North Yorkshire Railway

Haworth, England, has not changed a lot since the Brontes lived there.



But if you'd rather ignore the Bronte trail, you can just watch the steam trains.

3d Week in July, Part2

While the boys still hunkered snoring under their blankets, I snuck out for a walk to King's Cross Station this morning -- the third bombing site and again within just a couple of blocks of our hotel. Here too was a pile of flowers and memorabilia. I took a few photos of storefronts in the deserted and somewhat run-down streets and returned in time for breakfast in the basement of the Avalon.

Afterwards we walked to "sunny" (per Donovan Leitch) Goodge Street (it really was sunny, and already hot) -- the nearest tube stop now that the Russell Square station was closed. A small station as they go, there was a very long series of art-deco stairs spiraling deep into the ground before we hit the platform. The train was full of commuters and stifling. We got out at the river and crossed over the Jubilee Bridge so I could treat the boys to the London Eye. Even first thing in the morning (9:30 or so) there was a huge line of international tourists snaking around the base of the gigantic ferris wheel; we shuffled half an hour in the glaring sun before we set foot in the fortunately air-conditioned plexiglass egg. It rose very slowly a couple hundred feet for a pretty comprehensive view of greater London and then back down. Frankly however I like the view from the top of St. Paul's better. More on that later.

We bought some souvenirs, meandered the embankment again, watched an amusing magician, and crossed over the river again to walk to Trafalgar Square. There what had evidently been an Indian cultural fair was just breaking down; booths for food and Hindu information were still set up. We lunched at a Pret a Manger  nearby and then returned via the convenient Covent Garden tube to Goodge Street. Next stop, the British Museum.

They boys attended an Egyptian 3-D show while I did a quick once-over of the exhibits, traversing the spiral stairs under the geodesic web of the ceiling and circling the huge marble rotunda; and then we all toured the Greek (Elgin Marbles etc.), Egyptian (Rosetta Stone etc.), African (masks etc.), and Anglo-Saxon exhibits (Viking and Celtic coins, swords, etc.). (Below is me reflected in the back side of the Rosetta Stone.)

We also enjoyed a huge library-like room of dark bookcases filled with an amazing miscellany of objects from the entire history of mankind. The museum was oddly hot and stuffy, and after a while we scuttled across the street to have frappucinos in the cool basement of a Starbucks.

We retreated in the heat of the afternoon to the hotel, where the boys read their books while I read e-mail and posted an entry here. Then after a cold shower (ahhhh!) I walked around the neighborhood for awhile, camera in hand as usual, returning around 7 to lead the boys to the dinner location I'd spotted, Cafe Mercato, near Russell Square. (High compliment from Nick: "This place sure beats Pizza Hut!") We sat on the cool sidewalk and chatted with a table of Yank retirees. Then, feeling slightly lightfooted after a couple of glasses of wine, I led the boys back to Goodge Street again for a nightime stroll, taking advantage of our day pass. They discovered that the railtracks were populated by tiny black mice (the color of the surrounding soot), and spotting them occupied Nick and Ben fully for the next 48 hours.

We debarked at St. Paul's, the trees blazing electric green from footlights, and crossed the aluminum bridge to the Tate Modern and back along the Thames. There was still red in the sky and the riverside pubs and the promenade were thronged by walkers and partiers, the city lights brilliant against the dark blue, St. Paul's dome illuminated. We walked as far as the Eye; the boys were then thirsty and a bit tired, and after getting them a soda in an arcade, I gave them some money and they rode bumper cars and played the slot machines. About 11 we returned via the Embankment to Goodge Street and thence home to bed (after a final bit of Potter).

