Heading out of Memphis, I had a small detour to make, to Oxford, Mississippi a small city of a mere 19,000 people but the birthplace of one William Faulkner, and is the model for Jefferson in his fiction. The surrounding county, Lafayette, is replicated by Yoknapatawpha County. Most of his books are set here, and the town has honoured him by having a statue outside (I think) the Town Hall - certainly some official looking building in the Square. The Square Bookshop also had an entire floor to ceiling shelf devoted to his work and commentary on him. It is one of the top ten independent bookstores in the land and did have some John Barth books, but not the one I sought. Another prominent writer from these parts is John Grisham, but I saw no mention of the fact as I wandered. It is an older town, has the oldest department store in the South, and many of the buildings have big balconies on which it is pleasant to sit out the heat.

The plan was to follow the river for a couple of days, but it was thwarted by the fact that in the fight between river and road-builders, the river won so no-one dares put a road anywhere near it. I did go up a road which I thought might take me to at least see the river, but after passing a few miles of cotton fields, it petered out in the middle of a farmers collection of agricultural machinery.

As the day was coming to an end, I was willing to stop at anywhere that seemed OK. I thought Clarksdale would work, but the town was just very sad, with the only accommodations on offer a very tired looking motel. I passed. Towns got smaller and sadder as I headed south, so it wasn't until I hit Greenville that I felt encouraged to stay. This was a town right on the river, with a floating casino in an old riverboat replica, and a mile or so of motels and fast food joints, one of which had an all you can eat fried chicken buffet. I think for the state of my health, it is probably good that the buffet was closed by the time I got there: I do like fried chicken.

I went in to the information centre in the morning, trying to find out whether there was any road that would be good to see the river from. The answer was not positive, but I have to say, the folks running that place were among the friendliest I've encountered. They made me sign their guest book, and sent my off with a couple of mementoes, one of which is a wee guitar, with tiny little flashing lights. I decided that since driving down the Mississippi side had been a bust in terms of seeing the river, I'd pop across to the Louisiana side for the day. It was no better, but I did get to spend a very pleasant time in Lake Providence, LA. The lake is very pretty, and up a side road, I found a fairly unusual place that was a combined delicatessen, coffee joint and gospel TV station called Jehovah Java.

For my last night on the river, I went posh. I'd decided that I was going to stay at Natchez, a town largely comprising old plantation-style mansions (I went mad taking photos here but, alas, no longer have them). My researches indicated that the Natchez Grand Hotel would be a nice place to stay, and it was: right on the river, four star, a river view from a very large room. As I noted in a review i posted, my only complaint was that the TV didn't quite swivel far enough to let me watch it from the very nice desk they provided. I went for a two hour wander out among the grand houses, and along the main street before popping in to the Pig Out Inn for some more pulled pork, green beans and corn on the cob. In the morning, I had even more houses to wander, and then made an important discovery: the Natchez Coffee Company. Two very high-ceilinged old shops joined together, cool art on the walls, good coffee, interesting food: I was set!

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I've only just learned that Knoxville is where Cormac McCarthy spent a lot of time when he was young: walking around, there was no sign at all. Funnily enough, given my fruitless quest for John Barth's Cambridge book, I actually had McCarthy's Knoxville book, Suttree, in my bag.

I dithered in the morning, eating a very fine chocolate mousse thing pushed on me by a coffee man who might pass as a drug dealer, so seductively did he point out the charms of his mousse, and then it was off to Nashville. Only I didn't quite make it - evidently I missed a sign somewhere, because I was quite confident I was on the right road. Eventually I thought to check, and found I was just outside Chattanooga - which is south of Knoxville, right on the border with Georgia, not west at all. D'oh! A quick change of plans was called for. Dinner at the Blue Plate restaurant that night was curious: possibly the best fried chicken I have ever had and definitely the worst beans ever (green beans cooked in a gluggy white supposed sauce).

Of course, I checked out both the bookshops I found, looking for John Barth to no avail. One was a complete shambles, run by this funny old lady. The radio was evidently playing some Christian station, as a fellow was preaching. The funny old lady took one look at me and up went the volume on the radio! I'd also read of a fantastic homely place that did great pork dishes for lunch, but it wasn't open so I had to hit the road in anticipation of finding more chain food outlets.

Its a long drive from Chattanooga to Memphis - 6.5 hours according to Google maps on the route I took, which took me into Georgia briefly and then snuck along the top of the State of Mississippi - so I was on the road quite early for once. Luckily, in some random town in Mississippi I found, in amongst the chain food, a very busy looking Mexican restaurant, so went in and had an enormous, impossible to complete, meal of fajitas.

I'd actually booked a motel in Memphis, a classic looking Super 8, but it proved the most elusive to find of all the places I have got lost looking for. I even had a wee map with the motel marked on it. Ultimately, I followed their directions to the letter - found the right Interstate, the right exit, and there it was, pretty much the only thing at that particular exit. Leaving to go into town, I took the wrong turn and was suddenly in a different State, Louisiana.

I did drive out to Graceland but, no, I didn't go in. I was far more interested in Beale Street and the Stax Museum of Soul Music. I spent my first night at the former, which had a nice buzz although the action is confined to just a couple of blocks, starting with the BB King Blues Club, where he appears regularly (but not the night I was there). There were several bars with live music, but only one seemed to be offering proper blues, so I went in and had a couple of Yuenglings. Back in Cambridge, Katie had worked on me to try pulled pork, and I finally found the exactly right place to have it: a place called Pig on Beale Street. This was absolutely delicious - slow cooked pork pulled apart, incredibly tender, with a wonderful smoky flavour. Nice with corn on the cob, green beans and Yuengling.

The Stax museum was a good way to spend a couple of hours. I hadn't actually heard of many of the artists on the Stax Records roster - just Otis Redding, Booker T and Isaac Hayes - but it didn't stop me having a good time, as there was lots of music playing and exhibits devoted to each artist, such as Isaac Hayes' gold Cadillac (and a video of him performing Shaft at the Stax Records gig in LA in 1972, when Hayes seemed to be wearing just a few gold chains and nothing else). The story of Stax Records is an interesting one: it formed because lots of locals were congregating at the record store, Satellite Records, and they wanted to make some music of their own, to respond to the Motown sound. They became vastly popular, which attracted the interest of the big record companies: three times Stax did deals with one, and three times they were done over (they even signed over all their original music to one). But they attribute their failure to the shooting of Martin Luther King at the Lorrain Hotel, a hangout for all the Stax people. Until then, race hadn't been an issue but suddenly it created divisions, and Stax couldn't function.

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Looking at the map, the way to get a decent run down the Blue Ridge Parkway was to go to a town called Boone - quite a short drive of 160 miles. I didn't find much to distract me on the road, so was there fairly early: dead on 5:00. It is a pleasant town, fairly modern, dominated by the bush clad mountains and by the Appalachian State University. It has a very nice radio station, WASU, which plays contemporary country: so contemporary that the DJ played a quite wonderful song by a girl who is going to school with her brother. Its that kind of station. Boone takes its name on the basis that Daniel Boone camped there a few times! Driving in, I didn't see any of the chains of budget hotels, but there were a few old style motels - I picked one that gave me a good view of the hills.

The drive down the Parkway didn't get off to a good start: after about 8 miles, it was closed and, after numerous detours, I found myself back where I started, at the entrance to my motel. I had to go down to a slightly more posh looking place called Blowing Rock to get back in. As far as I could tell, there is nothing built on the Parkway at all, it doesn't have any major roads intersect with it - instead, it has little side roads head off to the nearby townships or to connect with the main road. It leaves you with a feeling of remoteness, even though I suspect it is a fairly narrow strip of forest at times, just looking at the map, and there was hardly any other traffic. At one point, I pulled off one of these side roads and found myself in a place calling itself Little Switzerland - just a cafe and a bookshop.

After lunch, and back on the road, there was a storm warning on the radio - it gave pretty precise instructions as to where it was aimed at, but because I didn't recognise any of the names, could only hope it was not aimed at me. One particular aspect of the warning that made me hope that was that it said to stay away from trees. The rain and mist and vestigial sunlight did make for some fantastic sights. I'd show you some photos but, since leaving there, I had an incident in which my camera was taken from me, including the last couple of weeks worth of photos.

My stop for the night was in Asheville, North Carolina. I actually had a hostel to stay in here and, thanks to a friendly policeman on a Segway, was finally able to find it, only to discover that the electricity in that part of town had been knocked out by the storms and the fellow running the hostel had gone AWOL. So it was back over the other side of town where I'd seen some cheap, old skool motels: the one I picked just happened to have an owner who liked to make people feel unwelcome: I was interrogated about the number of guests I was proposing to have, the location of my vehicle etc and then subjected to a long and quite freaky silence (Rolling Stone does say that Asheville is the #1 city for freaks). I was about to walk out, when he smiled and told me about his family in Wellington, and everything was sweet after that.

I liked Asheville - it provided me with a wonderful jumbalaya (that is a southern rice dish, not a song) for dinner and it was very pleasant to walk around. I found three good bookshops - no John Barth, but - and was intrigued to find one that had eschewed the fairly common combination of books and coffee: this one had a champagne bar. It has had some famous residents: to me, the most important would be F Scott Fitzgerald, O Henry and Thomas Wolfe but others might be more interested in Charlton Heston, or Robert Moog (he invented the Moog synthesizer).

A very famous family from these parts is the Vanderbilts: in the morning, I tried to see their home, Biltmore House, which is the biggest private house in the USA. There was no actual obstacle to seeing it, save for my repugnance at being charged $US50 for the privilege: nice to see the spirit of greed that made them one of the richest families is still alive and well, but there was no way I was going to contribute to it.

Instead, I rejoined the Parkway for a bit, and then cut through the Smoky Mountains - busiest road I've seen in a while, with older gentlemen on Harley Davidsons travelling in groups of 20-30 being a common sight. There was so much traffic, I basically had to just go with the flow. I was out the other side before I knew it, and if I had read my guidebook before setting out, would have taken the bypass up to Knoxville, Tenessee. But, well, I wanted to see Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge - they turned out to be two very tacky, endless strips of cheap food joints and motels, that went on for miles, with an enormous number of traffic lights. It was just awful.

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I think most people going to North Carolina would check out its capital, Richmond, and as I drove out the old US5 from Williamsburg,

that was my plan as well. Whimsy took over: it amused me last year to visit Moscow, Idaho and now I had Petersburg, North Carolina just a few miles away.

In around 1650, this marked the western and southern boundary of English exploration. Its definitely a town that has seen better days, half of its main street was closed down, but I found it to be magical, far more engaging than Colonial Wiliamsburg. I spent a couple of hours wandering its streets,





admiring people who were starting new and fairly obscure businesses, such as the shop selling Crabtree & Evelyne stuff in this building,

or having wonderful displays in their windows

(these are dolls, not real women)
snapping pics of the courthouse, which loomed above erything

On 3 April 1865 at 4:00 in the morning, the flag was taken down from the courthouse, to mark the end of the seige of Petersburg and thus the end of the Civil War - making Petersburg a neglected big deal of a city.

