Adventures in the UK and Ireland - 1975
© Copyright 2008, Carroll Williams
"England and America are two countries separated by a common language."
- George Bernard Shaw
Our journey to the UK began in Lakewood, Colorado. It was June 1975. We drove our little VW sedan to Miami, Florida and parked it in the back yard of a former neighbor. Our friend dropped us at Miami International Airport for our flight to London's Heathrow. The flight was scheduled out of the gate at 6:10 p.m. With jet engines started the tractor pushed the aircraft back from the gate. Almost instantly the jet engines shut down and the tractor pulled the aircraft back into the gate. What's this? The captain came on and announced that ground personnel observed an oil leak from the number two engine. We would be delayed until it was checked out. Mary had never flown commercial before and looked at me with a quizzical look. I said, "Oh its nothing, just a routine safety precaution." When the captain came on again he told us that a morning service crew had added oil to the engine's lube system and had not closed a valve following the servicing. He assured us that we had enough oil in that engine to make the flight and we could all relax. Mary wasn't quite so sure.
We took off and climbed out over Miami Beach and turned to the northeast. We following the U.S. coast of the for a couple of hours. I am a neck-craning spectator while flying and invariably glue my eyes to the window. I can't resist watching every passing cloud and anything I can spot on the ground. During the night I was able to identify the lights of villages on the coast of Newfoundland, and lights of the city of Iceland. Between Iceland and Ireland the sky was loaded with huge cumulus clouds. Lightning played throughout the whole of the sky for a thousand miles in all directions. It was as if there was a hidden blast furnace contained within the whole array of clouds.
As we approached the Irish coast the sun was just peeking up over Europe. We were due at Heathrow at 7:10 a.m. local time. I saw the River Shannon just to our North. Crossing the Irish Sea the pilot began a procedural let down from altitude and began reducing air speed. We touched down at Heathrow without a discernible bump and taxied to the gate area. Customs and Immigration were simple enough. We claimed our bags and strapped them onto our little luggage trolley. There we were with two large suitcases, and two smaller bags all on one little two wheeler.
Our first order of business was to find our way to Victoria Station in the heart of London. We had planned "not to plan" this trip. We would arrive and play it be ear. We were to be here for 42 days and we intended to live life to the fullest in those six weeks. At Victoria Station we sought out the Tourist Information Desk. A young man gave us a list of agencies which could steer us to local Bed and Breakfast homes in the greater London area. He recommended a couple of agencies and we called the first on his list. A friendly voice on the other end of the phone gave me the name of a lady in Wandsworth who did B&B. I called and spoke to Mrs. Jill Poynder who would be our landlady for the next two weeks.
Jill was the secretary at a language school in downtown London. She was divorced and had two kids, a boy 14 and a girl 12. Jill told us that she would arrive home from work around 4 p.m. and gave us her address. It was around 9 a.m. and we had been awake all night on the plane. Jet lag hadn't yet hit us. We walked around central London for a while and toured Buckingham Palace for starters. We pulled our luggage out of storage and took the Underground out to Wandsworth. The train emerged from the underground and ran on the surface just before we crossed the Thames bridge at Battersea Power Station. We rolled into Wandsworth station and walked the last three blocks to Jill's home. We were early and sat down to rest on our two large suitcases in the driveway. Jill's home was one half of a double two story surrounded by high hedges. We were out of sight of the street and we promptly fell asleep leaning on each other's shoulders. Jill arrived home a bit earlier than usual and let us into her house. She went to pick up her daughter from a track meet. We promptly fell asleep leaning against each other on the living room sofa. When Jill returned we were introduced to her children Vicky and Robin.
Our room was a spacious front bedroom on the second floor. We shared the bathroom at the end of the hallway with the family. Robin was a typical 14 year old boy with posters on his door. One proclaimed, "Don't get your knickers in a twist." Vicky was a curious 12 year old and asked many questions about our homeland. To illustrate where we lived I sketched an outline of the USA on a piece of notepaper. She was aghast when I told her we had traveled by car four days from Denver to Miami to catch our flight to London. She couldn't believe two people could spend four days in a car. We experienced a similar response from a barrister at dinner one evening in the cafeteria at the QE2 concert hall. He told us he had a friend in Salt Lake City, Utah. I said, "Your friend is our neighbor. He lives only five hundred miles from Denver." He looked askance and said, "Your neighbor?" I said, "Yes, we can drive it in just one full day." His reaction was just like Vicky's. He couldn't believe a person could sit in a car for a whole day.
