Category Archives: history

around home, history, UK

Brighton

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Last weekend I had set aside to be the first in over three months that I didn’t travel anywhere & instead stayed at home & did very little.  However, one can’t take brilliantly clear & sunny days for granted in this country. So shortly after waking up Saturday morning with no plans, I was joining that 170 year tradition of days out – a day-trip to the Brighton seaside by train.  It would seem many others had that idea as the train was crammed by the end of the two hour all-stops journey.

I headed straight for the seaside & the famous pier.  As expected, the beach is overly stoney – but it was all very pleasant with plenty of people out & about and many restaurants and cafes to choose from (many built in to the bottom, sea-side of the promenade).  West Pier has many similarities to the third Swamp Castle – disused for many years, it burnt down, fell over & (mostly) sank into the sea.

There’s a tiny museum devoted to the local fishing trade, & seaside attractions to some extent, tucked under the promenade as well – that gave me a bit of local history. With plenty more chances of food from enticing stalls, I strolled around the historic pier looking at the various funfair attractions and gazing back to the beach and further along to the white cliffs.

Hungry by now, I was easily tempted to shell out a few quid for a ride on the oldest electric railway still operating (Volks Railway) – it’s about a ten minute ride along the edge of the shore to Brighton Marina. That area started out looking rather shabby, but eventually I found plenty of restaurants beside the moorings – I just had to get past the encamped gypsies, a huge boarded up lot, an ASDA, a parking building and a McDonald’s.  Having had so much pasta & pizza recently, I was keen to give British Italian a miss & ended up in a small chain (there is one other in Newcastle) of American restaurants.  It was not over the top (so not really American in that respect), but I was well thrilled to be having a proper large burger with plenty of blue cheese, pickles, onion rings & sweet potato fries.  For a southwest touch, they even served pink lemonade; just as well I was wearing my Stetson in the bright sunshine.

The main thing I wanted to see in Brighton was the Royal Pavilion – the Prince Regent’s residence that he had built either side of the turn of the nineteenth century.  I was well prepared that it would look a little odd on the outside – it was built in the Indo-Saracenic style, a strange mix of Indian styles and those favoured in Britain at the time – Gothic & neo-Classical.

I was taken aback by the extent and the grandeur of the interior – I was not expecting such a Chinese influence.  The pavilion is the greatest example of the chinoiserie (French – Chinese-esque) style in Britain.  With large dragons, palm leaves & all manner of other Chinese decorations, it really was quite something.  Unfortunately, no photos inside – so an image search will have to satisfy any curiosity you may have.

I had a bit more time to wander the extremely narrow-streeted Lanes area, there are many curious looking shops – with a big student population and being the foremost LGBT centre in the UK, it does have quite a different feel to the place than most old towns & small cities in the country.

Back home at a reasonable hour, the next day I headed out for my first mountain-bike club ride in six or seven months.  Pretty flat out on the other side of the Forest, it was pleasing to have more than half of the fast group riding singlespeed.  I may need to get a smaller cog at the back as I was frequently spinning out on the flat sections & struggling to keep up – 32:16 is very achievable around here, in fact 32:18 borders on the silly.  Still, I’ve only just started singlespeeding again, so at least I didn’t have to push up the hills.

city, engineering, Europe, food, history, travel

Ravenna & Venice

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Barely having recovered from the exhausting journey back from NZ, I was off to Italy less than a week after getting home.  It was a little odd going back to work after NZ & having all sorts of people telling me I was going to visit one of our sister plants for a week to see how they operate their similar plant better.  It was a very productive, informative & interesting week spent with my boss & workmate as the Italian process engineers showed us around and gave us plenty of ideas to try out back at Hythe.  For the most part, the language difference wasn’t a problem as most, except some operators, spoke reasonable English; Steve (my boss) knows quite a bit of Italian & Henry (workmate) knows a little – I of course only know the tiny amount I remember from previous Italian trips.