I was even able to find a good coffee in a cool cafe, Maria's,

much better than that produced by the "leftie wierdoes" in Norfolk. I was stalled by these suits - they were equally charming

If it hadn't been so early in the day, I might have stayed. In fact, to hell with the earliness, if I'd seen a functioning hotel as I wandered, I'd have stayed.

Across the main road, things took a turn for the posh: all of these appeared to be private homes

I know I could make things happen faster if I was to take the Interstate, but I don't like them very much - six lane monsters that are disconnected from their surroundings - for example, you have to exit to get into a town rather than have the road take you right through - and heavily populated by chain food and lodgings outfits.

So, instead of I-75, I took the old US-1 south from Petersburg. It is quite an experience on this stretch of the road, as it has been superseded by the nearby Interstate: most of the service stations

and shops sit derelict and unused.

I noticed a couple of old style motels that were pretty sad but possibly still in use, there was grass growing on the roadway and there was no traffic. This is a road which should be honoured: it is one of the first created for the automobile, running from Florida to New York. Originally, it was apparently just some ribbins or the like attached to telegraph poles to show motorists they were on the right track! I liked the Roanoke River as I passed by

Favourite song on the radio today, in amongs all the R'n'B and R'n'R? A Country & Western number Here's a Dime, Go Call Someone Who Cares, by someone called Dewayne Bowman.

Chapel Hill is a University Town, part of the Reasearch Triangle (Durham and Raleigh are the other two points). The trusty NY Times sent out a brilliant list of things to do there, two days after I left. I was a bit tired and it was raining, so I found a Red Roof Inn, tangled with the Interstate a few times (I overshot the hotel twice), and went for the first decent looking place to eat, some sort of noodle fusion hell.

Distance travelled: 737 miles. To go: 1600.

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I didn't get very far after dropping Katie at work, no further than the Wal-Mart at the end of town. I've only ever been in one, and I wanted to go and explore the joys of $7 jeans, see if they had any books at all (they do, but John Barth is a long way from what they sell) and generally check the place out. Somehow I emerged with a gallon of kettle fries (Really, a whole gallon. Of chips.), a doo-hickey to let me play my MP3 player through the car stereo and a $1.68 chilli bin.

The drive down the Delmarva Peninsula to its point was fairly unspectacular, but I did have to pull in and wander about Pocomoke - it was – it was hot and still

At the point, there is one of the seven engineering wonders of the world, at least it had that status when it was built in 1964, the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. First there is a bridge

and then there's, well, nothing

To allow shipping to get in


the bridge is transformed into a tunnel, twice. The whole thing is 17 miles long, the longest in the world. This had me back on the mainland, near the big naval base at Norfolk Virginia. My guidebook mentioned a coffee shop there run by leftie wierdoes, so I popped in to check it out. There was a bit of a boat tied up on the way

This is the battleship Wisconsin.


After that, it was a clear run up to Williamsburg but even so it was late in the day before I got there. Williamsburg is one of the oldest settlements in the USA, and when Jamestown was burnt down, it became the colonial capital. Early in the 20th century, after having his church restored a local priest decided it would be a good idea to restore colonial Williamsburg to its 17th century glory. It has operating taverns and shops as well as various historical buildings with a replica of their original contents. Several blocks in all. Almost everything was closed by the time I got there, but wandering around made for a pleasant couple of hours.

This is the Governor's Palace, occupied at one stage by Thomas Jefferson


and the Court House

Next door is William & Mary College, second oldest University in the USA, and a collection of very handsome buildings indeed, although not the originals


They had a good bookshop, it even had several John Barth books, but not the one I want. I'll get one if it kills me!

I was quite keen to try out one of the dining establishments in Colonial Williamsburg, as they serve 17th century food, but they were mostly closed, and the offerings from the one I did find open didn't realy appeal (partly because they were $US30 for a main). So, recourse was had to one of the endless fast food places America offers.

Distance travelled: 510 miles. To go: 1800.

Williamsburg, VA remains copyright of the author NZBarry, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Navigation was very easy - out past Annapolis, across the Bay Bridge (would have loved to stop and take a picture as it looked splendid, but they don't tend to like that on freeways at the best of times, and definitely not when its going across a bridge) and, coincidentally, through Chester which is where I helped my Turkish friend to yesterday. I actually stopped there because I was feeling peckish, and the picture of a big red apple convinced me I was outside a foodstore. Not so lucky - I could get paint, my clothes cleaned or electrical supplies, but not food. Didn't actually get any until I hit Cambridge.

Our plans were not really set in concrete, so it wasn't a surprise to find Katie was not home, so went for a wander along the main street of Cambridge and out towards its pier - some nice old colonial style houses made for a pleasant walk and I found a bar down on the waterfront which served up (very slowly) a beer and quesadilla (a word I had a little trouble pronouncing, particularly when I couldn't remember which way round it is constructed). It was only after I'd ordered it that I remembered I'd had one last year, somewhere in Idaho or Montana and thought it awful. Luckily, this one was much better.

When I did catch up with Katie and Brian, they took me on a tour of the town. I think the highlight had to be Chesapeake Classics: even the possibility of such a place had never occured to me. It is a largish shop given over almost entirely to decoys, primarily ducks but also some fish, mostly for collecters rather than those who actually hunt ducks. Out the back was a decoy museum. Stupendous! Since it was second Saturday, Cambridge was putting on a show: a band was playing, beer was sold in the street (but not from a truck), pulled pork was on offer. I wouldn't say its the biggest turnout I've ever seen, but it was a nice thing to do. Like a lot of American towns, Cambridge main street has been destabilised by all the new shops starting up out on the highways and so things to get their downtown districts appreciated are important.

Chesapeake is crab country, but I can still shudder at a childhood encounter with a crab on my dinner plate: in 8 year old boy terms, it was yucky. The idea of a softshell crab which is battered, cooked and eaten whole brings back the shudders. So I didn't have crab for dinner.

On Sunday, they brought out the big guns in terms of places that appeal to me: traditional American eating establishments. Cambridge seems lucky to be blessed with several of these places. I wasn't too keen on Katie's chipped beef on biscuit, mainly because it was smothered in a milky white gravy, but was very happy with my choice. It is places like Millies, and another we would have eaten at had they not shut as we drove up, and the bakery Katie's sister has that make me think I could happily be American.

There was an information centre nearby, so we had to go over. Funny thing was, they were promoting Cambridge by quoting John Barth, who was born there, but when I asked the lady running the place if I could get any John Barth books in town, she had no idea who I was talking about. No visit to the John Barth birthplace for me then. It did set me on a quest, however. I have most of his books back home, have only ever read Lost in the Funhouse, but really wanted to read his Floating Opera when I heard it was set in Cambridge and the Bay. Cambridge doesn't really do bookshops, it seems. Katie was busy with my camera, managed to get lots of sideways shots but in one I am facing the right way up

Like my Orioles hat? Its the colour that did it for me.

The rest of the day, we just went to the beach away over on the East coast, in Delaware, at Reheboth Beach. First stop - every bookstore in sight in the hunt for John Barth books. No joy. Then it was time to settle into some seriously good beer at the Dogfish Head brewery pub - some of his beers are a bit extreme and gimmicky for me, but he makes a fine IPA, so fine I bundled a 24 into the car. I liked Reheboth Beach a lot - Katie had said it was kind of white trash, but it wasn't noticeably so (or I'm too white trash myself to know). It seemed very friendly, lacking in the kind of louts and drunks and drunken louts you run into at a lot of English beaches. The beach itself run for miles.

We were more interested in the ice cream, the popcorn, the salt water taffy, the t-shirts, the burgers, the rather nice gentlemen's clothing shop and, finally, the funfair.


These cars got up to an incredible speed

This was a squeal machine - all the kids would scream as it came down

although I was amused when a more mature lady got on - all she could do was laugh their head off. Katie and Brian were intent on going on this alarming whirligig thing, that I just couldn't cope with so I amused myself by trying to get their photo every time they came around: missed every time, except when the machine was stopped

Somehow it was after 10:00 before we got back, so after a quick cook up of some franks on the barbie, it was sleep time: early start Monday for us all. After going to the bakery and having rather good coffee twice and a fantastic donut twist thing, it was time to drop Katie at work and head off on my adventure.

Distance Travelled: 80 miles (the wrong way). Distance to go: nearly 2000.

Cambridge, Maryland a.k.a. Katie Town remains copyright of the author NZBarry, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Ticket finally in hand, you queue again, this time for the bus. It is a long queue, and people are counting the number ahead of them and asking “how many does that bus carry?” Because Greyhound just keeps selling tickets without regard to the number of seats on the bus: if it is full, you catch the next one. SIX HOURS later. So, the back of the queue becomes somewhat indeterminate, as those who are simultaneously late, nervous and pushy manage to find themselves in front of people waiting ten minutes.

One last flourish attends this performance: the man with the wand. It looks like a fat black spatula, with green and red lights. It is waved over everyone’s luggage, the lights flashing as if they are on a Christmas tree, not a machine to ensure we can safely travel Greyhound without being maced, knifed or drugged (these were the three things the man with the wand seemed worried about). It beeps frantically, like an alarm clock on speed. The man with the wand is evidently a better man than I, as I could detect no pattern to the sound and light show, and went away suspecting that that was all it was, a show.

Once on the bus, everything is fine. The driver, a self-sacrificing sort of gentleman warns us not to go near the luggage compartment as the cables holding the doors up tend to snap, and they’re heavy doors. “If anyone is going to die today, it is better that it be me, rather than one of you. So don’t mess with the luggage compartment”.

As you come into Baltimore, its industrial heritage is evident: no shops, motels etc, just some factories, piles of materials, and lots of cranes. Even the Greyhound station is out in an industrial area, next to a factory with a big chimney.

Again, I didn't have much of a plan, other than to wander around and see what can be seen. One reason for choosing Baltimore was The Wire, but I don't think I'd want to go to the places you see there. There are warnings not to go into certain areas of this city.

Walking out from the hostel, I had this feeling I was in a good place, a bit of a wreck of a city but I was glad to be there and, unlike Philly, there are two good coffee shops within a block of the hostel. What I didn't find were the big brand shops I've come to expect in American cities. I was impressed by the city library and Walter art gallery, not because they were particularly special but because they were both started with private money. Mr Walter had to have this building

to house his private collection. Inside, things are a little eccentric:

The Inner Harbour is where its at in Baltimore if you're a tourist, so I went and inspected the marine life:

Yep, that's a submarine. I've never even seen one let alone had the chance to go inside. You start in the aft torpedo room

which has been set up as an extremely cramped backpackers!

Moving forward



There are four of these, each producing 1600 horsepower.

Backpacker operators could learn something from submarines - this space has 36 beds:
The dining area is cosy

They call this a stateroom! I grew up reading about Captain's staterooms but never imagined they'd be like this:

The Officers' rooms are identical, except there are three bunks. And then it is the forward torpedo room,

and its all over.

