A sure sign the trip is almost over

I just adjusted my weather module on my Google home page. For months I've had listed all the UK destinations we would, or even might, visit during our two weeks here. Now, on the last evening, and back in London, I sadly deleted them (Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Manchester, London). But I'm leaving Bristol up so that I know what Janna and Jules home town's weather will be like.

Just for kicks (maybe), I'm going to see if I can set up a Monster agent for Bath and Bristol. Less than an hour and half from London.

Manchester England England, Across the Atlantic Sea ...

“And I’m a genius genius. I believe in God. And I believe that god believes in Claude … that’s me.”

Well, not really that’s me. ‘Cause my name's not Claude. But I love that song. And I love this city. It’s so un-fucking-believably friendly. And pretty.

I know I’m not going to do it justice. I’ll try to hit the highlights and perhaps elaborate more, well elaborately, later.

The Southern hospitality style friendliness, but with the beauty of the English not Southern accent. You know how Southerners give directions? “You cain’t miss it, you’ll find it no worries dear, it’s just up that road by Bessie’s diner which has the best apple pie in the world.” Same thing ‘cept with an English accent and “it’s dead easy love, you’ll find it no problem, just head up there past the Peterloo and take a right.” Took us three days to find out what the Peterloo was. But we found our hotel alrighty.

First night, met up with some friends of friends that are now definitely friends. They’re Cam gamers who managed to get a 17^th century church to host their game in. Is that not the fucking coolest or what? It’s the Sacred Trinity Salford, a pretty tiny church with a vicar that thinks gamers are cool. He lets them use the church for their game and for Tiff and Phil’s going away party. We arrived in Manchester just in time to wish them good bye as they’re returning to Portland, Oregon. Now that’s timing!

Saturday was fairly lax and lazy. We tried, based on a recommendation from someone the previous night, the Chinese restaurant just down the street from our hotel. It does banquet style where you just pick your price point and they bring you what they recommend. Spot on and absolutely yummy. Just next door was this wonderful Chinese bakery. We went there Sunday with Tiff and Phil for all kinds of yummy buns.

Speaking of yummy buns, we were one week away from Manchester’s Pride Parade which is apparently a huge deal with hundreds of thousands of GLBT folks arriving for the event. We weren’t going to be there for it, but the preparations were starting. There’s a gay radio station that is called Gaydio. Don’t really know how it’s different from a non-gay radio station, but the posters for it were cool.

Lots of kudos for our hotel, the Arora International and its basement bar, the Obsidian. Between the bartenders and Tiff and Phil, that’s the reason for the lag in the travel updates. We spent Saturday night with the man trying any drink the bartenders wanted to experiment (and they were good!) then Sunday walking all over the city with Tiff and Phil.

Sunday night was dinner than drinks at Tiff and Phil’s favourite hole in the wall, but a fairly early night. Monday the man and I wandered over the portion of the city we’d missed the day before then hanging out in the bar for the evening.

Tuesday was checkout and catch the train to Bristol to see Jules and Janna. They are doing fabulous and have been wonderful hosts. I’m about to get a proper English breakfast!

Will provide more Manchester details/discoveries as well as the Bristol update later. Photos from Manchester have been updated in my FB.

This blog has been temporarily disrupted ....

... by too much real activity. Have notes, will post later. Brief scenario:

4 days in Manchester, great friends, great bar, lots of walking. Fantastic Chinese restaurant and bakery.

Currently in Bristol with friends Jules and Janna.

Check FB for recent photos from Manchester. Haven't been out and about in Bristol much yet, though I expect we will later today.

Cheers!

Today’s Food Report

Ibn Bru: Scotland’s primary soft drink. An orange soda (in both regular and diet) that tastes like a cross between Fanta and Thomas Kemper. Neither version contains high fructose corn syrup.

Fisherman’s pie: salmon in some kind of cream sauce with a pile of potatoes in the middle. Excellent.

Smoked mackerel and trout salad with horseradish mayonnaise. I can’t even tell you how good this was.

Pork medallions (unfortunately overcooked) with perfect roasted potatoes, vegetables, and a mustard sauce that more than made up. I guess Scotland hasn’t heard pork can be rare. Ah well.

