The Antrim Coast

Sunday 26th August

It was a day without rain and reasonably warm with sunny periods, so we set off for the beautiful Antrim coast. We started off at the little town of Carrickfergus, where my friend and her brother grew up. It is a picturesque little place, with a little harbour, now full of leisure boats, though it used to be full of fishing boats.

There is also a superb castle, in a reasonably good state of repair, which is well worth a visit

We didn't visit it this time, as Paul and I have been before, and we were all anxious to get on with our drive along the coast.

The coast really is beautiful, with spectacular views across dark cliffs or of bays of white sand and blue seas (the sea was a beautiful blue when the sun was out, a rather steely grey when it was hidden by clouds). All along the coast were pretty little villages with whitewashed cottages.

It is so beautiful, I wonder that it isn't better known. You would think that tourists would come flocking in droves. However, like many beautiful places we have visited, there aren't enough places where you can stop and take pictures.

We arrived at the Giant's Causeway in time for a late lunch, then Paul, my sister and I set off on the walk down to see the basalt columns, while our friends caught the little bus. We didn't wait for it, the queue was enormous with its being a Bank Holiday. It's a beautiful walk down, and, as it was a very nice day, there were hundreds of people.

You can see, on the left of the picture, the black burned rocks on the sea shore that further reveal the area's volcanic past. Further down the road, you arrive at the basalt columns.

I'm afraid this next picture is slightly out of focus, but I think it gives a better idea of the 40,000 columns that stretch away under the sea.

You can walk on quite a distance, there are lots more formations to look at. This a view you can see once you pass the main group of columns.

Further on still, there are other extensive rock formations, including one that looks very like a giant boot - which, given the number of people there, is quite hard to photograph without somebody sitting on it.

There are other rock formations too, but I won't post any more photographs as I'm not sure how this new software will deal with posting photos. We did go a bit further, but not too far, since it was getting late and we had a long climb back up the hill again to the car park, not to mention thinking of our exhausted hosts having to drive us all the way back again.

August Bank Holiday Weekend

August Bank Holiday Weekend

Friday August 24 - Saturday August 25th

On Friday we caught a plane to Belfast to visit friends we had last seen on our visit to Norfolk. My sister came too, which was the first time she had been to Northern Ireland. We flew from Gatwick, which is fairly close to home, so we had the great luxury of parking, rather than using public transport. It was a great deal quicker, cost about the same, and meant there were no stairs to haul the suitcase up and down.

On Saturday, which was a fairly cold and rainy day, we celebrated the centenary of the Titanic by visiting the Titanic experience, which was only opened this year.

It is set in what used to be the Harland and Wolf shipbuilding yards, where the Titanic was built. You can see it was quite a stormy day.

The building itself is quite spectacular - though you need a better camera than mine to get a decent photo.

This is slightly less than half of it, there is another similar wing the mirror image of this one, joined by a smoked glass spine.

It is even more spectacular inside

There are huge escalators to get around the various parts of the exhibition. Some parts of the exhibition are also quite spectacular, such as the dark ride that takes you in little cars through a sort of replica shipyard to show you what the shipyard looked like. I did try taking pictures of that from inside the little car, but they were all rubbish. But you get a general flavour of the sights and sounds as you see how the different parts of the ship were built.

After that, there were many interesting displays showing life in and around the shipyards, before you get on to life on board the ship. There is quite a large model of the ship

and there are many examples of the cabins and public rooms. I tried to photograph these, with little success because they are all behind glass, which reflects all the lights.

This is one of the small cabins

This is a Second Class cabin. I photographed all the first class cabins as well, but they were completely surrounded by glass on all four sides, so not only were there reflections from all the lights, there were people looking through the glass on all four sides. There were very interesting displays showing some of the crockery, cutlery and furnishing materials. There were also plenty of photographs of of life on board, and it was interesting to see the contast between the luxury enjoyed by the passengers and the simplicity of the crew's quarters. While the passengers slept in luxurious beds (First Class) or comfy bunks (Second or Third Class), the crew slept on what looked like industrial metal shelving!