I did have a vague idea of seeing the Baltimore and Ohio Railway Museum, biggest in the country apparently, but the submarine distracted me so long I didn't see any point trying to see the Museum.

I went back to the hostel to much love. In the morning, I'd been hanging about, eating pancakes and doing a bit of work, when the hostel manager brought in a damsel in distress. She'd flown in from Turkey the day before, had very little English, and had some work lined up in a McDonalds out in the boonies. The manager was looking for someone to put her on the train to the inner boonies, where someone would collect her. Since it was time to go anyway, I thought what the hell. Somehow this was a big deal to the manager, so when I got back, she was all "I love you so much...". Speaking of the hostel, it had a touch of elegance I don't normally get in hostels

For my last eveing, I walked up what was the main drag, and is now called historic Charles Street - it seems largely residential, but with a few grand hotels, cafes, bars, clothing shops, a University, a train station etc strung out along its length. It made for a pleasant walk, and about halfway along, there is Brewer's Art - a brew pub I'd been told about. Just as well, as I'd probably never have ventured underneath, where there's a cool bar, a proper underground place with limited light, hordes of people, loud music and good beer.

Distance travelled: 200 miles. To go: roughly 1900.

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The captain seemed to like telling long lingering tales about our arrival time – with the lack of headwind we’d be half an hour early into JFK but then he had quite a list of reasons why that time might get cut down. As it happens, we arrived dead on time. I had not made arrangements for onward travel, as I’d heard horror stories about how long it would take to get out of JFK. After collecting my bag, I was outside in two minutes! Outside, there were a couple of women touting for business for the buses into town: I was impressed that someone had the nerve to approach one to borrow her cellphone to call someone about a ride. Even more impressed to see the phone was actually lent.

I had a succession of commuter trains to catch,

first into New York’s Penn Station, then out to Trenton New Jersey and on to Philadelphia. It took hours and is not to be recommended. A more organised traveller to Philadelphia might have flown to Newark and saved a lot of time and hassle. An even more organised one would have flown to Philadelphia direct. But when I booked, I really had no idea where I’d go and so JFK seemed like a convenient option.

Although the temperature was less than 20 degrees, it was so humid that by the time I hit the hostel, I was asked if it was raining outside. It took a couple of pints of Samuel Adams to recover, then the hunt for my first dinner in the USA (since last year, that is) was on: America does food well and I wanted something nice. Unfortunately the place I picked sounded good, a roast beef palace, if you like, and the beef was nice but the microwave was a wee bit over-used.

I only had one full day in Philly, with no real plan except a feeling I should check out the Independence Mall - not actually about shopping but history. Philly has it in spades, thanks to a couple of bits of paper signed here a while back - the Declaration of Independence to name one, in this building

and it was the centre of US government for a few years. I took a good look at the display set up in the information centre as to what was on offer, and didn't feel any need to do anything but wander around the precinct for a while. Here is all that is left of the house occupied by Jefferson when he was President - the blue lines, not the handsome buildings to the rear

Horse drawn carriages are available by the dozen

Eating became important, so it was time to go to Reading Market, something I read about in the Guardian.





I was a bit bamboozled by all the choice and by the time I snacked on a couple of donuts and had a cinnamon sugar pretzel, in no need of lunch anyway.

My wandering walk took me past the magnificent City Hall



Ben Franklin was nearby, doing his thing an keeping an eye on what's going on

I had a sort of plan, in that I wanted to check out the main Art Gallery. Unfortunately, I had failed to find out where it is, so after a long walk along Philadelphia's version of the Champs Elysees, past the library

I finally got there about an hour before closing time. Since it is so large

and the entry fee a little steep, I took a shot looking back into town

and headed off in what turned out to be the direction of the railway station, where I enjoyed the classic lines of the interior.


Even more than that, I enjoyed the food to be found in the station - a marvellous chicken bisque given life by the addition of green chillies, jalapenoes, garlic and coriander then, in another stall, juicy and very filling ribs - getting four might have been a little greedy!

After the low rise buildings of Ireland and even the UK, I enjoyed wandering inner city Philly, as the tall buildings really evoke a big city feel. Not sure that I feel any pull to return any time soon, however, although I did miss out seeing what is reputed to be its most interesting street, South Street.

Distance travelled: 110 miles. To go: roughly 2000.

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He took me on a pub crawl, told stories, got me drunk, in the same pubs as James Joyce and Flann O'Brien had undoubtedly got drunk before me, he ferried me about and took me into his home and fed me and was a very generous host. Thanks, man. I'm on my way to see someone else who is going to be playing host, and he set the standard high, but I venture hopefully. After all, she has indicated the possibility of sailboating, of crabs and the absolute incontrovertible fact of truckloads of beer in the streets.

It was nice to have a bit of a leer up in Dublin, to be still out when the bars were closing around us, even though it seemed very early at 2:00 a.m. Travelling by myself, I'll go and have a drink, maybe two, but for a long mission company is needed. An odd thing happened, twice on the night out. In one pub this Frenchman told me that he'd seen a mural of the band The Dubliners, and as he fingered my beard, he told me I looked just like one of its in and out members, Ronnie Drew. Poor fellow - he was very earnest about how we Irish were so great, and that there was a deep spiritual connection between the French and we Irish people. We didn't have the heart to put him straight. In the last bar of the night, an American woman could have easily been convinced that I was Ronnie Drew. As I had been until about an hour earlier, she was ignorant of the fact he had died.

On the Saturday, it was time for another pilgrimmage, but this time without the beer. My destination was a lot smaller than I imagined

and I wondered about how "stately, plump Buck Mulligan" managed the stairs.

This is the famous Martello Tower at Sandycove, in which the first chapter of Ulysses is set and where James Joyce himself stayed for just under a week - he didn't take too kindly to being shot at by his friend, apparently.

The room has been set up as described in the novel,


except that the black panther in the fire place was just a dream.

There were two plastercasts made of Joyce's face when he died. This is one of them

After the fabulous weather of last week, it was a bit of a shock when it turned miserable. I left the hostel in my shirtsleeves, thinking it was just a bit of drizzle. Within a couple of blocks, I was thinking I should find an umbrella. By the time I was half way down O'Connell Street, I was so desperate I bought an umbrella from a gift shop. By the time I was at Connelly Station, it had turned itself inside out three times (the umbrella, that is, not the station) and its frame was bent so I biffed it away in disgust. Only then did I remember the toasty warm raincoat I could have gone back for.

There was an upside, however. By the time I got down to Sandycove, the rain had gone off and the wind trebled. As someone said to me "there'll be no swimming in this":

Funnily enough, I walked around the point and someone was swimming, and another fellow was heading out in a kayak. Into this

Not so funny: as I left, I noticed the lifeguard getting very anxious, then running to his wee shed, extracting binoculars and running back to take a look. I hope it was nothing, but I did notice a human head bobbing in the waves.

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After I got established in my hostel, I ran into a problem. They very kindly gave me directions and a map to help me get to what they said was a good place for coffee, but half the streets in Galway have no signs. So that's what the U2 song Where the Streets have No Name is about. Makes it hard to get about - eventually I found the place I'd been sent to, which turned out to be a cute French bistro. Galway was completely chocker, full of people in for the Volvo Yacht race - the boats are in town for a couple of weeks and Galway's turning on the party. I was in the laundrette and overheard someone travelling with the yachts: of all the places they're visiting, Galway is by far doing the most to make their arrival an occasion. Not, it seems, that Galway needs much of an excuse: guys in my hostel were talking about coming to Galway to perfect their serious drinking habit.

I found the whole place far too packed to be comfortable - I couldn't walk around without being bumped into, and trying to get a spot for dinner in anywhere that looked decent was impossible. Around 10:30, I finally succumbed and went for some chicken'n'chips at Supermac, where the person serving seemed to bark at me and all the staff scowled there way through the night. To make matters worse, two guys spent most of the night outside my window accosting all passersby. It was a little amusing, in that one guy sounded just like James Nesbitt (the fellow in Cold Feet) and the other like Billy Connelly, but still I was geting more and more uptight the longer I was in Galway. And I'd booked for a week!

I was considering doing my dough at the hostel, and finding somewhere quieter - even a hotel would have let me hole up - but had the brainwave of asking the hostel if I could shift my booking to another. And so I came to spend most of my Galway time in the Burren.

First, though, I had a night booked out in Clidfden, out through Connemara on the coast. It was nce seeing Connemara as we whizzed through on the bus, and Clifden was almost completely as I remembered it, a nice wee town set out in a triangular pattern



with a tail leading off to its "beach"

After I'd wandered around a bit, I had my heart set on salmon for dinner, as it seemed to be everywhere. I think I made a good choice, in the very modest EJ Kings hotel, in its third floor restaurant. Modest because, despite being started in 1820, they say they are "over 100 years old". Really good dinner. I was sitting outside, enjoying the last remnants of the sun, about 10:00, when this charming couple, up from the country and dressed for a visit to town, he was in a suit, she in some sort of eveing dress, sat with me for a bit and wanted to know all about New Zealand and my travels.

To get out to the Burren, I had to go back into town and catch a bus that went south along the coast for a bit. The Burren is a very odd piece of land - hills which have been denuded of their vegetation and soil, and just have crowns of limestone. I tried for some photos, but taken out of the bus window, they weren't so hot.

There were lots of wee cottages with thatched rooves - again, my efforts to take photos failed: I tended to get the tractor parked nearby rather than the house. Some worked, however:

Stone fences prevail - I think that each of these blocks were farmed by an individual crofter, to give him and his family a subsistence living. When I was here in the 80's, I remember a lot of them becoming unoccupied, simply because they were of no use to anyone.

My actual destination is a town called Lisdoonvarna - six hotels and a gift shop and that's about it. Oh, and the spa. I actually saw a movie about this town a while ago - it has had an annual match-making event every September for more than a century.

So, of course all of the hotels are plastered with banners promoting that, and promising "weekday dances" [so long as you wait until September]. It has the dinkiest wee library

The hostel is a former hotel

I had a really great time in Lisdoonvarna - the hostel was very peaceful, with a group of young Frecnhwomen hanging about chatting quietly to give a touch of sophistication. I even cooked. Town was a two minute walk away, where I could repair for a decent coffee twice a day. Incredible weather, 25 degrees every day, and long evenings - I found it very pleasant to sit outside until after 10:30, when the light finally faded. When I checked out, I had to tell the fellow its the best I've been in.

I did venture out for one day - through this odd town called Doolin. It seems they couldn't work out where to put it, so just flung it about on the side of the hill facing the coast. My objective was the Cliffs of Moher.

I didn't quite make it to the very end, as I had a bus to catch and really didn't want to miss it. Plus I had to visit the gift shop

Further round, the information centre and restaurant are fully underground.