This was a common response from people in the UK. When you consider that we covered the distance from the Roman Wall in North Umbria to Bath in Southwest England in a half day's drive you begin to realize just how small the UK really is. People there take a holiday and travel a couple of hours from home, spend their week or two, and return in a couple of hours. Speaking of driving in the UK and Ireland, it is quite an adventure. You just have to keep thinking like your looking in a mirror. Everything is opposite. I learned very early not to say it is "backward." That word means something quite different. A lady street vendor apologized for the pears being green and hard, saying "Sorry love, the pears are a bit backward this year."
Words carry much different meaning in the UK. I was playing chess with Vicky and the little gal was beating me soundly. I wanted to compliment her and I used an American slang expression. I said, "Vicky, you play a mean game of chess." She looked hurt and responded, "Oh, and what of your own?" I immediately went into damage control mode and said, "I have obviously said something which has hurt your feelings, please tell me what it was that upset you." She explained that I had told her she was playing an "awful, terrible game." I told her, "No, not at all. You are beating me at every turn. Your game is very good." I went on to explain that we often use words which have opposite meaning to emphasize a point. She quickly observed, "Oh then you meant crafty, effective." I said, "Yes, by all means, crafty effective." We went on with the game and she trounced me within minutes. Checkmate!
During our two weeks in London we alternated touring the city and its suburbs, and sometimes took an out-of-town train ride to places like Colchester the capital of Roman Britain, to Canterbury and Dover, and to Salisbury and Stonehenge. In London we spent endless hours in the British Museum.
From London we moved to Oxford to a B&B in the heart of the city. At Oxford we visited the Bodlian Library and perused some ancient manuscripts pertaining to the settlement of the North American colonies. One day we rode a bus from Oxford to Stratford-on-Avon and walked our way through Shakespeare's home town. At Ann Hathaway's cottage we sat down and embraced each other on the bench where the Bard courted Ann Hathaway hundreds of years earlier.
Our next B&B stop was at Stow on the Wold "where the wind blows cold." While at Stow we walked for miles through the countryside to visit my mother's ancestral village, Upper Slaughter. There early one morning we entered a little tea shop. We spoke with Mrs. Colette the proprietor and learned that the Rev. Vicar Ford was the pastor of the local Anglican Church. Mrs. Colette called the Rev. and told him there were some people from the United States who wanted to look at the Parish Registers. We finished our tea and walked through the ancient burial ground to St. Peter's Church. Rev. Ford soon appeared and ushered us inside. We went into a small ante room to the left of the sacristy. There he opened a huge iron safe and removed two ancient leather-bound volumes. "This is what you want to see. When you finish just leave them on the table here, and I will come back around 4 p.m. and put them back in the safe."
What a find! One volume recorded the Parish marriages, births, and deaths from the early 1400's through the early 1700's and the second one covered the time from the early 1700's to the present. I turned to pages covering the late 1500's and hit pay dirt. My mother's direct ancestor was born in 1595 and there was his name staring back at me. I had already identified the individual from genealogical records in the Denver Public Library the year before. Now here was the whole record right in front of my eyes. Some Parish Priests wrote very clearly and others not so legibly. For some records I had to decipher words by comparing letters in common words to those in given names. For the most part I was confident that I decoded correctly.
We had many conversations with our hosts at various B&B's. Many were of the generation that lived through World War II directly under the air warfare known as the Battle of Britain. They had many stories to relate of death and devastation in their towns and villages. In the UK it is not uncommon to share a restaurant table with strangers. Several times we invited another couple to dine at our table. In Scotland we had the pleasure of sharing lunch with a gentleman and his wife. He had been "an engine fitter" in the RAF I shared that I too had been an "engine fitter" in the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War. We spent a whole day at the RAF Museum at RAF Hendon north of London proper. The museum at the time had a fine collection of WW II British aircraft. We learned that in coming years they planned a German section to feature airplanes of the Luftwaffe. As the museum guide told us, "We fought the buggers twice; we at least should display their hardware."
