Lorient in Brittany, France

Posted on 17 October 2016 by Katrina

We sailed into Lorient in Brittany on a Monday. Apparently shops in France shut on a Monday. I’ve spent a couple of holidays in France before and I don’t recall that at all, although they did have what seemed to us to be bizarre opening times. In Britain we just assume that shops should open at 9 am and close at 5.30 pm but it isn’t like that in other parts of the world. You would have thought though that any town that has a cruise ship containing nearly 1,000 passengers docking within a very short walking distance from ‘centre ville’ that the business owners might think it was a good idea to open up the shops, just for that Monday, but hmm, they don’t seem to think like that in France. The only shops open were bakeries and pharmacies. I think that France must have the biggest number of pharmacies of any country in the world. The photo below is of a typical street, complete with very tall plane trees. Well, I think that’s what they are.

Anyway, it was just nice to be able to stretch our legs properly after getting off the ship and Lorient is a lovely town – for window shopping. If I had known the town would be shut we would have arranged to go on one of the arranged trips to nearby Quimper, where that charming pottery originates, oh well, maybe next time we’re in that neighbourhood we’ll go there.

Below is a photo of the Hotel de Ville, I love fountains, I don’t know why we don’t have as many in the UK.

It has a rather snazzy looking modern theatre.

Most of Lorient is quite modern, it was badly bombed during the war in 1943-44, but the Hotel Gabriel and tower below are quite historic. The Germans had their U-Boat headquarters in Lorient so it was always going to be a big target for the allies, they apparently dropped leaflets prior to the bombing campaign advising inhabitants to get out. It’s quiet depressing how nothing seems to change where human beings are concerned, we – or should I say – the powers that be just never learn and ordinary people just have to suffer it all.

Despite being disappointed at fetching up in a more or less deserted town, it was only at this time that I began to really enjoy the cruise. The weather wasn’t great, it was quite chilly and we even got a wee smattering of rain, but Lorient has some beautiful planting and fountains and is obviously quite a wealthy area, going by the huge amount of yachts and boats moored there. The photo below shows just a tiny fraction of them.

There’s quite a lot of art deco inspired modern architecture around. I especially liked the porthole windows in the building below.

As we were leaving port on the Black Watch there was a nice looking wee town across the river from Lorient. I think it’s called Locmiquélic.

Tomorrow we’ll sail via the Bay of Biscay to Getxo in Spain, the port for Bilbao, where things get much better.

Cruising from Rosyth, Fife

Posted on 16 October 2016 by Katrina

We chose to go on a cruise leaving from Rosyth in Fife because it’s fairly handy for us, in fact we even looked at a house in Rosyth when we were looking for a new home a couple of years ago. Rosyth is by the River Forth and for me it meant that our trip would be exciting from the very start as we would be sailing under the bridges – all three of them, and getting up close to the third one – the Queensferry Crossing, still under construction. We checked in at 4.30 pm on September, 30th – as we were asked to and by 6.00 pm the Black Watch set sail. The photo below was taken from the ship, looking over to Edinburgh.

The photo below is of one of the islands in the Firth of Forth, Inchcolm.

The photo below is of the new bridge called the Queensferry Crossing, still under construction.

The photo below is of Kirkcaldy where we used to live until a couple of years ago.

If you look closely at the photo below I think you can just about make out all three bridges.

The week previously had been wild and windy but the weather had taken a turn for the worse as far as I was concerned as the North Sea that we sailed into was a flat calm. What a disappointment, I’ve always loved heavy seas, ever since going on an incredibly rough voyage to Scandinavia as a schoolgirl. Anyway, we sailed along at an average speed of 16 knots and after sailing from the North Sea into the English Channel I was a bit happier as the sea was quite a bit choppier there.

I was still wondering if we had done the right thing in going on a cruise though as I’m not really a people person. I’m fine once I get to know folks but a shipful of around a thousand strangers was a bit daunting to me. For the first few days I did a lot of reading in our cabin, apart from meal times. I must say the food was really delicious, but going out for fancy meals has never been my top way of relaxing, although I did get used very quickly to having everything done for me. The evening meal was five courses but we usually just had three courses, I think we were unusual in that.

