Final curtain and time to go home

Our escape for 2011 is over and we are about to put this experience behind us. In many ways, we seem to have made this a complex event. To visit places where a number of the boat people involved in creating the two of us came from has made it a deeper experience. And to cope better with the duration we have not tried to pile experience on experience rapidly but taken a bit longer than most to cover the ground.

In Ireland, almost all of the many people we met had a well developed scepticism and a growing desire to move on despite the country being broke. They just get on with things despite any difficulties. Irish politics and development is complex and we enjoyed trying to get an appreciation of where they have come from and where they are going. I hope that the English will leave one day so that the country can be united.

We liked Ireland a lot and thoroughly enjoyed our 5 weeks here. For us, we are grateful that we had an opportunity to spend several weeks here as just a few days is not enough in our books. Yvonne has found a new artistic mentor and hopes to continue working with her over the years ahead. Randall not only had a great walk through County Kerry but is now looking to find out more about his own Irish heritage.



In Wales, we found things a bit tired and bleak. Perhaps our judgement is a bit unfair with only a few days experience in Northern Wales only. But we feel no urge to go back there. In Llandudno we did meet a couple who have energy and a zest for life but too many seem content to just drift along the same old rutted trails, even those dependant on tourists for a living.


In Scotland, we found things more refreshing and interesting. Yvonne, of suspected but unproven ex-Spanish Armada descent, is now firmly asserting her Scottishness. I was not as smitten as she was but I would have liked more time out and about walking the glens and highlands than we managed to do. The people we met were almost as friendly as the Irish. They love their traditional things but the outlook is modern and forward looking.



We found England to be much like Wales. Quite old and tired in outlook with a heavy emphasis on sticking with tradition and protocols. In some ways, I think they just don't get the modern world. Service in England is relatively poor and they can be quite aloof and patronising at times. Too much royal family and too much assumption that the world will come to them. So maybe it is a good thing that Randall's boat people left England, never to return. As far as I know, none of these people ever returned, even for a holiday. Smart people, I now think. On the other hand, if they spent some time with Tony and Julia, maybe they would regret the big move.



But for now, it is time to rejoin people down under, despite the pathetic politics and the mindless paranoia Australians whip themselves into. There are clearly some deep forces at play in the minds of Anglo Australians over us boat people. More Australians need to reflect more positively on where they came from, as we have done.

This has been a good trip to make. We had fair weather, about what we expected. We enjoyed good food, good beer and modest wines. Our travel plans worked perfectly, as we would expect after quite a few years of doing these sort of trips. But it is time to move on and we probably need a break from each other.

And now this is us?

What does where you take a holiday say about you?

In this weeks newspapers we had one complete page telling us that a certain Mr Beckham is paying a certain Steven Spielberg a very large sum of money to hire a gross house overlooking a not that interesting part of the Californian coastline with its own private beach for a bit of a holiday. Whilst towards the other end of the spectrum here in Llandudno we are amongst quite a few ordinary families, quite a few retired types and quite a few “boocket” and spade shops for our own holiday break.

Within our tour planning, we left a couple of days spare as contingency and so we have lobbed into this Victorian era gently aging spot on our way back to Dublin where our “ship” awaits. Which reminds me to recall for any aviation buffs out there that a couple of days ago and just outside of Bedford, I noticed that there are still 2 airship hangers existing since way back when. They looked very tired and perhaps no longer in real use since housing airships built in the 1980s when they almost made a real comeback of sorts.





But back to downtown Llandudno.

Yes, they still do the same old Punch and Judy shows along the promenade. A few kids watching and quite a few of the living dead sitting nearby remembering Queen Victoria. Yes there is a long pier for us Brits to stroll out with raincoats on whilst some kids explore side show alley. Reach the end of the pier then you stare out to sea wondering, wondering... Yes, there are endless fish and chip shops plying their trade. Yes, there are many lolly and rock shops about, almost as many as I saw in Rockingham WA the last time I was there amongst the many pommies who live in our remote west. And Yvonne's favourite here is Grumpy's. And yes, the pedestrians must dodge even rented mobility scooters zooming along with warning flags flying.

And now this is us. Where is this heading?