When we left Stow-on-the-Wold we took a train north to Crewe and changed to a westbound train to Holyhead, North Wales. On the way we passed directly beside Conway Castle. At Holyhead we caught the night mail boat to Dunleary, Ireland. She was small and a very old steamer that made the crossing round trip daily. At dockside I was trying to untie our luggage from our little two-wheel trolley when two big burly young Irish lads grabbed up the whole load, one on each end, and carried it up the gangway and placed it on deck for us. I thanked them profusely. We conversed for a while. They observed that we would love the weather in Ireland. They said, "We are having beautiful sunny weather. It is truly wonderful, aye but the crops are all burnt up."
We found the pursers office and booked a tiny cabin with a narrow set of double bunks. We barely had room for our luggage and ourselves. I took the upper bunk and discovered that the partition between cabins was a single layer of plywood. There was a small peep hole someone had drilled through. I took out a band aid and placed over the hole. There, that would give me privacy.
Our steamer left the dockside at Holyhead around 1:00 a.m. and arrived at the Quay in Dunleary around 6:00 a.m. What we didn’t know was that our steamer tickets entitled us to ride the boat train from Dunleary to Dublin about 8 miles away. I had read the TWA travel guide to Ireland. It said we could call Avis car in Dublin 24/7 and they would pick us up at dockside with a hire car. Not so! I used my only coin in the pay phone and got Avis at Dublin Airport. They informed me that I would need to call Avis in downtown Dublin for a car and even then they would not pick us up. We waited on the lonely dock for a time and then strolled over to a tourist Kiosk that was just opening up. The kind ladies in the Kiosk called a taxi for us, and we were off to Dublin.
With a large map of Ireland stretched out on the counter, I explained our intentions to the man at Avis. I showed him that we would go south first and then around the Ring of Kerry and up the west coast ending up at Glen Columcille. I asked for the best return route to Dublin. He drew his finger along a highway that would lead us through Ulster, the infamous six counties in Northern Ireland where the Catholics and Protestants were still very much in a struggle to control their destinies. I said, "Oh no, I don't want to drive through Ulster." He retorted, "Aye and you can get shot a lot quicker in New York or Chicago than you can in Ulster." Even so, we chose to stay inside the Republic of Ireland and leave "the troubles" off our itinerary.
Many times we were stopped at roadblocks. Locals had to open "the boot" and let the soldiers inspect their luggage. Every time, and I do mean every time I opened my mouth to say, "Hello, what would you like us to do?" The soldier or policeman would smile broadly and say, "Oh, you must be a Yank on holiday. Well then have a pleasant day." They waved us through without so much as a cursory look into our hire car. Maybe we looked like innocent babes in the woods. We didn't mind at all.
At a traffic round about in a small rural village a local constable waved us to a halt. He asked where our tax decal was for our car. I explained that the car belonged to Avis and I wasn't aware that a tax decal should be displayed. I assumed I would get a citation and turn it in to Avis. I asked, "What can I do about it?" He just smiled and said, "Well lad, I don't suppose there is anything you can do about it now, so have a pleasant holiday." He waved us on. We were much relieved.
Sunday, July 13, 1975 we visited Blarney Castle and kissed the Blarney Stone. Mary kissed it once. I kissed in not once, but three times. On my first two kisses, Mary didn't get a photo. She wasn't familiar with our camera. She finally got a photo on the third kiss. By that time my upper back was getting tired. One has to lie on his back with his head and shoulders protruding out over a ninety foot drop. The Blarney Stone is in the bottom row of stones in the castle parapet. How this particular stone came to have such significance is unimportant. Ireland attracts tens of thousands of tourists annually to this ritual. The Castle itself got the reputation because the Lord of the Castle wrote endless tomes to Queen Elizabeth I. The Queen grew irritated at his excessive wordiness and dismissed one of his letters as "Just so much Blarney." The expression stuck and to this day kissing the Blarney Stone conveys to the person a gift for gab. Some tell me I didn't need to kiss the stone, that I was already good at gab. Even so, it didn't hurt to insure my gift through this ancient ritual.