Reading for the week was a brand new book the Guardian reveiwed a wee while back, by Richard Milward: Ten Story Love Song. The Times said of his first book, Apples, that it was a celebration of teenage immorality. I haven't read it, but in his second book, his post-teens are growing up and finding value in old values. It was curiously like the The Forsyte Saga, if you could imagine it set in a tower block in early 21st century Middlesburgh. Bob the Artist (the author is one and all) is the central character and a bit of a sweetie, although he spends a lot of his time doing multiple drugs and painting while in that state. An example of his innocence: a london gallery wants to show his art and bring him to London. He goes to McDonalds for lunch, and then remembers he's on expenses. His blow out? Another burger, and maybe an ice cream. Plus there is his yearning to be back home, with his girl. There is an enormous amount of drugs and violence in this book, but ultimately, it is a comedy, in the traditional sense.

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That wild sea I was watching at Manorbier? Still a bit wild when I had to cross it from Fishguard to Rosslare. The ferry heaved considerably and I was less than comfortable with the movement. In a brilliant stroke of Swedish design, the ferry was equipped with swivel chairs, nicely spaced to provide the tables with an almighty thump every time we hit a wave.

I’m afraid that reportage from Ireland is a little limited. This is not because there is nothing to see, but work has tended to get in the way of my explorations. As a fellow in the hostel in Fishguard said, its a terrible thing to do when you’re travelling. He did accept my point that the travel makes the work go easier.

When I was in Ireland twenty years ago, I found it to be completely enchanting. Mind you I was a bit closer to the ground. After flying in to Belfast and getting up to the Giant’s Causeway, I hitched the rest of the way, travelling with farmers, priests, prison warders, tradesmen, accountants, a friend from my first year at university, you name it. This time, I don’t think I’ve seen anyone hitching. I’ve had to have recourse to buses again, as the train system has not really catered to my plans. The only train running south from Rosslare was at 7:13 in the morning, and from the south to get over to the West Coast seems to involve many changes or going via Dublin whereas the buses are frequent, direct and cheap.

First stop was Waterford. What a grim place. Of everywhere I have been, this is the most savaged, or maybe it is ravaged, by the economic crisis. Two big new buildings standing completely empty, a big hole in the ground where another was planned, and many vacant buildings in the centre of town tell the story. I just got a bad feeling about the place, and found nothing I liked except for this 800 year old tower

and Scholars bookshop. And then there was the food – even a sandwich seemed to be 8 euros. I did go into a pub for lunch and hit the trifecta: surly service, bad food and expensive. The only thing good about it was that there was not much of it. I stayed in the Travelodge which is a bit south of town: after my first wander around, I wasn’t tempted to go back. Waterford made McDonalds look good - the food was plentiful and the staff cheerful.

The trip south to Cork was nice, with cool looking towns and pretty countryside. Cork itself was much better than Waterford, starting with the food – my first two meals were an extraordinarily good Moroccan lamb tagine and a wonderful spicy concoction of prawns and green beans. Plus the best coffee I’ve had in a long time, thanks to Cork Coffee Roasters. They’re the best in Ireland, at least according to the plaque leaning against the Probat sitting in the middle of the cafe. Various coffee related items adorn the wall, and the ceiling has this psychedelic floral wallpaper. I was in Cork for almost a week and this was a regular feature of my stay.

I wouldn’t say Cork had much of the spectacular about it, but it was comfortable and had a bit of a buzz, plus the various waterways were a nice feature to wander around. The University confused me, though: it seemed to be made of modern materials, but was built in an old style, including turrets.

I had another of those dilemmas while I was there, as I had a two day space for which I had no booking and couldn’t decide if I should go south to Kinsale or north to Ennis. Then I saw a poster saying Holly Golightly was coming to town and that clinched it: one night in Kinsale and back to Cork. Kinsale is a pretty harbour town just south of Cork

I was intrigued by its port - ships practically tie themselves to the flash looking Trident Hotel

This ship was loaded old school style - a crane with a bucket emptying the contents of the vessel, looked like cement, into lorries. Not exactly a container port, but for some reason I found it curiously satisfying lounging about watching the boat being unloaded.

The good people of Kinsale seem to have gone to town in terms of the colourful way in which they present their buildings

The first of these, the Spaniard's Inn, is about 400 years old, commemorating the joing of Irish and Spanish forces to fight off (unsuccessfully) the English. The people at the B & B I was staying in had commended it highly to me as a place to eat, but as no-one else there was, I didn't really feel in the mood. Besides, Kinsale is well known for its food, and has a number of acclaimed restaurants. Funny then that I shouldl end up eating fish and chips. Good ones, but, and from a proper restaurant. All in all, it was somehow well after 10 before I trudged back up the hill to the B & B.

Back in Cork, more great coffee, more fighting for space with school kids in the Cork public library, and then I checked into a real hotel, the Gresham Metropole. Nice. A few steps above the Travelodge, to be sure, and without costing the earth. I particularly enjoyed that the entire groiund floor was given over to lounging space.

In the evening, I crossed back over the river to see Holly Golightly and the Brokeoffs, who are actually just one person.

Sorry it is not the best photo ever. He's from Georga, she's very English but their music is old fashioned Americana with lots of jokes in-between. Surprisingly, only about 20 people turned out, but we managed to make a bit of noise to show we were glad they had come. After the gig, I was talking with Holly, wanting to know what would make her come to New Zealand, as I reckon we could produce a better turn out - even if she played the Penguin Club. The answer: someone with the money to underwrite her trip. Hmmmm. I know someone with money and a yearning to see Holly Golightly in New Zealand.

I read the last volume of The Forsyte Saga, and it is by far my favourite, although I laughed and cried my way through them all. Some of these three novels struck a very contemporary note, such as the people writing to the Times about Iraq, or worries about the rising unemployment and runs on banks, or that Westminster Abbey might be turned into apartments, or that England would be so much more well off if it didn’t import so much pork, poultry or potatoes.

The last 200 pages, I just read in one sitting, finishing about 3 in the morning and going off to bed, to dream I got married, to a girl I have never seen. Maybe it was Dinny Charwell, the central character in the volume, a woman of “pluck” and a “brick” – the highest of accolades. Each of the three novels in the last volume sees her family go through the mill. First, her brother is accused of letting down his team leader when on an expedition in Bolivia, and basically not playing the game. That’s almost worse than the fact he killed someone, because the fellow was “only a half caste” (yes, quite a lot of racial slurring seems to be part of being English in the late 1920’s) so, when the Bolivian’s want him extradited, his success depends upon which strings can be pulled.

Then it is Dinny’s turn. She has the misfortune to fall completely in love with one Wilfred Desert. He does with her, and all, but he is a man not completely sure of himself, so he cracks when it is revealed that out in the Sudan, when given the choice of recanting his Christianity and becoming a Moslem or being shot he converted. Again – that’s not playing the game and it is “yellow”. For her long term happiness, he has to break free, but although it doesn’t break her spring, it bent it severely. I found myself with tears in my eyes when one of her dear old uncles spoke of her in this way – poor Dinny. In the final novel, sister Clare is in for a hard time. Out in Ceylon, her husband has been sexually perverse, something to do with a horsewhip, and she leaves him, meeting a nice young fellow on the way back. Of course hubby wants a divorce, since she won’t return, and within the family, divorce isn’t really playing the game.

There is a touch of the soap opera to these tumultuous times, but much more than that, Galsworthy is taking a look at the things that the English of 1928-1932 really hold as their values, and the ways in which they’ve changed. But his younger generation have such great people within it that maybe these changes won’t destroy the fabric of society. I think the other really great thing is that his characters are not portrayed as black and white (well, maybe he goes overboard with the white). Wilfred is a complex man; Clare’s husband could have been just a monster, but he’s not and another fellow, Jack Muskham who bullied Wilfred, has his good points.

There was a cute reference to Dr Johnson. I thought it was funny enough that the two gardeners were called Boswell and Johnson, but it was made even better that once Boswell had been taken on as a gardener, they had to cast about for a Johnson to complete the set.  

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Nah, can't keep it up - but I had a dose of young Americans around me recently as I took a bus somewhere.

Anyway, I left Manorbier on a bus, one of the many that makes short trips all around the Pembrokeshire Coast. This one was going a relatively long distance, all the way to Haverfordwest, 18 miles. Still, it managed to take more than an hour, as it popped up side streets and waited vainly for passengers at various point. At one time, it had three passengers, but for a while it was just me, and when we got to Neyland, I seriously wanted to absent myself - this is where Brunel ran his railway to, or from. Probably to, actually, as until there was a railway, there wasn't a Neyland. It looked a pleasant place as well, on the banks of the River Cleddau. At least this day we could go over the river - I'd heard on the previous day that the wind was so high that buses weren't going over.

Haverford West was just a place to stop and catch another bus, one going 16 miles, but there was a gap of a couple of hours. I had all my bags with me, so a leisurely walk wasn't really an option but I saw a wimpy bar. A wimpy bar! A brand new one, even. I was convinced they'd disappeared, as I've not come across any, just a sign in Tenby. I had to go in, was surpised that they offered table service and had pictures of nice looking ice cream sundaes and had a full menu going, but not surprised although sad to find my food was basically crap.

At the end of my second bus ride, which had taken me through pleasantly rolling farm land, for a swoop down to the coast and then through a bit of rough, I was in St David. Here is its main street, standing about one block from the end.

There's maybe another block around the corner and two roads running off it and that's about it. Small is the word, according to wikipedia, it has 1797 occupants and yet it is a city, the UK's smallest, but still a city. The thing is, if you go to the bottom of the main street, and do a bit of a dogleg to theright and go through a gate in a high wall that stops you from seeing anything, you suddenly find this

It was a wee bit like the welsh lass saying Machynlleth - every time I saw it it was a fresh delight. I didn't stick around very long the first time, as I was still carrying my bags and had a long walk to the hostel, the longest so far under full load. I'd asked the bus driver about taxis, and was told there were none. Of course, when I got to the hostel there were signs for three different taxi companies. Ah well, at least it wasn't as warm as in Singapore.

It is right out in the country

- I can't think of any city where you can start in the centre, walk 30 minutes and spend the last 25 of them in the country. Off to the side is White Sand Bay - the weather was hovering on the verge of rain, if not raining, the whole time I was there so this is as close as I got

Most of the time, I actually spent around the hostel, there were friendly people and I could work, easily enough. A bit of a scare to have no internet at all, however.

By the time I got back into the central city to find dinner, I was a little alarmed - no convenience store, no chippy, no pizza, hardly even a pub, but three or four posh restaurants which were full. I really didn't feel like starving, and luckily I found a pub at the far end of town that did me proud.

On the Monday, the weather cleared enough to encourage me to make a dash into town, where I could explore the Cathedral properly.

It had a very nice restaurant where I was planning to spend a chunk of time relaxing, until a group of four year olds decided that it was really a football field and that football means lots of screaming. My tolerance to such things is not what it used to be so I retreated to the Bench, which was a very nice place in the centre of town - with a pervasive smell of deliciously cooked prawns.

Next to the Cathedral is the Bishop's Palace, not quite as well kept unfortunately

Despite being small with no shops, I managed to spend most of the day in St David, popping through the gate to see the Cathedral a number of times.