Where was Yvonne?

Whilst Randall was pouring over old records, maps and gravestones Yvonne took advantage of the train service and revisited Brighton for the day. Also to send a postcard to Randall's mum with an update on her honeymoon location. Twenty eight years on Brighton is not how I remember it – much bigger and the weather was appalling. The wind was so strong on the promenade you could hardly stand up. I checked out the Royal Pavilion, wandered The Lanes and just had time for a coffee at Jamie Oliver's Cafe/shop/cooking school.



Another train journey took me to London again after just as many years. I forgot – July is top tourist season and they were out in full force. London is a major works in progress right now, with so much building/reconstruction going on for the Olympics. I spent nearly 5 hours on buses just getting around as a refresher – no time for even a coffee. The Queen had a garden party on but I didn't have time to go there – saw her guests lined up in their finery under umbrellas sheltering from the huge deluge we had. I also only had time to drive past Westminster where all the action was happening. It was a stressful day, with my eye always on the clock so I was glad to relax on the train home with the pinstripe trousers (no suits on this train). Take me back to Scotland.

Back to history lessons

We had ventured into family heartland around the counties of Hertford and Bedford. This family back tracking only means what you want it to mean in if you were born and raised in Australia then perhaps your link to England is tenuous at best. But it seems it is never that simple. Find a couple of family names in the records, look around a couple of churchyard cemeteries and then the J part of ISTJ preferences takes off and new conclusions were being drawn. In the 2 days available, Randall managed to take off in several different directions at once reacting to snippets of new information.

A high school history education largely based on an English view of the world combined with a layman knowledge of powerful events including the religious reformation, agrarian reforms and land enclosures plus the industrial revolution in post Napoleonic war England are now not enough. Randall has now learnt that John Bunyan spent time in Bedford gaol whilst expounding the merits of religious reform. And he had a keen follower in the vicar in Pirton village where Randall's forebears lived in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. So what, you say?



Well, at least some of the family “strayed” into Baptist or Methodist or Quaker or other Puritan streams. And this makes for somewhat messy tracking of the baptisms, marriages and deaths records so necessary for family tracing. Randall could not find any Facebook pages for clues and calls to the Murdoch empire people and the police hackers did not seem the right thing to do as quite a few of these people were tied up with a small parliamentary enquiry or mulling over lost jobs.

So after just two days of effort here, Randall had found new areas to investigate whilst consolidating disparate information previously discovered. As well he had confirmed that Hertfordshire not Bedfordshire was home base for most of his family at one time, particularly in the nineteenth century. These days there is perhaps one family member left in this small village.



And it does appear that forebear William was one of a kind with no others in the near family falling foul of the system to find himself bound for Botany Bay and life consigning descendants to a different form of misery under Julia and her ilk. (Or was young William given a great break to establish a new dynasty down under?)

PS. Horror, horror. A big historical hero in Bedford is one John Howard (1726-1790), statue and all. Bedford is not a place to come back to. Wonder if there are any connections here?

Finally, what was Yvonne doing whilst Randall was living in the past?

Kingsley tour of Scotland ends

The people we have met in Scotland have been almost as friendly as those in Ireland, if a tad more dour and subtle in response to us Australians. Economically, we would guess that whilst things might be tight, they are better off than people in Ireland. Real estate, on the surface, looks to be in better shape too and there seem to be more tourists about.

As we prepare to move a little south and into England tomorrow, I am now getting ready to adjust our own sails a bit after we get home. My sense of where we really come from has certainly deepened. We have also had several interesting conversations, without conclusions I might add, over the last month or so about what we might do next and where we might head off to. Whilst these are part of an ongoing tension about family, place and activities, our visits and learnings here are helping me to make some changes.



Our tours through stately homes have also raised the somewhat thorny issues of hereditary power and earned wealth. Not to think about the little people crushed along the way as families grabbed for influence. It is too easy to be entranced by the public images projected without thinking too much about the power being exerted and some are currently being bewitched by the touring Wil and Kate brigade. Up here it seems that English Queen Victoria wasted no time in her day to extend her family's grasp of property and influence in much the same way. By visiting these places this week, I guess in some ways we are also supporting the status quo. Meanwhile the process of power gathering in society continues as it has for thousands of years.



