What could possibly follow my fabulous trip to Highclere Castle last week? I had to find something totally different that would appeal in very different ways. And I think I did. Before I could continue my fun, however, I first had proposals to finish, webinars to complete, surveys to write and committee meetings to schedule and attend. Have to remind myself that it is necessary to do my “other” work also.
So I waited until Friday to head off on another adventure. This time I did the London Walks In the Footsteps of Sherlock Holmes. Now I must admit, I have never read any Sherlock Holmes stories. But I have enjoyed several different movie versions as well both the English and American television series. The walk was very interesting, led by the extremely knowledgeable Richard IV (IV because London Walks has so many guides named Richard). I didn’t take any pictures this time; I don’t believe pictures would have helped describe the walk much. Do you want to see a picture of Charing Cross Police Station, that used to be the Charing Cross hospital where Sherlock was said to have visited in two different stories? We did see where Arthur Conan Doyle lived for a time (right outside of Gordon’s Wine Bar, which my friends and fans know is one of my very favorite places in London. In fact, the marble gates in the alleyway of Gordons used to be an entrance to the street from the Thames). We saw both locations of where the magazine The Strand was located; The Strand is the magazine that published the Sherlock Holmes stories. I never realized that there were only 4 SH novels initially, but there were 56 short stories (the 56 short stories have since been published in 5 additional books). Arthur Conan Doyle was originally a physician (didn’t know that either!) and, in addition to writing SH, also wrote numerous other stories and books as well as several plays. I learned a great deal about the character, the author and the stories and should I decide to read them, certainly will enjoy knowing I’ve seen places that relate to the stories.
On Saturday Tim and I headed to visit the town of York. We didn’t decide until Friday evening, so purchased our tickets but couldn’t get reserved seats. Huge mistake; when we got on the train, almost every seat was reserved. We ended up sitting in some reserved seats for people who weren’t getting on until Newark. Once they got on, we got up and took the seats of some people who got off in Newark. Phew! Otherwise we would have ended up sitting by ourselves in different cars.
York is a town that has significant history. It is a walled city that was founded by the Romans. It has a huge 13th century cathedral , York Minster. You can walk on top of the walls 2.5 miles all the way around the city. Guy Fawkes was born and raised here. It was a delightful medieval city to wander. When we got there, we walked over to York Minster to take a look and then walked down the street to where Guy Fawkes was born.
We then took a right down a small winding street and stopped at Ye Olde Starre Inne for lunch, the oldest licensed inn in York. Delicious steak and ale pie! And wonderful warm cozy atmosphere. We then spent a wonderful afternoon wandering down small crooked streets and lanes, including The Shambles which is renowned in York. We found interesting little shops, several wine cafes, and an open air market. Lots of “hen parties” which are what they call bachelorette parties here. Numerous groups of ladies were having a great deal of fun apparently. Talked to two lovely bobbies who told us about the parties as well as what to watch out for at the train station.
We ended up at “the castle”, which is really only what remains of the castle. There is a castle museum that is supposed to be very cool, but expensive, so we opted to have a drink at the Hilton next door instead 🙂 Continuing our “hotel tour”. We then headed back to the train station and promptly got lost. I knew we needed to go back following the river, but turned the wrong way down the river. Thank goodness for Google Maps; we stopped after 10 minutes and turned back around. So we had a longer walk back than we had planned, but such a pretty town that it didn’t really matter all that much. In fact, still got back way too early, so had another drink at the pub next the train station.
Finally boarded – we went back in the first class car! What fun!! Decided we wanted to do that just once while we were here. Much more comfortable seats, trolley car to bring you food and drinks. Lovely experience. Saw the disturbing nuclear-type columns pictured above; who knew they had those in the English countryside? We got back to Fulham around 8:30, so stopped by The Tommy Tucker to say hello only to discover that our very favorite bartender Patrick was leaving for a new job. So glad we were able to stop and say goodbye. We wish him much success!
I forgot to mention that Tim left his phone on the train on our way to York. We realized it when we sat down to eat lunch. Immediately called and the phone was answered by Stefan, our good Samaritan. He turned the phone in to the train office when he got off in Newcastle. I spent Monday on the phone trying to track down where the phone was and how we could retrieve it. Finally got it figured out and I spent Tuesday back on the train heading to Newark, where the lost property office was. Thankfully was able to get the phone and head back, but it was truly a wasted day. Only highlight was seeing Platform 9 3/4 in Kings Cross Station
I didn’t do any walks for the rest of the week (had planned one for Tuesday, but clearly that had to be rescheduled). On Thursday instead I went out in search of what I had decided I want for my “London souvenir” – I want a fleece jacket that has a small Mind The Gap logo on the front to commemorate not only our trip but also this blog. Thought I might find one at the London Transportation Museum gift shop. Stopped for lunch first at Rules. I learned about this oldest restaurant in London on one of my London Walks (maybe the one on Covington Gardens?). Please click on the link to learn of its history, its pretty cool. Anyway, I wanted to go back and try it, so decided today was the day I would treat myself. Had a phenomenal lunch of roasted cod with wild garlic mashers and carrots, followed by a sticky toffee chocolate pudding (cake). Oh, and a nice glass of french rose of course. Was very expensive, but really delicious. It had rained while I was having lunch, but thankfully began to clear as I began my walk. Got to the museum shop, but no luck. No clothing really to speak of. But I was in Covington Gardens, so decided to stay and wander around a bit I do love this area. Ended up at Punch and Judy’s on the balcony watching the street performers in front of St. John’s Church – the Actor’s Church – which is in the first scene in My Fair Lady. Met a lovely woman visiting for the day from Amsterdam and then another woman who was celebrating her birthday. Saw some pirates roaming around the Gardens. Afterwards I walked down to the Coal Hole to meet Tim and some of his work colleagues for a few drinks before we headed home.