So much good Scotch we couldn’t have cared less whether the pork was overcooked at all.

Some recommendations, albeit based on a one-time brief visit, about Edinburgh

Glasgow seems to be a more modern city than Edinburgh, though admittedly we've only seen small portions of each city. But with the royal seat having been in Edinburgh, it doesn't surprise me that more medieval/ancient buildings are there than in Glasgow. It truly is beautiful.

Do not go during the Fringe Festival unless you are actually going there for the Fringe Festival. Too crowded.

If you’re going to go to the Edinburgh Castle, see the recommendation above, then follow this advice:

• Be prepared for the School Field Trip Academy of Museum Curation style of exhibit.
• If the above tip doesn’t stop you, be sure to go to the Scotch Whiskey Experience before going to the Castle. You’ll be good and knackered and it will be funny.
• The Scotch Whiskey Experience is very worth it. The videos and barrel ride are cheesy as hell, but actually informative if you’re interested in Scotch at all.

Regarding Scotch, the man knew most of what we saw, but we both learned a few things:

• Blended Scotch is not a blend of different scotch whiskies. It’s a blend of Single Malt and grain whiskey, which mixes wheat and barley and is much sweeter. Explains why I never liked blends. I'm not much of a sweet fan.
  
• “Blends” of single malts are called Vatted Scotch Whiskey.
• If the Republicans want to keep their good scotch, they’d better start advocating for clean water. Clean Scottish water is vital to their old boys’ drink.

Today's high point, scotch!

Seen/Heard, Edinburgh, Scotland, Thursday, August 14, 2008

In the Edinburgh Castle Royal Scots Dragoon Guards Regimental Museum:

• Beleaguered Nanny: Do you know why we come here to see this? (implying it’s to see his heritage)
• Child-who-should-be-slapped: Because you’re ANNOYING?!?
• Man, myself, and two old ladies: Hysterical laughter. Old ladies had to leave the room.
  

At a Scottish bistro:

• American customer: I’ll have a Coke and fries.
• Man and I (under our breaths): There’s a Burger King back near the train station.

At that same bistro, after the man and I expressed a liking for Ibn Bru, the server solemnly nods and declares we may stay in Scotland, but only if we also like Haggis.

In the Prisons of War exhibit at the Edinburgh Castle, the solitary confinement cells:

• Interactive exhibits of the cells that you could go into (they still smell like open pit toilets).
• Cheesy dioramas/re-creations of punished soldiers including bad mannequins to represent the soldiers blurbs about their offenses.
• One closed/locked cell door, with the only view through the peephole, into the modern supply closet. The most interesting/amusing part of the whole exhibit.

More on the Edinburgh Castle in a later post.

When in Rome?

Why does instant coffee taste good over here, but is absolutely unacceptable when at home? Is it really worse in the states, or am I just doing the "when in Rome" thing?

Harry Benson

I'm not even qualified to comment on the amazing work of Harry Benson, who we were fortunate enough to encounter in an exhibit at the Kelvingrove Art Museum & Gallery in Glasgow. I've been familiar with his work thanks to Vanity Fair, but his entire body of work represented in the exhibit is positively amazing. I also did not know until today that he is a Glasgow native. In addition to his amazing international entertainment and political work, his local Glasgow work was so indicative of this pretty city. Unfortunately, the catalog was sold out so we have only our memories, what we find on the Web, etc. to remember it by.

I think the SIS and BIS would never have forgiven us had we been in Glasgow and not partaken of this exhibit. And they would have been correct. We were lucky enough to stumble across it and are now actively pursuing procuring a print. The Dolly Parton if we can get it. Don't scoff until you see it. Positively beautiful.

You won't eat haggis, but you'll scarf a hot dog?

The hotel in Glasgow is not anywhere near itteh-bitteh standards. You can see it on our Facebook album (and if you aren't on Facebook, why not?). In addition, we love Glasgow for itself. It reminds me a bit of Vancouver in size, shops, and overall feel.

