Read this blog: The one where Matilda gets to have her cake and eat it [twice] Friday 14th and Saturday 15th February 2025 Our flight to Wattay International Airport in Vientiane left from Don Mueang International Airport in Bangkok and we booked a taxi from the hotel to take us there. To our surprise, the driver seemed to be trying to tell us that it was expensive in Laos. As we stood in the queue to board, the man waiting behind us first complimented Robert on his Hawaiian shirt. This happens a lot. As the conversation progressed it transpired that he was an American athletics coach specialising in the pole-vault currently travelling on a year’s sabbatical. One of his students was a teenage girl from London. When Robert told him that he was also a pole-vaulter, the coach looked at his current girth and said good-naturedly, “a little while ago”. Some readers will be surprised to find out that Robert was an English schools level pole-vaulter and still in fact holds his school record for pole-vaulting, which he set over 40 years ago. He represented not only Warwickshire AAA but also the West Midland Schools at the English Schools Athletics […]
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Read this blog: The one where we find out that people like pink. Thursday 5th December 2024 Robert had a browse through the sights recommended on GPSmyCity and was delighted to discover the existence of Ritter Sport Colourful World of Chocolate. Here, you can book a session to make your own personalised bar of Ritter Sport or you can choose your own favourite ingredients and a member of staff will create an individual bar of chocolate to your specification. This takes about a half to three quarters of an hour to produce. We settled for buying a selection of the special editions available. Unsurprisingly, the shop is essentially wall to wall chocolate. Around Berlin there are lots of “Buddy Bears”. The bear has long been associated with Berlin and these colourful sculptures have been installed across the city to represent tolerance. Of course, the bear inside the Ritter Sport shop sported colourful squares and looked as though it had been dipped in chocolate. From here we walked to the Deutsches TechnikMuseum [German Museum of Technology]. The museum occupies a vast 28,500 m2 site where the freight yards for the old Anhalter Station once stood. Formerly one of Berlin’s busiest railway stations, this was […]
Read this blog: The one where we devise BOBs Pub Crawl Wednesday 27th November 2024 The Mystery Guides’ Birmingham City Centre adventure, The Mystery of the Fake Cheque Fiasco took us to several places that Robert (erstwhile Brummie that he is) had never been [see previous post] and we passed several banking halls which had been renovated and re-imagined as public houses with grand interiors. The conclusion of The Mystery of the Fake Cheque Fiasco is happily located inside The Old Joint Stock, one of our favourite Birmingham hostelries. Presentation of the booklet for the adventure at the bar secures a 10% discount on your first order [see Selfie of the Day]. Quietly sat sipping our drinks we brainstormed the concept of a pub crawl taking in the old banks of Birmingham which have been converted into pubs and coined the phrase [Birmingham’s Old Banks] BOBs Pub Crawl, starting where we sat in The Old Joint Stock [see Selfie of the day]. Erected in 1862 the building was originally the library for St Philip’s church opposite but was swiftly acquired by the Birmingham Joint Stock Bank. In 1889 Queen Victoria granted Birmingham ‘city status’ and in the same year the Birmingham Joint Stock Bank merged with Lloyds Bank. Shortly […]
Read this blog: The one where we visit an Imperial Citadel Saturday 9th March 2024 The Imperial Citadel of Thăng Long is an extraordinary mixture of historical buildings, archeological excavations and twentieth century wartime command bunkers. It was the centre of power for eight hundred years. From here first the Chinese administrators and later the Vietnamese Emperors ruled. More recently, the headquarters of the North Vietnamese government and army were located here during the period which the Americans refer to as the Vietnam War (1955-1975) but which is also called the Resistance War against America; the Second IndoChina War; the American War in Vietnam and we also heard a guide call it the Civil War. The entrance to the Citadel was lined with lanterns, although these may have been left over from New Year celebrations rather than being permanent, and the trees were carefully trained on trellises to resemble parasols. Construction of the Imperial Citadel of Thăng Long was started in 1010. The gateway certainly evokes centuries of history. The five gates served as entrances for different classes of people, with a strict hierarchy and the central gate was reserved for the emperor and the two either side for mandarins. […]
Read this blog: The one where we discover we are in two time zones at once Wednesday 21st February 2024 The SS Great Britain was the first vessel of its kind but nevertheless she had a rather checkered history, including running aground off Northern Ireland and bankrupting her owners. Over the course of 90 years at sea she had several adaptations and she spent a further 84 years in the Falkland Islands where she was used variously as a warehouse, a quarantine ship and a coal hulk before being scuttled. In 1970 she was bought and rescued by the owner of Wolverhampton Wanderers and, although she was close to breaking in two, sufficient repairs were made for her to be re-floated and towed back north through the Atlantic to the UK, where she returned home to the Bristol dry dock where she was built. This former luxury passenger steamship is now a museum. The exterior of the SS Great Britain has been restored to show how she would have looked at her launch in 1843 while below deck she has been renovated to reflect some of her various incarnations. Designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, SS Great Britain was the first ship […]