Ravenna is a very nice little city (~160000) & fortunately we were staying close to the centre – so it was very easy to walk around town on the warm evenings.  We didn’t have a lot of time to see some of the renowned early-church mosaics (eight UNESCO World Heritage sights to be seen), but Henry & I managed to see a couple once Steve had gone back to England early.  Of course, being Italy, the food was fantastic & as the capital of Romagna region we were able to sample quite a bit of the local food & wine.

The SBR (styrene-butadiene rubber) plant was on a huge industrial site, a similar size to the Port Kembla Steelworks – but with more space dedicated to plant, rather than stockpiles. There were an incredible number of bicycles and small Fiats all around to save much walking.  There was an appropriately sized canteen, where the lunches were bountiful & cheap.  Perhaps I ate too much pasta last week.

It wasn’t too difficult to get my return flight pushed out by two days so that I could have a free day exploring somewhere else in Italy.  Conveniently, Venice is on my list and only a short, cheap train ride away from Ravenna.  I rolled in Friday evening & then had a twenty minute walk rolling my cases along a lot of cobbles and carrying them over many bridges.  The end of September is a good time to visit: it’s warm, but not hot; the famous stink wasn’t there; and the crowds are tolerable.

But what an absolute nuts city – built on (& sinking into) the water, it’s just mad.  Being so flat, it’s a very easy city to walk around & get to the main sights & even outlying neighbourhoods – pre-cached maps on one’s phone really help in not getting lost in the labyrinth (the GPS signal was surprisingly strong in such skinny streets surrounded by tall stone buildings).  While I expected no cars, the lack of bikes took a little more to get used to – especially after the proliferation of bikes in Ravenna.

Grand Canal

Rialto Bridge

St Mark’s Campanile

As usual, I walked an awful lot around the city popping in to a few of the famous buildings & museums – Scuola Grande di San Rocco (filled with huge Tintorettos – said to be his Sistine Chapel) was my favourite.  The Jewish Quarter was nice & quiet, but then so were a lot of the neighbourhoods away from the Grand Canal & associated crowds.

Somewhere along the way I stumbled across some sort of musical museum, so I took a peek and learnt all sorts about Vivaldi – I didn’t know he was from Venice.  But that’s not surprising as I am musically ignorant.  Which makes it even stranger that I somehow ended up at a concerto that night in a packed hall listening to (what seemed to me, at least) an incredible string recital.  It can’t have been just me that thought so as the applause was prolonged – they came back three times just to bow and another two times for encores.  Most of the evening was Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, which as well as being brilliant kept on fooling me into thinking that another summer of NZ cricket was here – thanks National Bank.

So that two hours of the four violins, a viola, a cello (the cellist was particularly exuberant and highly entertaining), a double bass & a harpsichord turned out to be the highlight of Venice for me.  A great place to visit, but with so much stone, so many people, no grass & few trees I don’t think it’s a city I could spend much more than a few days at a time in.

city, Europe, food, friends, history

Prague weekend

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Just in case I needed an excuse to visit another great European city for a weekend, good friend (& one of my oldest) Levi having been somewhat exiled to Czech while he tries to get back in to the UK provided such a reason. As Levi was travelling in by train from the east of the country, he arrived at our apartment (but fifty metres from Old Town Square) a little before me.

Although so close to the centre of the old, & therefore most visited, part of town the apartment was set well back in a big, enclosed courtyard & was super quiet & conducive to sleep. We were bemused by this door as we eventually wandered out to explore the city Saturday morning.

It became apparent quickly that Prague is filled with beautiful buildings.  This is the Rudolfinum – a concert hall home of the Prague Spring Music Festival.

Crossing the river (Vltava), we were wandering towards the castle to have a look. I spent a little bit of time explaining to Levi modern-European history – well, as much as I know – when we came across this monument marking the German occupation before and during WWII.