2d Week in July, Part 6

A Morning in Diss

Our last day in Suffolk (or Norfolk, depending on where one draws the line) started with a marathon launderette stop in Diss.  My first challenge (after finding a place to park!) was to find change for the washer and dryer. (The perennial problem with ATMs.) I attempted to do this by cleverly purchasing some pastries in the bakery across the road but it was so early in the morning that they had no change yet. I bought several very gooey jelly doughnuts and some cheese breadsticks anyway. The Safeway store (!) satsified me for change, but the next challenge was to acquire laundry soap -- the machine in the launderette was out of order. I didn't want to buy a whole box at Safeway. A nice woman lent me some of hers. While the clothes tumbled I took the opportunity to post a few of these blog entries and check my e-mail around the corner at the newspaper office. Afterwards I lugged the clean clothes back up the high street where, yes, another street market was taking place, with the typical produce as well as lingerie and assorted knickknacks.

Back at the Town Clerk's Cottage, Nick had filled the bathtub to the brim and was about to climb in. I pointed out that he'd better reduce the water level a tad. Finally, in a sufficient state of cleanliness, we headed east along the twisty, narrow, country roads to the coast, about 20 miles.

To the Seaside

Southport is a pleasant town, a far cry from the mega-resort of Blackpool but quite popular nonetheless. We lunched on homemade sandwiches, and Nick and Ben hired a canoe, paddling for an hour in a sort of lagoon amongst islets of weed and a good many ducks, while I wandered uptown for a look at the seafront. Bathing huts lined the promenade -- multicolored, bare, single rooms you could rent for 10 pounds a day. The beach was divided by "groynes" in various states of decay.

A regatta was taking place, many sailboats with wine-colored sails heaving past in the breeze, and crowds lined the pier with binoculars. There was even a TV newscaster there, looking snappy in a blazer. The pier was spartan but there was an arcade at its foot and a restaurant; the boys spend a few pounds on the machines, and then we strolled to the pier's end, stopping at one exhibit of arty mock vending machines, very funny, using TVs and animation (for example, a dog-walker featuring a pixillated view of Southport) , as well as very crude robotics (for example, an automatic customs agent who would frisk you).

After we spent a brief time skipping rocks on the beach, it suddenly began to rain, so we returned to the car and headed to Walberswick, just across the river by foot ferry (which I couldn't locate and someone told me wasn't operating) but a drive of several miles. By the time we got there, the sun was back out.  The village was small and colorful (swinging between run-down and gussied-up). We found the foot ferry but there was now little point in taking it back to the Southport side of the river. A tiny museum pointed out that the architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh had had a cottage here. And there was a bowl full of "hagstones," rocks with natural holes through them that you use for good luck. Had a nice chat with the woman at the front desk, who had a daughter living in Mercer Island, oddly enough. Dying for a cup of coffee, we were alas late again and the town was closing up at 5 PM.

Poetry

So we headed inland to the town of Halesworth a few miles away, where I'd discovered that the poet and musician Martin Newell was giving a reading. We wandered "the Thoroughfare" (the pedestrianized high street) until we found the venue, a coffee shop named The Gallery, and then grabbed a pizza dinner at the nearby White Lion pub while locals stared at us. Halesworth is not exactly on the tourist track.

There was a modest crowd at The Gallery, made up of members of the local poetry society (very reminiscent of their Washington counterparts) and presided over by a very friendly, fat, ruddy, middle-aged fellow -- a bit like Holmes's Dr. Watson. Newell and a ladyfriend were there looking sedately hip. I introduced myself and mentioned I'd come all the way from Seattle to see him, which was more or less true.  He and the emcee were also impressed that the kids had come to the reading. As we sat sipping our steamed milk and lattes Newell gave a very spirited two-hour recitation from a number of his books and uncollected works.  Mostly these were highly formal poems, quite regional, but witty, rather like A. E. Housman crossed with Dorothy Parker.

Halfway through there was a break and I bought a couple of books and we chatted about pop music. Nick and Ben nipped outside and did not return for the second set. I didn't worry too much, given the small size of the town, and sure enough when I went out later they were seated on a bench a few feet away, surrounded by local kids, all chatting cheerfully. Apparently the kids hadn't run into any Americans before, and were asking Nick and Ben to say things like "Dude!" and talking about the differences between the US and England.

