The Best of Britain and Ireland -- Day Eight

The following is my journal entry (with pictures added) for Day 8 of my vacation to Britain and Ireland.

Happy May Day!

Today we headed south back into England and into Wales. We drove through Moffat and saw the narrowest hotel (Star Hotel) in the world, a mere 20 ft (6 m) wide.

Image stolen from the official web site. We drove by too fast for me to get a picture of my own.

We stopped in Gretna Green where young couples would come to elope. Gretna's famous runaway marriages began in 1753 when an Act of Parliament was passed in England, which stated that if both parties to a marriage were not at least 21 years old, then consent to the marriage had to be given by the parents. This Act did not apply in Scotland, where it was possible for boys to get married at 14 and girls at 12 years old with or without parental consent. The local blacksmith married most of the young runaway brides and grooms. Scottish law allowed for 'irregular marriages', meaning that if a declaration was made before two witnesses, almost anybody had the authority to conduct the marriage ceremony. The blacksmiths in Gretna became known as 'anvil priests'.


We had a comfort and shopping stop here, so we didn't have a lot of time to explore. We couldn't go inside the blacksmith shop, because a wedding was taking place, but we did get plenty of pictures outside.

We took some time to shop for more gifts for family members; however, when we were ready to check out, we got behind a group of Japanese tourists in line. They had TONS of merchandise, and most of their credit cards were rejected. It was very chaotic and took us about 30 minutes to get through the line. There were several in our group who got stuck and we were about 10 minutes late to the coach for our departure time. Whoops! Kelli and I were not the last ones, though. :o)

We traveled through the beautifully scenic Lake District, considered to be the finest of England's national parks. We drove through the back roads so we got to see a lot of very beautiful landscapes from up close and personal. I tried to take drive-by pictures, but because it was raining that day, not a lot turned out. It was interesting...it only rained when we were inside our coach. It never rained on us when we stopped and got out to explore towns or for photo ops.

I had to get a picture of the Shetland Ponies.

We stopped in Grasmere for our lunch break. This town is famous because of two people: the poet, William Wordsworth and author Beatrix Potter.



We ate at a little cookery. Then we walked around the town a little. We stopped at the local chapel and took pictures of Wordsworth's grave. However, since there are so many Wordsworths buried there, I am not sure which is the grave of the poet.




Inside the graveyard, there was a man dressed in stripes and looked like an escaped prisoner. Kelli went on one side of him, yelled to me to pose for a picture, and then proceeded to take a picture of the prisoner. Haha!



We walked around the very cool graveyard taking other pictures of old graves. I am mesmorized by old grave yards. I don't know why. But I am going to use some of my pictures for Halloween decorations.



We then went to their famous gingerbread store. This little store is very well known. They have their own, very unique, recipe for gingerbread. It is now a trade secret, though some people try to imitate it. I really liked this gingerbread, and I don't really like gingerbread very much. It is very different than what you usually think of. It doesn't have a very strong ginger flavor, and it has a lemon flavor...or maybe it's cream of tarter...but whatever it is, the mixture is beautiful (as our Australian companions would say).



As we were walking back to the coach, we went through the graveyard again. Two kids ran passed us. They saw the prisoner and yelled "See a robber, catch him!" or "See a robba, cetch heem!". :o) The robber (what we thought was a prisoner) ran away while the kids chased him around the church. Kelli and I looked at each other quizzically, but continued onward. I asked Christina (our tour director) what that was, but she didn't know. She thought it might be a May Day tradition.

We drove through (or followed the shores of) Windermere, the largest lake in England.

I took lots of pictures of the lake, but this one is the only one that really turned out.

This odd building is a one room home over a small river. Very interesting.

Then we stopped in Chester, the historic county town on the River Dee. We had a quick walking tour through the Roman remains, black and white half-timbered buildings, and the two tiered shopping arcades called the "Rows". Chester, like York, is also a walled city.



Chester was founded in the 1st century. Today, one of Prince Charles' names, besides the Prince of Wales or the Duke of York (to name only a couple) is the Earl of Chester.

After our walking tour, we were let go to explore on our own for an hour and a half. We walked the outer wall for a while (taking pictures of things along the way, such as one of the wall towers, a garden of a house along the wall, and the canal that runs around Chester).


We also peeked in some stores, had a gelato on this cold day, and took pictures of the cathedral,


the Rows,

the Roman column,

the Cross (where the town crier gave announcements...there still is a town crier today),


the East Gate Clock,

the Blue Coat Hospital,

and the town hall with the English flag (not the well known UK flag).



After Chester, we crossed the border into Wales and we finished our day's journey at Wrexham.

Tomorrow we are heading across the channel and into Ireland. We'll spend two days in Dublin before heading west.

Interesting tidbit: Our tour group consisted of mostly Australian travelers. Of the 37 people in our group, six were American (including Kelli and I), four were Canadian, two were South African, one's from Mumbai, and the rest were from all over Australia. Australians get minimum four weeks of vacation time, so if they save their time over two years, they can take a two month holiday. Most of these travelers did two back to back tours. It was fun to spend time with them. They are a very entertaining bunch of people!