Read this blog: The one where we aim to confuse Sunday 10th September 2023 The morning after England’s first win of the tournament, we left Marseille by train to travel to Nice. For several years now we have been secretly plotting with our friend Belinda to host a surprise sixtieth birthday holiday on Tresco for her and her husband John. Part of the surprise involved us maintaining the fiction that we were staying in France for the RWC, rather than travelling back to the UK. Our trip to Nice, the next RWC venue for England, was in fact a cover for the fact that we would be flying home from there to avoid the thousands of fans travelling back from Marseille. Although we were not staying for the next match, we would have most of a day and one night in Nice, hopefully throwing a dummy pass to keep John guessing. Matilda wanted to look at some of the sights despite the heat. She suggested a visit to the Russian Orthodox Cathédrale Saint-Nicolas, which is apparently the largest Eastern Orthodox cathedral in Western Europe. However, as official tour guide, Robert exercised his power of veto and refused to include it […]
Read this blog: the one where Sally says a fond farewell to Bay House, Tresco Tuesday 16th to Saturday 27th May 2023 This was to be the last year of Robert’s parents’ 30 year time-share at Bay House on Tresco and his mother, Sally, invited us and our sister-in-law, Caroline, to join her. Unfortunately Robert’s father’s health means he is no longer able to travel such distances. We arrived on Tuesday 16th May, a day later than our companions, and as Matilda still had the ear ache which first manifested itself on the mainland she went straight to the Estate Office to ask what her options were. She was given the number and advised to call the medical centre on St Mary’s. The receptionist who answered had clearly undergone the appropriate training. She exhibited the traditional professionally prickly persona and suggested Matilda phone her GP at home. However, when Matilda explained that she used to work in the NHS and that all the telephone consultations at her surgery were likely to have been allocated within half an hour of the lines opening at 08:00 that morning, she grudgingly made an appointment for the GP to call her later that day. When […]
Read this blog: The one where we visit a Scottish win. Saturday 19th and Sunday 20th August 2023 We started our exploration of the local area on Saturday morning by visiting the historic site of the Battle of Bannockburn. This battle took place on 23rd and 24th June 1314, between the army of Robert the Bruce, King of Scots and the army of King Edward II of England. It was a turning point in the First War of Independence between Scotland and England: a decisive victory for Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn effectively re-established independence for the Scots although it was not officially declared until 14 years later in 1328. The visitor centre is well worth the entrance fee. A very enthusiastic and knowledgable guide explained the movements of troops as we stood looking down on a sunken 3D map of the area. He described how the terrain had influenced various decisions the leaders on each side had made and ultimately contributed to the outcome of the battle. Matilda had not thought that battle and troop movements could be so interesting. The visitor centre is child-friendly and there are activities as well as interactive displays. Apparently you are never too […]
Read this blog: The one where we pass through the Rhine Gorge Thursday 13th to Saturday15th July After returning to the boat in Rüdesheimer, where we had lunch, the boat set off for its journey further north up through the most picturesque part of the River Rhine. Here we are travelling through an area with many beautiful castles on both sides of the river. The Rhine Gorge is the name given to the 65km stretch of the river between Rüdesheim and Koblenz where it runs between steep rock faces up to 200m high. Historically many boats have capsized here on a dangerous curve in the river. The rational explanation is that the rocky riverbed coupled with unusual currents make this section difficult to navigate safely but locals have woven legends to explain the frequent tragedies. The Rhine Gorge still presents a hazard and the most recent shipwreck was in 2011 when a tanker carrying 2,400 tons of sulfuric acid capsized. One feature of the gorge is the Lorelei, a 132 m high steep slate rock formation which has had an amphitheatre perched on the top since the 1930s. There is a bronze statue called the Lorelei Statue which marks the […]
Monday 15th May 2023 Once again Matilda was woken early by ear ache and having had breakfast we realised that we had time to visit a pharmacy in Penzance for advice before going for our pre-booked tour of the Minack Theatre. The hotel receptionist had told a us that there was a pharmacy at Sainsbury’s near the heliport but this had closed last month [in April 2023] and we were directed to the pharmacy attached to the minor injuries unit. Here Matilda was advised to use Ear Calm [which was kept in a small cabinet on the shelves] and call the health centre on the Isles of Scilly if this therapeutic spray did not provide any lasting relief. Reading the active ingredients, it seemed to be comprised predominantly of vinegar. From here we retraced our steps towards Land’s End and the Minack Theatre nestled on the cliffs at Minack Point above Porthcurno. This is quite unique. The approach reminded us of the ‘a big reveal’ at the Eden Project: here you walk through the car park, the entrance and down a winding path before the whole site dramatically appears below you. Minack is an open-air theatre created by Rowena Cade […]
Tuesday 28th March 2023 We anticipated that there could be some continued disruption following the strike so Robert went down to reception early to ensure he could sort out the issues with our extended hotel stay. Once again it seemed to take three members of staff to unravel what one person on reception had done. Eventually it transpired that the receptionist had cancelled our first booking for two days and then reinstated a booking for the wrong date. This went some way to explaining why the hotel thought we had checked out when we hadn’t. When all was under control and good relations restored we set off for Maastricht. Most of the trains were running but we would need to take a bus for part of the journey. Although staff on the railway were telling passengers that their tickets were valid on the bus, the bus driver did not seem to have been informed of this fact. Eventually he became tired of repeating himself and simply allowed passengers with train tickets to board unchallenged. The last time we were in Maastricht was in the autumn of 2018. For our first trip after Matilda retired we took our Lakeland Terrier, Ralf, away […]