And the world out there continues to intrigue. The Anglo Irish are currently marching away in Belfast and elsewhere in Ireland, frustrating other young Irish natives into ongoing protest. Learning is being learnt over the centuries.

Rupert M is still in the UK defending his turf and demonstrating what happens when people stay around too long, lose touch and fail to succession plan. Here in the UK former dining partners Blair and Brown have quickly turned with knives drawn and I wonder if Julia (if still around) Gillard and other PMs will continue to grovel at the Murdoch table when next in the US?



Lastly spare a thought for Yvonne on Saturday as she supervises English traffic whilst looking for photo opportunities and puts her foot on the brakes of the hire car at the same time. The experts are predicting wind and rain all day so this will not be a day of reflection on what we are doing about our own boat people.

Meandering along with Randall And Yvonne

The sense of this trip has varied over the week, perhaps largely as we are self-catering and touring from a fixed position just a few miles from Perth. We have completed tourist and educational trips to Stirling Castle and the William Wallace monument, adding in a bit of exploration around St Andrews and the sea-side villages of Crail and Anstruther – the best fish and ships in Britain ??...... whilst trying to learn a little about our local area of Dunning. The weather has been good as we wandered. We also continued to enjoy our Rapunzel type existence in the Tower House.



We have not done this area justice as we have sacrificed opportunities to stay very local and just walk the ground seeking deer, red squirrels, highland cattle and more sheep for Yvonne's camera. Instead we have spent more time in the car to reach a few more of the interesting towns and castles. Our walks have been fewer and shorter than we anticipated.



The boat people mission had been parked until we visited the old Innerpeffray Library, the oldest in Scotland where we spent a couple of hours pouring over 16th and 17th century books and checking out the maps and descriptions of English counties and Randall's heritage. We were shown and able to thumb through several ancient books describing history of counties and so Randall was riveted there for quite a while delving into old English and also Latin.



Visits to Dunkeld, Pitlochry and the castles of Blair Atholl and Scone were all really interesting and Yvonne was quite blown away by highland shopping opportunities at Bruar near Blair Atholl. This was where our picnics were brief and our walks shortened a tad.

North of the border

We all get things right sometimes and I got it right today in Scotland. Our pre-booked church tower, transformed into a self-catered accommodation, meets all of our requirements. And Yvonne gets to live in this romantic place on her birthday. As part of a decommissioned church set just outside Dunning, an ancient Perthshire village, the place hits most of our buttons. Facilities to a high standard, all mod cons, broadband wifi (for Randall), second floor bedroom in the church tower and below the old clock and bells, a short walk to the village, pleasant hosts and big smiles on Yvonne. Well that was until Yvonne discovered the narrow winding stairway up the tower as you would expect in such a church tower. She is getting used to the idea now. In the kitchen Yvonne prepares dinner with the angels watching over her and under the stained glass window. Could be a good week here if the weather holds.



It was quite a long haul up into Scotland from Wales and made more interesting as the traffic levels on the motor ways were very high. Randall enjoyed practice for the British Grand Prix whilst Yvonne was trying to look everywhere at once. She did not have enough time to call out driving instructions, just a squeal or two from time to time and exhausted look on her face at the end of the day..

By judicious planning we managed to get to a great little market town in Lancashire, Kirkby Lonsdale, for lunch. We stayed for a week in this delightful spot many years ago and with good holiday weather and an international Harley Davidson gathering on in and around the town, the place was humming along nicely. We had a very pleasant cafe lunch of modern food and great service so some of our fears about stodge, stodge and stodge in England are being dis-spelled somewhat.



On Sunday, and whilst seemingly hours of media being chewed up over the death of a low life newspaper, we made a short couple of hours driving tour around the local district to get a bit of a feel for this part of Scotland and to get a better idea of what we might do to entertain ourselves over the coming week.

And as a now total convert to staying in touch through internet and with all places in Ireland, Wales and now Scotland so far providing good connectivity, we are easily following the somewhat inept politics and happenings going on down under.

We have yet to think about when this particular venture will stop, as it must. For now it is still a fine adventure.