next, look two paragraphs above). After driving through Rathdrum a number of times, and asking directions from 3 different people who each sent us diverse ways, we found ourselves at The Old Presbytery Hostel. The hostel demonstrated another aspect of Irish signage with which we were to become familiar; the art of hiding a sign behind foliage so that it cannot be actually seen. They were providing 2 rooms for us for two nights so we didn’t complain too much to the hosts (who were actually very friendly and concerned for us). We were mostly just relieved to have a bed for the night and looked forward to occupying it.

We unloaded our luggage, went into the village to get some dinner and came back to cook it in the kitchen. Here we met some Austrian tourists who were lovely but had no notion of how to cook the rice and Indian food they were trying to prepare for their group of six. While Meg and Wayne assisted them with their cooking, two of the girls attempted to teach Quinn how to insult people in German. Sadly, Quinn’s memory means he has retained very little of what they taught him, but we did learn which places in Austria are particularly worth going to, and we will attempt to put that to use sometime in the future. For now, we headed up to bed, ready for a good nights sleep and looking forward to the next day, when we would do more exploring.

Animals and birthrites

On a wall in the Symes household hangs a print of the John Constable print ‘The Hay Wain’. Although it is spelled differently, it is from this painting that Wayne got his name. Because Constable was an English landscape painter, there was always going to be a good chance that we were going to encounter the place in which the painting was painted.
As it turns out, that was a place named Flatford Mill, a tiny place just north of the city of Colchester, very close to where Constable’s family lived. Because there were other good reasons to go to Colchester, we decided that we would take the opportunity to visit Flatford Mill.

The trip out was as fascinating as all our journeys into the English countryside. We went through villages where almost every roof was thatched. We went past Stanstead Airport, from which one of the major cut price airlines into Europe does most of its flights. We were able to show the boys where Meg had had to drive when she was doing exam invigilation at a school at Stanstead Mountfichet so that they realised just how far away it was and how long it took her to get there. We drove into the outer suburbs of Colchester, one of the oldest cities in Britain, and realised that we were lost. The problem was that we had left Hertfordshire and driven into Essex, and our street directories and atlases were nowhere near as detailed as they needed to be for this part of the world. While Google Maps is an excellent resource, we have also come to understand that their instructions are not always as detailed as they might be. However, the purchase of an Essex street directory (it is the next county to the east of us, and we will be going back there) made life a little easier.

After a couple of failed attempts (the turns weren’t very clear and the English have developed an interesting approach to signposting which we will mention more of later) we found ourselves in the village of East Bergholt (which was where the Constable family house actually was) and made our way down into the Stour River Valley. As we have found before, it was important to park a little outside the village and walk the last hundred metres or so. For this we were joined by the members of an antique car club who had also made the journey. Even without the Constable link this valley is a beautiful part of the world and the house at Flatford Bridge which houses the Constable Centre would still be picturesque.

After looking at the pictures and reading about his history we went for a short walk along the river. There were ducks, geese, swans and lots of other birds, along with some gorgeous old boats buildings. We rang Wayne’s mother to tell her where we were (and cleverly forgot to wish her a Happy Birthday for the following day, sorry Mum) and just as we were describing the glorious surroundings it started to drizzle. So we headed back to the other side of the bridge and wandered down to the mill itself. There is a study centre here (which is how we discovered the place, one of the teachers at the school has taken a number of groups to stay there and raved about the place when he saw ‘The Hay Wain’ on Wayne’s computer) and just past that is the spot where Constable must have sat to paint.

One of the amazing things about England is how well they preserve some of their heritage. Apart from the changes in the trees through various cycles of growth and regrowth, and the absence of a cart with some workmen passing through the river, the scene is still very much as it was when Constable painted it. As we stood and took photos, a couple came along the path walking a dog and Meg persuaded them to let their dog be photographed with Wayne to add another element to the shot. They had lived in Australia (although they were both English) and were happy to loan Josh (the dog) as well as suggest a number of other places that we might like to visit. All in all we had a fabulous time and as we climbed back into the car to head to our next destination, Wayne mentioned that it was almost like visiting one’s birthplace, even though he had never been there before.