And then it was all over. A bus up the coast to Fishguard, a night in a pleasant hostel there with a pint and a bite to eat in the pub while some folk musicians did their thing in a corner and it was bye bye to the UK. So many things I've seen, yet so many more that I haven't. I could have spent a month covering the ground of the last few days! But it has been grand, with more to come.

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After a hefty breakfast in an 80 year old cafe and sending yet another consignment home, it was time to go in. Pembroke Castle is a pretty big deal: it was a stronghold for quite some time, variously for or against the French and for or against the Welsh, and the birthplace of the first Tudor King, Henry VII - his Uncle Jasper, Earl of Pembroke, was the last proper one - Henry VIII was against baronial power, and actually had Ann Boleyn take the place over. Then he had her executed. For a couple of hundred years, after some deal was done, it was left in private ownership to moulder away but then in the 18th century, romantic poets and artists got all keen on it and it was back on the map. There's been a massive restoration project, and it is looking pretty good. This is inside the wall:

and various shots as I wandered around

I was curious at the concept of a dungeon tower

The building to the right is the Great Keep, one of the earliest towers with a domed roof, built around 1200

After a quiet pint, listening to a local and a couple of guys he struck up a conversation with solve all the problems of the world, it was time to hop on the bus, and head back. Yep, I said bus - trains aren't that good for travelling up the south west coast of Wales, and it means I had to abandon my bike in Tenby. I left it locked with the key in the lock in the railway station - probably means that some morally bankrupt lowlife will get the thrill of thinking he's stolen a bike, but I couldn't think of a better distribution system.

My destination for the night was a wee place called Manorbier, which had been a big defence base. I chose to stay there simply because the blurb in the YHA book about the hostel made it sound cool. It has a Norman church



and a pretty wild looking beach

It started to rain while I was at the beach, but the wind was so strong that I was being dried off quicker than the rain could wet me.

Of course, being a nook or maybe a cranny, it has a castle

What it didn't have was any place to eat. Yes, there was a pub which had some fine ales and a menu but no-one to do anything about food. So, for the first time since leaving home, I actually had to cook for myself. The horror. The horror.

The hostel was almost deserted - a group was finishing off their meal as i returned, talking about seeing someone called Harry Potter, apparently he's in films. I wanted to shout at them that they were in Wales, the site of some real history, the Last Invasion, and that was all they could find to interest them. Maybe they knew what was on my mind, as I never saw them again.

The hostel was certainly an unusuall styled building, had been part of the defence base

It is up the coast, about a mile from town, on the Coastal Path, so I took a wee walk

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But before Tenby, I had a wee bit of tripping about to do. First, I had a couple of nights back in York, where I was disgusted to find that among the hundreds of bikes at the station, mine had been picked upon to be stolen. It only cost £25 and was nothing special, so why it would be taken I have no idea. It would have been very helpful to me, as I had quite a trudge to the hostel, and I’d perfected the art of making the bike carry the heaviest bag. Since that was the end of that, I thought I might as well confuse someone by tying my helmet to their bike.

This time in York, I did get to see inside the Minster, but didn’t really do much else. The hostel was good to work in during the day and, in the evening, well another retired bloke had struck up a conversation with me within about a minute of getting into my room. He too had been to New Zealand, even bought a bike with big ideas about cycling the length of it, but didn’t get far – the bus was much less tiring. Poor fellow, he was made redundant, his age made it hard to get more work, then the recession cut in to make it impossible. We went off to a really nice cafe, Concerto, opposite the Minster – it had music scores in place of wallpaper and a really friendly vibe – and took a couple of pints before tackling the walk back. The next night, we didn’t even get to leave the hostel, just spent the evening in the hostel bar, with our young German room mate and a New Zealander, doing a bit of travelling before going back to her accountancy firm. I’m fairly sure she’s the first Kiwi I’ve talked to since I left home – the funny thing is, she didn’t recognise my accent. After my rant about teacakes, she probably wishes she’d stayed in her corner. Or maybe I converted another to the cause.

Now, the logical way to get from York to West Wales is to go back through Birmingham, not via the Scottish Borders. But I’d heard so much about the Settle to Carlisle railway as being the most spectacular rail journey in the UK that I had to try it out for myself. Of course, back in York railway station, I found that my bike hadn’t been stolen after all, so it could come for the ride.

We didn’t get far. After a change of trains in Leeds, a very interesting looking city, lots of very new flash buildings among the older, more sedate brick edifices, we got stopped at a station just south of Settle. A freight train had broken down ahead of us – normally that would not be a problem as there are two lines, but this one had chosen to break down on the Ribble Viaduct, where the railway was reduced to a single track, and there were problems extracting it.

So, I got to Heilliford Station before 11:00 and was there for a while. Luckily it was a nice station and had an alarmingly cheap cafe – after I’d loaded up with a quota of crisps and Mars Bars and homemade ginger cookies and a cup of tea, I had to question whether he had his pricing right.

They did put on a bus, but the only reason for going to Carlisle was to do the train trip, so I was determined to wait it out. I had a fellow to talk with, a local who turned out to be a retired Crown Court Judge (and to continue with the theme of retired gentlemen who went to New Zealand when he was young, he was another). He was just going “over the top” for a day trip, but by early afternoon he gave up. A train did come along, that would take me to Carlisle via Lancaster, and the staff on my stuck train were quite definite that I should take it. Nope, no way, I’m doing the Settle Carlisle. It was just before 4:00 that the line cleared and the next train came along which could take me.

The journey? Kind of nice but the bleak experience I’d been promised

was over pretty quickly.

Didn’t help that Carlisle was not that great. I think the best thing about it was my dinner – walking around, one place was much busier than anywhere else, so I went in despite it being a Chinese eat all you can Buffet (traditionally not very good food) and it was great. Swansea the next night wasn’t much better, lots of people there for stag and hen nights and generally getting drunk, but I’d had to stop there because of the wacky world of Waterstones. You can go into their shop and buy books, or you can order online, which saves you heaps. Then you can ask that they deliver to your local Waterstones, which they’ll do for free. Since Swansea was the only place I was passing through that had one, and I was curious to see if it is as dour a place as the guide book says (it is), and I found a cheap night in a Travelodge it all added up.

All in all, I was getting a little apprehensive, maybe I’m getting over this travel lark and won’t enjoy Tenby? I needn’t have worried – even the little train that bumbled its way between the bushes to get me from Swansea to Tenby cheered me, particularly the very proper speaking English fellow with a very long white philospher's beard who turned out to be the train driver.

And in Tenby, I had a great week. I had an apartment, which gives a bit of the view of the sea

Yep, these are all from the window of my apartment. From the outside, it was nothing, a grey concrete wall above a shop selling touristy kitsch, but inside it had all I needed, even a bath. Not having to work within the routines of a hostel or hotel or flatmates was wonderful – a week of getting up around 11:00, working through until 2:00, when I’d spend a couple of hours in a cafe for a sausage baguette (much better than it sounds) and apple pie, catch up on the internet and go for a bit of a wander.

It was nice for the fellow in the cafe to decide I was a writer, which I guess is what I am at the moment. Then it would be a few hours work in the afternoon, then dinner at a pub and another wander, before working through until about two. The changing mood of the sea was a constant entertainment

The TV mumbled away in the background, so I became heartily sick of the MP expenses row, but it was interesting to spend 10 minutes listening to what they’re debating in the House of Lords – the fact that the bacon in their restaurant is from Holland, not Britain – because British bacon is £6.59 a kilogram and the Dutch is £4.80 and “we like to give value for money”. They even tell jokes in the House of Lords” “I had this friend, he came back from Mexico, and I was worried because he didn’t seem very well, thought he might have swine flue. So, I rang the swine flu hotline but, instead of help, all I got was crackling.”

I may as well write it here – I had a particularly geekily spooky experience during this week. I got this thought in my head on the Sunday night, that if I was to buy land and build a caravan on it, like the static caravans they have here which have wheels but never go anywhere, then it wouldn’t be a building so I wouldn’t need a building permit. All sorts of images of what sort of thing I could build and it not be a building were in my mind. That kind of passed, but then a few days later I read something – at almost the precise time I was having visions of buildings that aren’t buildings, the High Court back in New Zealand was convicting a fellow for constructing non-mobile caravans in his caravan park without a building permit.

I think that I was right to be confused about whether Tenby or Whitby is better, because they both suit me so well. The town of Tenby might have a little less to enjoy than the town of Whitby, certainly has nowhere of the stature of Beckett’s, but the beach that circles around Tenby is definitely superior.

In between my doses of The Forsyte Saga, I have been reading a more contemporary novel. Over the course of nearly a fortnight, I only managed the one - Victor Pelevin's Babylon, set in Yeltsin's Russia, after a fashion. Another name for Babylon is Babel, which has certain connotations important to understanding this book. Its central character is a fellow often simply called Baby, who is an adertising copywriter who spends most of his money on drugs, and he takes some wild trips as a result, imagining himself in a ziggurat communing with its priest or having a long argument with his ex-boss, only to find it was a fence post. The middle class is somewhat different to Addison & Steel's, or even Galsworthy's - here, they're thugs in armour plated cars with heavy automatic weapons and have bodyguards.

Towards the centre of the book is this sort of funny episode, although it was incredibly dull to actually read, like a lot of critical theory. Baby has himself an ouija board, and wants the spirit of Che Guevara, which he gets. But Che gives him a multi page account of marketing theory, based on the premise that we don't watch TV, we are controlled by it. And TV certainly has a huge role in this novel. I'm tempted to say just how huge, because I did enjoy the premise, but I have been warned off by the Guardian review: Baby is "initiated into a huge politico-cultural conspiracy - but it is so delightfully realised that to reveal it would be an act of gibbering critical sabotage".

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The hostel is a couple of miles north of town, in a peaceful spot

I’d only been in my room a minute, maybe two, and I found myself in a fairly intense discussion with a retired school teacher, who had a lot to say about the state of the country, essentially that the Great has gone out of Great Britain. While I’d noticed some of the things he was talking about, at least I was able to reassure him that there were still, as Ian Dury might have said, reasons to be cheerful, by launching into some of the great things I’ve seen here. He was in New Zealand when he was young, even planned to move there but then met the lady that proved to be his wife, and that was it.

To go back to town for dinner, I decided to promenade along the North Beach Promenade

There’s not much left of Scarborough Castle

As I rounded the point, I had this weird experience, it sounded like there were about 50 8 year old kids chattering in front of me (having spent some time in hostels, I know exactly what that sounds like) but I couldn’t see how that would be, then spotted the culprits

I quite liked my wee wander along the waterfront

Behind me wasn’t so hot, classic English resort


but I still like the look of this hotel

Nice mural

Dinner was a great carvery, where I was once again struck with indecision: pork or turkey? Which is which? Have both, dammit. The man doing the carving was a bit of a grump (“Is that young bloke in the kitchen a foreigner?” “No.” “Well, he’s f*ng stupid anyway”) but generous with the food.

