Here we are in the land of Travis. It used to just refer to the band, but we’re going to have words to the Scotland Government and they will change things for us. After all, they all obviously think looking pasty and white without a tan is a sexy look. Or, it could just be that there is no sun.

After all the hot weather in Spain and Italy, the UK has come as quite a shock for the temperature difference. Talking to the locals, apparently summer was two weeks ago and this is no longer summer. Really??? So that explains why two weeks ago we could not even bear the idea of wearing more than we had to just to be decent, and now we are wearing all our clothes at once! It is bloody freezing here!

Mind you, the locals are all still in short sleeves and short pants. We stand out as tourists simply because we are wearing polar fleeces under our wind jackets and still shivering…

The flight from Rome was pretty basic, and the jaunt through customs was a breeze. Hired a Fiat Punto (car of choice of the police in Rome), which is a remarkably gutless little rattlebox, with a turning circle about the same as the Ford Econoline in the USA, but hey, that must be the stylish European motor vehicle standards we’re told to drool over…*grin*

Caught up with Jen and Hamish in Milton Keynes for a couple of nights, and in between, zipped over to Oxford to have a look at what appears to be the mother ship for Melbourne Uni. The architecture back home is identical, so there was a clear influence from the old country.

Interesting to see that the students apparently take a lot of pride in their colleges. Then again, ask the officials at University College at Melbourne Uni, and they will say the same thing. Nobody ever mentions the cold cramped rooms in the tourist blurb, do they?

We did a walking tour and there was another Aussie on the tour. He was there because his girlfriend was attending a conference at Oxford and they were taking some personal time (sound familiar?). Anyway, his girlfriend came from Tatura and her sister is married to Tony Kerr, a guy I went to school with in Shepparton. It’s a very small world…

The guide, incidentally, looked like quite an old fellow, but when we went on the walking tour, the group was hard pressed to keep up with him. He was like a rocket, zooming from place to place. Perhaps he had seen it all before, but still, he was not slow at all.

Went to Lincoln and checked out the Joseph Banks Conservatory. For those who came in late, Banks was the botanist on the Endeavour, the boat that Captain Cook discovered Australia on. He collected lots of plants and there is even a plant named after him which is quite common, called the Banksia. Oddly, the Banksia was not growing in the conservatory, and they could only muster pictures on the wall. We wanted to ask why, but there was nobody around to question.

Cruised up the east coast to Whitby, which, in a strange relation to the last point of call, and was not planned, was where the Endeavour was built, and Captain Cook set sail from apparently. A very pretty little town, with lots of tourists and a ruined abbey up on the cliff overlooking the ocean. We could only appreciate this for a short time due to the bitterly cold wind.

Went to York and walked on the old wall that used to go around the town (before the town grew). Very interesting, and the site of the last surviving barbican gate in the UK apparently. Basically, the bad guys would come trying to get in the gate and you would hold them off for a while, then let them think they’d gotten in. Quickly shut the gate behind them and they find another gate in front of them, and you had them pinned. Put a whole stack of your guys around the top and the bad guys are in a lot of trouble. Vicious but effective.

Stayed at a B&B last night due to a howling wind and rain that would have destroyed the tent. Tenting was cheaper, but it would have ripped the tent in two, we feared, so we had to spend the extra cash, alas.

Went to Chester’s Fort this morning, on Hadrian’s Wall. Again, for the benefit of those who came in late, the Romans tried to conquer the Scots but the latter just would not give up, so the Emperor Hadrian ordered a big wall built across the country in 121AD, to stop people going between the two countries.

Chester’s Fort was a fort for the guards on the wall, and a lot of it has been excavated and a lot more is just out in a paddock for people to look at. Really interesting to see such old buildings and foundations, and to think they had running water and latrines and bathhouses way back then. Inventive lot, those Romans…

Crossed from England to Scotland by road (not a boat or ferry in sight!) and immediately saw a guy in a kilt. Of course, he was selling Scottish souvenirs and other stuff, but hey, it’s a guy in a kilt.

As we mentioned, now in Edinburrrrrrgh where it is very cold. Off to see Nessie in the next couple of days and see if we can get a scoop photo that will have the world beating a path to MooQuack dot com.

And then you can say “Oh, I was there so long before everyone else knew about it”…*grin*

Categories: Travel, Odyssey 2001