Wednesday 1st February 2023 We planned our walking route to the Europejskie Centrum Solidarności [European Solidarity Centre], taking in some of the ‘must see’ sights of the city. This included the Golden Gate which formed part of the old city fortifications and was the inland entrance to the Trakt Królewski or royal route of Gdańsk. Almost 90% of the city was destroyed in WWII and when the Polish came to rebuild, there was understandably some fairly strong anti-German feeling: the people did not want to spend money and effort on recreating old-style Germanic architecture. Instead, other European influences were drawn on, in particular the Flemish-Dutch connection from the time of the Hanseatic League and much of the old town now features traditional Dutch style gables. The Targ Węglowy or the Prison Tower complex was originally part of the Ulica Długa Gate and was built as part of the medieval city fortifications. The tower was added to several times to make it taller and, presumably, more imposing but when new fortifications were built between 1571 and 1576, it no longer formed part of the city’s defences and the smaller building was used as a courthouse and torture chamber while the tower was used as […]
Wednesday 28th and Thursday 29th September 2022 Leaving Chioggia, the day was overcast and windy as we crossed the Laguna, passed through the Moranzani Lock and turned up the Riviera del Brenta. Having passed through the lock, you have to ring ahead to the on-call teams to arrange for the swing bridges to be opened. At the first bridge, we met a pleasant Swiss family who had arrived in Malcontenta shortly before us and were waiting to be let through. We both assumed we had arrived during the lunch break. A member of the team arrived at the allotted time to open the first bridge electronically and once both boats had passed through he closed the bridge and drove to open the next one. We continued on up the canal in this way, in tandem with the Swiss family, leapfrogging the workman, who was joined by a colleague at one of the bridges which needed to be manually operated. As we waved goodbye to the workmen, we agreed to meet them the following day at the last bridge so that we could do the journey in reverse and head back to Venice. Robert suggested 09:00 but we were firmly told […]
Friday 16th to Monday 19th September 2022 Derek continued to improve on his whittling, copying the lettering from the original and the final result was quite impressive. Waking early on Friday, Matilda ventured out to watch the sunrise as it bathed the cottage in a warm glow. The boats dictate our plans on the Scillies and when we checked the trips running on Friday, the best destination was St Martin’s as this was likely to be the only day we would be able to go there. Matilda decided that she would stay on Tresco and take advantage of the indoor pool. So while Matilda set off in her costume and robe, the other three set off for New Grimsby to catch Firethorn over to St Martin’s where they walked to the Day Mark, a navigation aid built in 1683 which is painted red and white. The views, as everywhere on the Isles of Scilly, are gorgeous and Gill pronounced it to be her favourite island so far. Any visit to St Martin’s with Robert obviously now includes The Seven Stones pub. He pointed its location out to Gill and they agreed to meet there later. When the Robinson’s failed to […]
Wednesday 4th and Thursday 5th May 2022 After receiving our test results yesterday, Robert successfully completed on-line check in for Matilda but even after multiple attempts, found he was unable to check himself in. This should have rung alarm bells. Next day at the airport seemed to be a training day: we felt that this was the only way to explain the excessive staffing levels. Matilda felt it did not bode well when, even before checking in our luggage, her passport was marked with a green sticker but Robert’s was branded with a red one. As we came through security, Robert was selected for a random security check, that included a substance test, with a strip wiped across hands, belt and shoes. We then continued through the airport but at the gate, several names, including Robert’s were called and he had to go through for further questioning and scanning. Matilda waited on the other side of the gate, watching while he removed his shoes; unpacked his ruck sack and was questioned by successive members of airport staff and homeland security. She mused upon the potetnial irony of passing the Covid test and still not being allowed to travel. Eventually airport […]
Tuesday 22nd February to Thursday 24th February 2022 Tuesday started with a short tunnel and . . . . . . we left Newbold with the sun trying to break through behind us. We are not sure quite how much Ralf can see but he seems to like the plastic “dodger” down to be able to smell the world as we go by. The Oxford Canal was originally a winding contour canal which was subsequently straightened in various places to cut 14.75 miles off the journey to improve efficiency. The picturesque cast iron bridges, inscribed Horseley Ironworks 1828, mark where the meanders and loops were bypassed to make a more direct route. Generally there is a strict division of labour – Robert steers and Matilda, who struggles with left and right, deals with the locks. However Matilda has noticed that, since coming up a flight of locks with another couple where the man steering slowed by the steps long enough to get off to close the lock gates behind them, Robert has started to adopt this practice. In return she will accept the responsibility of steering, briefly, during Robert’s comfort breaks. She might also provide fewer hot beverages. Today’s journey […]