In the morning, I was saved from yet again having to walk into town to catch the bus, as my talkative friend dropped me off. Instead of going straight back to Whitby, I hopped off at Robin Hood Bay

This was a truly charming wee spot, as was its town, which basically had a single street

and then a bunch of alleys only accessible on foot

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When I left Birmingham at the beginning of May, I was a little torn about what I would do: in theory I was supposed to go to Galway, but there were places I wanted to see again and the cost of living in Ireland is a little frightening, even by comparison with the cost of living in England. So I put that aspect of the jaunt off for a little, and headed back to Whitby. It took me all day, but that was mainly because I had a three hour wait between trains in York – I might have made the earlier train which left about five minutes after I arrived, had I known about it or not had to struggle through the station with all my gear and take the time to stable my bike in York railway station. So, I found a quiet spot in the pub in the station, there was no way I was going to carry my bags about, and did some ale-powered work. Then it was up through Middlesburgh and across to Whitby.

Just seeing the place

again confirmed that it is my kind of place. Although the trudge up the 199 steps to the hostel

is not my kind of thing, by the time I had spent a long weekend there, I was really reluctant to leave. The hostel felt like home, helped by the really quite wonderful views from my room

Last time I was here, I found a good cafe but this time round, I found Beckett’s and once I did, the other place didn’t get a look in. I was in every day once I found it. Beckett’s is a cosy and very welcoming place which not only does good coffee, but has great cakes and has two walls devoted to books for sale. Breaking my rules about buying more stuff to carry, I bought two. One, I was reading the back cover and thought, hmmm that sounds a lot like Men Behaving Badly, who is copying whom? Then I saw it was actually David Nye’s Men Behaving Badly. Turned out to be pretty lame, as it happens, so I left it in the hostel book exchange.

On what was Bank Holiday Monday over here, I had a horrible attack of indecision: their cakes were good, their teacakes were good, how the hell was I to decide? I didn’t – I went for both. Somehow this same state of indecision found me paralysed outside another cafe on the way back to the hostel and in much the same state of mind, had to go in and indulge in more teacakes. My extensive research has revealed that the baker in Whitby makes a particularly yeasty and very addictive and fine form of teacake.

Another great find in Whitby was the Board Inn. I’d been for a really good meal of fish and chips and wasn’t quite ready to climb the 199 steps so thought a pint was in order. This led to me going back for another every night I was in Whitby. Watching the sun go down had a peculiar fascination

Captain Cook is on the horizon – here he is a bit closer

On the way through to Whitby, I’d noticed a wee town that looked kind of cool, Grosmont, then I found out that a steam train


was running from Whitby to a festival of steam at Grosmont. It was something I had to do.

Now, when you travel on the 17:55 to Lichfield Trent Valley, or even the 14:02 Virgin Pendolino to Euston, people tend not to be out waving, but put yourself in a steam hauled train and everyone wants to wave at you. A LOT of people seem to be interested in just seeing a steam train arrive

Mind you, some were quite spectacular

I wonder if people can work out what the special story is about this train

The Tornado is the first steam engine made in the UK in something like 50 years, and was commissioned in 2009, just a couple of months ago. Grosmont is not the biggest of towns,


and trains seem to be a big part of its life – I think there were three shops selling railway souvenirs. Going back, I decided to travel first class

Back at the station in Whitby, there was sword dancing

I've managed to knock off the second volume of the Forsyte Saga over the past couple of weeks, which I found to be quite strange because the Forsytes are decidedly thin on the ground. Yes, Soames Forsyte is there as a central figure, and his daughter is to the fore, but the rest drop into the background. Instead, the Mont family, into which Fleur married come in for a lot of attention. So, I came to like Soames in this volume, and was sad when he took the ferry in quite a dramatic way. Fleur is horrible, completely spoilt - her only saving grace is that she knows it. One of the more interesting features of the novel is that it sets up oppositions between the old ways and the new, including the modern use of language. Some of the phrases have stuck, but a lot were just a fad and long gone, to the point I hardly knew what was being said at times.

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That reminds me of a wee story I read in Tartu about a large cupboard. Apparently the library was pretty keen to maintain discipline, so when people talked in the library or were late returning their books, they’d be locked in the cupboard. One person spent three days in such fashion. Go into a modern library, you’d soon need a HUGE cupboard to apply these measures to the users!

Back in Lichfield, it was my last couple of weeks. They were pretty full on, as I was making as much use of the library as I could during the day then spending my evenings in a pub, as it offered free internet and mine was cut off at work. I did take time out for a few photos of the University campus:
Great Hall



Law library:

Law Faculty:

Main Library:

Random statue outside my window (the source was named, but not the statue)

and my favourite, Michael Faraday

He’s an impressive man and an unusual one for an educational institute to feature at its front entrance as not only did he have no formal education, but according to the theorists of the time, his most famous invention, the electric motor, simply could not work. Yet it did – he was the great experimenter, possibly the greatest ever. He later went on to become a Professor but not at Birmingham University, I have no idea what connection he might have with Birmingham – certainly not a strong enough one to feature in his Wikipedia entry.

I spent my last weekend in the area holed up in a hotel in Lichfield,

since my house wasn’t really conducive to hanging about in and decided to go walkabout with the camera.

Lichfield Cathedral is quite remarkably hard to get a good photo of, because it is so big and the Close is rather, well, close.

Walking around it at night was a pretty special experience, because it tended to be a ghostly looming presence when it was really dark. I tried taking a photo – you’d get the experience of seeing it!

Lichfield library:

Scooter convention:

One of the reasons to stay in town was to go visiting. First up, it was the house of Erasmus Darwin,

grandfather of Charles.

He was a doctor, and quite a guy. Mary Shelley credits his experiments in which he tried to re-animate corpses in the basement (visitors can only go down there under very special arrangements) with inspiring her to write Frankenstein, and he influenced Coleridge and Wordsworth with his own poetical works. Patients would tell of his travels to see them, his carriage laden with a pile of books to one side and food to the other. He invented all sorts of things, including a talking machine, a horizontal windmill

and a system for independent turning of front carriage wheels (to stop carriages falling over) which still informs motor engineering today.

He also had a few thoughts along the lines of a theory of evolution, but ran into a little opposition from the neighbours

His house was an important focal point for 18th century Lichfield intellectual life, which made Dr Johnson

a frequent visitor. Johnson’s house is right in the centre of Lichfield,


where his father was a not very successful bookseller

I have no photos at all of Birmingham. I was initially reaonably impressed with it as a city, but after spending four months there, I actually had trouble picking out any specific thing that I had warmed to, unless you count my Asian greasy spoon under the railway station. I think I managed three visits there in my last couple of weeks. One regret I have is that I didn't get to go back and say a finale farewell to Wolverhampton, as it had provided me with a variety of homes for a month or so and there's a very nice curry shop I wanted to dine at.

But time run out. At around 7:00 on 1 May, I slung my bags over my shoulder, reunited myself with my bike at Lichfield station and I was off.

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I planned to get a photo of its impressive front, but somehow forgot. There are several storeys facing the road in a kind of red brick gothic style, I don’t know what all the space was used for, but had the impression that it was barely used at all so am glad to see that it is getting new life as a hotel and apartments. Inside, there has been a massive redevelopment. Trains are on the upper level

along with a statue of John Betjeman

and a couple, obviously just re-uinited or about to separate for a journey

Downstairs there was enough to amuse me for my entire visit to London, a branch of Foyles, lots of cafes and various interesting shops.

I didn’t actually stay in a railway station for two days, however, I had films to see. First was the Swedish Let the Right One In, about a 12 year old boy who is a bit of a loner, picked on by the other boys, but then he makes this friend, when a new girl moves in next door. So, at one level it is a sweet movie about two outsiders finding each other and forming a bond, but the wrinkle is that she’s a vampire. Such is the sacrifice that her dad will make that he goes out and kills for her. The oddity of this as a vampire movie is that the audience is left empathising with the vampire.

On the Sunday, I had a fairly hefty walk as I planned to see Camden Market. On the way, I found St Pancras Old Church

which has been here since the 11th century, although it has had a bit of refurbishment along the way. There’s a cute story about burying all of the Church’s treasures so that Cromwell’s men wouldn’t steal them, but then not being able to find them again. It was only when the church was being rebuilt in the 19th century that they were found. Mary Wollenscroft is apparently buried in the graveyard, but I never found her grave. This


is a sundial which one Baroness Burdett-Coutts saw fit to give to the public (she was heavily involved in slum clearance in London (which has curious links to my reading in The Forsyte Saga), the first woman peer).

I’d heard that Camden Market had burnt down, but that was a bit of an exaggeration: much of it was still going strong,



completely crowded and still selling much the same sort of stuff it has always sold,

even though they have become mainstream in the meantime, such as Doc Martens. Even the street outside was chocker

It was nice to see that there were still some freaks among the civilians, young and not so young.

Down in Camden Lock, someone was actually using the canal

It was then a fairly long walk along to the top of Upper Street in Islington, and an unfortunately rushed walk down that street – so many interesting looking cafes, but I had no time to longer, as I was headed for the brutalist splendour of the Barbican


to see another film, 400 Blows, one of Truffaut’s early movies and said to be one of the defining moments of the French New Wave. I’ve seen a few movies from that movement that have left me completely bewildered, not as to what was going on but why they made it into a movie, but this one I enjoyed. Antoine is a troubled school boy, where he has a hard time behaving and is given progressively worse punishments. He kind of brings things upon himself: when asked why he was not at school and has no note, his answer is that his parents both died. Not sure how long he thought he’d get way with it but it wasn’t long. Home life isn’t much better – he has to sleep in a cot in the kitchen, and there doesn’t seem to be much of a relationship either with or between his parents. There is an almost farcical scene when, to get some money, he and his mate steal a typewriter (of all things) from his father’s work but are caught when trying to return it. This is the final straw, the cops get called in and it is off to borstal, on his mum’s recommendation. This suits him, in that he’d always wanted to be by the sea.

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My first night in the hostel in Riga, my room mate, a musician from France, suggested I go round the corner to a restaurant called the Lido - a place I had seen advertised and thought would be awful, but I let myself be persuaded. It was kind of awful, a buffet set in an extremely fake medievally themed room, with an old lady comatose in the window (I happened to walk past three times during my stay and she was always there, although not always comatose, otherwise I might have thought her a mannequin). Worst of all was the drink I bought, thinking kwass might be a local brew of beer. Apparently it is a very popular Russian drink, essentially a fermented malt drink - the recipe I saw online would have me add (to about two gallons of water) a single large raisin for flavour. I guess making it a large one makes all the difference.

In my wanders over the three days, I saw a lot to appeal. Oddly enough, the Old City was OK, but it was the newer part, the hundred year old Art Nouveau areas that really appealed. Here are some more or less random buildings that caught my eye:

These are known as the Three Brothers, some of the oldest standing buildings in twon, from the days of the Hanseatic League. I was sure that this building was some sort of church, but it turned out to be an academy.

