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We are sitting in the most amazing place, in a house, in a village which has remained unchanged in any way (at least to the eye) since the mid 1600s. There were people living in the cottage in which we are staying in 1640.
We are in the lake district, having moved up here today from Meifod via Liverpool. We stopped off in Liverpool and did a Hop On Hop Off bus tour of the city and although Liverpool has an amazing history, it does not have the "character" of the places to which we have become used to since our arrival here.
But to go back a few days...we were in Wales, an area which is not on the route of a lot of Kiwi's when they visit Britain. It should be! Wales has history and scenery to match any other part of the British Isles and is so compact that it can be easily covered in a relatively short period. So it was that we set sail with the Astra at full steam for Snowdonia in the North West, an area that brings the Scottish Highlands to mind. The roads here are good, which is not always the case in Britain. The lanes I can understand, they have been there forever and were never meant to cope with cars. They are narrow and usually flanked either side by hedgerows or stone walls. A car fits snugly into these lanes with door mirrors just missing the hedge on either side, the trouble starts when a car, or worse, or bus, tractor or truck comes from the other direction. Every now and then there is a bit of a bump in the hedge and one or other of you needs to back up so the other may pass, and so on you go. Now, this may sound all very quaint, but when you have say 10 to 20 miles to still go, it can get a little tiresome. Every one is very good though and it all seems to work. As the lanes get a little wider and there becomes room for a car to travel in either direction without banging into each other, they paint a white dotted line down the middle. Buses, tractors and trucks still pose a challenge on these roads, but the biggest problem is now there is room to park. Usually this is confined to just one side of the road, but it takes almost to the white dotted line, so we are back to the lane situation because now half the traffic is on the wrong side of the road. They even have traffic signs "Narrow Road. Oncoming Traffic in Middle of Road." Again this seems to work.
The Old Tractor up the Lane Trick
The overriding problem is if you are going the same way. Even these monster tractors seem to go for miles on some errand or other and remain oblivious to Astras and other road users.
Parking is a huge problem in Britain, but it seems that some in authority become a little zealous on occasions.
BBC news reported recently of a case where double yellow lines had been painted the entire length of a street in "Big City GB". The residents complained. The council responded by painting double yellows down the other side. Now this street was a little under three feet wide and even a bubble car (remember them) would have to have burst to fit down this street.The council now confirm that "it would appear our staff have not taken the actual size of a car into account whilst implementing our new parking policy" well you voted for them.
Roads that are larger than those just mentioned are a pleasure to take to and even the Astra seems pleased after a long haul on the lanes.
Anyway, back to the road trip up through Snowdonia. One of our main objectives was to take the Rack and Pinion Train to the top of Mt Snowdon, regarded as the most exciting rail journey in Britain, so to give ourselves plenty of time we had booked into a hotel for the night.
Our first trip after negotiating a low mountain pass was a visit to Portmeirion, a small village built entirely in the style of a Italian village built by
ite."Sir Clough Willaims-Ellis between 1925 and 1975. It seems that he had fallen in love with Portofino and stated "How should I not have fallen for Portofino? Indeed its image remained with me as an almost perfect example of the man-made adornment and use of an exquisite site"
Port Meirion (In Gwynedd)
It is charming, but having been to Portofino...well it is just not the same. It may have been the weather which, after a few days of glorious sunshine, had taken a turn for the worse, in fact it was freezing. The Astra's thermometer was maxing out at an outrageous 7 degrees and with a wind chill factor which must have been approaching -30, it made for a very cold wet old day.
From Portmeirion we made haste for Porthmadog and a hot cuppa and a quick flick around their fascinating little maritime museum. I found here that the origins of the name has nothing to do with mad dogs and it was just a matter of the Welsh language again. Porth = Port and it was founded an Englishman by the name of Madock and Madog is the Welsh equivalent. To get to our goal involved driving over what must be the finest mountain pass in Britain, outside of Scotland. It is breathtaking in it's stark beauty, with great granite boulders strewn about in all directions. All homes are of granite with roofs tiled in local slate.
Snowdonia National Park
Sowdonia National Park
This reminds me of Central Otago and Central can get as cold as this too. Finally we arrive at the Snowdon Mountain Railway..only to be told that it is closed due to 80 MPH winds at the summit...."we can come back tomorrow"......"the forecast is for worse tomorrow, maybe by Saturday it will be OK". DAMN, that's two days in a row now that the gods have conspired against me. Onward we go to Caernarfon, home to the famous castle and to where our hotel is booked.
Next day, not to be beaten, we headed back to Porthmadog. They too have a mountain railway running up to Ffestiniog site of one of Wales' largest slate quarries. This little railaway has been going now since the 1830s when a narrow gauge line (23.5 inch) was built and horses used to haul the wagons up the 700ft and gravity to get them down again. Steam was thought to be impractical on such a narrow gauge and it was not until 1863 that two steam engines were introduced by the son of the original designer.
Ffestiniog & Welsh Highland Railways
So this little train was what I had now set my sights on...and we got tickets. It felt a little like Thomas the Tank Engine, but who cares and so it was with a little huffing and puffing and a lot of tooting we were off. It was GLORIOUS, we went up the 700 ft mountain, over little stone bridges, through the woods with mountain streams cascading down waterfalls and bluebells growing in profusion. It was a magic land and I'm sure that if you would just allow it, your imagination could place a gingerbread house just over there in that clearing. But we are adults, so no gingerbread house today in these woods. Arriving at Ffestinnog, the weather had deteriorated further and as well as the cold wind, rain fell steadily, so it was a dash to the tea rooms and another cuppa, before the descent in 40 minutes time. The journey was under 20 miles each way, but took a little over an hour to complete, so by this time we were about ready to head back to Meifod.
Yesterday, our last day in Wales, we actually crossed the border and went to Shropshire's main town, Shrewsbury. What a higgilty piggilty town this is, with it's black and white buildings at all angles, some looking like they were about to topple. They, by and large, had been here for centuries, so I guess there was no need for them to pick this day to tumble. We lunched at 15th c. pub and wandered around the town, this taking most of the day. Thoroughly enjoyable.
Grope Lane in Shrewsbury
Like everywhere in Britain Shrewsbury has some interesting street names, some beg the question "where did they come from" whereas others, such as Fish Street off which Grope Lane runs, may have obvious origins such as that's where the fish market was, but GROPE LANE?
That brings us up to today and, as previously mentioned, the Lake District and a wee village called Hartsop. No pub, no shop (both a half hour walk on the footpath), just a collection of very old houses, occupied in the main by very old people with most being over eighty. There is one old fellow here, John, who is a New Zealander and was in the NZ navy during WW2. He is 93 and a meeting is being arranged. Everyone, it seems, has an interesting story to tell so it would be nice to meet with some of them. The village houses are all listed historic places and so very little can be done to modernize them, but I don't think that that worries the villagers. We are here for a week so it will be interesting..
So it'goodbye from Hartsop
Take care
David
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