Some of you might remember that when we first arrived in the UK the boys and Meg spent a considerable amount of time watching television while schools and jobs were being organised. Apart from Home Renovation programmes, the other television show that they all became addicted to was one called ‘Zoo Days’, the first two seasons of which were hosted by Jane Horrocks (you might remember her as ‘Bubble’ from ‘Absolutely Fabulous’) and set at Chester Zoo. However, season three has been at Colchester Zoo and filming was taking place (we saw on a sign as we arrived). This proved to be harder than we had hoped. There were lots of signs pointing us in the direction of the zoo but, as we have found previously, once you actually get close to a place in England the signage stops until you are right on top of it. This is ok if what you are looking for stands out from the surroundings, not so good if there are a number of turns just before you really get there.

Colchester isn’t the biggest zoo we have ever been to (it is only 60 acres whereas Australia Zoo is 72 acres and Western Plains Zoo in Dubbo, NSW is 741 acres) nor does it have the spectacular backdrop that makes Taronga Zoo in Sydney (51 acres in case you were wondering) such a wonderful place. However, the animals here are just as fabulous as they are in other zoos around the world. We loved how close we could get to some, while the space available to them was sizeable. Like the beautiful Adelaide Zoo (almost 20 acres) and Perth Zoo (47 acres) there are excellent connections with wildlife conservation areas in other parts of the world and the opportunity to sponsor individual animals. One of our favourite sections was the African wildlife area, where the ability of the animals to live together reminded Wayne of Monarto Zoo (2560 acres) near Murray Bridge in South Australia. Unlike Melbourne Zoo (55 acres) which has had some negative publicity this year, Colchester is gaining in popularity (hence the television show being set there).

There were animals there to appeal to everybody; penguins for Brock, turtles for Quinn, aardvarks for Meg and red pandas for Wayne. At the very beginning (where a handy trail was set out on the ground for us to follow) we came across some sloths which had the boys all excited, and this level of excitement continued for most of the zoo. We rushed to see some of the big cats (the zoo has one of the best collections in Europe) and the monkeys. Brock had to have his photo taken with the zebras (something to do with a girl at school apparently???) while we all wanted to see the baby warthogs who were charging at and head butting each other. We laughed at a poor male egret trying to help his mate build a nest out of sticks, who would struggle to bring her a new stick, each time only to have her knock it back down onto the ground.

Almost as fascinating were some of the other people who were visiting the zoo that day. Lots of the little children absolutely loved the animals they were seeing (although they found some a little scary). Many of them, despite the television series, had no idea what the animals were that they were looking at, nor where they came from. When they asked their parents they seemed to have even less knowledge. Most amusing were the small groups of people who would make fun of how the animals looked while anyone nearby who saw them were sniggering at how the people themselves looked (honestly, what is the British females obsession with wearing white trousers over dark coloured undies, or the teenage males for wearing their pants so low that you can see virtually all their underwear???)

Possibly the only drawback with Colchester Zoo is that, like Taronga, the countryside in which it is set is actually quite hilly. We walked up and down and down and up trying to see every animal that we could but, as we got close to the exit, it was getting harder to stay motivated to see the last of them. In the end, it was the fact that it was the red panda which kept us going and we were all very glad that we did. As mentioned, Wayne loves red pandas and has been to many zoos to see them, but Colchester has the best exhibit of any that he has yet been to. We were able to get really close to them yet they still had lots of space in which to play and hide. We got some fabulous photographs and then headed for the carpark (an experience which was much more like Australia Zoo, for those of you who have been there). It was a great day, topped off by some pizza which we picked up on the way home.