Spying a small gate in a large wall, we somewhat stumbled across the beautiful gardens of the Senate.  Eventually we found our way to the one exhibition I particularly wanted to see – the Lobkowicz collection.  A family collection, there was more fascinating history here as the family had their extensive property confiscated & regained not once, but twice over fifty-odd years in the twentieth century.  The first time the Nazis took it all and shortly after getting it back from them, the Soviets came & took it all again for much longer.  The audio tour, by members of the family, was surprisingly good.  The highlight of the entire collection was Haymaking by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, part of his seasons series – another one, The Harvesters, I remember vividly from the Met in NYC.  A couple of large Canolettos of London panoramas were also particularly interesting.

By now we were within the walls of the castle (which is much more impressive from a distance).  In the middle of it is St Vitus Cathedral:

All around Prague were these old open-topped cars for showing tourists around, the one on the right is an old Skoda that somehow is still going.

We were both intrigued by the patterns on the side of this building:

There were plenty of trams around, some sleek & new – others like this one below made me feel like I’d stepped in to an old Bond film.

This poster, on a rather circuitous walk to more fantastic food, I found deliciously ironic:

National Museum

It’s not quite the Kaituna River

In between watching the Olympics (with the Czech commentary very quiet), there was plenty of time to wander around & look at the beautiful sights.  This is the Prague Astronomical Clock in Old Town Square – the oldest working example of such a clock in the world, dating from the early 1400s.  It puts on quite the show on the hour, but as a timepiece is extremely difficult to read – we got more enjoyment looking at the crowds delighting in the clock & even cheering it on.

With more delicious gelato & smooth beer consumed, at different times, it was very nice to end up relaxing on one of the islands in the middle of the river.

Dancing house down near the river

Plenty of people out pedalloing

Did I mention we ate a lot? Gorgeous salmon down near the John Lennon wall.

So a fantastic weekend hanging out in Prague with Levi, strangely we talked an awful lot of cycle-touring – must be a good place for it, seeing the sights & enjoying the local food & beer.

Europe, history, travel, UK

Jersey

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A little sick of sitting at home in the weekends just in case I was needed at work during the annual maintenance shutdown, I somehow decided that a weekend trip to Jersey wasn’t too far to go. Technically not a foreign country, although in some ways it felt like one, it was still sort of overseas – an easy half hour flight over the Channel from Southampton after work on Friday. Although a small island, it turns out Jersey is a maze of narrow lanes – even a Focus was feeling a bit large. The open road limit is only 40 mph, but most of the roads are restricted more than that – some down to 15 mph. Driving was interesting because most of the intersections were blind due to various walls, so there was a lot of creeping out in to the next road hoping no-one was coming along in a hurry – which, invariably, they weren’t. Navigation wasn’t exactly straight forward, even with a pre-cached map & GPS on my phone – I was told that people that have been on the island their whole life can still get lost. I did manage to find where I was staying out on the east of the island & got a very warm welcome from my airbnb hosts – I was surprised to see a bottlebrush growing in the garden, a reminder of home.

The number plates are even more simplistic than back home – although not nearly as boring

Having settled in to much larger accommodation than I’m used to for just one person, I was keen to head out & explore a little & find some dinner as the evening was brightening up. It wasn’t a long drive, nowhere is I suppose, down to the small harbour at Gorey. There’s rather an imposing castle, Mont Orgueil, right behind the esplanade and a long breakwater that shelters the fleet of small boats harboured. At the end of the pier there was the smallest customs facility I think I’ve ever seen – there are occasional ferry sailings to France (which is a whole lot closer than England).

