Road Trip 5: More castles and ‘Pemberley’

On the way north from Oxford we stopped at Kenilworth Castle, another of our free sites, ie English Heritage.  The castle is a huge complex with the first buildings erected in the 1120’s and expanded by King John.  It was the site of the longest siege in British history in 1266, the Lancastrian base for the War of the Roses and Robert Dudley’s, the Earl of Leicester, lavish reception for Queen Elizabeth I in 1575.  Robert Dudley was the ‘Virgin’ Queen’s favourite.  Unlike most of the other castles we visited, Kenilworth had Medieval furnishings and really came alive for us.

Kenilworth Castle

The stables now exhibition center

Ornately carved sideboard

The gardens Dudley made for Elizabeth

The old and the new

I love these arched windows

We drove on through the Peak District of beautiful windswept dales and moors.  Our goal was the great house of Lyme Park, aka Pemberley from Pride and Prejudice.  This was the only great house we visited.  I have some issues with great houses.  Although very beautiful, they were almost exclusively built on profits of war, slave trade and/or industrial exploitation.  Lyme Park was in the Legh family for over 600 years from when Edward III gifted it the 1300’s for services to his son, the Black Prince, during the Battle of Crecy in the Hundred Years War.  In the 19^th and 20^th Centuries, the Legh family made their money from coal mining.  After WWII, the house was given to the National Trust.  Despite my misgivings, I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the site where Colin Firth emerged from the lake to meet Elizabeth Bennet.

Pemberley and the Lake

The courtyard where Mr Darcy hurried to meet Elizabeth and her Aunt and Uncle

Beautiful garden

More beautiful country side awaited us in the Lake District.  We had a brief visit to Windermere and I could well imagine the Swallows and Amazons racing around the islands in the Lake.

Lake Windermere

Beautiful hotel in Windermere

We checked out Hadrian's wall and some old Roman ruins of a fort along the wall.  I felt we had come a bit of a full circle as one of my favourite statues in the Fethiye museum is of Emperor Hadrian. 

Hadrian's Wall stretching across Northern England

A house was built right over the Roman ruins

As we were driving along we came across a private castle.  The owners live on the premises but you can hire it out for weddings and parties.  Amazing!

Private castle

Next stop Scotland.

Road Trip 4: Wales with an Oxford detour

Our first stop in Wales was Caerphilly Castle, a 13^th Century castle with elaborate water fortifications of artificial lakes.  Caerphilly Castle was built by a rather unsavoury character, Robert de Clare, though probably he was no worse than other powerful Medieval men of the time.  De Clare lead the massacre of Jews in Canterbury in 1264, was excommunicated by the Pope, spearheaded the English takeover of Wales under Edward I (building Caerphilly to subdue the locals), then got involved in private wars against other wealthy men over land disputes.   The displays in the Castle were very well done, complete with Medieval weaponry.

Caerphilly courtyard

Large dining room

Lakes around Caerphilly

More water defences

Bob trying out medieval weapons

Moat around Caerphilly Castle

Through the cold, gray, dreary drizzle we drove to the centre of Wales to the little town of Rhayader where our friend Peggy lived.  We spent a few hours at the local pub across from Peggy’s house to await her arrival.  It was a great pub and a wonderful place to while away some time on a rainy afternoon.  We were given a hard time about the cricket, Australia having just performed shockingly badly in the latest Test (I mean really – all out for 60 is just humiliating!).  Bob’s counter that the Australian lost was all carefully planned solely to boost sagging British morale nearly caused an international incident – all in good fun.

We had a lovely visit with Peggy in her beautiful 15^th Century Tudor cottage.  It was great sleeping in a comfortable bed after 10 days in our little campervan. 

Peggy's beautiful 16th Century cottage

Peggy suggested we check out the nearby Elan Valley (Cwm Elan) which was quite magic despite the continuing drizzle.  The Elan Valley is the site of much natural beauty and several reservoirs with the wonderful names of Claerwen, Craig-goch, Pen-y-garreg, Garreg-ddu, and Caban-coch.  These dams were used during WWII in the testing for the Dam Busters raid which flooded the Ruhr Valley.

