From "eh?" to 'aye!'

Tuesday, 1 May 2012

A Trip with a Twist

In February, Matthew and I travelled to Durham with the intention of renewing our visas at the post office in town. For some reason, you can do this there but not anywhere in Scotland, not even in Edinburgh, the capital city. Go figure. We got a good deal on a hotel, packed all our paperwork and set out on the train which is my favourite mode of transportation because it affords views of cattle, sheep, the coast, and - if in season - lambs and canola fields. Oh yeah, and it means I don't have to drive on the wrong side of the street. :)

To make a long story short, we had not been sent all the required paperwork in order to renew our visas at a post office. We were informed that we'd have to make an actual appointment at a UK Border Agency office. After a rather tense, stressful hour of sorting this out we decided not to let it ruin our trip and set off to see the sights we had come to see. Day 1 was Matthew's choice: Durham Cathedral and Castle.

Durham Cathedral as seen from the bridges.

Durham Castle as seen from the bridges

We had a lovely time exploring these impressive structures. They do not allow photos inside of the Cathedral proper, but we also got to stroll through the cloisters and climb up the square tower for views over the whole region. Durham Cathedral is built on the highest point in the whole county - so it would have been super cool if only I weren't so afraid of heights...

Durham Cathedral's impressive main doors.

We found a solar clock in the cloisters!

The cloisters

Heading up to the tower fearlessly.

Arriving at the top of the tower and sitting, paralysed with fear, while Matthew took a few photos.

View from the top! Look at Durham County.

Matthew admires the architecture.


I just thought this was a fun shot. :)

After the Cathedral, we had a guided tour of Durham Castle. This is a unique castle because it is the former home of the Prince Bishops of Durham County (they could mint their own money and were in charge of kind of defending the north of England) and is currently a university residence. Lucky students! They actually live in a castle! Again, because it is a residence, we could not take photos of the interior, but hopefully you will enjoy these exterior shots.

Grand Entrance

The Keep

Main entrance from courtyard.

Clock tower in the courtyard.

Day 2 we went to Beamish - the attraction of my choice. Beamish is what is called an "open air" museum here, but would be called a "living history" site in North America. So in other words, I was finally getting to go to a museum like Black Creek Pioneer Village! I was through the roof with excitement and the weather was absolutely gorgeous, all of which made for a great outing. Beamish is not in the city of Durham itself, so we enjoyed the bus trip out of the city and fairly quickly arrived at the green fields and hills of Beamish.

This is a very large site, divided into 4 sections, and it is therefore able to represent the Georgian, Victorian and Edwardian periods at different locations within the site. In the winter, the Pitt Village and the Town are open and those 2 locations alone were more than enough to fill a day!

Our first view of Beamish. I love that there are sheep!

We were transported from section to section in fully-restored, vintage trams. Awesome!

Our favourite shop in the Town section. We got to see hard candy being made.

Buying hard candy at Jubilee Confectioners.

I got to see a real-live English Omnibus (labelled Borwick's).

Still need to figure out what exactly sheep dip is... There were plenty of vintage signs advertising it.

The print shop.


A February day warm enough to have a picnic lunch outside? Yes, please!

Home Sweet Home - A Victorian Parlour in all its crazy glory.

Hey! - I know those folk in the mirror...

It's as if they knew I was coming.

Can I have a kitchen like this?

Another fun sign found in an original Co-Operative building.

Hee! Hee!

The Pitt Village - The mining section


Houston, we have a problem - these desks are too wee.

A Magic Lantern set up in the church at the Pitt Village. Matthew points to the innovative blinds that roll upwards to accommodate the arched windows.

Mining canaries!

We spotted a furry friend on the settee.

Historic "Back-to-backs"

In the yard of a back-to-back. One shed was for coal and one was the loo and we can't remember what the third was for...

Mining machinery

Apparently, people stand in line for hours for this fish - it's that good!

Good-bye, Beamish!

We had a lovely trip, despite not being able to renew our visas (put your minds at ease that we did successfully renew them in Glasgow in April) and I would definitely recommend Durham as a worthwhile place to visit. And don't let Beamish's remote location dissuade you from going for your own fantastic day out!

Saturday, 3 March 2012

Paint-Your-Own-Pottery

Since moving to the UK, I have subscribed to Living Social and Groupon. These are deal sites who send you daily e-mails for discounts on entertainment, meals, beauty, and travel. Most of the time I don't buy anything but every once in a while, something comes up that is quite exciting.