I had to give a miss to the films of the wreck at the bottom of the sea - I can't look at undersea things - but I was pretty tired by then anyway, and my feet were sore, so it was time to go home.

Between the Olympics and the Paralympics

August 13th to August 24th

However much I try, I still seem to be behind! Now, as I am a month behind, it is hard to remember exactly what I did. However, I need to catch up, as I am off to Sicily soon and will once again attempt to keep a diary every day. Things will be much harder now, since the very wonderful BlogPress has refuseed to open since the last update, and I am experimenying with another piece of software.

Once the Olympics were over, it was easier to travel round London, though, like everybody else, I missed the excitement. Work quietened down a bit, so I didn't have quite so much to do, which was just as well, since it could be very hot. 

The rhododendrons were long finished, but the hydrangeas were really spectacular. These are some in the lane outside.

I went up to London a number of times, since, although there were no Olympics for a while, there was still the London 2012 Festival and lots to see and do. Although there were fewer free shows outside the National Theatre, there were still things to see. I spent some time looking at the Book Maze at the back of the Royal Festival Hall. It was made of some enormous number of books, which are destined to be donated to charity afterwards. It was rather difficult to photograph, the light levels being quite strange.

The walls were low to begin with, but became higher the further you walked inside.

The walls were low to begin with, but became higher the further you walked inside. You were allowed to take out and read any book, as long as you put it back, so I spent quite a while reading one, and remembered to photograph the cover so I could look for it later in the library.

Outside, on the upper level, was a wonderful Lego map of the world.  I managed quite a few pictures of that, though none of them was much good. This is the one of South America.

It was too big, as you can see, for a picture of the whole world, this was the nearest I could get. You can see that one or two landmarks are shown, apart from the mountains.

End of the Olympics

August 11th to 12th

I see I am catching up fast!

I had been disappointed not to be able to get any Olympics tickets. My sister said she had even stayed up all one night in an attempt to get any ticket at all, but had no joy, so we were determined to be able to see something on a big screen with a crowd of other people, even if we couldn't get any tickets and get in to see an event. She went to Hyde Park, to the big screen there, but she said it was very crowded indeed. I had been to the big screen in the Quad at UCL, but that wasn't huge and we wanted to be in a bigger crowd. So we decided to try the big screen on Blackheath on Saturday afternoon and evening, principally to see the final of the men's 5000 metres race. Blackheath is not far from where my sister lives, so it seemed a suitable place to her - it was a somewhat longer journey for me, but there was nothing nearer. This is when I really miss living in central London. I love the countryside where we live now, but how I miss London!

It was very crowded when we got to Blackheath and there was a fair as well, which I walked round. It was very busy with excited children, in spite of the weather being quite windy and not all that warm. There were some stilt walkers in some quite amazing looking costumes, slightly like dinosaurs and quite frightening I thought.



Watching the race was an experience in itself. I think every single person in the huge crowd must have been supporting Mo Farah, and they all jumped to their feet and screamed in support as he came from the back to the very front and won the race. My sister's friend screamed so much she was quite hoarse the next day.

We so enjoyed the experience that we decided to watch the men's marathon the next day - that's one event you could go and see without tickets. My sister and friends had decided to travel to Cannon Street Station and find a spot there, and we were really lucky because it wasn't too crowded and we were able to lean on the barriers and see all the runners.



It helped that they went past us three times so we got a real opportunity to see how the race was developing.



The three of us yelled loudly in support of Kenya, where we all grew up, though we could see by the second and third time the runners went past us that Uganda was well ahead. Still, Kenya took silver and bronze.

We stayed until we had cheered on all the runners, even those at the very back, then went off to Greenwich where my sister's friend hoped to see some of the sailing boats which were taking excursions down the Thames. Many of the houses were decorated with bunting, since the route from the station is taken by people lucky enough to have tickets.