Three Blind Mice

A bit over a week ago we had our first visitor since arriving here in the UK. Julie Boyd, who had worked with Wayne at Southbank TAFE and who also, with her husband Jeff, used to have brunch with Wayne and Meg on the occasional Sunday mornings. For those of you who don’t know Julie, she is originally from Northern Ireland and works as a mortician, which means that conversations with her are regularly interesting and held in a wonderful accent. Even though she was born in Northern Ireland she lives in Queensland, so this left open lots of options for jokes about the Irish person who came to visit us in England via Australia.

Julie’s visit came at the end of an interesting week, particularly in relation to our car. On Wednesday evening, after Meg and Wayne had been up to Hertford, they were travelling back down the A10 toward home when they noticed a car stopped on the Motorway. This was an issue because it came to a halt in the middle of the lane we were travelling in and, because there was another car between them and us, we saw it quite late. There was lots of traffic in the other lane, so Wayne applied the brakes quite firmly and we went off the road into the gravel, leaving some tire marks behind us and narrowly missing some of the rabbits which regularly eat grass beside the road in the afternoon. At this point the car that had stopped decided to move the extra 20 metres or so into the slip road. We still don’t know what they were thinking but were very thankful that our brakes had worked.

On the Friday we journeyed down to Radlett in order to pick Julie up from the friend’s house where she had been staying. Because Kylie is only little, both the boys stayed at home in order to wait for the goods we had shipped over when we first left Australia back in January. Neither Meg nor Wayne had ever been to Radlett before so it was interesting to see yet another new place. There has been a settlement known as Radlett since at least as far back as 1453. However modern Radlett has been created almost entirely since the end of the 19th century and nowadays it exists in the middle of the Metropolitan Green Belt. As we drove around we were very impressed by the size and architecture of some of the beautiful houses in the area. It is not surprising then, given that it is also very close to London, that so many notable people live or have lived in Radlett. Some of these include; Brian Bennett and Hank Marvin from the musical group, The Shadows; George Michael, formerly of the 80’s group Wham!; Dennis Wise, Vinny Jones, Kolo Taure, Lauren, and Thierry Henry (all football players); former England cricket captain Douglas Jardine; and actresses, Pam St Clement and Lacey Turner (who played Pat Evans and Stacey Branning on Eastenders).

Sadly for Claire (Julie’s friend), it is not in one of these enormous houses that she lives, but we were able to find the place easily enough. Because there was still a little time before she needed to go to work, Claire suggested we go down to one of the local pubs for lunch. Because neither Wayne nor Meg had eaten a meal in a pub as yet, we readily accepted and went back down into the village to the Red Lion. Inside was just as we had expected from an old English pub, a man with a northern European accent behind the bar, lots and lots of different brews of beer, a few old gentlemen sitting at the bar, and some really lovely food. We sat and discussed a whole range of things, including some of the interesting things the net brings up about Radlett. These include that; on the 24th of May 1943, a missile from Germany hit Radlett killing seventeen people. In 1823 Radlett was the site of an infamous murder. Claire also mentioned that one of the more infamous ‘swingers clubs’ operates at Radlett once a month.

When we got home we found that our possessions had arrived while we were out, so the next few hours were spent opening boxes and trying to find places to store the things that we had been making do without since January. Because the brakes had been making a squeaking noise, Wayne ducked up to the garage to have them checked but we were told we would have to wait until Monday. What was good to find was our photos and photo frames; wedding photos of them standing next to Julie helped to convince the boys that they had, in fact, met her before. Indeed, we all got on like a house on fire, telling jokes, looking at photos of Julie’s children and grandchildren, and making decisions about where we might travel on the following day.

