England Trip - a reprisal - first and brief 'after action' report posted

[FifteensAway]

If on my own, no issues - it is the wife who wants to blend in, mostly.  Though I disagree on the security element, sometimes standing out as an USA person is genuinely hazardous and that includes London  - and not necessarily entirely undeserved unfortunately.  And, I swear, absolutely zero chance of me wearing the red flag, um, hat, unless it's a San Francisco 49ers hat!

Once 'immersed' I'm happy to have people know I'm an American - and equally happy to disabuse them that we all think we are somehow 'perfect'.  Good?  Mostly.  Great?  Sometimes.  Ugly?  Too often.  Hope I never leave that impression behind me - or even in front of me.

Traveling, done right, should broaden both our horizons and our perspectives.  While my globe trotting has been limited, I've attended very cosmopolitan colleges and interacted with people from all over the globe.  So, I am very much looking forward to discovering people as who I am.  And likely traveling, on the organized tour, with people from other parts of the planet.  And from what I hear, London is a remarkably cosmopolitan place as may be a few other places on out travels.  So, I expect not only to absorb Britain but have glancing blows with other parts of the world - though get plenty of that right here where I live: Sikhs, Persians, various Africans of various colors, Ukrainians and Russians (a 'mixed' couple right around the corner), Vietnamese, Philippines, China, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, France, Mexico, other parts of Central and South America, etc.  Still haven't found that darned leprechaun, though! 

[carlos marighela]

I swear, absolutely zero chance of me wearing the red flag, um, hat, unless it's a San Francisco 49ers hat!

What even after the CIA colluded with Taylor Swift to rob you of the Super Bowl? 

I think you're taking a pretty sensible approach to it all. Security is a complex thing but distinguishable between politically motivated violence and ordinary street crime. The  former is extraordinarily unlikely statistically, the latter largely unaffected by nationality, being typically opportunistic in its nature. Of course wearing an 'I Love Ottawa' T-shirt might help with the former, albeit alloyed with the natural desire of anyone subjected to  Michael Buble or Celine Dion to visit violence on any available Canuck.

I used to participate in a couple of travel forums years ago. Visitors to Brazil seemed spooked at the prospect of murder, robbery and rapine and the advice was to try to blend in*. I used to see lots of 'dress down' advice. 'Don't wear jewellery', 'Keep your phone out of sight'. All well meaning enough, invariably proffered by people who had spent five minutes on the ground and had never ventured far from the tourist traps or their hotel. It ignored the fact that Brazilians typically dress as well and usually neatly as their income allows, use jewellery themselves (often expensive like my wife) and constantly chatter on their smart phones.

The same sage advisors would also suggest keeping cash in their shoes (euugh !) or wearing bum bags (what you Americans humorously call fanny **packs) all the while trying to blend in. This used to cause no end of mirth in our household. Never laid eyes on any local wearing a bum bag or removing their footwear to pay their bar tab (good luck with that!). To make it doubly funny, a subset of these experts would frequently advise folk to do the poverty tourism-favela jeep tour thang, Cos doing an hours prurient tour of a poor area, gawping at locals would er give you some sort of insight into life.

It's like anywhere, watch what the locals do and if in doubt ask. Contrary to the popular view, in my experience most people in most places are helpful and often interested in visitors.

Enjoy your trip. It's been some years since I have been back to the old dart and despite its current grim travails I find myself yearning to return, at least for a visit.


* With some reason, although invariably overhyped.

** In case you aren't aware, in most English speaking countries other than the old Estados Unidos, the word fanny denotes another body part altogether. Closely located but still quite separate in form and function.

[Cerdic]

When in London don’t bother about trying to ‘blend in’. The population is so cosmopolitan that everybody looks completely different to each other anyway!

Don’t worry about opening your mouth - there are over three hundred languages spoken here. As long as English of some description comes out you will be understood.

Don’t worry about looking like a tourist - there are literally millions of them in London. In fact, that is probably the easiest way to blend in!

Don’t worry about ‘being American’. Again, there are thousands and thousands of Americans in London. Many are tourists, many live and work here. On the whole we like Americans but we do like to take the piss a bit! Just our way of being friendly.

As regards places to go…

The ‘big three’ museums for starters. Natural History Museum and Science Museum are side by side in South Kensington, British Museum is in Bloomsbury. All are huge and free to enter.

Museum of London is excellent. Located in the Barbican close to the Tower and St Paul’s Cathedral. They have some really good ancient artefacts found in the mud!

Kew Gardens is really good. I’m not interested in plants and stuff but even I enjoyed our visit! Take the District Line tube or overground rail to get there.

Theatre. Really a major part of the ‘London Experience’. Doesn’t have to be a musical, though they tend to be the big popular tourist choice, there is always something for every taste.

Finally, just having a stroll! Although London is vast, most of the touristy bits are quite compact and walkable. The path along the South Bank is always fun with a variety of things to see. Some people like to wander around the ‘posh’ bits, like Chelsea or Belgravia for example, to gawp at the extravagant wealth! Greenwich (pronounced grin-itch by the way) is also good to explore on foot.