Just about the first thing that struck us was that everybody seemed to be so much older than us. I reckon that the average age was about 80. To be fair we deliberately booked up a cruise that was for adults only, mainly because I thought it would be a nightmare if there were a lot of badly behaved kids rampaging around. It never occurred to me that going on a cruise is actually cheaper than paying for a care home – but it is, and I’m sure the care is better on board too! We did find a few people who were younger than us, some folks who were maybe only around 40 or so.

The ship seemed to be full of people who were more or less addicted to cruising, loads of them had booked up for their next cruise before this one came to an end. They claim that the sea air makes your clothes shrink!

When I started to explore the ship a bit more I noticed that there were loads of people reading books, a few using Kindles. John Grisham was very popular but I didn’t see anyone reading the sorts of books that I tend to go for. There were a fair few knitters around too. I had thought about taking some knitting as it’s getting on for my knitting ‘season’ but I really thought that I would definitely be looked on as being a bit eccentric – knitting on a cruise.

So the first few days I was a bit down and that song about Camp Granada kept running through my mind. But then we made friends with the people at the next door table, and we discovered some old friends were on the cruise, old in both ways as we’ve known them for 30 years or so and they are both over 80 and still going strong. So by the time we got to the first port – Lorient in Brittany on Monday I was feeling a lot more optimistic. Tomorrow I’ll show you some photos of that port.

Back Again – all being well!

Posted on 16 October 2016 by Katrina

Well, I thought I was back, and although we were back from our cruise, almost as soon as I had got the holiday washing hung out I succumbed to a ghastly flu type of bug. That test of whether you have a cold or flu – if it’s a cold you will pick up a £20 note lying on the ground but if it’s flu you will ignore it – means it was definitely flu, as I would have ignored £1,000.

Anyway, after two and a half days of barely being able to lift my head – pain, dizziness and gunge – I’m left with a cough and a hoarse voice which is getting better. I’m just very thankful that I didn’t get ill like that whilst away on the cruise.

So, on with the beginning of the cruise blogposts, very soon.

I’m Back!

Posted on 12 October 2016 by Katrina

Yes, I’m/we’re back home now after cruising on Black Watch from Rosyth in Fife via the North Sea, English Channel, Celtic Sea and Bay of Biscay to Brittany and Normandy in France and then on to Spain and Portugal. We were amazingly lucky with the weather, apparently they get a lot of rain in the north of Spain (although I think their idea of a lot of rain might be very different from mine) but to be fair the place is all very green and lush so they must get a fair amount I suppose.

Anyway, we took loads of photos and I hope to get through at least some of them tomorrow and so have a cruise blogpost up soon. We decided against going online on the ship as it cost £13 for 30 minutes and was very slow so with both of us using it it would have been very expensive and no doubt frustrating.

I wasn’t at all sure about going on a cruise but after the first couple of days, when I was eyeing up the lifeboats and deciding that there was no way off the ship, I settled down and threw myself into life on board, visiting the cinema, cabaret shows and comedy shows. Amazingly there were five talks by a chap who had run trips to the First World War battlefields in the past, he was very interesting and the talks were incredibly popular, just about standing room only sometimes.

Meanwhile, you can see a lot of images of Black Watch here.

Possible Blog Hiatus

Posted on 29 September 2016 by Katrina

Way back in July, just after Gordon and Laura’s wedding, we were feeling a bit flat. You know what it’s like when you’ve had something to look forward to for ages and then it’s all over, there’s usually a sense of – what do we do now? – and to cap it all the weather was pretty rotten. So to cheer ourselves up we booked a cruise! Of course as soon as we did that the weather improved hugely – typical.

I’ve never really been keen on the idea of a cruise but it is the only way of having a holiday that doesn’t involve Jack doing a lot of driving, it’s years since I’ve flown anywhere, I’m not crazy about flying nowadays.

I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do much if any blogging while we’re away but I will schedule some posts, although recently the scheduling hasn’t been working.

We’ve never been on a cruise before, well I say that but we have both been on those educational cruises for schoolkids that were massively subsidised way back in the 1960s and 70s. I went to Scandinavia when I was 12 on the SS Uganda and Jack went on two cruises on the Uganda and the Dunera – ah the glory days of the 60s and 70s, when we had full employment (the 1960s anyway) and everything seemed possible, the world has definitely gone backwards since then!

