Thursday, October 28, 2010

England

Rob, George, James, Kate, Sam, Cynthia and John and
Belle the dog
United Kingdom
Visit to Cynthia, John & Family

Our arrival in the UK was a day of travel and queueing but in the end all worthwhile as we managed to get our little hire car at Heathrow, find our way to a Tesco to purchase a GPS (Sat Nav as they call it here) and then on to Sanderstead where we caught up after 20 years with Cynthia and her family as pictured.

We were a bit on the tired side and omitted to take a photograph of young John (Mac), his wife Marguerita and their dear little baby Kyri.


On the morrow, after meeting up with Kate's children and husband, Rob, we travelled to Taunton in the South west of  England and stayed their the night as Ray was a bit off colour.

The next day we headed for Exeter and its Cathedral.  This is one of the great medieval Cathedrals of England and we were not disappointed. A lovely surprise is the magnificent old clock with its pendulum and long ropes. Apparently mice were running up and down the bell ropes which were greased with animal fat so that Bishop of the time cut a hole in the door (pictured) to the bell tower to enable his cat to eradicate the mice. Hence the beginning of the nursery rhyme "Hickory dickory dock".

Exeter Cathedral - vaulted ceiling
the largest in the world

The Bishop's door at Exeter Cathedral
with cat hole





















Torquay

We travelled on from there to Torquay - the home of Fawlty Towers fame and found a 2 star B & B but the landlord was not a bit like Basil Fawlty (thank goodness!). Torquay is a lovely seaside village, in fact they call it the Riviera of the UK.

Travelling through beautiful Devon countryside we then stopped over for lunch at Plymouth - a large University town and buzzing with families as it is school mid term holiday break in the UK.

We moved on then to Truro and discovered another great Cathedral, this one  built in the 19th Century but with some current 21st century additions happening to the tower and spire.

Our destination was reached at Penzance in the far south west corner of England, in Cornwall. It is spectacular to see a active fishing village that also obviously is a hub for boats going out to the Isle of Scilly and other tourist destinations. Unfortunately we were a little late to make the trip crossing to St Michael's Mount which is a tiny island just off the coast that can be accessed at low tide. A monastery sits on top of this little pyramid shaped island. 



Penzance foreshore.....hopefully some better photos to come
We found a delightful B&B with free Wifi (hence this blog!). A stroll along the Cornish beach front was followed by a drink in a typical English pub and then a yummy meal fish and chips.

We need to make a lot of ground tomorrow to get to our ferry rendezvous on Saturday midday so unfortunately we must leave this area almost as quickly as we arrived.

Watch this space....... and keep the comments coming .. we love them.

2 comments:

  1. Interesting to see the change of light in the photos! Hope your stay in England/Ireland is a good one. Safe traveling!
    B xx

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great to see a picture of Cynthia and family, I'm surprised that after 20 years I recognize Cynthia and Kate immediately. I thought we went to Exeter Cathedral back in 1990, if we didn't I can't believe there are any left we didn't see! Hope you found time to stop for some Devonshire Tea while you are in the area!

    Nana wants to know if you saw any Pirates in Penzance? And did you see any Chanter history evidence in Devon?

    ReplyDelete