From Blarney we drove around the southern coast of the Irish Republic and headed north along the west coast stopping for the night at a B&B on the outskirts of Limerick on the banks of the River Shannon. From there we spent a day touring Castle Bunratty where William Penn the founder of Pennsylvania lived as a child. Admiral Penn, the father of William was the commander of the castle at the time. Beside the castle we visited an Irish Folk Park. The park contains a rural Irish village one might encounter several centuries ago. There were live animals, gardens, dwellings, and shops and the smell of peat fires burning on the hearths of the houses. Not the most pleasant odor.
On the way northward toward Sligo we had a flat tire. Not wanting to change it on the narrow roadway, I pulled into a farm house driveway. Knowing that there were many terrorists about, I wanted to let the farm family know that we were not one of them. I approached the house and knocked on the door. A ruddy-faced man of about thirty opened the door and greeted me. Inside I could see his wife and about six or seven children ranging in age from around two to around eight. They were very pleasant people and invited us to “Please do come in and join us for dinner.” I politely declined as I wanted to find a town with a tire shop and have the flat repaired. In retrospect, we should have joined them, it might have been a very nice experience. I changed the tire and we drove on. We made Sligo in time for our own dinner at a little open air restaurant overlooking the sea.
From Sligo we drove northward to find our way to Glenn Columcille, our desired destination. Again, in retrospect we should have found a B&B earlier. The drive around the jagged cliffs of County Donegal was a bit scary in the dark. The road hugged a cliff with jagged rocks and the sea below. It was raining as it often did, and the road was slick. We made it fine, and found a room at a B&B owned by a Mrs. O'Gara. We unpacked the car and locked it up for the next two days. From here we planned to walk around the Glenn and get some much-needed exercise. While Mary prepared for bed, I went across the street to a local Pub.
The Pub was small, and there were a few locals enjoying a Guinness and cigarette. Oh, yes, Ireland was a country of smokers in those days. I sat down at the bar and ordered a Guinness. The lass behind the bar instantly detected that I was a Yank. She asked me where in the States I lived. It told her Denver, Colorado. She brightened up and said, “Oh, perhaps you know my Auntie, she lives in Philadelphia.” I drew a quick outline map of the USA on a bar napkin and explained the distance between Denver and Philadelphia. She seemed surprised to learn that any country could be so large. We both had a good laugh.
For the next day or so Mary and I wandered around on foot in the Glenn. We found the roofless stone ruins of an ancient chapel built by Saint Columcille. It was amazingly small. No larger than an average sized room in a modern house. In one corner lay a single stone slab about the size of a single bed. It was reputed to be the bed of the famous Irish Saint. I photographed the ruins including the stone slab and we moved on. I thought seriously of lying down on the slab and having Mary take my photo. Later I regretted not having done so, as I later learned in Scotland that Saint Columcille founded Clan Donnachaidh out of which forty-nine Septs or additional clans descended including my paternal grandmother's Clan Duncan.
Around the Glenn we visited several Iron-Age ring forts constructed by an ancient people who may or not have descendents in the current population. These ring forts are simple piles of stones arranged in circles. Some fortess circles may be only a few yards across, and others my be much larger, as much as a hundred or so yards in circumference. The stones are piled high enough to shield defenders from attackers from outside the walls. There is no mortar, and the stones are only loosely piled one on another. The larger ring forts may have contained a village of permanent inhabitants.
Glenn Columcille lived up to its reputation in the travel guide. We found a little tea shop that served the most delectable scones and strawberry jam. All of it home made. The scones are continuously baked fresh in a peat-fired oven. The tea or coffee is brewed fresh continuously as well. Young ladies with crisp white aprons waited on us and made pleasant conversation.