On our way home we passed Newell and his friend biking back to their lodging (he lives in Wivenhoe, near Colchester, and does not own a car). We waved them goodbye. Thus ended our stay in Suffolk. Or Norfolk.

2d Week in July, Part 5

In Search of Bentleys

As if we didn't get enough driving yesterday, we again had a road trip today, to the Bedford area, which took a couple of hours. To break up the drive I stopped to let the boys take a few turns around a go-kart course, all kitted out with blue jumpsuits and helmets. This was a big jump from racing cars on the computer, and I was pleased that Nick resisted his natural impulse to crash into things.

In Bedford, we passed through another street market in the town center in order to hit the tourist infomation office, to get directions to the County Records Hall. We lunched at Mill Yard Cafe, sequestered back in a little lane, whose owner reminded me quite a bit of my grandfather in his younger days. Realizing that the John Bunyan Museum was just a couple of blocks away, I diverted us there and I'm glad I did: Bunyan, author of "Pilgrim's Progress," was the son of Margaret Bentley, herself the daughter of William and Mary Bentley, the earliest Bentleys I have been able to trace with any surety. In the museum were a number of amazing artifacts, including the key to his house, his anvil (he was a tinker by trade), the chair he used when preaching, and the flute he carved from a broom handle when incarcerated for preaching illegally. The docents were impressed that I was related, and pulled out a biography of Bunyan that listed William's mother as being named Mary -- information I had not had to date.

We walked along the swan-filled river to the Records Hall; the boys remained outside while I nipped in to try and dig up some parish records for Elstow and Ampthill, where the Bentleys lived and died. William and Mary were so early that there was no record of their births (primarily I was trying to establish William's parents), but there was plenty of corroboration for their children's births, marriages, and so on. The young guy helping me also looked at tax records and finally at wills -- whereupon miraculously he brought me a manila folder with Mary's will (dated 1632) - written in brown ink on very fragile paper. I got a photocopy of this.

From Bedford we drove over the river to the village of Elstow, birthplace of William Bentley (1573) and John Bunyan. This small suburb still has a nimber of half-timber buildings, an ancient moot-hall, and the church where Bunyan was baptised. We wandered the churchyard looking for Bentleys and Bunyans, to no avail. It also has a creek running through it that supposedly was the inspiration for his "Slough of Despond," and it looks the part, much overgrown with weeds and overhung by trees. The boys were getting hot, tired, and hungry (translation: irritable) and so we stopped at the Swan pub, where we were treated kindly by the barmaid; we had a lovely curry in the well-flowered back garden.

Before heading home (it was now about 5 PM) we continued onward a couple of miles to Ampthill, where the Bentleys settled and whence some eventually departed for America. It contains the church (St. Andrew's) where they were buried, but again, so early that no gravestones exist -- but we prowled about it anyway. The town was pretty much shut down except for a pub or two, and was not as picturesque as Elstow, and as we were pretty tired we headed home.

It was Nick's turn in the front seat as navigator, and unfortunately he steered us several miles out of our way, through Luton, which wouldn't have been too bad except there were extensive roadworks (bane of my existence) in the middle of town, and we had to do quite a bit of circuitous (and often signless) driving to get back on the right road. At one point we went right through the Muslim section of town, past a mosque that had been featured on the news the night before with regard to the London bombings.

2d Week in July, Part 4

Warplanes and Punts

I bravely or foolishly gave the Eye map another go this morning in the foggy wee hours. This time I found that one footpath simply was not there, apparently obliterated by new (post-1998) housing. I got a few suspicious glances from folks leaving for school or work, but persisted and finally located a track heading off along some parsley fields. I noticed a number of folks off in the fog in the middle of the field; they were either birders or perhaps panther stalkers. The footpath petered out after a half mile or so, or -- more precisely -- suddenly did not match the map, and rather than duplicate yesterday's wild goose chase I wisely turned around. An older gent with an aged golden retriever that resembled a polar bear were out for a walk and waylaid me for a few moments. For some odd reason (I guess I felt suspicious myself being out that early) I fibbed about where I was from and assumed what, I suspect, struck him as a weird amalgam of BBC English, Scouse, and Irish brogue, with not a small measure of American, but I escaped back to our cottage ready for the day's adventures.