Anyway, I’ve wandered as usual, we’re sailing off to France, Portugal and Spain. We had planned on going to Norway but the cruise dates didn’t fit in well for us so maybe that’ll be our second cruise, if we enjoy this first one. One good thing is that the weather should be warmer than it is here so we’ll be prolonging our summer a bit. I just hope that it isn’t all reminiscent of Hi-de-Hi, but on the high seas! Whatever, it’ll be an experience and we won’t be in danger of ever lying on our death beds wishing we had gone on a cruise!

I’m a cheery besom – amn’t I?!

Kenmore in Perthshire, Scotland

Posted on 29 September 2016 by Katrina

On our way back from the Highlands recently we passed through the teeny wee village of Kenmore, I say passed through but when I saw how pretty it was we had to stop. I had no idea that this place even existed and it’s really quite close to where we live, well 60 miles or so from us. Just above the Post Office sign to the right it says Telegraph Office, I’ve never seen that before and I’m glad that it has been left there as it’s part of the building’s history.

The Kenmore Hotel claims to be the oldest hotel in Scotland. I think we’ll have to go and give it a go sometime.

A one minute walk from the Post Office takes you to the banks of Loch Tay as you can see. Kenmore has a really beautiful setting and is very historic, people have lived in that area for thousands of years and a crannog has been reconstructed on the loch, as they would have been there originally in the Bronze Age.

It was beginning to get quite chilly and misty when we were there and we were keen to get home after our Highland jaunt but we’ll be going back there to explore it more thoroughly in the future.

I’ve wanted to visit a crannog for years so I’ll definitely be going to explore the one below, maybe in the springtime.

crannog

Edited to add on 31/3/18

If you’re interested in seeing some more of Kenmore and you enjoy a pipe band, have a look at the You Tube video below. It shows the 2018 River Tay salmon fishing opening ceremony.

Blood and Beauty by Sarah Dunant

Posted on 27 September 2016 by Katrina

Blood and Beauty by Sarah Dunant was a random choice by me from the library. I enjoyed watching/listening to Sarah Dunant when she used to be on TV some years ago when she presented the culture programme The Late Show, so I thought I’d give her writing a whirl.

The setting of Blood and Beauty is mainly Rome, the Vatican and when the book begins it’s 1492 and a new Pope has just been elected. Rodrigo Borgia has got the top job of God’s representative on earth, he’s a politician and worked hard to get what he wanted. Although he has lived in Italy for years he’s still seen as a foreigner, a Spaniard looked down on by many but he has bribed his way to the top job, the other cardinals couldn’t resist his gold. It seems not to have been a problem that he had six children and never had any intention of sticking to his vows of celibacy, but that seems to have been normal for those days. He became Pope Alexander VI.

In essence he used his children as pawns and married them all off to the various important and powerful families in the neighbouring countries. He was a similar type to Henry VIII but of course the pope could just decree any marriage to be dissolved if he became unhappy with his choice of in-laws. So he didn’t have the same problems as King Hal. In fact it might be fairer to say that Rodrigo Borgia resembled Henry VIII’s politicians and advisors as they were the ones keenest to form alliances with other countries.

Anyway Pope Alexander’s son Juan was very much his favourite and he made that obvious to everyone which caused a huge amount of jealousy and resentment especially within the family, particularly where his son Cesare was concerned. But as Juan was spoiled rotten his behaviour was always going to make him plenty of enemies. It isn’t going to end well!

I decided to read this book because I thought it would be a painless way of learning about the history of that era, and so it turned out to be. The only thing that I knew about his daughter Lucrezia Borgia was that she had a reputation as a poisoner, but so far she is a much used and abused daughter, sister and devastated widow. This book has a sequel (I think it’s out in 2017) and I’ll definitely be reading it but I must say that if Lucrezia does resort to poison eventually, I won’t really blame her too much. I don’t think this is a brilliant book, it isn’t in the same sphere as Wolf Hall but it is very readable.

Mind you, I was watching something on TV quite recently and the historian mentioned that although at the time someone was thought to have been poisoned (I can’t remember who) it’s now thought more likely that they died of a burst appendix!

What a thought – there must have been loads of people over the years who were accused of poisoning people who had just died of what we now know as being unfortunate health problems such as appendicitis, peritonitis, perforated stomach ulcers, food poisoning and such.

At the end of the book there is quite a long bibliography and I might read one or two of those books too. Well, I would like to but you know what it’s like – too many books!

