We're off and running in the UK

First UK trip leg starts in Frome, Somerset, England. Our plane landed about a half hour late at Gatwick, and Scott's bag was on the luggage carousel by the time we found our way there. Getting to Frome was not as quick as we originally thought, and we didn't have a restful night's sleep due to a young child who kept crying and making loud noises. In any case, we had to wait at the airport until Noon before we could catch our first train to Clapham Junction where we switched trains for our two-hour ride to Frome. Countryside was green and filled with lots of attached housing as you would see in company towns. We both fell asleep on the train off and on, not because we wanted to, but because we couldn't keep our eyes open.

Once we reached Frome, we decided to try to walk to our rowhouse. We found a really nice grocery store along the way and picked up some provisions for Happy Hour and breakfast. We made it to the town center then realized after getting directions that walking up hill was going to be too much for us at this point with little sleep so we found a taxi. Ride to our home for two days cost $4 pounds or $5.52-- not bad! Our accommodations are really nice, and we thank our good friend Paul Schultz for making arrangements for us to stay here gratis.

Ate our first dinner in a local pub called The Griffin, and it was delicious-- best french dip sandwich I've ever had with homemade au jus and coleslaw. Scott had a blue cheese burger made with local cheese. We were in bed by 8:30 p.m., woke up about 3 a.m. and read for a little while then went back to sleep until 9 a.m.

That's all for now as have to get going, but I will write more later. photos above are the Frome Library, St. John's Church dating to 865 AD as a worshipping location, and Cheap Street filled with local shops and restaurants. Frome is quite charming and filled with history.

Above photos go with Frome and the church. Cemetery is connected with the church, and Scott noticed one of the graves was that of a WWI veteran. You'll have to ask him the story of the guy once we return, it is a sad one. We spent an entire day wondering around Frome starting at the Wednesday outdoor marketplace where we bought some croissants, olive bread, and a pork pie for dinner. All were delicious. Went in search of the Three Swans pub for lunch as it's the oldest in town, but it was closed. However wouldn't you know there was a used bookstore right next to it. Well, whatever books Scott buys at this point, he has to carry. ;) We found a local pub called the Blue Boar for lunch, and had some nice conversations with a young guy who was interested in why we came to Frome from Oregon, and he just loved the fact that Scott was trying to explore his family history. The people were very friendly in town, food delicious wherever we ate, and lots of history for us to explore another time, hopefully. Oh, I did go see the Downton Abbey movie in Frome because it was at the local theater for the mere price of $4 pounds. Scott didn't want to go, and I sat between two guys and their wives. There were a lot of men there, which I was surprised about, and they seemed to like the movie as well. It was fun to walk out of the theater and be in England.

We left Frome and headed to Gloucester with a stopover in Bath. Jill Hibbs had warned me that Bath is very touristy and only worth a tour then move on, and she was correct. I wandered around quite a bit while Scott sat with our luggage because he was not interested in seeing much. A local told me to go behind a wall of buildings to gain a different viewpoint as I was walking toward the museum, and there was a beautiful park behind it. The photos I'm posting are the Bath botanical gardens, and the weir in the river. Also a church and some shots that give the feeling for the walled buildings and curvature of the town. Also will post a few shots of Gloucester, which seemed more like an industrial town with worker housing. We had a great dinner there and stayed in a cute really old hotel. Dinner was at a Spanish-Portuguese restaurant where I had Chicken Piri Piri, which I love, and Scott had the best paella ever. It was a fun evening after a pretty exhausting day of traveling and sightseeing. Enjoy the photos below.

Photos below are from Gloucester. Next up will be from two days in Cardiff, Wales where we really enjoyed the town, people and scenery.

So much food for dinner that we had to take some with us, which we ate the next day.

We spent two really fun and exhausting days of touring around Cardiff, Wales. Above is a shot of the downtown area, and the lower night pic is the view from our budget hipster hotel room. We walked around town on our first day and went to the Cardiff Castle, which had a great museum filled with a lot of Welsh history and military involvements from 16th century through the Gulf wars and Afghanistan. We spent a lot of time going through the museum then ventured out into the grounds, climbing to the top of the tower of the fortress. I also went through one of the apartments. Photos below: We climbed to the top of the castle tower and the other two pics are the view from the top. You can see from one of the views that the castle is in the middle of the city.