Some I really did not like, mainly because they were out of place. This is a museum, in the Old City

and this is a bar

But it was the Art Nouveau style that really got to me: some streets were entirely given over to it, and the thing that impressed me was that no matter how impressive the individual detail one building might have, the next would be entirely different. I did go to the Riga Museum or Architecture to find out more about it, a place which claims to have 7000 exhbits. All I know, I went in and all they had to show me was a big banner, leant not a damn thing. But I was in the hostel talking with a couple of the guys, and we decided that the aesthetics of the buildings have so much in establishing the tone of Riga as a very relaxing place to be, and contribute to one's own sense of well being. So it is little wonder I spent most of my non-working time just wandering slowly around.

This is the fellow creditted with doing so much to get Art Nouveau going in Riga

As for reading, I decided to take a break between volumes of The Forsyte Saga, and went for last year's Man Booker Prize winner, Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger. It started off well enough - a fairly presumptuous letter to the Chinese Premier to clue him in to the current state of India. After a while, the narrative dropped back to simply telling the life story of the White Tiger, Balram. He had humble origins but somehow got the determnation to get ahead, and with India the outsourcing capital of the world, there are opportunities for those willing to do what is ncessary to grab them (in Balram's case, it is revealed very early in the novel that what it takes is to kill someone). A couple of people on the bus out to Riga airport noticed me carrying it and did a bit of a rave about it, but I wasn't left overwhelmed - it is a bit slight, a bit Slumdog Millionaire, a bit Nabokov lite.

The Baltic Air flight to London was straightforward. I have to confess to a minor error on my part in making the booking - I had found a decent enough price on a flight discounting site, but thought I'd check out the airline's own site. The price there was expressed in Ltvian Lats which, when I looked up the exchange rate was something like three to a pound. That made the flight a bargain, so I was happy to add extras, spending up large on the website to get myself a pork steak lunch wine, etc. I felt a bit sick, however, when I realised I was using the conversion rate for the Lithuanian currency - 1 Latvian Lat is actually about 1.3 pound, making everything just a tad expensive.

Arrival back in London was a bit of a slap in the face. Eastern Europe is so peaceful and quiet, and the people for the most part seemed pretty cool. But getting on to the train to London soon dispelled the sense of peace acquired. Someone was wrenching the table on the back of my seat, up and downm up and down... and it was making a horrible screeching sound. I thought it might be a young kid doing it, and that the parent might ask whoever it was to stop but no, this went on for a long time. But when I finally lost it and asked that she stop, the perpetrator was a teenager. All my request that she stop produced was her smiling at me, redoubling her efforts and she and her mates mimicing my accent among themselves. Luckily for my sanity they all got off at the next stop.

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I did far better the next night, at a place called Truffe, one of these buildings (apparently they lost some in the War and had them replaced by Stalinist neoclassical buildings, but I can’t tell which are the old and which the new):

Quite apart from a lovely dinner, I found myself mesmerised by some of the music playing. I have no idea what language the particular songs I really liked were being sung in, it may have been Estonian but they were also playing English and French sons so I can’t be sure. Nonetheless I told myself it was Estonian triphop.

I have a couple of other buildings that caught my eye. These wooden ones stood out as being a bit of a contrast to the prevailing mode

and then there was the Art Gallery (behind which was the Tartu Public Library, in which I ensconced myself for several hours work)

In my quest to find the Tartu Barge, I had quite a wander along the river

it was very peaceful


and I almost forgot that I was within a half hour’s walk of the city (although the three playground were a reminder). The river itself was not behaving very well

One other joy of Tartu is that they had a brand new bookshop, a branch of the one I liked in Tallinn, so I was in and out a few times for coffee and to enjoy

I stayed in a hostel which was basically just an apartment in a typical apartment building, the thing that made it special was the three guys running it. They seemed to be having a great time, kind of like college room-mates (they were American, Australian and English) and running the hostel as an extension of their home, which made for a very comfortable space. One fellow visitor had arrived a couple of weeks earlier for a two day stay, and was extending it day by day.

My hostel in Riga was a far more hostel like place, although a very very good one (except for the six flights of stairs) – a ten room communal apartment converted a year ago with a clear sense of style, (when I got back to England, I read a bit of a rave about it in the Guardian), lots of black, white and red

The building itself is an example of Art Nouveau, a movement which started around 1897 – apparently Riga has the greatest collection in the world

Something quite a long way from being Art Nouveau is the Riga Central Market

During the war they were used as Zeppelin hangars, but have been returned to use as a market



with a few flowers for sale outside

Here is where I sequestered myself to do a couple of days work, in the Riga Graduate School of Law library, two glorious examples of Art Nouveau


(sorry about the infection my photos seem to have caught).

As I hit Riga, I finally finished the first volume (of three) of The Forsyte Saga. Soames Forsyte started out as rather a horrible man, but he found his humanity when he had a daughter, and really does lover her unconditionally. There is this whole feud going on because Soames and Irene split, and she married Jolyon and had a son. So these is hell to pay when her son (another Jolyon) and his daughter (Fleur) meet and fall in love - they have no idea of the old history. Soames is able to get over it, though: if Felur really wants to marry Jon (as he's known) he will accept it. This, combined with his outstanding probity as a lawyer makes him end the book as its hero, rather than the villain.

To Riga (Latvia) remains copyright of the author NZBarry, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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I should perhaps mention as a warning that there is full frontal nudity at the bottom of this post, so go there now or stop when I say.

When I last posted, I was speaking of Helsinki. I think the one thing that lingers in my memory apart from what I have already mentioned is the buskers I encountered on my Easter Sunday walk through the near deserted city. They were not your ordinary class of buskers: one was playing the double bass, another a couple of blocks along had a clarinet and the last had an instrument I do not know the name of. It was the size of a largish zylophone, and sounded like a zylophone but with extra features, as if combined with a small pipe organ. The pipes were to the front, and by hitting a key with his plonker, the musician would make them sound.

But I was only in Helsinki until early on Easter Monday. I caught the ferry back to Tallinn, had a last look at and coffee in my favourite bookshop and caught the train south. Although brightly coloured, that did not hide its Soviet origins and the interior accommodations were decidedly Spartan

The journey down was uneventful and unspectacular, trundling through a nondescript forested region for most of the way, broken only by the occasional factory around which a town clustered. I began to doubt my destination, which was driven by the fact that it is not possible to travel from Tallinn to Riga in one day unless one has an early start. When early came around I, of course, was in Finland. So I took some advice and people said that rather than stay in the border town of Valga, I should only go as far as Tartu. They were right.

Once again, I fell in love with a place. Tartu was also a Hanseatic town, important because it is on a river connecting two lakes, one of which borders Russia. There were several hundred barges in use, ferrying goods backwards and forwards. Sadly, they fell into disuse around the end of World War 1, and then the timbers were found to be important for other purposes and not even one survives. The extraordinary thing is that in the last few years, a group of people in Tartu has, working from old photos and descriptions and learning all the skills necessary, first made the tools necessary to hand build one of these barges and then they built one.

It was out when I went to look at it, but the photos show it to be more of a small sailing ship than what I would call a barge. The same group is presently getting ready to make a Viking ship. They also throw quite a Christmas party: a fellow in the hostel told me of going and getting fairly sizzled, then having to spend time in the sauna prior to a refreshing dip in the river. Not so bad, perhaps, until you know the river was frozen solid and the dip was by way of a hole cut in the ice.

As for Tartu, unlike Tallinn it has not undergone all sorts of upheavals and transformations and so it is a place of quite startling formal beauty. A key place is the University, which has been around since the early 17th century after establishment by the Swedes. There was a bit of a gap during the 18th century and it was re-established in its present buildings very early in the 1800’s, becoming very important in scientific and philosophic thinking.

People like this fellow

helped – he founded “descriptive and comparative embryology” (no, I don’t know either).
So, the University is probably the most beautiful of the buildings in Tartu





I had lunch in the main canteen, which is in this building

and has pieces like this inset into its walls
.

Behind is the city park, which I liked because it was a bit rugged and had a touch of the wild about it and it had a ruined Abbey


although to be fair, it could only be said to be half ruined as one end is still in use as a museum

One thing that really features in Tartu is its street art (the third one down does feature complete nudity). The first I really paid attention to was this conversation outside the Wilde Hotel

One is indeed Oscar, but the city is honouring the other, a fellow called Eduard Wilde. You have to like a place that has this outside its town hall, simply known as Two Students Kissing

But there is one piece which I walked past without really paying attention, and when I did I was slightly disturbed, not because they’re nude or right in the middle of the central square, but because this is a father and son, and the son is said to be a mere 18 months old!

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Friday night in Tallinn is less pleasant – by 8:00 I’d seen one fight and run into lots of drunks. The woman running the hostel summed it up: lots of English men, looking for the cheap drinks and beautiful women (and yes, they were, very much so).

Two other cafes I liked a lot. One was underground

.

The other was out of the Old Town, in a very new shopping mall, within a bookshop, a very cool bookshop as it happens, with such a wide selection of English fiction I felt compelled to buy a couple of books, along with some DVD’s. They had a different cafe on each floor, both making decent coffee and one doing proper meals, such as the very tasty lambsteak I had for lunch. Dunedin would be improved if it had a bookshop like this one.

The major part of Tallinn was built in the Soviet Era – they built half a dozen suburbs, apparently very planned and in the neoclassical style. I’d have liked the chance to go explore. In between those suburbs and the Old Town is the downtown area, a weird assortment of styles running from the medieval through 18th century wooden to early 20th century neoclassical to stark glass edifices, all cheek by jowl with each other.

I walked all over and around this building, I'm not even sure it is abuilding and not a monument


and still have no idea what it is about – it showed very few signs of life, although it had the city heliport and a pleasant fountain

A couple of its neighbours, I found amusing. The photo might be a bit small to reveal the sign on this old wreck

but it is apparently the contemporary art museum. I remain a bit disbelieving about the sign on this place and all.

Tarkovsky shot one of his movies here, Stalker, but I will have to wait till I get home to see if these are props: my nice bookshop didn’t have that on DVD but I found a copy on trademe.

I’d ventured out without a jacket, and was finding it a wee bit cool but not unpleasantly so, until I saw this

This is probably the nicest part of Tallinn outside the walls

Maybe I should have stayed in Tallinn for longer, because I really liked it. But the original plan had been to take a ferry back to Rostock in Germany, more of a short cruise than a ferry (it takes a couple of days) but it was going to cost a fortune, way more than I could think of spending. So I hopped on the ferry across to Helsinki. It was a bit like being in a floating night-club cum cocktail lounge - a bit odd at 9:00 in the morning.

You'd think by now I could read a map, but i got way off course on the way to the hostel but eventually made it. Quite a big place, and iunlike any I've been in so far had big rooms with just two people in each. Kind of nice. Wandering back into town, I found a nice cafe called Engels Cafe opposite this church

I sat and ate some wonderful meatballs and roast potatoes in a sauce which had fflavours I couldn't work out, a slight sourness and a hint of spice. I went for a general walk, but it was cold and I wasn't feeling 100% so it wasn't a very exciting day. Coming back into town for dinner, I caught the very end of the Easter Procession - they really make a show of it. There was some black and white film being shown, using the church as its screen. The steps were occupied by dancers and lots of candles, and somewhere there were some actors, acting out the resurrection, singing quite operatically as they did it.