Glenn Columcille is situated on the rocky Atlantic coast in the far Northwest corner of the Republic of Ireland. It lies just three or four miles from the border with Ulster, the six northern counties still under British control and the scene of so many terror bombings between Protestants and Catholics. While walking along the beach one morning we fell in step with a couple from Ulster. In the conversation the lady invited us to be sure and visit Ulster. Me and my big mouth. I shot back a bad joke that I had heard stateside about such places. I said, “We will, just as soon as peace breaks out.” She immediately broke into tears and said, “Yes it is actually very awful right now.” I felt terrible for being so quick with a quip.
We reluctantly departed Glenn Columcille and headed back south through Sligo and on toward Dublin. Just outside Sligo we were stopped at a roadblock. About a dozen Irish soldiers were searching trucks and cars for terrorist weapons or explosives. Each soldier had an M-16 at the ready. We were questioned briefly and waved through without a search. Again, we were not regarded as suspicious.
Around noon we stopped for lunch in the town of Boyle. It was here that we again encountered a phenomenon that we noted several times. Irish people were teaching the next generation to distrust and dislike the British. Boyle has one of the hundreds of burnt-out churches from the Cromwell era. Oliver Cromwell, the Puritan dictator of England invaded Ireland and waged war without mercy on the Irish Catholics. One of his favorite tricks was to capture a town, herd the inhabitants into the local church, seal and guard the doors and then burn the church with its parishioners inside. The roofless remains of those stone churches from the 17th century still stand as stark reminders of Cromwell's atrocities.
A man had his two children by their hands and stood just across the street from the ruins of the Boyle Abbey church. The boy was about ten, and girl about nine. The father told them the story of Cromwell's army coming to Boyle and the fate of the people in the Church. Earlier on our trip through Ireland we encountered the same phenomenon in a restaurant. Two business men were seated at a table very near us. One was explaining a Nazi atrocity against a town in Yugoslavia during he second world war. He said, “Oh, you know what I mean, it was a Cromwell job.”
The Irish take their Catholicism very seriously. At a B&B we were talking to our hostess. She was an older lady around sixty or so. Mary asked her why with a nation like Ireland surrounded by the sea, and with fishing fleets in so many small harbors around the coast we had noticed there were few seafood restaurants. She responded that the Irish were Catholic and ate fish on Fridays at home. I asked her if the Vatican II dispensation hadn't changed that habit. She responded, “Aye, and if he Pope wants to lose his religion 'tis alright with me, but I'm still Catholic.” Later out of her earshot we both had a good chuckle knowing that the Irish are more Catholic than the Pope.
When we returned to Dublin where were fortunate to board a very modern and large auto ferry to Liverpool. The ship had a large dining salon with tables spread with linen and set with silver service. I think we had one of our favorite meals of baked salmon, fine bread, great salad and steamed vegetables all served by an efficient wait staff. While crossing the Irish Sea toward Livepool I went topside and made my way to the radio room just aft of the bridge. On the door was a sign “Marconi Room.” A testament to the inventor of the wireless radio and to the more common term used for decades in Europe. I placed a radio telephone call to Avis hire car in Liverpool. A young lady at Avis assured me that she would meet the ship with a hire car reserved for us. At least we wouldn't repeat the error we made coming to Ireland assuming we could call upon landing. It was a good thing we made the call as the ship would dock at closing time for the Avis office in Liverpool.
On the way toward Liverpool I stood on the deck and was amazed at the number of wrecked ships whose superstructures and mastheads still stood as start reminders of the carnage wreaked here by Nazi submarines against the merchant shipping of Britain in the early stages of World War II. When hit by torpedoes the masters of these ships steered them into the shallows on either side of the ship channel and let them settle where they would not be a hazard to navigation. In addition, it allowed their crews a better chance of survival by letting the ship sink nearer the coastline. I had to remind myself that these ships were destroyed just thirty-five years earlier.
When we docked in Liverpool, sure enough the young lady from Avis was there to greet us. We accompanied her back to her office to sign the paper work for the car rental. While there we learned that as soon as she closed the office she would load a lorrie (truck) with several cars and transport them back to London. Her day was long and she had many hours yet to go.