Waking to drizzle that had well & truly set in, a day of indoor activities was dictated to me. I started off at Jersey’s most popular & well known attraction – the Jersey War Tunnels on the other side of the island. The Channel Islands were the only part of the UK that was occupied by the enemy (the islands having been left demilitarised, as there was not much strategic importance in defending them) during WWII & Hitler was apparently so keen to hold on to this little bit of the country, that it was in the process of being turned in to a fortress. This complex of tunnels was built as a large underground hospital – but it was never used as such. Now it holds a fascinating account of what life was like for the islanders under German occupation; it’s really well done, the unexpected loud sound effects of screeching bombers & explosions can be a little disconcerting – but that’s probably the point. I expected a bit more of the history of the complex itself, but I suppose there’s not much more to say than forced labour dug it out & it was turned in to a medical complex.

Without getting too lost I made it next to Hamptonne Country Life Museum. I was interested to see how life might have been for my great-great-great grandfather, who was a farmer on the island (my great-great-grandfather left in 1863 for New Zealand, he was a mariner – I assume there wasn’t enough land for all the sons to carry on farming; this is the reason at least one other of my forebears made it all the way to NZ at a similar time). There are some really well preserved & furnished farm buildings from the late seventeenth & early eighteenth centuries, I was a little surprised to pop my head around a dark corner & find a large sow suckling ten or so piglets. There was also a fascinating display on the Jersey cow, the island’s greatest export and one I’m reasonably familiar with having grown up the son of a dairy farming expert – not to mention having milked a few after leaving school.

Horse powered wheel for crushing apples to make cider

Having spent enough time out in the rain for a little while, I returned home to regroup & watch some of the Wimbledon finals before wandering down the lane a bit to Le Hougue Bie. The largest archaeological attraction here is one of the best remaining passage graves in Europe – used in the Neolithic age (six thousand years ago) as more of a church than as a grave. On top of mound covering the passage grave there is also a medieval chapel – that once had a big tower built around & on top of it in the 1800s, but that has since been pulled down. As this is one of the high points for the east side of the island, it’s a good observation point – so there is of course a bunker from WWII. This now houses a poignant display commemorating all the forced labourers that were transported to Jersey.

The entrance to the passage grave – one could stand up inside it in certain places

Being an island, seafood is of course a staple – the oysters & scallops I had for dinner that night were glorious. The aptly named local ale – Liberation – was also pretty damn good. Returning home that evening, my hosts Lesley & Peter were only to happy to hear about NZ over a bottle of wine – so I happily obliged while we pored over an atlas that was surprisingly detailed (why was Pongakawa on there?) & then gradually we drifted through the atlas sharing travel stories.

There was actually blue sky on Sunday morning, so it was back to Gorey to have a proper look around Mont Orgueil. The castle has been around since the early 1200s, but with many changes – as you would imagine – over the last eight centuries. In a great defensive position initially, once gunpowder & cannon became more useful the hill overlooking the castle to the north became rather pesky & rendered it only useful as a prison for quite sometime. Of course, the Germans found a use for it, raising the observation towers. The castle has only been reopened since 2006 & there is a really good mixture of social history, architectural/military history and more recent artworks. The morning I visited Jersey Heritage was running a program for children so there were plenty of people dressed up using olde worlde words and masses of kids running around with wooden shields & swords trying to find the Crown Jewels.

Back over Gorey

Just to show that there were actually some Jersey cows left on the island – they’re not all overseas

After packing up, lunching, more chatting over table-tennis on the lawn in the sun I had a few more hours before the flight home. A rather famous conservancy & zoo (Durrell) was not far away, so I popped in to have a look – mostly because I couldn’t really believe that there were gorillas on the island. There were, it turns out.

There were also these red river hogs from west Africa

So I pottered around in the car exploring the few areas of the island I had not visited yet before returning the car & watching more Wimbledon before the quick hop back home. Jersey was a good visit & a welcome break from home, a pity the weather wasn’t a little better – but this is the UK after all. It was a strange mix of English & French – so close to France, most of the street names were in French (I remember two that weren’t) and most of the houses are made of granite & look decidedly French; yet English is the predominant language & accent and they drive on the left. For some reason, that no one could explain to me, there is also a strong Madeiran influence – plenty come over from Madeira & work, but I don’t know why.