Easter Sunday in Helsinki is quiet - almost everything is shut, all the shops, galleries and the like. There were cafes and bars, that was it. I think it was even colder than Saturday, so I didn't linger.

Since I knew I'd be travelling and not wanting to carry lots of books, I brought with me the first two volumes of The Forsyte Saga. Each is just under 900 pages, it is a trilogy of trilogies, so plenty to keep me going. I've seen it on TV of course, but never quite appreciated what a loathsome person Soames Forsyte is: his attitude to his wife is the same as to any other property, she's a chattel (or, at one point, an unnoccupied house ready for a tenant), yet he can't work out why she doesn't like him. The night he forces himself upon her is the end. The opposite strand of the Forsyte family is all kindness and sentiment, in Jolyon.

To Helsinki remains copyright of the author NZBarry, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Now the roundabout nature of my travels really took over – I caught a succession of trains to Norwich, where I stayed in a very pleasant Travelodge. I’m afraid I have little to say about Norwich, not because I didn’t like it, quite the contrary, it seemed very much like a place I’d enjoy, but because I was working quite hard – the deadline on my other project, although still months away, seems very close. So I got to see the shops near where I was staying, found a nice Italian place for dinner and that was about it.

Apart, of course, for my reason for being in Norwich in the first place. Beckett’s Waiting for Godot. I haven’t read as much Beckett as I should have, but enough to know the pleasure he gives me and Godot must be his best known work: it has been said to be the best play of the 20th century even though nothing happens, twice. Not only that, but the actors were a bit special as well: Patrick Stewart as Vladimir and Sir Ian McKellen as Estragon. I had tried to see this a bit closer to home, at Malvern, but it had long sold out when I tried. Same for other places, like Milton Keynes, so I was pretty pleased to get anything at all for Norwich, even though it meant lots of tripping about. This, by the way, is what my friend from last week was so envious about.

My only regret is that I was a fair way back from the stage, so the finer details of their facial expressions was a bit lost to me. I’m not sure why I didn’t use the small pair of binoculars the Theatre Royal had thought to provide each seat with. But the play was brilliant, much funnier than I expected, given that it is about two tramps waiting for someone never shows up (I’m not sure that anyone today would go to this play not knowing that) and who are amusing each other while they wait – a “tragicomic allegory of the human condition”. Suicide is not far away at times. Beckett said he introduces the other two characters just “to break up the monotony”. I do wonder about Lucky’s one speech – an extremely long and incoherent monologue: does he memorise the same “narrative” or make it up on the night?

Anyway, it certainly made me feel pleased I took the time out to go to Norwich, even though it meant a fairly early start on Wednesday, so I could get down to Stansted and catch my plane: Easter in Estonia was the plan, and it provide to be marvelous. Easyjet did the job, getting through Tallinn customs was a breeze and I was on a bus into town in no time.

As always seems to be the way, it took me a while to find my hostel, despite having a map in my hand and a larger one on a placard in front of me. Perhaps if I had just looked around – it took a drunk sitting at the bus stop to point out that the rather large building across the road gave a vital clue to finding what I was looking for.

The hostel was quite unlike any I have been in. It looks fairly normal from the outside

but inside, the hostel was basically a single living room – the beds were in the same space as the kitchen and the staff, who just kipped in whichever bed was spare. But it was warm and friendly.

The Lithuanian Embassy is directly opposite

This must be pretty old,

because they banned wooden buildings in the Old City a couple of centuries ago, because of worries with fire.

On my first night, I had a bit of a wander around the Old Town, had one of the worst burgers I have ever had (that’ll teach me for going to local competitors to McDonalds whenever I see one) and was beginning to wonder whether Tallinn was really the place for me. All doubts were dispelled over the next two days – my wanders had just taken me to the least interesting part of town.

It also revealed to me that there is a huge and fascinating bit of European history about which I know nothing. Tallinn wasn’t part of Estonia until the 20th century, didn’t have an Estonian Mayor until about 1916. The Danes were there first, then they sold it to the Hanseatic League, a German trading venture which prized Tallinn highly as a seaport - so it was basically a privately owned city and stayed that way until the mid 19th century. They put up buildings like this

The Swedes came along and established the Lower (Old) Town was Danish, under a town council. All was surrounded by a wall
.

Of course, Estonia was a bit of a football in the 20th century – the Russians took control, then the Germans, and then the Russians. It has only had independence since 1991 but is very much a place on the go.

I spent two days wandering, mostly in the Old Town, and could have easily spent another couple. Here is some of what I saw, as I wandered:

The main street into the centre of Old Town is lined with bars and boutique shops and thronged with people

It opens on to the Town Hall Square

in which the Town Hall looks like none other I have seen

The wikipedia page has a couple of nice panoamic images of Tallinn.

More next time.

To Tallinn, via Norwich remains copyright of the author NZBarry, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Sennen is the first harbour north of Lands End, tucked in under here

and tiny

Nice beach – I stopped and had breakfast so I could watch it for a while

Then it was back past the hostel and into St Just to look around during the day – it is like a small Dolgellau

But with added bonus of a Welsh amphitheatre, which has been here since the 12th century

As you head up the coast of Wales, you go through its mining district, silver mainly (plus, I think, tin). The Levant mine was actually on a cliff face and under the sea. Little remains today, however

There is still a fully functional mine, in the hands of the National Heritage Trust – I did pop in and wandered around the outside a bit, but I found the Levant more interesting.

The land round here is a bit wild

So too are the roads – very narrow in parts, with drivers like me taking it easy but the locals, not so much. At one point I had to back over to let someone past so far that I was sure I felt the car come into contact with the stone wall, typically concealed behind a benign layer of foliage.

The entire town of Zennor, where some famous poet came to live (I hope he liked long walks in the countryside!)

and suddenly I was in St Ives, a town which presents a few challenges to those seeking to drive through – this is the road

I was pretty much convinced that I had inadvertently driven into a pedestrian zone (I’m sure it is possible) but someone was following me, and then there was a car park.

St Ives is a very pleasant spot – it has a lovely waterfront




and quaint narrow streets, full of shops selling ice creams (I was warned to watch for the seagulls when I bought one) pasties (it is Cornwall after all – have to say that I prefer the Birmingham version, Balti chicken), nicnacs and gewgaws. Importantly, I found one selling the local beer – the Admiral Ale by the St Austell’s Brewery won the best ale in the world competition last year (it was tasty).

I really did try to take a look at Penzance, you can’t go to Cornwall and not go to Penzance, but I got caught up in a mess of narrow one way streets and was spat out at the south beach

so decided to press on.

Next stop was Newquay (on the north coast), another town with a weird system of one ways, so I again got lost, but did get out to its main beach

People may have heard of Rick Stein, he’s been on our screens pursuing fishy dishes. He owns half of Padstow, which is along the coast from Newquay. Since his fish and chip shop opened as I drove into town, I decided to join the queue (yes, there was a queue to get into a fish and chip shop – luckily it didn’t last)

for a cod and chips. Not that special, really.

Padstow has a tranquil little harbour

.

I had one more essential stop to make, so I gobbled my dinner and headed off, still along the north coast of south Wales. I feel quite special, parking my car here

(possibly not that recognisable, although this bit of beach has been on our TV’s quite a bit). Maybe if we look at it from another angle

or pan around
.

This is Port Isaac, but perhaps better known as Portwen, the home of one Doc Martin. Even if it hadn’t been famous (in some quarters), Port Isaac was well worth a visit, despite another set of narrow streets (I drove in one


and had no idea how to get out again, until I watched some people leave – straight out the way you come in).

It is lovely




so I decided to hell with it and went to the pub for a reflective pint. I had hoped to sit on the balcony on which Doc Martin had so many embarrassing moments, but it seems to have been built special for the show: the only balcony I could find was a terrible small concrete thing, one table deep with a grill work. No worries, the sun was out, the beer was good and I was happy.

So, it was near dark already before I headed off to Exeter, where I was booked into the YHA. Nice hostel, but I have no idea about Exeter (and I so wanted to see the narrowest street) – I did try driving into town, but my first finding of the hostel was a complete fluke, so I wasn’t sure I could repeat it. I did check the car for scratches – there was a horrible ridged silver gash. Expensive!

To Exeter remains copyright of the author NZBarry, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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I was curious to see Cheshil Beach, after Ian McEwan named his novel in its honour. All I knew was that it had a few pebbles


but it is unusual in another way

Those pebbles provide a challenge to those wishing to take a gentle stroll along the beach, particularly if you’re trying to go up or down. The noise made was curious as well, a kind of crash to start with, then a lingering scrunching rattling.

After a coffee at a very tempting looking restaurant, it was already noon and time to go – I had a date with a pic’n’mix bin. One of the major victims of the recession has been Woolworths, probably the most iconic and longest established (over 100 years) brands to go (well, there are a bunch of empty shops still around). In Dorchester, however, the manager decided that wasn’t good enough – her branch was making a steady profit, her community was behind her, her workers all saw Woollies as their family, so she re-opened her branch. This hit the press big time, and there was even a TV documentary on her last week I happened to see; she’s one of my heroes of the recession, and seemed like a lovely person to boot. So, I headed for Dorchester, which is about 20 miles north. Here’s her shop


The place was humming, and I did see the manager, had this weird impulse go shake her hand or hug her or something – luckily she left the premises before I got myself arrested. So I bought a gallon of pic’n’mix and had some lunch. Dorchester is just a solid sort of market town, but it has a nice church


Next stop was Lyme Regis – now this is town which knows how to be a beach resort! It has the beach

with plenty of bars and cafes fronting on to it


There are even pebbles for those who feel a need

Pity about the homeless guys

Lyme Regis is a town with a looong history - it is recorded in the Domesday Book (1086) and gained its Royal charter in 1253. It is still a nice town, one of the more genteel along the Jurassic coast:


and in between was a glorious garden

I must confess that I don’t know where this is, somewhere not far from Lyme Regis, and it might even be Beer (Devon) but it seemed peaceful


Ah, it is Beer, a fairly small town, a full 139 miles from my destination according to the marvels of google maps. I think the pub in Beer has one of the lamest sort of punning names I have ever come across - Barrell O' Beer. It was so warm I had to have an ice cream then, since the time had crept on to being well after 5:00, I basically tramped it.

Even so it was around 9:30 before I got to the hostel at Lands End (down a one way mile long track behind a farm).

Lands End itself was closed – no loss, there is a big building that obscures any sort of view, and the building doesn’t seem to have changed since I saw it twenty years ago. It was tacky and new then, now it is tacky and old.

So, dinner was a bit of a step down from last night – a mile the other side of the hostel is the stone town of St Just. All I could get to eat at 9:45 was Chinese takeways, so I sat with them and a beer in the near freezing cold at a picnic table and dined al fresco (the picnic table reminded me strongly of Massey, as I spent half my life at a picnic table there). But the Star Inn

was still going strong, so I went in and had a nice St Austell’s ale as a nightcap.

To St Just remains copyright of the author NZBarry, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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