After a late night we all managed to wake fairly early in order to start the car and head off for the ‘other’ university town, Oxford. Not long after we arrived we borrowed a book from the library called The Top 50 Crap Towns in Britain, published by a magazine called ‘the Idler’, and Oxford was one of the places featured within. It is about 70 miles from home and Julie had never been there either. While it was a bit cramped in the back of Kylie, we had a great time singing, telling stories and looking at the amazingly green countryside as we travelled through Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire and finally into Oxfordshire. Having learned our lesson from the earlier visit to Cambridge, this time we parked outside the city at the Park and Ride carpark and boarded a big red double decker bus heading for the centre of Oxford.

Oxford has been described in many way. George Santayana called it ‘the paradise of dead philosophies’ while Anthony Trollope said that it was ‘the most dangerous place to which a young man can be sent. What we found, much as with Cambridge, was a beautiful city centre, filled with amazing old buildings dating back hundreds of years. At the very centre of the town is Carfax tower. The Tower is all that remains of the 13th century St Martin's Church and is now owned by the Oxford City Council. It is 23 m (74 ft) tall and still contains a ring of six bells, recast from the original five by Richard Keene of Woodstock in 1676. On the outside, under the clock, is a pair of bellringers who move back and forward on the quarter hour, apparently chiming the bells. There are 99 stairs to the top of the tower and apparently a wonderful view of the spires of Oxford, but cost (as well as the objection of some to climbing stairs) kept us at ground level.

From there we headed off down Cornmarket Street, which is available only to pedestrians and runs from the centre of the city to the North. There were an amazing variety of shops housed in some buildings which also showcased a variety of ages and architectural styles. In particular, next door to Burger King, was a lovely old Tudor style wooden building which, over time, has gradually begun to lean. These days it houses a Pret A Manger (sandwiches) store and a Starbucks, which provides an interesting contrast. Next door is the tower of St Martin at the Northgate, so called because, when the town was walled, this was the site of the gate to the North. This building dates back to 1040 and is the oldest in Oxford. Like Carfax Tower you can actually climb to the top of this old Saxon building to look over the rest of the city but again we chose not to do this.

What Oxford is most famous for, however, is the University and as we turned up Ship Street we walked past the first of the Colleges that we had come across, Jesus College. Jesus was the only College founded during the reign of Elizabeth I, having been granted its charter on the 25th of June 1571. Graduates of Jesus include an enormous number of politicians, writers and bishops. However some of the most famous include; Pixley Ka Izaka Seme (1881- 1951) Founder of the African National Congress; (James) Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx (1916 - 1995) MP and Prime Minister; and T.E. Lawrence also known as Lawrence of Arabia (1888 - 1935) Academic, historian and British liaison officer during WWI. What we were amazed by was the amazing architecture and, especially for the boys, the gargoyles and statues which we were to find was a feature of Oxford.

From the end of Ship we crossed Turl Street, glimpsing Exeter College as we passed and found ourselves on Broad Street outside the Museum of the History of Science. While the exhibitions and the museum itself looked fascinating, this was to become one of a multitude of places we would pass during the day which we will have to go back to see. Quite honestly, Oxford could easily fill a long weekend with the number of things there are to see and do, and that is without attending the theatre (of which there are several). Across the road from the Museum is Trinity College, founded during the reign of Elizabeth’s sister Mary, and hence much more steeped in Roman Catholicism. Famous students who attended here include John Henry Newman (1801-1890) Anglican Minister, Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church and Founder of what was to be called the Oxford (or Tractarian) Movement; and William Pitt the Elder (1708-1778) MP and Prime Minister (featuring in an episode of the Simpsons where Barney Gumble and Wade Boggs argue about the best British Prime Ministers of all time). Also worth checking out is a former student who was expelled (or sent down) from Trinity, Richard Burton (not the actor).