Friday night we stayed in Fulham. Had dinner at The Malt House. We’ve eaten here before; its in a lovely old 18th century building and the food is typically very good (and of course a very decent wine list). Can’t recall what we had, but you can look at the menu to see how yummy it sounds. We left and visited a couple of pubs; first we tried Vagabond Wines, which is a wine bar & wine store right across the street fromm The Malt House. You can do tastings of over 100 wines there – or just have a glass of something different. Unfortunately, they were packed with a private party so we couldn’t go in. We then tried a place called The Lucky Pig. Mistake! Clearly this is a young singles kind of place where a disco ball turned and the music coincided. We were definitely the oldest ones in the place. Tried one more spot – The Cock Tavern – with much better luck. Slightly older crowd, much less noisy, better quality of wine. Once we were done, we called it an evening and walked back to our flat so we could get up early for our day adventure on Saturday.
Saturday we got up really early and headed to the train station to go to Bath. We were very excited about this trip, as everyone who lives here says it is definitely a place to visit. And they were absolutely right! Probably one of our favorite towns that we have visited, for may reasons. Bath is located in southwest England on the Avon River and has a natural hot springs located under the city. It is another World Heritage Site. The Romans built large bath houses to take advantage of the springs; the city (or whomever it is that is responsible) has done a really phenomenal job of preserving the ruins. There is also the Bath Abbey that originated in the 7th century. The English nobility decided that the springs in Bath had restorative power, so it became quite a fashionable place in the 17th century.
When we arrived, we headed immediately for the baths. It was very chilly and it had started to rain, but luckily the baths were not too far from the train station and when we got there, the line was still inside the building (just 10 minutes later it had already snaked outside). You get listening devises when you pay your fee, which was quite nice. The first things you encounter is an upper terrace that goes around the main bath pool and then some extremely well done exhibits about life at the baths during Roman times.
Next on to the baths themselves. In addition to the main bath pool, there are changing rooms, smaller heated pools and even a cold plunge pool. To see a map of the baths, click here. One of the things they did that was quite ingenious (I think) was they piled tiles to serve as the foundation of the floors and then pumped warm steam under the floor where it could circulate and therefore keep the floors warm also. Although you are not allowed to go into the baths, you do get a chance to have a drink of the “restorative” waters at the end. I took quite a number of pictures, as you will see below. Couldn’t help myself, it was just so COOL!
Once we left the baths, we headed to lunch. We made a reservation at the Bathwick Boatman, based on a recommendation from a colleague of Tim’s who actually lives in Bath. It was a bit of a walk, but we got to see residential Bath, which was really quite lovely. Beautiful Georgian houses and smaller quaint homes. We also passed where Jane Austin lived, totally by accident. That’s always fun. The restaurant is located right on the river, and if you ever go, apparently they also have guesthouses that can be rented to stay. Might be a pretty cool way to visit Bath. The food was just phenomenal. I had the soup of the day which was tomato chili. Warm, filling with just the right touch of heat. Tim had the calamari with homemade tartar sauce that was delicious. My main course was creamy smoked salmon tagliatelle – I wish I had taken a picture, as it was truly beautiful as well as tasty. Tim had Thai curry chicken, also very good. If you go to Bath, we highly recommend this place!! It is also possible to get here by boat, but water levels were too high, so we ended up walking back to town.
Once done (and very full!) we headed back into town. The Pulteney Bridge that crosses the Avon River was designed so that it has shops on either side. The Avon River is beautiful. We wandered the pedestrian streets of Bath all afternoon, stopping to shop once in a while. We stopped into the smallest pub in Bath and sat outside enjoying the fact that the sun was finally coming out and enjoyed people watching.
We ended up at the Roman Baths Kitchen Prime location – right in front of the baths and right next to the Bath Abbey, which is just absolutely gorgeous. We sat outside and listened to a variety of street performers (from opera to trumpet player to guitar player who sounded like Jim Croce) while we enjoyed a bottle of malbec and a chartcuterie plate. Service was spot-on; again, we would highly recommend a stop here. Sadly, our afternoon was over way too quickly and we had to head back to the train station to go back home.
Once we got back to Fulham, it was fairly early so we decided to stop by the Broadway Bar and Grill for a nightcap. This has been a local favorite of ours. Bad decision. Lately we’ve noticed a significant decline, which makes us sad. On this particular evening Chelsea had a home game, so the pub was full. There are bouncers at the door who aren’t terribly nice and almost no tables to sit at. That in and of itself isn’t all that bad. But I ordered two glasses of malbec and the bill came to 24 pounds (that’s 36 dollars) for wine that was only so-so! When I asked if I could just purchase the bottle instead (only 12 pounds more for the bottle, which would have been 2 more glasses), the bartender couldn’t figure out how to do that and actually was pretty rude, claiming to have been at work for 18 hours. Oh well, we drank our very expensive, only mediocre wine and went home.
Its been a very fun two weeks. It’s hard to believe that my time is quickly coming to an end. I imagine I will do a couple more walks and then next weekend Tim & I plan to do a “favorite haunts” weekend. So you can look forward to that, I know I am. Until then,
Cheers mates!
Mind The Gap 