If you feel the need for a day trip from London, Canterbury is only an hour on the train and is very historic with the cathedral, walls, and stuff. If castles are more your thing, Dover Castle is humongous with stuff to see from Roman to WW2. The town itself is unfortunately a bit of a hole, but you can stand on the top of the white cliffs and see France and make rude gestures at them…

[manchesterreg]

If you visit the Tower Of London, ask if Beefeater Jimmy James is on duty, tell him a Scarlet Lancer sent you, you may get a good tour.

[FifteensAway]

Well, I tried the Jimmy James gambit - with no more result than a smile from the second woman to be a beefeater, very friendly lass, as she directed us to the next tour being a 'wet' tour, one of the few days we got rained on, had remarkable nice weather for almost all of the trip.

My thanks to all who gave advise. 

Two best "surprises" during the trip were getting to see the Northern Lights from the "wilds" of the Scottish Highlands (Laggan Hotel), can cross that off the list of "one day".  The other was an unscheduled but much enjoyed stop at Hadrian's Wall, the section near Haddon-on-the-Wall where I got to actually walk on the wall (okay, technically the ruins of the wall).  That was super cool.  Made it to the two regimental museums at Edingburgh castle (whirlwind through them both, alas).  And I crossed off what really was the last of my undone major bucket list items, I got to visit Stonehenge.  More later with some selected photos, must have taken a couple of thousand!

[Belligerentparrot]

I've lived in Edinburgh for nearly 20 years, and this year was the first year the northern lights were visible. You really got lucky with the northern lights on your trip!
Glad you had a great time.

[Doug ex-em4]

Look forward to seeing some photos and a sense of your impressions while you were here - the good (hopefully most of it) and the bad - we can take it

Doug

[FifteensAway]

Doug, overall impressions were quite good - really only sour note on the whole trip was the farewell dinner at the second pub included on the tour, worst meal out I've ever eaten and as little as courteous frankly.  Dessert however was quite good.  I did buy some chocolate bars from the pub to share with the local gaming lads.  The first pub's dinner was quite good including dessert.  Hotel breakfasts were actually better than most American hotel 'continental' breakfasts, though seems they all source from the same commercial provider.  But we ate well at breakfast every day with a nice array of options to choose from.  To my relief - and in combination with intended restraint - didn't gain any weight while on vacation.

As to our tour's encounter with the constabulary?  Was actually a fun experience, turned out we were pulled over for a regular random coach safety inspection (in Devonshire).  I was the only 'tourist' to get out and chat with the gentlemen and had fun asking them a "quite serious question" about order of jam or clotted cream first on a scone, they had a good time with it and didn't put Cornwall's ways down at all, just said they had a different approach.  Apparently in conversation with our Swedish tour director and 34 years experience tour driver from Liverpool, one of the higher ups got on the bus just before we were "released" to correct how to pronounce scone (not scon) - probably her Swedish accent, corrected with a mischievous smile.  Tour director was a bit mortified but it just added to the fun as far as I was concerned.  All the police were very pleasant with us.

Taken as a whole, with very few and quite localized exceptions, the lack of litter along the roadways was nice to see.  Did we see a sheep?  Well, at least one.  At a time.  Until we saw hundreds at a time.  Not sure we got to a million in view but tens of thousands for sure.  Joked with the tour director that my biggest complaint was we didn't see enough sheep.  Not sure she got the reference in as humorous a manner as intended.  And all the rape seed fields in vivid yellow made for some enhanced scenery that was already pretty nice to look at.

Question: is it true farmers are not allowed to clear out their hedges or stone walls?  I can see wanting to keep some but what an impediment to higher levels of productivity per acre in what must be a hungry island if true.  And surprised at how few (any) orchards we saw.  In my neck of the woods, they come in hundreds of acre lots, tens of thousands of acres if not hundreds of thousands of acres in total.

While going again goes to the back of the line because there are so many other places to see, a second trip would focus on at least a whole day at Stonehenge and many weeks at the British Museum and probably a full week at the Natural History Museum.  One thing I got tired of, though all were very nice, was way too many churches/abbeys/cathedrals.  And I was surprised how many of London's 'landmarks' are now hotels. 

But taken as a whole, it was a great trip and the only rude people encountered were the black cab driver's who got a bit testy with people crossing the roads in front of them.  As to was there any where I might want to live?  That would have to be the Lake District, Lake Windemere in particular, that is my kind of country.

Photos will take some time but they will get posted in due time.

[Charlie_]

Question: is it true farmers are not allowed to clear out their hedges or stone walls?  I can see wanting to keep some but what an impediment to higher levels of productivity per acre in what must be a hungry island if true.

It's true that less hedges = more productivity, but at the detriment to the appearance and character of the countryside. If all farmers ripped out their hedges the public would be up in arms! There are lots of public footpaths through farmland too, so it's not just farmers who go there.