A few weeks ago there was a deal on for paint-your-own-pottery at Doodles workshop, here in Edinburgh.
http://www.doodlesscotland.co.uk/
I have been trying to foster my creative side, so I bought the voucher and invited some friends along. Catherine, Pip, and I went the evening of the 22nd of February and had the workshop to ourselves. We had a great evening of chatting (mostly while staring intently at the piece we were painting). I was quite scared that I would end up creating something that looked like a four-year-old had produced, but my William Morris-inspired plate actually turned out to be quite gorgeous! I will definitely treat myself with a few more trips there. :)

Catherine and I hard at work on our creations.

You can almost see the concentration emanating from our brains.

My un-fired plate.

Pip and I show off our un-fired works of art.

Also, phone booths are excellent places to keep warm, as we discovered while waiting for Matthew to come pick me up at the end of the night. Perhaps a little sketchy and ghetto - but nice and cozy. :)

Phone booths were built for three...

And - voila! The finished piece, fired and glazed. I can hardly believe that I actually made it. I hope it's not beginner's luck!

A Monkish Adventure

In October, our good friend, Liam, was again in Edinburgh to visit his girlfriend, Pip, and Matthew and I had tons of fun hanging out with them.We (Pip, Liam & I) talked of the 4 of us taking a road trip somewhere and connived to surprise Matthew with a day trip to Lindisfarne Island (also known as Holy Island), in the North of England. It is a tidal island whose 2 biggest attractions are: a ruined priory and a wee castle. Those of you who know Matthew will immediately see why he wanted to visit!

The only day that would work for all four of us was October the 22nd so we looked up tide times for that day. It was safe to cross over to the island between 00:45 and 9:30 and then to cross back between 13:40 and 21:50. So Liam booked the car and I wondered how on earth I was going to get Matthew to go to bed at 9p.m. on a Friday night so that we could get up at 6a.m. on a Saturday. Not an easy pitch! I eventually had to tell him Friday night what we had schemed and Matthew was very surprised and happily went to bed early.

We awoke before sunrise, packed our snacks, camera and outerwear (an island in October is bound to be chilly) and set off around 7:40a.m. Liam did a brilliant job at driving stick with the wrong hand on the opposite side of the road and we were treated to a very beautiful sunrise and hills dappled with sheep on our journey. At 9:10 we sped across the causeway, praying the the tidal charts were very accurate in their timings! Once safe across we parked, bundled up and head off into a beautiful day.

The first order of business was getting breakfast for Pip and Liam (who had not eaten) and second breakfast for Matthew & I (who had). We dined at a wonderfully quaint and homey cafe that seemed to partially be decorated with a maritime theme and partially just cluttered with "old stuff". It was wonderfully eclectic in any case. We all loved the lobster claws bedecking the walls.

After breakfast we set out to the post office (for the requisite cash) and then to wander on to the priory. Because the tide times were so early, the island was sleepy and peaceful. We felt like we had it all to ourselves and enjoyed taking in the quaint, quiet streets.

Quiet streets of Lindisfarne

Gearing up.

Pip is so excited!

A sleepy street.

We found a garden beside the post office.

Pip and Matthew examine the cross in said garden.

A peaceful little cottage.

After our little nosey about we arrived at the Priory. Because of the early tide times we had it almost all to ourselves. It was just us, the blue skies, sunshine and puffy white clouds, which made for great photos. I was sufficiently bundled against the island's winds so that they were not a problem. We climbed all over the place taking shots of the exquisite architecture and each other. A highlight for me was finding traces of the biggest bake oven I have ever seen! I could lie down in the circle (hopefully no one ever did that while it was fully functional...). I also liked looking out at the skyline - or rather lack of it. Just sky and water and and beaches and fishing boats.

The Rainbow arches of Lindisfarne Priory

Pip, Liam, and Matthew admiring the entrance wall of the Priory.

Admiring the pattern in the stonework.

Cotton ball clouds!

A most gigantic bake oven.

A man in ruins.

Silly shot!

All of us jumping high in the air - oh yeah - except me!

When we had worked up a sufficient appetite from doing ridiculous things like cartwheels amongst the ruins and a photo shoot with Liam's amazing camera of all of us in mid-air, we had lunch in a quaint house-turned-restaurant where we ate upstairs in one of the bedrooms and the bathroom had a shower in it! When we emerged after our meal our sleepy little island that we had all to ourselves had vanished and we found instead streets heaving with tourists. The causeway had opened up again. We found refuge in the Lindisfarne Gospels Museum, to learn more about what makes Lindisfarne so famous (those gospels and the mead). Pip got some good research done for her paper on the gospels, we got to do some brass rubbings, Liam had a close encounter with a Viking and in general fun was had by all!

A narrow escape.

After that we made our way to the tip of the island to the story book castle perched atop the hill. We were rewarded with amazing panoramic views of the island and sea. When we had finished our tour of the castle we enjoyed watching the sun set from the upper level parapet.