After our typical cholesterol-heavy breakfast we walked up to the weekly farmers' market in the spacious, tall-ceilinged main room of the Town Hall, arriving on schedule but, according to some of the ladies there, after many of the best produce had already been snatched up by early comers. Some were selling baked goods, some greeting cards made with pressed flowers, some home-made children's clothes, and many fruits and vegetables; we bought some coffee cake, potatoes, and cards, and chatted with the ladies who of course were curious about of holiday.

We then drove an hour or so southwest, past Cambridge, to the Imperial War Museum at Duxford -- essentially was an airport. You could charter rides in vintage aircraft, but these were all reserved today by school field-trips.

So we wandered the various hangars looking at Spitfires, Mustangs, and other WWII planes from both sides of the conflict, in various states of repair, plus a number of modern aircraft, helicopters, and boats, including a small submarine. The American collection featured an entire B52 suspended from the ceiling, a Blackbird, Harrier, U2, and other impressive death machines. We skipped the tank exhibit. It was boiling hot. The cafeteria, deluged by students, was out of sandwiches and pop. It was refreshing to stand in the intense backwash of a biplane on the runway. After a quick walk through a Concorde, a rather unsatisfactory lunch at another cafe, and a spin through the gift shop, we headed back to Cambridge.

It took quite a bit of back and forth to find our way to the town center (dang ring roads and unclear signage!) but finally pulled into a parking garage just as an absolute torrential downpour unexpectedly hit.

We stood looking out at it for several minutes, watching hapless pedestrians skittering by on the sidewalk below, or huddling under the plane trees, totally drenched, but it soon had returned to a hot, dry afternoon and we walked the high street a few blocks to the river. There we were accosted by warring punting vendors, but I opted to stay on foot, making a brief circle following a map I'd copied off the Web, which led us to "the second oldest church in Cambridge" and a few pubs which frustratingly were closed for the afternoon. The boys were getting a bit tired and we plumped down at a coffee bar's damp table, beside the river; then since Nick was feeling contrary we simply returned to the car. It was mid-afternoon and I knew it would be pushing things to either take a punt or walk any further in the burning sun.

Leaving Cambridge was even more fruitless than entering it since we got caught in rush-hour traffic, but we finally crawled to a roundabout that led us home, although we'd wound up traveling in exactly the wrong direction (again, without signage) for 20 minutes (my fault, I should have been using the sun for directions!). Unfortunately we then ran into a terrible jam on the M11 due to an accident, and we couldn't get off; it was about an hour of stop-and-go creeping until I finally reached a Services and we pulled off for dinner at a Little Chef. By the time we left the traffic had thinned out. It looked like the accident had happened right at the spot where the Services slip road rejoined the motorway. We didn't get back to the cottage until about 8 PM, about two hours later than I'd planned.

2d Week in July, Part 3

The Beast of Scole

I went for a morning walk while the boys slept. We were scheduled to take the train to Colchester at 10, but there seemed to be plenty of time. En route I picked up some apple sausages and pork burgers at the town butcher: it's best to get your groceries early, before they're all sold! Following the cool hand-drawn area map I'd purchased in Diss, I located the trailhead at Park Road beyond the river. My aim was to follow the footpaths on the map to yet another bridge and then loop back to town. The path was there but was simply tamped-down grass bordered with the requisite nettles. Nonetheless I proceeded. A lot of wildlife was about in the still morning: Canada geese, rabbits, and a huge number of birs (starlings?) on the telephone wires -- not counting livestock.

After awhile not only did the promised bridge not materialize but I found that the path was not following the configuration the map showed. I sort of crawled under some barbwire (still following the path, mind you) into a field of huge cows, who began slowly but determinedly approaching me. I hastened on to the next stile and found myself in a field of wheat, or something like it -- the footpath was literally just a slash through the crop; at one point two such paths met to form a cross in the middle of the vast field.