Some of the most beautiful architecture in Oxford is to be found next to the Museum of the History of Science in the Bodleian Library. This is the main research library of the University of Oxford, and is one of the oldest libraries in Europe let alone England. It is one of only 6 legal deposit libraries in Britain, which means that any book published in Britain or Ireland must present a copy to the library. Because of this, it is the second largest library in the country, behind only the British Library at Westminster in London. Meg renewed her love affair with doors, as there were so many old, beautiful doors leading into different sections of the library. This is one of the reasons that the library features in ‘The Madness of King George’, ‘Brideshead Revisited’, ‘Another Country’ and the first two Harry Potter Movies (as the hospital ward and the library). It also features the Radcliffe Camera which is actually a round building (the word ‘camera’ coming from the Latin for ‘chamber’) that featured in the Inspector Morse television show, as well as the movies ‘Young Sherlock Holmes’ and ‘The Saint’. J.R.R. Tolkien (who was a Professor at Oxford) described Sauron’s temple to Morgoth on Numenor, in ‘The Lord of the Rings’, as being architecturally like Radcliffe Camera.

Once you pass through the Bodleian library you reach the church of St Mary the Virgin. This is the building where the University of Oxford was established, lectures used to be held in the church itself. There has been a church on this site, at the centre of the old walled city, since Anglo Saxon times. Congregation met there from at least 1252, and by the early 13th century it was the seat of university government and was used for lectures and the award of degrees. During the Marian repression of the Reformation in England it saw the trial of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer (one of Wayne’s heros), Bishop Hugh Latimer and Bishop Nicholas Ridley, for their teachings and their support of Lady Jane Grey, before they were burned at the stake outside Balliol College on Broad Street. It is said that the nursery rhyme ‘Three Blind Mice’ originally referred to these events. Sermons by William Laud, John Wesley, John Henry Newman, John Keble and Rowan Williams (the current Archbishop of Canterbury) have all been preached here. We have seen many impressive churches so far in our journeys, but this would be right up there with them.

By now it was the early afternoon, so we walked past Lincoln College, Brasenose College, All Souls College, and Hertford College as we walked back up to Cornmarket to look for somewhere to have lunch. Although McDonalds, Burger King and KFC all had their attractions but we ended up at The Crown Inn in the Clarendon Centre for a pub lunch. The food was fabulous, and reasonably priced, so both Brock and Quinn want to go back there for another meal. Indeed, Brock was even talking about going back to The Crown for his birthday dinner (70 miles might be a bit of a distance to travel however). While on Cornmarket Street, Meg also took the opportunity to buy a birthday present or two and we discovered that there was an entire store devoted to things related to Alice in Wonderland (the author, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson also known as ‘Lewis Carroll’).

As we walked down St. Aldate’s Street to Alice’s Shop we passed the Oxford Museum, Pembroke College, Christ Church College and Christ Church Cathedral. After Meg and Julie (in particular) had had an opportunity to make purchases we looked at the beautiful Christ Church parklands across the road. As with Cambridge, the university town of Oxford sees lots of people on bicycles or walking and the city centre is beautifully set out for this. Having said this, we had a little trouble trying to find the exact place to catch the bus back to the Stop and Ride, but we had had such a wonderful time that no one seemed to mind too much.

On the way home we took a slight detour via Hemel Hempstead so that Julie could experience the joy that is the Magic Roundabout (see our blog from April 22nd, ‘Dougal, Zebedee, Ermintrude, Dylan and Brian’). This time we got to travel in both directions, including doing a complete loop around one of the smaller roundabouts (much to Meg’s dismay but everybody else’s delight). The trip back saw both boys fall asleep to the accompaniment of Julie, Wayne and Meg singing along to Meatloaf’s ‘Bat Out of Hell’ album. We can highly recommend Oxford, indeed Meg describes it as being close to her favourite place because it had a lovely atmosphere. The fact that we were also able to travel there with a friend accentuated the experience, it made a nice change to see something new with a different pair of eyes alongside us. Sadly, Julie headed off to Northern Ireland the next morning, but we have an invitation to head across there ourselves in July/August, which we are very much looking to.

Hope you are all well and happy. We look forward to hearing from you.