Food: We've had lovely Scotch food. Scotch pie (mutton) and Haggis (cheeks and buns on naps and tatties--we know what that means, do you?). And of course wonderful Scotch.

The award for sauciest curator goes to the Kelvingrove Art Museum & Gallery. Samples of his/her work:

• "Seemed like a good idea at the time": Literally, this is what this exhibit was titled. It was an exhibit of those animals and plants introduced to Scotland for one purpose, only to have destroyed the natural habitat (rabbits, japanese weeds, hedgehogs).
• Haggis: Fake animal put together showing all the different animals haggis can be made of.
• Thought bubbles: Made-up thoughts from a 17th century painting of a young woman married to an old man and all the potential thoughts she/he plus the butler were probably thinking.

Check Facebook for the picture of the giant Irish deer. Positively HUGE and would have been terrifying to encounter.

In addition to the museum, we walked Glasgow, down to the River Clyde, down Sauichall Street, and through Kevinglove Garden.

Tomorrow we day-trip to Edinburgh, then Manchester on Friday.

Transportation

This is my first train ride in a very long time. I took one train from Portland to Seattle a few years back, and I used to take the train to and from Boca Raton and Ormond Beach my freshman year in college (my parents wouldn’t let me have my car my first semester, grr arrgh), but it’s been a while and never in Europe. I don’t think I have to go on and on about how better mass transportation mechanisms are in Europe vs. the US. That will most likely be sprinkled throughout various posts. But damn, it’s impressive. I could have taken any of five trains today from London to Glasgow, all at reasonable hours. I realize rail transportation is better in the Northeast of the US than the Northwest (or anywhere else in the US), but can’t we get it together throughout the rest of the country? C’mon, we’re in an economic downturn, how about some good old fashioned (and oh-by-the-way-it-worked) infrastructure investment ala Roosevelt-during-the-depression? Wean America’s fat ass off single-occupancy vehicles and invest in our infrastructure while we’re at it. If the US could build the interstate highway system, can’t we do something for a rail system? < / RANT > Sorry, I can’t be in a place with decent mass transit without ranting about the US’s piss poor attention to it.

We’re sitting in the First Class Quiet Car. For longer trips (this ride is six hours), I prefer to upgrade our transportation. I have found that it helps to make the most out of the non-travel portion of our vacations, when it’s not completely out of reason, cost-wise. Yeah, I’m getting older, but the time it takes to recover from a long journey in coach class is getting worse, and the man is no better even though he’s younger. I won’t bother for the shorter. But when I require a nic patch to get through it, then it’s time to shop for upgrades.

Accommodations

Accommodations

I wish we’d taken a picture of the itteh-bitteh-even-for-a-kitteh hotel room. We weren’t taken completely by surprise. The man and I have stayed in metropolitan hotel rooms before (London, Paris, NYC), so we don’t expect spacious. But this was maximizing space to an extreme. If you pulled the chair out from the little desk, you couldn’t get to the bed; you had to move the nightstand to open the closet door (but you had to move it in front of the other closet door); you could barely get in and out of the bathroom. But still, I have to admire the economy of space and the amenities they did manage to squeeze in. The bathroom had good lighting and the shower had both a regular and a rain shower head. Flat panel televisions have made small hotel rooms better. And the internet access was included.

What’s required in travel accommodations varies trip to trip for us. Depending on what we’re doing as well as how much we want to spend. Our New Year’s getaway to San Francisco this past year required a spacious and luxurious room, because it was a trip meant for us to crash and burn (didn’t turn out that way, thanks EXPE!) while somewhat venturing out to the city. So for that we got a suite with an amazing balcony on Nob Hill. This trip, as previously noted is meant to be ad hoc, so we don’t really expect much out of the hotel rooms we get. Cleanliness and reasonable prices are the primary drivers. That said, and while we were quite adaptable, the itteh-bitteh-even-for-a-kitteh room was just too damn small. I’ll do an inventory of furniture bruises later.

We’ll be in Glasgow until Friday. The hotel we got supposedly has a king bed, which is positively luxurious over here! Still haven’t decided where we’re going after Glasgow. Recommendations from London bartenders have leaned towards Manchester. Maybe we’ll hear differently from folks in Glasgow. We’ll be day-tripping once to Edinburgh.

