PEACHFRONT SPEAKS

part 2: northern england trip report -- hikes up hills and down dales

2008-10-02 - 8:56 p.m.

john o'gaunt entrance to lancaster castle

all photos © 2008 by elaine radford

Note: You have reached Part 2 of my Northern England trip report. To start with Part 1, click on the photo of the Lapwings.

Wednesday, September 24

DH's work was done, and he was free to join me in my wanderings. He had never seen a typical English town or, indeed, any English town, so we decided to explore the highly atmospheric town of Lancaster. Well, the first thing we learned is that we had just missed our bus into town and that another would not be along for an hour. Silly to wait an hour for a twenty minute walk, don't you think? So we strolled toward the center of town, eventually finding the millennium bridge, the Lune River, and a rather steep climb up the hill to the castle. We approached the John O'Gaunt Gateway and soon noticed this placard:

"No way," I say. "Is this British humor?" Then I noticed the razor wire atop some of the high walls, and I started to believe that they were serious. Sure enough, when we toured the castle, we learned that it had two working courts (both civil and criminal) and a low security prison. In fact, over the centuries, it has held everything from debtors to criminals awaiting to be transported to Australia to witches condemned to execution. Our guide said that even though it is owned by Queen Elizabeth, the current Duke (not Duchess) of Lancaster, she has never been inside, and she only whisked herself to the outer door for a moment to exchange some ceremonial keys and then hurry onward to the presumably more pleasant task of unveiling Eric Morecambe's statue.

nothing like a hint of razor wire to make your castle fortifications complete

In any case, in these wicked modern times, the cause of public justice and the search for the tourist dollar have made an uneasy truce. We noticed a judge complete with wig scurrying to the toilets (never say "restroom" in Lancaster if you wish to be understood) and, later on, noticed that the door to the Shire Hall had been left ajar so that we could see a hint of the shields inside. Even though we tried to stand well back of the door, breathing not a sound to interfere with the civil case being heard inside, someone in a suit and tie noticed anyway and quickly closed it tight to put an end to our curiosity.

As an optional part of the tour, you could be locked in one of the 500 year old cells that are no longer in use for real prisoners, and while half of the people on our six person tour declined the privilege, when the two older folks hobbling along on their canes insisted on giving it a try, I felt honor-bound not to chicken out either. It wasn't as dark as you would think, though, since there is an electric light in the direct line of sight of the grill over the door. I'm sure, in days of yore, the light was at best a miserable flickering candle. The two older folk sneered and said it wasn't a bit dark and that they were made of sterner stuff than that.

After enjoying the castle and the views from its scenic hill, we stumbled downward to the Merchants Pub, dated 1688, where I tried the gamebird trio. The proprietor assured me that it was fresh and that the man had brought in the birds that morning -- teal, wood pigeon, and pheasant. Poor wood pigeon! DH studied the arch of the ancient semi-underground structure but I've already forgotten exactly what he said about it. I think it's one of the older building techniques that he studied when he was exploring underground housing. But he'd only seen it in books, not in reality.

We continued to hike through the scenic town, discovering such things as the ruins of an old Roman bath. No hot springs here, they had to heat the water themselves. We also took a spin around the Maritime Museum.

At some point we ascended another hill and discovered a lovely "coppiced woodland" and then the breathtaking Williamson Park. A beautiful day for a beautifully landscaped English garden overlooking the area.

williamson park, lancaster, i don't know how i got this photo without all kinds of people walking their dogs in it, talk about how to lie with photography, this is almost supernatural considering what a gorgeous day it was -- and how many people were out walking their dogs

Thursday, September 25

We could only scratch the surface of the many, many things to see and do in the area. There is an embarrassment of riches when it comes to the hiking and walking trails. I pretty much threw a dart at a map and decided that we would go to Arnside and do part of a walk I'd printed out from the internet. We took the train to the town, then strolled along the beach promenade and then up a short path toward the Arnside Knott trail. It wasn't Mt. Everest or anything, with its elevation of 159 meters, but it had spectacular views almost 360 degrees around of the Lake Country. Absolutely breath-taking. We also did a circuit around the Knott and at one point had a view of the ruins of a 14th century tower.

hard to capture the scale of the view from a picture of a tiny portion of it, we had panaromic views in all directions

ruins of the 14th century tower at arnside, now with a working farm around it

After some discussion, after we took the train back to Lancaster, we decided that it was only right to have a second pub stop at the Golden Lion -- the famous pub where those condemned to hang in olden times were given their last "pint" on their way to the gallows. Even the Pendle Witches were allowed to stop here, and now the pub is on the Pendle Witches Trail -- yes, there's a trail for everything in northern England, pub crawls, birds, bicycles, even witches, you name it.

some gorgeous gardens in arnside and hard to pick which photo to use but i liked the whimsy of the oversized garden chair

You have just read Part 2 of our northern England trip report. Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion!

a colorful train seen from overhead at arnside knott

portion of a sign at the arnside train station, yeah, so that's fairly defensive, i think they're worried you'd think they didn't ever mow their grass or something, that ain't no patch of weeds, bunky, that's a wildflower preserve!

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