We paused to admire the newly re-opened Cutty Sark as we went past,



before sauntering along the river and stopping to have a nice lunch beside the river. Watching people sailing along the Thames in a real sailing ship proved, as I had suspected, to be something of a disappointment, since the ships were all rather small, and not running under sail - though some of them did have a small sail up. We went off to wander round the Royal Naval College, which is quite close to one of the Olympic venues. We were able to watch another big screen here for a while, and saw Anthony Joshua win Britain's last gold medal.

We wandered all round the buildings, which were designed by Sir Christopher Wren, and are very beautiful, though it is hard to find the right place to take a photograph. One of the Olympic stands can just be seen right at the back in the middle of my picture, between the two buildings. It was full of spectators lucky enough to get a ticket.



A notice told us the Painted Hall was open, so we rushed off to see it, but it had closed by the time we got there. We were able to get into the Chapel though. It is described as a wonderful example of a complete neoclassical interior, and I fear my photograph - of the organ - cannot do it justice. I need a better camera - and a better eye!



After a long day, I was glad to go home to watch the closing ceremony from the comfort of my own sofa, though I didn't enjoy it as much as the opening ceremony - but then, I really don't appreciate pop music.



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Manchester back to Oxted

July 22nd to August 10th

Dear me, I see I have got very behind again. This has been due to some very tedious periods when I have been working and have had my nose to the grindstone all day, and some very busy periods - like the Olympics, when I found it hard to tear myself away from the TV long enough to work.

The Olympics began while we were still up in Manchester, and only had a tiny TV about the same size as as a laptop screen. Fortunately, we were babysitting for my grandson the night of the opening ceremony, so we managed to see it on a normal sized TV screen at their house. Our grandson saw part of it as well, since he didn't want to go to bed, and we didn't want to be upstairs lying on the floor beside his cot singing nursery songs and lullabies when we could be watching the opening ceremony. So the little mite just watched it with us and eventually fell asleep - he can't have been terribly impressed, though we were - especially with the Queen parachuting in to the stadium! I found I had a lump in my throat quite often, particularly with the lighting of the cauldron, the design of which I found wonderful - what a very creative and uplifting idea.

I was desperate to get down to London and see some of the many events but Paul was up a ladder filling cracks or painting so I had to wait until that was finished before we could leave.



We had hoped to leave at the weekend, so missing only one week of the Olympics, but our son asked us to stay on to let in the Estate Agent for a valuation. The valuer came on Monday August 6th, so we didn't leave until Tuesday 7th.

Once we were back in Oxted, we found the weather was rather warmer and were able to have our breakfasts out on the terrace.



After breakfast, I went up to London to do some work in my old office, as I needed some on-site access so I could use some services controlled by an access control list. I didn't think I'd have much hope of succeeding if I asked for my home broadband's Internet address to be included in the access control list!

At least this meant I could go and watch the Olympics after work on the big screen in the Quad, which I enjoyed. It's always more exciting to watch events in a crowd, especially when there are British contestants, which there were. There was space to sit on a nice bench, which was a lot better than trying to get comfy on the grass at my age. I watched Taekwondo, some Boxing and some BMX biking, which was quite amazing. I was fortunate to be sitting in a crowd who were interested in and informed about Taekwondo, and of course there was a British contestant - though with such an international collection of students and staff, not everybody was supporting Jade Jones. However, I watched her win her semi-final, and was interested to find she won the gold medal later in the day. Watching Nicola Adams win the first ever gold medal for women's Boxing was even more exciting, because it soon became obvious she was going to win - boxing is slightly easier to understand! The crowd I was in were behind her and cheering her on, just as though they thought she would be able to hear!

After all that excitement, I went down to the South Bank to see what was happening there. The entertainments there have been added to with the London Wonderground, which includes the Spiegeltent for cabaret, lots of bars and food outlets, and plenty of circus and sideshow things. There are also some new rides - a rather tame looking roller coaster



and a terrifying huge pole thing which takes you up incredibly high on a chair, and then whizzes you round and round so that centrifugal forces send you and the chair horizontally outwards instead of dangling quietly. I didn't fancy it at all!



It goes right up to the top of the pole - it's only about half way up in my photo.