Seen/heard, Monday, August 11, 2008:

Woke up in Paddington, will sleep in Glasgow. Seen and/or heard throughout the day.

• A man staring morosely into the window of a closed Laundromat at 5:30 AM. I could have understood if at that time of the morning he—like I—was staring morosely into the closed windows of the coffee shop. But to be so upset at not getting to launder your shirts at the crack of dawn?
• A girl on bicycle so pretty I grabbed the man to make him look.
• Amidst the lovely English countryside (seen from the train to Glasgow), a trailer park. Followed immediately by a floating trailer park of houseboats. Quite odd looking.
• Why are houses just so much cuter here? Row houses are sexy, town houses like the new ones being built by our park aren’t. Inherently what’s the difference? I know, I know, it’s older and they’re probably building those same modern townhomes on the outskirts of London or Paris or wherever. It just kills me there isn’t standard good craftsmanship anymore. Will people in a hundred years think early 21st century townhouses are sexy?
• Sheep, pigs, cows (seen from the train)
• A wind farm, very pretty.

Ad hoc travel

Youth do it and think nothing of it. So the man and I decided to do the grand tour. Fly in and out of London, with no set itinerary in between. Couple of issues right off the bat to deal with:

• You can only buy BritRail passes when you are outside of the country. We didn’t do so, so no passes. Only point-to-point sales. While annoying, probably better in the long run since we don’t know where we’re going on any given day, how many days we might be traveling, and when we want to go first class vs. standard depending on the length of the train ride.
• Jet lag: I’m right now up at 4 AM. Really awake. 3 hours before anything is open for eating. And I’m hungry.
• Itteh bitteh, even for kitteh, hotel room: No bathtub, no suite. No way to get away from sleeping man who isn’t awake and who shouldn’t be so no reason to wake him. So little room that I already have furniture bruises just from moving from room to bathroom. Thankfully the hotel has a lounge with wireless. That’s definitely a step up from the last time we stayed in the Paddington area. But still will have to stick my leg in the sink from the shower to shave.
  

But good stuff so far:

• Pubs! Pubs are always good.
• Business class makes the transition so much easier! As does wireless once you arrive.
• New Mudd boots are working out wonderfully! Sorry, can’t find a pic, but found them at DSW.
• Sister and Brother-in-Sin using the house for vacation, thereby making us worry-free on the house/cat front.
• Olympics coverage outside of the US means we actually see what other countries are doing.
• Did I mention pubs?

When you fly business, you don’t need Xanax

Flying is an increasingly annoying, often painful, experience. We do it out of necessity, to get to our destination, without any pleasure whatsoever. The man and I have even extracted, not even ethically, a prescription for Xanax to facilitate the process (give us the prescription or we’ll order it illegally over the internet). Flying across the US is not so egregious, five hours or so, with half a dose and a nicotine patch, but across the pond is something else. Eleven hours is intense for even the best of flyers. Enter the beg for upgrades.

Not cheap, to be sure, but oh so worth it if you get it. The seats fully recline, and on this particular flight (Northwest direct from Seattle to London), you get lumbar massage, foot rest, full recline, etc. The man and I forewent the Xanax in lieu of comfort, champagne, and real plane rest. So started the trip to the UK. Not complaining! This is seriously the way to fly, and airlines should stop with this stupid veal-like coach experience. Coach is positively torture!

This trip is going to be interesting. Only solid itinerary points are the arrival and departure points to and from London, the arrival/departure dates to and from Bristol (to see Janna and Jules) and everything ad hoc in between. We already encountered our first obstacle and need for adaptation when we discovered we couldn’t buy a BritRail pass once we were in the country, nowhere was this noted on the Web site. Ah well. Point to point will probably be better in the long run, or so I'm telling myself.

So far nothing earth shattering. Arrived in London Saturday, checked into Paddington hotel (not bad, especially compared to last time in Paddington), ate/drank in neighborhood pubs, and booked train travel to Glasgow for tomorrow.