Below is a carved wooden mural that extends along a whole wall of the entry, it is coated in some other materials but can't remember what.

Above is the castle apartment library, my favorite room, and below is the sitting room

The museum also had a children's area, and Scott decided I should try on one of the uniforms-- however I'm not the right size obviously. I actually was not saluting but brushing the hair out of my eyes when Scott took the photo.

The next day we took a day trip to St. Fagan's a Welsh village containing farmhouses and other buildings from throughout time. Many of them were dismantled from their original locations and moved to the site. Some were reconstructions, but it was all very well done and interesting. We didn't know about this historical place until a gentleman at our Gloucester Hotel told us about it and said we had to go because it is free, and there was plenty to see even if it rained. It did rain off and on while we were there, but it really wasn't a problem because you could just duck into a building.

Amazing stone wall with pig sty behind it.

one-room schoolhouse that operated from 1880s to 1915

Buildings constructed from materials and style of the Iron Age

Bedroom from inside the thatched roof farmhouse below dating back to 1790s. Look at the thatched roof ceiling.

From Cardiff, we did some fast pace traveling on our way to Ireland. First we went to Fishguard, a cute little fishing village at one time, and the home to the ferries that travel to Ireland. The weather had been drizzling off and on so I was nervous about the 3 1/2 ferry crossing as I wanted to have smooth sailing since I get seasick in rough seas. We spent the night at the James John Hamilton Guesthouse, which turned out to be really fun. However getting there was not so easy. We came in on the train, and we thought we could walk to the guesthouse, but it turned out to be all uphill-- not fun when you're dragging your luggage. Luckily, I was asking for directions and asked at a gas station convenience store if I should get a taxi, and one of the customers offered to give us a ride-- even though he was going the opposite direction. He had just finished running a 10k and had taken first place so I think he was in a celebratory mood. In any case, he dropped us off at the guesthouse, and Steve the owner greeted us at the door. We had a very nice room, and upstairs was the living room and kitchen where we had a 'do your own breakfast.' After Steve showed us our room, he said he was making some soup if we wanted to come and have some then we really wouldn't need to go buy any food. There weren't many guests at the house besides us-- a couple from Australia who were going to a religious site of miracles, and a young German gal who is a pediatrician specializing in cardiac care.

We decided to walk around town first and buy a few provisions-- bottle of wine and snacks. The town is filled with history and was the location for the movie Under Milk Wood starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor-- and also the location for Moby Dick. The town dates back to the Viking era and has its own charm. It is nested in between mountains, and I think the German doctor was planning to do some hiking. Our stay was too short for that, but we did enjoy walking around and of course we visited a local pub and each had our first Guinness of the trip. Served very cold, which was a surprise to me. We walked past a Chinese restaurant so decided we would try it-- it turned out to be "take-away" so we brought our meal back to our room, which was fairly large. Before we went for dinner, Scott wanted to relax so I went upstairs and tried some Steve's delicious potato/leek soup, and that is when I met the German doctor. I met the Australian couple after we returned from our walk, and I went up to get a couple of glasses for our wine. ;) Steve ended up being a great storyteller, and he kept us around until we needed to leave to catch our ferry. He also was nice enough to drive us down the hill to the ferry. He said he loved having a guesthouse and meeting so many interesting people and hearing their traveling stories because mainly well-seasoned travelers stayed at his place. He had lived in the states for 15 years and several of those in Newport, OR working on a fishing boat. Running the guesthouse is his semi-retirement. He said he still had plenty of time to close it up during the slow months and travel himself. Here are a few photos of Fishguard, Wales, and the Welsh countryside on the way there.