Instead of that, I went along to the National Theatre where there were free shows, and I watched a wonderful group of young men who juggled, did acrobatics and conjuring, and mixed cocktails - all great fun. I was too far away to take pictures though - or, unfortunately, to get one of the cocktails they handed out at the end.





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Oxted and Norfolk

July 10th to July 21st

I had hoped that my daughter-in-law and grandson would arrive on 9th, but then it turned out she had to be at the hospital for another check-up on the morning of 10th. The steroids she has been prescribed have given her cataracts, and she needs to have them removed. She had the first cataract operation at the end of June, and has been attending hospital once or twice a week for check-ups since then. She booked a train down to London for early afternoon on 10th but missed it because they kept her at the hospital from 9 until after 2. So she only caught the 4.30. It was at this point that I realised that the dinner party I had organised for that night was just not possible, and had to ring the friends I had invited and cancel everything.

Paul had chosen to make my day complete by arranging for our handyman and his helper to visit in the morning. New hall carpet and underlay had been purchased, and when it was laid the previous week, we discovered that a number of doors were now shaving off the top of the carpet pile. So Tuesday was the day Paul appointed for 6 doors to be taken off their hinges and shortened a fraction. Previous tenants had also replaced some of my carefully chosen light fittings, so Paul decided the work of restoring them could be done as well. This took, contrary to his predictions, most of the day.

At around 4.45, Paul decided they might as well also check that the underfloor area was also still dry; a couple of years ago we had been obliged to have all the floor joists replaced when they rotted after an inefficient repair following a flood. So around 5pm, just when I was thinking we needed to get ready to leave so as to meet our visitors at Euston just after 6.30, the carpets were all up in the hall and bedroom and men were crawling around in the underfloor area. The result of this was that I needed to go up to Euston on my own, and left in rather a rush, unfortunately leaving my phone behind.

At least I managed to catch the 5.23 (by the skin of my teeth), and was not too worried when I realised I had no phone, because I was not then aware that public phone boxes no longer exist! I managed to reach Euston in just over an hour, so was in time to meet my daughter-in-law. Unfortunately, we missed each other in the crowds; I didn't see her, and the hospital had filled her eyes with drugs, so she couldn't see anything at all. As it was hot and airless, she went outside the station and looked for me there, while I was inside looking for her.

There are no public phones in Euston station! A very kind lady lent me her phone and I phoned my phone (the only number I could remember) and got Paul to answer and call our daughter-in-law to tell her to go to the Information kiosk - she hadn't told Paul she was waiting outside the station! I didn't realise how hard it would be for her to find the Information kiosk, as she couldn't see at all, so she couldn't find it! To cut a long story short, I finally found her at about 7.30, by which time my poor grandson was starving to death! So we had to buy food and feed him first, before setting off for Victoria station. As luck would have it, we missed a train to Oxted by less than 5 minutes, and had to wait half an hour until the next, so we were not back at home until after 9.30.

Next day, we left Oxted and set off for Norfolk where we were spending a few days near our friends from Belfast. It was a long journey for our grandson, who had had to be entertained by his mother in the back of the car for hours. We were all hoarse from singing silly songs by the time we arrived!

Our grandson liked the barn where we were staying as there was plenty of room to run up and down, and there were some interesting toys as well. There were some goats in a field just outside and he found them really interesting. I am not sure just how hygienic it is to be kissed by a goat!



On Thursday he discovered he liked the barn where our friends were staying even better than ours, it was much bigger and there were some outdoor toys. Moreover, there were lots more people to play with him, and he exhausted 5 or 6 other adults making them run around the lawn as well as helping him up and down the slide. Everybody slept rather well on Thursday night!

On Friday it poured with rain all day. We went to visit Blickling Hall



On Saturday it also poured all day. It was a real shame there was so much rain on our short holiday, so we didn't manage much in the way of walks and sightseeing, but we enjoyed seeing our friends again. We returned to Oxted on Sunday night, Paul with such a sore throat he had stopped speaking. On Monday, which was a day of horrible pouring rain, we dropped our daught-in-law and grandson at an indoor play place, which helped to keep our grandson away from Paul whom he adores and will hardly let go. We didn't want the poor child to get Paul's cold and sore throat. He was able to run about to his heart's content, make as much noise as he liked, and there were lots of new things to play with - as well as other children. On Tuesday, we drove them both to stay with her cousin, and Paul retired to bed to nurse the cold and sore throat.