19th Century Novelists

“I do not, for one, think that the problem was that the band was down. I think that the problem may have been that there was a Stonehenge monument on the stage that was in danger of being crushed by a dwarf. Alright? That tended to understate the hugeness of the object.” This Is Spinal Tap

This, might we say, would be a difficult feat. Travelling to Stonehenge on Sunday March 9th demonstrated just how huge it is. Brock commented afterwards that it was so much bigger and more impressive than even he had imagined it would be. How could people possibly have been able to get such large rocks on top of others, so high off the ground? Why would they have wanted to do so? The size of the spectacle would have been helped by the hundreds of tourists from all sorts of nationalities who were there with us. It may also have been aided by the fact that, immediately after we left, we went a couple of miles away to a site called Woodhenge. As the name suggests, instead of stones, the almost identical site had been constructed using blocks of wood. Because of the nature of wood, these had rotted to such an extent that concrete pillars now stand where the wood would have been. This meant that, unlike at Stonehenge, we were able to get right in amongst the pillars and imagine just how big and impressive it all once was.

After visiting these first two sites that were thousands of years old, we journeyed slightly further south to another, Old Sarum. Unlike Stonehenge, Meg, Brock and Quinn had never heard of Old Sarum, which was a great shame. In many ways it is as impressive, both in the sheer size of the place, and in the amount of history connected to it. The earliest fortifications date back to 400BC when it seems to have existed as a hillfort and market centre for the local area. During the Roman occupation of Britain (43 BC) it was re-established under the name Sorviodunum, as the defensive possibilities inherent in the site were utilised once more. In 552 AD, an Anglo-Saxon named Cynric fought and defeated the Britons here, and it was given the Anglo Saxon name of Searobyrg. Then, in 1003, King Sweyn of Denmark, destroyed the larger cities of Exeter and Wilton (from where the county Wiltshire gets the name) and moved the mint, among other things, to Searobyrg. By 1066 it was considered a borough (known as Sarisberie) at the centre of a huge estate owned by the Bishop of Ramsbury and Sherborne. When William the Conqueror arrived he also recognised the potential of the site as a fortification and made it part of the first wave of royal castles built by the Normans in 1069 (when it was known as Seresberi). A cathedral was also built, just outside the castle walls but within the enormous earthen fortifications, which was consecrated on April 5th 1092. 5 days later it was severely damaged by a violent thunderstorm. The cathedral was extended under Bishop Roger who also had a bishop’s palace built at the site, but his death in 1139 meant that building on the site was scaled back. Eleanor of Aquitane (the wife of Henry II) was kept in the castle for much of the 16 years she spent as a prisoner of her husband, but under King John, relations between the clergy and royalty deteriorated severely. As a result, the Cathedral was moved stone by stone into ‘New Sarum’, the city of Salisbury, which is 3 klms away in the valley below the castle and, although the castle was still occupied, by the time of Henry VIII it no longer served any purpose and he gave permission in 1514 for the stone of the castle to also be taken down. Even this was not the end for, despite the fact that, by then, no one lived at the site, its position as a borough meant that it had the right to parliamentary representation and it became notorious into the 19th Century as a ‘rotten borough’ by which someone could be guaranteed a place in parliament. Wayne had come across the name while reading about this practice in Modern History at both High School and University, but had not realised the other historical links to the place.

The wind was very chilly at Old Sarum, which made things a little uncomfortable, however it paled into comparison to the number of stops made on the way down to Stonehenge allowing Meg to vomit. Wayne had woken up that morning having to vomit also, so it seemed either food poisoning or a virus provided the explanation. On the bright side, we now know much more about the quality, cleanliness and facilities available at the various services between Broxbourne and Wiltshire. Compared to the following day, when the south west of England was hit by an enormous storm and Salisbury was experiencing winds of up to 80 miles per hour, a chilly breeze and occasionally overcast conditions were not worth complaining about. Certainly, the rabbits which lived in the side of the fortifications seemed more concerned about having Australians visit than the huge number of dogs which were being walked around the site or any weather.