Meanwhile thoughts of the Beast of Scole crossed my mind. (One of the first things I'd read in the local newspaper, while awating our first night's Chinese take-away, was that a local woman had spotted what appeared to be a large black panther crossing a field near her home in Scole. I later checked the map: Scole was about three miles up the road! This beast seemed to have been following me -- there have been, over the years, reports of a similar creature in other places we've visited, such as Evesham and the Forest of Dean.) No one knew where I was this morning. I was glad I at least had a bag of sausage I could distract the panther with, unless I had to eat it myself first to stave off starvation.

It being the point of no return timewise, I continued on, finally finding an actual footpath marker on a fence post, and I followed more of these to a "lane " (a tractor path) which finally arrived at a paved road. Both the lane and road could be construed to be those portrayed on the map, but how I could have arrived there was suspicious. At any rate I flagged down a car. "Excuse me," I said, "I seem to following a somewhat flawed map. Could you please tell me where I am on it?"

Sure enough, I had gone far south and west from where I was trying to go or thought I was going. I was nearly to Yaxley. Fortunately it was a clear, if lengthy, way back to Eye, so I started up the road at a speed-walker's pace. It was now about 8.40 and I'd hoped to be back at the cottage by 9. This I amazingly enough managed, give or take a couple of minutes, even with my stopping for some eggs ("Help Yourself!") at a little hutch outside a farmhouse. They were so fresh they still had grass sticking to them.

Back to Boudica

We made it on time to the electric commuter train at the Diss station -- the parking lot was overflowing.

We had a picturesque hour's ride south through fields and past estuaries to the city of Colchester, where we were met by poet Estill Pollock, with whom I'd corresponded after reading a book of his and accepting several pieces for Fine Madness magazine. A tall American who's lived in England 25 years or so, he drove us through the roundabouts and to his home island on the edge of the North Sea, West Mersea, population surprisingly 7000. We walked along the road beside the seafront, past many old liveaboard boats of all sizes, on blocks in the sandflats, which at high tide you accessed via rickety wooden walkways; the tide was quite far out at the moment. The island itself, in fact, is only accessible when the tide is not high -- otherwise the causeway road itself can be under as much as a couple of feet of water and you must queue up and wait for the tide to turn in order to enter or leave. Estill always carries a tide table.

We took in the lovely old black-and-white houses and the working waterfront -- fishing boats, seafood stands, and chandlers, etc., descended the "Monkey Steps" to check out "St. Peter's Well," of ancient origin, just steps from the sea, and spent some time on the beach itself. After dropping by his house briefly, we drove to The Peldon Rose pub for a fine meal outside by a pond. Skate, tuna, cod, and Guinness! We chatted about publishing, poetry, and weirdly the recent reports of a black panther around Colchester.

Then back into the city for a tour through Colchester Castle, basically an empty shell like Clifford's Tower, only larger, which has been reconstructed inside to accommodate a quite good museum featuring items from Colchester's Roman and pre-Roman past. Especially mind-blowing were burnt plum pits dating from the destruction of the Roman temple by the forces of Boudica (Boadicea) which took place on the site of the castle two thousand years ago (30,000 Romans were killed).

After a short walk in the gardens behind the castle and through St. Botolph's, a ruined priory where the local drunks now like to spend the night, Estill returned us to the train station. We spent the whole trip standing in the breezeway between cars as the air conditioning in the carriages was not working.

 

2d Week in July, Part 1

To the South

The drive from Oakworth, Yorkshire, to Eye, Suffolk, for the second installment of our hejirah, took longer than expected, but I have no one to blame but myself -- I wanted to cram in two last stops before leaving the dales:  Hebden Bridge and Heptonstall.