Looking toward bay

Welsh countryside

Our guesthouse

Fishguard Street in upper part of city center

sign on street corner

From Fishguard the next day we took the ferry, which actually turned out to be a very comfortable and smooth trip to Rosslare. From there we took a taxi to Wexford, which was about 15-20 minutes away and spent the night there. It was not a very picturesque town, and we found the Irish restaurants seem to close early and it was a Monday evening. We ended up having dinner in the bar of a really nice hotel, and it actually was quite good-- pub fare. After Wexford, we had a stopover in Waterford on our way to Kilkenny. Here it became difficult to know if we were going to be taking trains or buses. So that is why we took a bus from Wexford to Waterford as it was the most direct and least expensive route. We had to wait an hour or so for the next bus to Kilkenny, but we were in the main part of Waterford so we could see what it was like anyway. More photos later of the beautiful countryside on the way to Kilkenny. We found people in Wales and in Ireland thus far to be extremely nice and friendly!

We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Kilkenny and stayed in a nice hotel near St. Canice Cathedral, which we did tour. We made it to a couple of pubs and drank some Guinness and Smithwicks and other local brews. We also heard some live traditional Irish music played by an older guitar player and a younger mandolin/banjo player. They also played some well-known tunes from the states. Here are some photos.

Irish countryside on the way to Kilkenny

Our hotel room at the Kilkenny Inn

More Irish countryside on way to Kilkenny

St. Canice Cathedral at night

River Nore in Kilkenny with view of castle to the left. We didn't go to the castle but went to the cathedral instead.

Sliver of a moon on our first night

Inside St. Canice Cathedral, really interesting history, Anglican church

downtown Kilkenny old Smithwick's sign

View of St. Canice Cathedral during the day. We didn't climb the tower because it was going to rain any minute.

From Kilkenny, we took the train to Dublin where we spent two days. We arrived in pouring rain, and took the lightrail into the town center then a bus out to our guesthouse, which was more like a boarding house. We had a difficult finding it as it was in the middle of a really highend residential area, but a really nice lady walking down the street called the place up, and we got better directions. This was the same day that Lorenzo was hitting land-- mainly in western Ireland, but it was windy and stormy in Dublin-- much like Portland. After finding our room, which was very large with an extra twin bed-- we decided to head to a grocery store and buy enough food for the evening and breakfasts and of course some wine to help us through the storm. ;)

The next day we went downtown and walked through Trinity University, went to the public library and walked around a lot. We ate lunch at a kind of hip restaurant in the Temple Bar area where all the hipsters hang out. And we were warned that it wasn't a good area to be in at night. Dublin is a lot larger than I expected and more industrial as well. I had heard it compared to Portland, but it seemed much bigger. It does have the Liffey River running through downtown, and it also has a college feeling with Trinity being in the downtown core as well. But that's about it as far as being like Portland. Also, a lot more touristy. We didn't see any people living in tents downtown, but there were some people on the streets--nothing like PDX now though. We did enjoy it, but we were ready to go to a smaller town and spend more time. After two days, we left for Cavan where Scott's great great grandfather came from-- and we ended up spending three days there. Here are some photos of Dublin.

Downtown Dublin

River Liffey running through downtown Dublin

Statue of Daniel O'Connell who advocated for Irish freedom

Trinity University

McCulligan's Pub, plaque on outside. It wasn't open.

We really loved Cavan and spent three days there because Scott wanted to see what he could find out at the genealogical society, which is located above the public library. Unfortunately, he doesn't have a lot of information to go on regarding his great great grandfather other than he served in the Einneskillen army, and that he was born in Kil located in Cavan County. We spent our first night in Cavan in a country guesthouse because I think we both thought we wanted to stay in the countryside. However, it was a very rainy and stormy day when we arrived, and luckily the homeowners offered to pick us up from the bus station because the walk to their house was all uphill. We did wander around downtown Cavan first and had a nice Saturday lunch, which is the big meal on weekends. Although the guesthouse was beautiful, we were pretty tired after getting there and just wanted to nap and hang out although I think the homeowners wanted to visit with their guests from the states. We had a full Irish breakfast the next morning, which was included in the price of our room. We both decided though that we would be more comfortable in town where we could just walk everywhere and see some of the locals in the pubs etc. We found a BnB above a pub at a great price so we moved there. The pub owner and BnB owner as well Declan was quite the character, and once Scott told him about his great great grandfather serving in Einneskillen, Declan said we really needed to take the bus and go there for the afternoon-- so we did. There's a small castle there with a lot of military history, and also an archivist who looks up information for you so Scott had quite the chat with two Irish gentlemen. And we didn't realize that we were actually in Northern Ireland when we were there as you can't tell when you pass a border, and in fact you go in and out of the country all over the place. After chatting and touring the castle museum, we went out to dinner at a really nice restaurant and ate delicious food-- Scott-- pasta carbornara and I had chicken curry with rice-- and they always want to serve chips with everything so I switched my chips for a really nice salad. More to come, here are some photos