We finished our day by travelling down into the valley to Salisbury, a gorgeous town with hundreds of years of history. Parking in the centre of the city, we wandered through the shopping district toward Salisbury Cathedral. We came across the river which runs through the city centre where others were feeding the beautiful white swans and mallard ducks. Interestingly, swans were not as calm or peaceful as their image would make them seem. Shops provided access to a toy walrus named Barry, and some styluses for Quinn’s Nintendo DS. We also managed our first ‘taste’ of McDonalds in England, where we discovered that not all the English are as polite as we had experienced previously. Apparently there is something about a Big Mac which just means you have to push in front of unsuspecting tourists and then claim that you were told to do so by a member of staff. Fortunately, the boys and Wayne managed to persuade Meg not to take matters into her own hands and we got hold of McFlurries to sustain us on the trip home without any blood being shed (although there are an English couple who may not realise just how lucky they are.).

Salisbury Cathedral is an absolutely magnificent building. It was begun using stone from the previous Cathedral at Old Sarum in the 13th Century but is now absolutely enormous. Having been founded prior to the English church becoming Protestant during the 16th Century it was a fascinating mix of old Catholic and Anglican styles and features. As you walk through the building you walk over and beside the graves of people which date back centuries. The stained glass windows are absolutely magnificent and the sense of history is almost overwhelming. The tombs of people connected with the Battle of Agincourt or the defeat of Richard III by Henry Tudor make those events seem real. People who are characters in plays by Shakespeare lie next to Archdeacons and Bishops from down through the ages. The concept that those who have money can buy anything, even a place in heaven (which led to the reformation of the church), is also fairly prominent. Most amazing of all was one of the 4 remaining originals of the Magna Carta (the English equivalent to the Declaration of Independence in the United States) which established the rule of law in England. It was signed by King John, at the behest of the barons, on June 15th 1249 and is kept at Salisbury Cathedral in the Chapter House. Obviously, because of the impact of British law upon the political and legal systems of Australia and the United States (among others) this document has had enormous significance down through the centuries.

Much of the trip home was spent admiring the gathering clouds which precluded the storm that the country was to have the following morning. Brock and Quinn began learning how to spot clouds with the potential for snow, although ultimately it only snowed in the North of England, in Ireland, and in Scotland. Despite it being a Sunday afternoon, the M25 on the way back to Hertfordshire conformed to its English reputation as the World’s Biggest Carpark, so there was enough time to discuss a possible visit to Stratford on Avon next weekend, and to listen to the football results. Despite initially having very little interest in British football, exposure to their schoolmates has convinced Brock and Quinn that Wayne was right in encouraging them to choose a team to support. Funnily, Quinn’s choice of West Ham has now altered to Everton (a good decision given that West Ham have lost their last three premiership games 4-0, while Everton are equal 4th and playing in the Quarter finals of the UEFA Cup). Brock initially elected to follow Newcastle but has now decided that Tottenham might be his second team, on the basis that his friends seem evenly divided between Arsenal and Tottenham.

Just so you know, both Meg and Wayne have stopped vomiting and seem much better. Finally, the title ‘19th Century novelists’ refers to Thomas Hardy (on whom Wayne wrote his university thesis), whose Tess of the D’Urbervilles concludes at Stonehenge; Charles Dickens who satirically condemned political abuses, such as the ‘rotten borough’ of Old Sarum; and Anthony Trollope, whose 6 part Barchester Chronicles were set in a version of Salisbury (renamed Barchester) and concluded with The Small House at Allington which was a village we passed on the way to Stonehenge. Anyway, that concludes our adventures for this week. We hope you are all well and enjoying reading about our travels. Thanks once more for your feedback and love, which we appreciate immensely.