From Liverpool we ventured northward into the English Lake District where we visited the home of William Wordsworth. A pleasant interlude to say the least. We spent the night at a B&B at Carlisle very near the Roman wall which was our next destination. In the morning we ventured along Hadrian's Wall often hiking in the green countryside. We visited mile posts and major forts along the wall. The first fort we came upon was Birdoswald Fort. It is an interesting garrison with many building foundations and the outer wall still very much intact. It lies within a sheep farm and one has to step carefully to avoid sheep droppings. The second fort was Houstead's Fort or as the Romans called it Vircovicium. This is a much larger fort and contains many structural remains. It was interesting to walk along the streets and venture into the store rooms and work shops, although the only thing remaining are the foundations and partial walls. Nevertheless one can get the feeling of the place. Many features such as the latrine can be easily seen where soldiers of the legions bathed and took care of nature's functions using running water to remove human wastes. Many residential structures clearly showed clever engineering. Space beneath stone floors allowed smoke to travel from a fire pit to a chimney on the opposite side to the building transferring heat to the rooms above heating the floors as it went.
Outside the fort lay the remains of a large civilian settlement. The usual activities accompanying a military installation occurred in these civilian towns. Shopping, rental housing, entertainment including drinking, gambling, carousing, and prostitution were among the services provided by these settlements.
A most remarkable similarity of appearance exists between ancient Roman brick architecture and some local buildings constructed in the last century or two. There are homes and farm buildings in Northumberland that bear a striking resemblance to Roman barracks buildings dating back two thousand years. While some things change, some things remain the same.
Our first night in Scotland was spent at a B&B on the shores of Loch Lomond. Mary and I went walking along the lake shore and recalled the lyrics of the ancient song:
By yon bonnie banks and by yon bonnie braes,
Where the sun shines bright on Loch Lomond,
Where me and my true love were ever wont to gae,
On the bonnie, bonnie banks o' Loch Lomond.
We were just two of about a dozen guests in the B&B that evening. There were two school teachers from France, a couple from Germany, and several other nationalities I don't recall. We had a great time at breakfast conversing across several languages.
We learned from the proprietress that there were to be Highland Games at a location nearby. For the better part of the day we witnessed ancient Scottish games and dances and ate lunch in a large tent among the locals. The games were held in a sheep pasture and so visitors had to step gingerly to avoid unwanted decorations to their shoes. All-in-all it was a marvelous experience. Pipers played and the lads and lasses danced the Highland Fling, and the Sword Dance. Strong men did the caber toss and engaged in a lot of other feats of strength.
We drove too long one day. We wanted to reach Ft. William before dark, but we forgot that in these latitudes it doesn't get dark until nearly midnight. In the UK it was customary for a B&B operator to have a yard arm with two hooks attached. They could hang their simple sign saying B&B on those hooks. We were just not seeing any signs out by the road. Then it dawned on us that the proprietors would take their signs down when their rooms were full. It gets really cold up at Ft. William, even in the summer time. We thought for a while that we would be forced to spend a miserable night curled up and freezing in a very small rental car. Finally when we were just losing all hope we spotted a sign. We got the last room in the home, and probably the last one in the region for the night. It was up a back stairway in an old farm house, but it was very comfortable.
One evening we stayed in a truly remarkable B&B, Invergloy House at Spean Bridge at Loch Lochy. The views through our large bedroom window were spectacular. Mountains and Loch are framed by gardens and trees unmatched anywhere.
We pressed on around the west side of Loch Ness. We stopped often to take in the view and shoot some photos. Did we see the Loch Ness monster? We can't be quite sure. We saw a number of objects in the distance which could have been Nessie, but we wouldn't bet the homestead on any of them. Locals swear they have seen and heard Nessie moving about on land as well as water.
At Culloden Moor battlefield we walked among the clan graves. My American Duncan ancestor fought here against the troops of King George II in the last battle of the Rising of the '45. In 1745 the clans of Scotland made an unsuccessful attempt to restore the Stuarts to the English throne. The war was lost and this last battle was lost. My ancestor escaped capture by fleeing southward to Liverpool and thence on a ship bound for Charleston, South Carolina. Many were killed by the King's troops and were buried according to their clan tartans. Each clan is buried in a long barrow with a marker stating only the name of the clan. There are no individual names available here, but I had the feeling that there were many lads sleeping here known to my ancestor as his companions in battle. My grandmother Duncan told me stories that were past down through her family generation-to-generation of how her great, great grandfather fought alongside Bonnie Prince Charlie.