Cavan country guesthouse

downtown Cavan

Our room was the top window, and we could walk everywhere from here. It wasn't noisy either.

Our room in the Cavan guesthouse. It was a little too fancy for us. We had a nice view of their garden, but it was raining the whole time we were there-- just like Portland.

Downtown street in Cavan. We ate our first Saturday lunch at The Big Apple in the Black Horse Inn. Lunch is the main mail on Sat. and Sun. We had really good meals: I had Irish stew, and Scott had chicken curry that came with rice and chips-- as everything seems to come with chips-- I've started asking to switch the chips for a salad.

The owner of the McCaul's Pub-- Declan told us we needed to go to Enneskillen after Scott told him his great great grandfather served in the army from there. So we caught a bus right away and went there for the entire afternoon and actually ate dinner there as well. The castle in the picture has a nice little museum, and there also is a military archive, and two gentlemen were there who looked up information for Scott. As you can imagine, Scott truly enjoyed talking to these guys and he did find out some information he didn't know and now knows where to look for more.

Regimental silver inside the castle museum

Before going to Enneskillen, we went to the library in the morning as that is where the archive is for researching family history. Scott didn't find out that much about his great great grandfather because he really didn't have much information as a foundation. However, while we were there I noticed that a storyteller was coming to tell stories for adults so I decided to stay and listen. She was a great storyteller and singer. Helena Byrnes told stories of the Banshee-- mean and evil fairies and sang some Irish folksongs including Molly Malone-- the only one I knew. The audience who had much grayer hair than mine were all singing along with her. I chatted with her afterwards as I wanted to tell her about Portland's storytelling festival, which unfortunately has dwindled, but we will try to keep in touch. She is from Kilkenny and now lives in Dublin-- very sweet. We ran into her as she was taking the bus back to Dublin as we were catching the bus to Enneskillen.

From Cavan we did some more fast traveling going by bus to Belfast, and we were the only ones on the bus for the first part of the trip so we had a running conversation going with the bus driver. It's really hard to know when you cross from Ireland into Northern Ireland, where the currency changes. The castle was in Northern Ireland, and we didn't even know it. The bus driver explained that the border weaves in and out, and that we would cross it at least three times before reaching Belfast. The way to tell was that the lines on the roadway changed from yellow to white. We spent one night in Belfast and then caught the ferry to Cairnryan and immediately got on a bus to Ayr, Scotland. Ayr is where Scott's great grandfather from his dad's side was born so we came here to do more research. It has been a good move, and we've been here two days. We are off to a couple of smaller towns today, Ochiltree and Auchelach. I will have to post photos later this evening, and I will write long captions on them. The Scottish accent is very strong here so that it is difficult to understand some of the people-- it sounds like they are stuttering or choking on their words.

Heading toward Northern Island from the bus

Beautiful Irish countryside

This is where we had dinner in Belfast. I ate my first cod fish and chips of the trip because it was made fresh with a light beer batter. Very delicious and not greasy!

View of downtown Belfast, which turned out to be way more touristy than I had anticipated. Lots of American chains and fastfood restaurants.

Our hotel room in Belfast was probably one of the most unique. Economical in both price and space, and located in a very walkable part of town.