Dam of the Elan Valley

Moors of the Elan Valley

We really liked Wales and wished we could have spent more time there, especially when it isn’t raining.  I was quite sad when we crossed the border and there were no more road signs in English and Welsh and I loved seeing those unpronounceable names.

Welsh place names

Peggy, who is the president of the Mediterranean Section of the Cruising Association (CA, Med Sec) convinced us we had to go to the CA summer party near London.  So we detoured to Oxford so we could make a day trip to London to attend the very pleasant afternoon party in New Maldon meeting new yachties and hearing their stories.

Oxford itself looked a bit seedy from my memories of it in 1988.  Evenso it was good to see again with the boaters on the Thames, the grand buildings and fantastic museums.  We only had a short time in the Ashmolean Museum but saw the fantastic Arundle Marbles and Egyptian papyrus and mummies.

Rowing on the Thames in Oxford

Buildings of Oxford

Beautiful archway

Once again I wish we had more time to see everything but the way north awaits.

Road Trip 3: Key Haven to Bristol

After Stonehenge we were stuck in traffic and arrived much too late at our friend’s house in the little village of Key Haven on the Solent.  Fortunately Tazeena is very generous and took our late arrival in stride.  Tazeena has the most fabulous house overlooking the water. It is her family home and she has lived there off and on for over 70 years.  I could have sat in her kitchen forever watching the boats go up and down the straits.

Boating heaven

We had a delightful two days with Tazeena.  She is a great host and a remarkable and inspiring person, though she would cringe if she heard me say so.  I am so glad we met her in Marmaris and were able to visit her in England and looking forward to spending more time with her in the second half of the season.  

We had a quick visit to another castle, Hurst Castle, before leaving the Solent and then it was time to move on in our unsubtle pink van.  We stopped in Bournemouth to check out Bob’s childhood home and visit with his cousin, Stephen, the last remaining family member in England.   It is good to see Stephen doing well.  His most recent book, The Mathematical Connection between Religion and Science, is available on Amazon.  I can’t even begin to understand it but he certainly is a deep and profound thinker.

Bob overlooking the Bournemouth Beach where he spent so many hours as a child

After a quick trip to Bradbury Rings, an Iron Age hill fort which Bob use to visit as a child, we continued on and found a car park in Lyme Regis to bed down for the night.

Beach huts at Lyme Regis

The next day we drove through Dartmoor.  I loved the wildness of it and could well imagine Sherlock Holmes stalking the great Hound.

Dartmoor

Hound Tor

We drove on to Boscombe in Northern Cornwall to camp for the night overlooking the Irish Sea.  Boscombe is a charming rugged Cornwall village and we spent an hour or so in the morning exploring the harbour.

Entrance to Boscombe Harbour - Wouldn't want to come in here in bad weather!

Boscombe Harbour

The dreary English weather set in overnight and our planned tour Cornwall was thwarted by crowds and bad weather.  I was so looking forward to exploring the seaside villages and pirate coves of the Cornwall coast but we couldn’t get near them.  The peak season crowds were impossible.  So Cornwall was added to the ever growing list of ‘next time’ but definitely in off season!

We continued north and spent the night alongside a charming waterside park in Portishead, just outside Bristol.

Swan with her cygnets and adopted goose - Portishead

The next day we explored Bristol which seemed a dynamic city despite the dreary gray skies and drizzle.   We went to the docklands, of course, and visited some chandleries for supplies then had a look at Brunel’s SS Great Britian.  She was the longest passenger ship in the world when built in 1843.  The great ship was revolutionary for its time and had a varied history including bringing thousands of people to Australia during the gold rush.  The museum was extremely well done and bring the ship back from the Falkland’s to its present location was an amazing conservation effort.  I enjoyed the exhibit of this old ship much more than the HMS Victory exhibit.

SS Great Britian

Model of the ship with sails

Bow of SS Great Britian

The dinning room as it would have been

We stumbled upon the Aardman Studios and children engaged in a ‘Find Shaun’ treasure hunt throughout the city.  

Shaun the sheep

Next stop – Wales just across the Severn.

The hills of Wales across the Severn