One evening we slept in a large farm house B&B at the very north end of Scotland. When I asked the farmer what he raised, he proudly proclaimed “Barley for Scots whiskey.” The family was descended from Vikings who raided the coast in the ninth and tenth centuries. Once more we were treated to an interesting group of guests. There were Germans, French, Swiss, and one couple consisting of a French wife and a husband from the Seychelle Islands.
On our way southward through the moors of Scotland we came upon a piper in the middle of nowhere. He stood on a knoll beside the narrow road playing his bagpipes to no one in particular. We stopped to listen. His instrument case was spread open and I noticed some coins had been dropped into the case. I contributed some coin, we thanked him for the concert and drove on. A few miles further on we stopped in the village of Blair Atholl. We had been asked by some friends back in Colorado to pick up a practice chanter if we visited Scotland. It is a single pipe that lets a beginner learn the fingering techniques before investing in a bagpipe which can be quite expensive. While in the music shop I mentioned meeting Hugh McFee on the moor playing his pipes and having dropped a pound into his instrument case. The owner just grinned and said, “Well I can assure you that your pound has already been spent at the local pub. Hugh McFee is the town drunk.” I thought, well at least he can still play the pipes and earn his libations.
One morning we emerged from a farm house B&B somewhat north of Edinburgh which was to be our next destination. The road was deserted and I was not thinking clearly. We drove a mile or so and suddenly Mary shouted “Get over.” There was no danger but she shocked me into realizing that I was driving on the right-hand side of the road. That can be a dangerous habit for American tourists.
Once in North Umbria on a quiet Sunday afternoon we were driving along a very deserted narrow lane between two very high rock walls. Suddenly we both realized that we had darted across a divided four-lane highway. Fortunately there was no traffic in sight in either direction, but when we entered the same narrow lane on the other side of the highway I braked to a stop and stepped out of the car. I swore to Mary there was no stop sign on the lane where it comes to the highway. As I stood there looking back I could see the stop sight clearly on the left side of the lane where it belonged in England. My mind had been focused on the right-hand side of the lane and I clearly did not see the sign. This was a wake-up call to me and I never forgot to “look left” from then on.
We enjoyed Edinburgh and its castle, but regretted that we would not be here long enough to take in the famous Tatoo in August. We had to be back in London for our flight home before the Tatoo would begin. The Tatoo is a festival of pipe and drum bands and much more. We decided to go to the south and west for a few days. The UK is quite small in comparison with the USA. If you placed John O'Groat, the north end of Scotland on our home town of Denver, Lands End, the south most point on the British Isles would barely reach beyond Kansas City. We spent one more night in Carlisle at the same B&B we enjoyed on our way north and struck out the next morning for Bath in the southwest. We arrived in Bath in time for lunch.
Aquae Sulis, or Bath was established in 43 AD by the Romans. The Roman baths are still in use today and are fed by natural hot springs. From Bath we returned to London the following day in order to catch our flight back to the states. On the way we had lunch at the Moon Rakers which is a country pub with a thatched roof. We dined in the garden on a cold salmon salad which was one of the best meals we have ever experienced in all of our travels.
We ended this first trip to the UK and Ireland after 42 days of wandering the highways and bi-ways. We met a lot of friendly people and enjoyed a lot of great conversations. Nine years later we returned to the UK for eleven days and toured in a rental car with my step mother Kathleen and my sister Ann Williams. That excursion was much too short in time and territory covered, but again, we had a great time and visited the Royal Navy Museum at Portsmouth. The museum collection includes the well preserved flag ship of Admiral Lord Nelson the hero of Trafalgar and the Battle of the Nile in which the naval forces of Napoleon were roundly defeated.
We always enjoy going abroad, and always enjoy returning home with memories to recall and memories to share. If you have read this far, thank you for your perseverance. We hope you enjoyed our recollections.
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