The bathroom was closed off by a frosted sliding glass door, which looks like it totally lacks privacy, but it actually is around the corner from the bed so not as bad as it looks. We were impressed with how well designed the room was because it had all the basics including reading lights for both sides of the bed as well as shelves for glasses. We also had a desk and chair and hangers for jackets etc. Price was about $65 for a night, which was half the price of the next economical hotels other than hostels with bunks and shared bathrooms.

From Belfast we took the ferry to Cairnryan, Scotland and caught a bus to Ayr. We spent two days in Ayr because Scott found out some information about his great grandfather on his dad's side. We found a hotel in the outer downtown core and went to the Carnegie Library downtown where they help you research your Scottish roots. The librarian found information for Scott that he didn't know before, which lead us to want to visit a little town called Ochiltree because his great grandfather's parents and family moved there when he was one year old. They later moved back to Ayr, where Scott's great grandfather was born. We couldn't find a hotel or anything in Ochiltree so we stayed in Auckinleck, which was about 20 mins. away by bus. We stayed in a four-star hotel called The Railway Inn, which was very nice. We arrived early in the day so we were able to take the bus to Ochiltree and see the sights, which weren't many as there were no restaurants, pubs or stores. Only a take away Fish and Chips shop-- so we just took the bus back to Auckinleck. However, Ochiltree was in a really beautiful setting so we enjoyed walking around a bit. Here's the photos.

Auld Kirk church and cemetery in Ayr

Ayr downtown area

Ayr Carnegie Library

View up Ayr River toward the sea

Ochiltree, houses on Main Street as there wasn't an address for Scott's great grandfather's family just Main Street. They could have lived in one of these houses.

View from Ochiltree

Stream that probably is a tributary of the Ayr River as it runs through Ochiltree

Ochiltree house on Main Street

From Auckinleck, we traveled to Glasgow where we spent a day and night before heading to Edinburgh. We were taken with how much the city is dominated by tributes to the architect Rennie MacIntosh. We stayed in a hotel very close to the art school and the MacIntosh Architecture school as well. Also, Scott's great grandmother was from Glasgow so we wanted to see what it was like.

Here are some looks at Glasgow.

View from hilltop where our hotel was located

Our hotel in Glasgow

Downtown Glasgow

The Willow Teahouse designed by MacIntosh

Inside the Willow Teahouse

Inside Teahouse

Scottish countryside

lunch in Glasgow at the The Griffin Pub. I had a cassoulet with some fried squid and Scott had a Scottish stew with mashers. Both were delicious! We'd already started eating when I took this photo.

From Glasgow we traveled to Edinburgh where we visited with my friend Elaine who was a Spanish teacher at Wilson H.S. She invited us to spend two nights with her in her lovely two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment located about a 20 min. busride from the city center. We really really loved Edinburgh. The minute we got off the train and first saw the city, it is amazing and like no other! I could easily live there as I enjoyed the history, the university feel, the bagpipe music, and the wonderful libraries. Unfortunately, we didn't make it to the National Library, but went to the university library and the city library-- both of which were great. Scott may get some more family history info from the university library. Here are some photos:

Dinner with Elaine at a place called Howie's-- great food!

View from Edinburgh Castle gun well

Greyfrier's Bobby statue

Corner bagpiper. You run into them in different spots of the city.

Edinburgh Castle

Downtown Edinburgh

Edinburgh another view downtown-- notice the close between the buildings. Edinburgh has lots of closes that weave in and out of buildings.

On my way to Edinburgh Castle as Scott didn't want to go up the hill.

We haven't had good wifi for the past several days, and we are on our last night of our trip. I'm going to do a quick catch-up of our travels and post as many photos as I can now, and I will try to add a few more after we get home.