The drive over the moors to Hebden Bridge was spectacular: we seemed to be at the top of the world, with views across the sunny moor-top and down into a series of valleys, festooned with sheep and cottages. We spiraled down into town and walked to the canal. Alas, the boats were only rentable for extended cruises; a large number of dodderers were shakily boarding one narrowboat. We stopped in at a cafe for coffee, cocoa, and pastries, and I dodged across the street to a bookstore, where I scored several good books by English poets and confirmed that indeed, Sylvia Plath's grave was in nearby Heptonstall.

It was only about a quarter mile away but getting there involved overshooting the turnoff and performing a U-turn in a specially provided lane, in order to negotiate an impossible hairpin turn, and then heading straight up a 50-degree incline to the village. We walked around the ancient churchyard to no avail, but it was lovely; also checked out another one, again fruitlessly, but glimpsed a fellow clopping along heartily in an old horse-drawn gig. I thought of asking the folks in the Heptonstall Museum, but despite the fact that the sign said Open, and it was the right time of day acording to the hours posted, and I'd seen someone just moments before, the door was locked and no one answered my knocks. So we gave it up and retraced our steps, getting stuck in Hebden Bridge rush hour -- the place being overrun by tourists, bikers, hikers, etc.

The ensuing few hours were spent on a series of boring but speedy motorways, speedy yet interesting A roads, and slow, exceptionally interesting B roads, spinning through countless roundabouts, and finally arriving about 6 PM in the burgeoning metropolis (aka 'ancient market town' -- the subtitle of every town in Suffolk) of Eye, "twinned with Pouzages, France," which I imagine must be quite a throbbing city as well.

Our home was dubbed the Town Clerk's Cottage, again a 16th century or earlier whitewashed half-timber house with nary a right angle in the place. Our landlady, who lived next door, was a Mrs. Ridger, a rather brittle old thing but friendly enough. Our house was full of watercolors and oil painting she (apparently) had done some decades back. There was a cozy (of course) sitting room, stocked with an eclectic selection of books, separated from a dining area by a see-through fireplace (electric), and a large kitchen. Upstairs were a master bedroom, a smaller bedroom, and a large bathroom, into which you typically fell at length, there being an unexpected sill at the doorway. Next door was an Indian restaurant which Mrs. Ridger said had mysteriously been closed for some time.

We explored what there was of the town (which is not only small but the streets roll up at 6 on a Saturday), settling on the New Happy House Chinese Take-Away. We should have been suspicious when it became clear that there were no Asian people anywhere for miles. Well, the boys liked it. After dinner we explored more and discovered a bridge over the River Dove (more like the Slough of Despond). (More on that later.)

Exploring Eye and Beyond

July 10, I and Ben rose pretty early so he could phone home, and then we walkied around the waking town, notably locating the 19th-century (yet ancient-looking) Eye Castle and the 15th-century (yet modern-looking) Sts. Peter and Paul Church.  We noticed that the Town Hall, flag flying at half mast, was interestingly decorated with what we later discovered was flint, in geometric patterns amongst the bricks.  After returning and having breakfast we brought Nick back to these locations, and also discovered another bridge over the river, this time running at a better clip and supplied with a rope swing, from which I could not pry the boys for an hour.

After lunch, we checked out Thornham Walks (Thornham Magna, not Thornham Parva -- it seems from the map that the majority of towns in East Anglia -- made up of Norfolk in the North and Suffolk in the South (get it?) -- come in pairs. I don't have the map at hand to give examples, but trust me. We walked, anyway, through blazing heat to a 'bird hide' in the woods, from which the boys watched birds (and mostly squirrels) feed from hanging feeders, and then to a Victorian walled garden and a pet cemetery belonging to the one-time estate.

After the requisite ice cream and a prowl through the shop, which featured third-world-made items (concurrent with the "G8" conference which in part probably inspired the London bombings) we then whizzed up the road to Diss for dinner (since we knew that Eye was out of the question -- only one pub (reportedly there used to be 14!) and one very expensive (though tempting) restaurant, plus the Chinese take-away and a chippie that looked pretty dicey as well.