My family are farmers - in my grandfather's day they did seem keen to remove hedges, but nowadays hedges are back in fashion, and we are encouraged to plant new ones - not to divide the fields more of course, but to fill in gaps on the boundaries where there are none (or where our grandads might have ripped them out years ago!).

Of course the other big reason hedgerows are good is for wildlife. A hedge and a 2 metre strip of grass at the boundary of a field is a haven for all sorts of small critters.

I do wonder at how much of the true character of the English countryside you would have seen from a coach! What you'd really want to do is go down all the little country roads where you have to pull into a gateway to let another car past, and get well and truly lost in the labyrinth of lanes between all the little villages and farms! You'd see lots of hedges then, and realise what a shame it would be if it was all just flat open farmland in every direction.

[Belligerentparrot]

One thing I got tired of, though all were very nice, was way too many churches/abbeys/cathedrals. 

Ha, have to agree but there is no way to win with this. Ideally you'd just want to see a couple of the best ones, but you need to see quite a few of them to know that they start being much of a muchness. "Stately homes" are in the same category for me.

[FifteensAway]

Charlie, great point about the wildlife - starting to see similar here in the states by the 'smarter' farmers who care about their land and long-term productivity of the soil.  Best example ever saw was on a TV report with one farmer having 'living' soil full of all sorts of organisms like earthworms, etc., and literally the other side of a fence inches away (barbed wire from the look) the soil was just plain 'dead' dirt.  You can only grow in 'dead' dirt by adding in all the nutrients and harder to battle the pests, animal or vegetable, etc., by using additives like nasty chemicals - pesticides, hebicides, artificial fertilizers.  Yields might be slightly less in the 'living' dirt but only marginally so and at much less actual out of pocket cost - and vastly less environmental degradation.  Dead dirt: eat today, starve tomorrow; Live dirt: eat today, eat better tomorrow.

Here is an aside, a few decades ago I read a report about the advent of artificial fertilizer - once put in place overall productivity per acre went down, not up.  Chemical companies lie through their teeth all day long every day and we all end up getting poisoned somehow.  May not be all bad but the net effect of the chemical industry is likely to be very bad indeed over time, plastics especially - who the fuck needs a tiny piece of plastic on the end of a ball point pen!?  Never a problem that I ever had but some salesman sold manufacturers on a 'need'.  Yeah, a bit of a sore point with me.

As to seeing the countryside, our routes were almost constantly bordered by fields on either side dissected by, mostly hedges, with some areas stone walls - much fewer of the latter.  Biggest exceptions were the western reaches of Scotland north of Glasgow, a lot of more open country but not entirely so.  And we did take a few routes where our coach had some interesting maneuvering to do to get through so I'd say we got a pretty good view of the character of the countryside you reference.  Included was one very interesting one lane road maneuver to let another car in opposite direction pass.

Bellingerentparrot, yeah, the stately homes were nice to see but I greatly preferred the 'real' castles - like the motte at Cardiff, or the older parts of Edinburgh castle. 

And up again in middle of the night, almost 4 AM, with the residual jet lag.   

[Harry Faversham]

You got a visit to Duxford IWM  on the itinerary, old bean?
The 'American Hall' is very humbling, there's a glass wall, with a graphic of every aircraft you Yanks lost, to break the Luftwaffe's back.
 

[FifteensAway]

Nearest we got to Duxford on the bus tour was Stratford-upom-Avon and we only got out of the central London area (?) on our own to go to Kew Gardens and Windsor Castle.  So, no IWM in Duxford, might have been a good option if we'd had more time.  But three weeks out of suitcases was a long time.  Glad to get back home.  Perhaps if one day we go again, we might include that.

For now, I'm trying to get wife interested in doing an Africa wildlife trip - but that would be even more expensive than our trip to the UK I suspect.  Currently, she is more interested in going to New York and taking our adult niece with us and keeping the trip shorter. 

Might be getting to photos tomorrow but that doesn't mean I'll be posting them tomorrow, will take days of work to get them in order to suit me.  And, don't worry, I won't be posting thousands or even hundreds of photos, just a few selected highlights. 

Speaking of highlights, a few things I was jazzed about seeing at the British Museum: items from Hallstatt and La Tene and Sutton Hoo, all very cool to a once-upon-a-time wanna-be archaeologist.  The Rosetta Stone was pretty cool, too.  Longest time was in the Minoan/Mycenaen room.  I am so thankful my wife was willing to go back a second day and be so patient in waiting for me to indulge my interests there.

Oh, another minor disappointment was at the British Library - the Magna Carta room was closed off.  Wondered if those irresponsible protesters damaging priceless objects in museums were the root cause of that? 

[zemjw]

Oh, another minor disappointment was at the British Library - the Magna Carta room was closed off.  Wondered if those irresponsible protesters damaging priceless objects in museums were the root cause of that?

There was an "incident" at the start of May - https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/05/11/elderly-jso-protesters-charged-attack-magna-carta/, so it was probably that