He didn't get up again until Friday, by which time the weather was a bit better. We were even able to have breakfast on our own terrace.



On Saturday we drove up to Manchester so he could make a start could be made on cleaning and painting our son's apartment so that it can be let (he can't sell it, it's in negative equity).

I don't know how long we'll be up in Manchester - not long I hope as London seems very exciting just now and I can hardly bear to be stuck up here in dull old Manchester. Also I have started work for a couple of months and although it is mostly preparing documents and communicating by email, it would be convenient to be able to go and see people. I hope be be back by the end of July or the beginning of August, so I should be back in London while the Olympics are on.


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London and Manchester

June 6th to to July 8th
Good grief, I can hardly believe I have gone for so long without writing anything here! I can't quite think how this has come to pass, but will try to catch up again and return to the present.

To carry on from where I left off, on June 6th we left our lovely Oxted home and went back to Manchester.

This is the back of our Oxted home. Needless to say, it isn't all ours. It was a country house that was built in the 1920's and has been converted into a number of apartments.

We needed to go back to Manchester to carry on helping our son and daughter-in-law. As well as this, we cleared our storage and we hired a van and some men and brought the majority of our possessions down to Oxted on June 16th. We only stayed long enough to unpack, and for me to attend a Directors' meeting on 18th then went back up to Manchester to continue up there.

We were fairly busy, but managed to take time out for a quick family visit to Dunham Massey

We were reasonably lucky with the weather; we had seen rather a lot of rain, but managed to find a better day for our expedition. Our grandson was not too impressed by buildings, but he enjoyed running about in the gardens and he liked the ducks and swans.

We drove back to Oxted on July 1st to get ready for my family visiting from Australia. We managed to get our house clean and tidy and ready to receive visitors by the time they arrived on July 5th.

We picked them up about 5pm and brought them back for supper. On both Friday and Saturday I went up to London with them, though I didn't accompany them on all their sightseeing - on Friday I ran them along the Thames from London Bridge to the Tower of London for some London photos, before going with them to meet someone for lunch. I didn't visit Buckingham Palace with them or Madam Tussaud's but I met them afterwards and went with them for a visit to have supper with another member of our family. Paul came too, driving up which was a mistake, as the traffic was terrible and it took hours. Our visitors were delighted when we drove past Harrods though, and admired the lights




On Saturday, after a bit of sightseeing, we left them to a Harry Potter tour, meeting them at platform 9 3/4 in Kings Cross after the tour. Paul and I had used the interim to visit the the National Portrait Gallery, where we hadn't been for years. After so many years teaching History in the 1980s, I found it interesting to see how many portraits of past English Kings and Queens which are well known from History books are hanging on its walls.

I took my family by bus from Kings Cross to Oxford Street, where they went shopping while we went off to organise somewhere to eat before the theatre. I had booked for 6 of us to see One Man, Two Guv'nors, which is an English adaptation of Servant of Two Masters, a 1743 Commedia dell'arte comedy by the Venetian playwright Carlo Goldoni. The play replaces the period Italian setting with Brighton in 1963. The easily confused Francis, the 'hero' becomes separately employed by two men — a local gangster and a criminal. Francis tries to keep the two from meeting, in order to avoid each of them learning that he is also working for someone else. The scene where he tries simultaneously tries to serve them supper in two separate rooms, aided by an octogenarian waiter, who has an amazing capacity to fall backwards down stairs and return like a rubber ball, caused most of my party to complain they were sore from laughing. We enjoyed it all very much, and Paul did not even complain about the songs used to cover every scene change which were performed by a skiffle band.

On Sunday my visitors left for further family visits, and we concentrated on getting ready for the visit of our daughter-in-law and grandson.

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