Diss proved pretty cool, a good-sized town with a large lake in the middle, a playground to one side, and a lot of interesting shops, all of which were of course closed. We did however risk (ultimately successfully) another Chinese take-away, primarily because it was actually run by Chinese, and we dined on a bench by the lake, followed by an evening of playground shenanigans.  And so to bed!

First Week in July, Part 4

Terror at a Distance

Writing this a week after the fact -- Thursday July 7 as we headed north to Ingleborough Cave we heard the BBC News report of multiple bomb blasts across London, including King's Cross train station, Russell Square tube station, and a bus in Tavistock Square, all near our hotel-to-be.  By now they seem to have identified the bombers:  one from Luton (we drove through it yesterday due to an error in navigation by Nick) -- because of roadworks were forced to detour through the Muslim part of town, which had been featured on the news the night before; one from Leeds, near where our friends' architectural office and former home are located; and one from Dewsbury, through which we'd driven only days before en route to Haworth -- I recall seeing several Muslim women walking about veiled and black-robed.  One of the bombers was a primary-school teacher with a young family.  The brain reels.

 

Anyway, we kept on driving through the dales to what we thought was the town of Clapham, which turned out to be just a small collection of shops and a cafe or two.  From there we walked an easy half a mile uphill through the woods to "England's greatest show cave."  A hardhatted young woman led us diffidently down the tunnel past a colorful collection of stalactites, stalagmites, and other bizarre formations, all given names such as Queen Victoria's Bloomers, Grandpa's Teeth, The Elephant's Legs and Tail, etc., based on their appearance.  We had to duckwalk in a couple of places to avoid cracking our noggins on the ceiling. All along the path there ran a stream, which reportedly contained cave shrimp, but we didn't see any; at one point the water poured down a "gill," or hole, in the floor of the cave, only to reappear somewhere down the mountain. The air temperature was about 50 degrees, the water colder, which was refreshing since the weather was pretty warm.

 

Upon returning topside, we walked a ways up a sheep-prowled trail to Trow Gill, through a narrow passage between the limestone cliffs. The kids blazed a trail up the hillside and thistles; from the top we got a stunning view of the hilltops and valleys, dotted with sheep and chunks of broken limestone.  No sound except for baas and a few bird calls.  Then we walked, thankfully downhill, to the car and a lunch at a homey cafe in town (hot rhubard 'pud' for dessert), chatted with a woman in the local wool shop, and drove home listening to BBC updates.

 

Not content with wearing the kids' legs off in the afternoon, I persuaded them to walk after dinner to Damems Station, across the Worth River, and up the other side of the valley, at dusk.  This exposure to nature was to counter the effects of Friday's daylong excursion to decidely unnatural...

 

Blackpool

 

at which we arrived after a not-too-long drive through Lancashire.  Thanks to Mrs Brunskill we had a 2-for-1 coupon for the Pleasure Beach, so a mere $60 bought a whole day's worth of rides for Nick and Bentley.  I left them to it in two-hour chunks while I explored the town, from the goofy to the seedy, plus  needless to say, the beachy.  I lunched in a very simple little cafe with a charming gran-type for a waitress, and a view of the street, where colorful daytrippers and not any less colorful native Blackpoolers walked. At one point there was an awful racket and a large tank clattered up the road. This had nothing to do with bombings, just the army putting on a jolly show for the tourists.   The promenade was lined with hotels, as were all the side streets -- an amazing amount of lodging available -- as well as fortune tellers and pubs.

 

There were three piers filled with arcades and kiddie rides, as well as more adult entertainment, if you know what I mean, and scarier rides such as 90-foot-tall bungree jumps.  I refrained from paying 12 pounds to ascend the Blackpool Tower, but I did break down and take one very tame ride with the boys and visit the ever grimly fascinating Ripley's.  We dined in a large, clean and rather Americanized fish-and-chips restaurant. Upon return to our cottage we were exhausted but packed up for our imminent departure for Suffolk.