The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard

Posted on 25 September 2016 by Katrina

The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard was first published in 1990 which is a shocking 26 years ago now – how did that happen? I didn’t read it back then, in fact I think I may be the last woman in the western world to read the book, I’m just thrawn that way, often avoid doing things just because everyone else is doing it. It was Joan of Planet Joan who made me think that it was time I got around to The Light Years, the first book in the Cazalet series, you can read what she thought of it here.

The book is in two parts with the first part starting in 1937 and the second part begins in late summer 1938 but it ends with the run up to World War 2 and Chamberlain’s attempts to avoid war. We meet three generations of Cazalets the Brig and Duchy are the parents, getting on now but the Brig is very much in charge of the family wood/lumber business. Their two elder sons work in the business and as the business is obviously thriving they’re quite well off, but the youngest son has hopes of being an artist and is working as a teacher until he finds success in that field.

The characters are all very different with their different personalities well defined but it was the characters of the children that I was really impressed with. Howard must have been one of those people who perhaps has never really completely grown up herself and has remained close to how it feels to be a child in various circumstances. She wrote about all their fears, problems and worries with great insight. I really didn’t want to leave this family saga and would have gone straight on to the next one Marking Time, if only I had had a copy of it. I’ll need to get my hands on one soon!

I didn’t watch the TV series when it was on either and I’m wondering if it is worth watching or is it one of the many dramatisations that end up being disappointing. If you watched it please tell me what you thought of the series.

Guardian links from the Review

Posted on 24 September 2016 by Katrina

I’ve just finished reading The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard. It’s the first book in the Cazalet series (I’ve yet to blog about it) and I’m trying to get my hands on the second one as I really want to get back to that family. Anyway, I noticed an article about Elizabeth Jane Howard in the Guardian Review section this morning, if you’re interested you can read it here. It’s by Artemis Cooper who has just written a book about Howard.

Elizabeth Jane Howard

The photo above is of Elizabeth Jane Howard with her then husband Kingsley Amis. Like many writers she was a bit of a conundrum herself I think. On a frivolous note I wonder if she ever regretted sticking her middle name on her books – I know I would have if I had been her.

There’s an article about the ghost stories that E. Nesbit wrote for adults, it’ll be Halloween before we know it so it might be of interest to anyone reading books for that spooky season. You can read the article here.

I’ve always been interested in children’s books but in recent years I’ve become quite distant from what’s going on, mainly due to having no small people in my life at the moment. I must admit though that I still do buy children’s books if I happen to see any with beautiful illustrations. So I was interested in this Children’s roundup by Imogen Russell Williams.

If Shakespeare is more your cup of tea you might like to read Margaret Atwood’s article on rewriting The Tempest for the 21st century.

Thetford, Norfolk, East Anglia, England

Posted on 23 September 2016 by Katrina

Another town we visited on our way back from our May trip to Holland and Belgium was Thetford in Norfolk. I wanted to go there because it was one of those places that I was always hearing about when we lived in East Anglia, but we never did get around to visiting it at that time. I must admit it seemed a lot smaller than I had imagined it to be. The main streets are pedestrianised as you can see.

Thomas Paine, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States was born in Thetford.

I’m not kidding you we were in the high street for more than ten minutes before we actually heard an English voice. It was like a league of nations – guess the language the passers-by are speaking! It seemed to me that the smallish community must feel overwhelmed with the amount of people who had settled there from mainland Europe, probably to work in agriculture. What was very surprising to me was that there were what seemed to be Spanish people who were way past retirement age milling around and gossiping, completely at home in the place. I suppose that it makes up for all those Brits who go off to Spain to retire there for the better weather and cheaper cost of living. I can’t imagine why older Spanish people would want to settle in the freezing wastes of East Anglia, maybe they all go home for the winter! I feared that the amount of migrants around would not bode well for a Remain vote in the then up and coming European referendum. How the farmers are going to get their produce up out of the fields and packed for sale is going to be a problem if the foreign workers do have to leave the UK.

Anyway all we can do is cross our fingers and hope that Brexit doesn’t eventually lead to more war memorials in our towns in the future, such as the First World War memorial in the photo below.

I took the photo below very close to the centre of Thetford where we parked the car. It’s a lovely river – called the Little Ouse and you can see more images of it here.

Thetford is a very historic town, the area was the stamping ground of the Iceni tribe of Boudica fame.

Pining for the West

Meanderings about recipes, books, craft and more