From Edinburgh, we went to Newcastle, England for a day and just wandered around as we were trying to break up our traveling and decide where we were going next as we were down to our last nine days of our trip. Original plan was to go to the Lake District, however a storm was coming through, and it was going to rain the whole time-- and most of what we wanted to do involved being outside. SO, we scrapped the Lake District and went straight to York instead. We spent two nights in York, which is a really cool historic town with lots to see-- and we walked through a lot of it just getting to our hotel-- The Old Gray Mare, which was above a restaurant pub. We went to the Railway Museum, which we had heard about, and I took an afternoon trip to Castle Howard. We also each saw the Shambles passing by and walked all around the Minster, and I looked into the cathedral but didn't get a great photo. From York, we traveled to Nottingham to see what it was like, and it was cute, but there was a large tourist section with American stores and restaurants etc. We just spent a day and night there then headed for Oxford where we spent two days and nights. It's pretty amazing walking around the historic streets and thinking about all the people who have studied there. Once again however there is a newer part of town which has a lot of American stores, and restaurants. One of our highlights of staying in Oxford was going to the Evensong at New College Chapel, which has a world renowned all male choir with boy trebles and adult professionals. It was a candle-lit service in a chapel dating back to late 1370s. The reverends who conducted the service were both women. It was really an experience, and the music was beautiful.

From Oxford, we decided to spend our last few days in Kent because Scott wanted to see that part of England especially Canterbury as Canterbury Tales is one of his favorite movies. I found a little town at the end of the train line called Lenham with a reasonable priced hotel on the town square. We spent three days there and thoroughly enjoyed the town, and the people who were super nice. We could hardly walk down a street without people stopping to chat with us as they knew were not from there as I think everyone knows everybody in town. Our highlight in Lenham was going to a bellringers practice at the local church. I thought it was going to be a handbell choir, but when we got to the church, the group told us they actually ring the tower bells and practice once a week. They invited us up to watch, and it was an amazing experience. I took a video, which I will have to post later. I got to go way up the tower to the bells when they weren't being rung of course-- as it is dangerous to be up there -- they are huge and there were eight of them in pretty close proximity. It looked like a lot of work to ring them especially with their chord changes etc. After the practice, tradition is that the ringers all go to a local pub, and they invited us to join them. They were very nice and friendly and wanted to know where we had traveled and what Portland was like.

We also had met a very nice lady on the street as we were walking around who invited us to come to her house for tea so I went the next day. It turned out that we are very close in age, and we shared a lot of the same opinions and interests. She was extremely nice, and I enjoyed our visit so we are going to keep in touch. She had lived in the U.S. at one point but had never been to the west coast. Scott and I did take a daytrip to Canterbury, which I had actually been to in 1972. It is much more touristy now then I remember, and you have to pay to go into the cathedral, which used to be free. It was covered in scaffolding so Scott decided he wasn't interested as he wanted to wander around and see some of the less touristed areas so we did-- and of course had to stop into a pub and chatted with a really nice guy who had a sweet dog named Barney. Scott fell in love with the dog, of course. Well, this is my last bit of writing so I'm going to post photos now for your enjoyment.

All the above photos are from Newcastle, which I wanted to go to because I wanted to see the North Sea, which we did on our way into town. The photo directly above is the river with a music venue-- the shiny silver dome.

Entrance to York Micklegate

York Railway Museum, which is really huge

York cathedral.

I will have to post a few more photos of York because the streets are really narrow and winding with the Shambles being the narrowest-- but unfortunately I didn't get photos there.

I've always wanted to go to Castle Howard since we saw the PBS Brideshead Revisited series so I was really excited to actually see it in person. Much of it still needs repairs from fire destruction, and many of the older murals are faded but still in tact. They also had a large exhibit about Brideshead as two different versions were shot at the castle, and it also is in the new Downton Abbey movie.

View of the grounds toward the famous fountain

The music room

The galleries, which are filled with works by many famous artists

On Oxford campus-- one of them.

Gate on campus

Honywell Street

Then and Now photo exhibition at Weston Library, which we went to instead of the Bodelean Library, which had a timed entry and was filled with tourists waiting to get in. The photo exhibit was great by Christopher Ward who traveled around England in 1974 in a double decker bus and took photos of people. He went back several years ago and found some of the same people and photographed them again.

Bridge of Sighs

Below are photos from Lenham in Kent, England. I will have to post photos from Canterbury when we get home. It's getting late, and we catch our airport shuttle at 6:35 a.m.