Welwyn Garden City

Today's trip was a bit of a jaunt involving a taxi test in Hatfield, then collecting the client from Lutona and going on to the licensing office in Welwyn Garden City.

Welwyn Garden City

Follwed by a collection, a Black Cab, in Boreham Wood which entailed a train into Kings Cross station in central London, crossing the road to St Pancras to catch another train back out of the city.

St Pancras Station

Holiday Reflections; Cumbia and the Lake District.

The county of Cumbria in the northwest of England contains at its heart the Lake District with spectacular scenery of mountains and (as the name suggests) beautiful lakes. The largest is Lake Windermere and, should I ever come into a substantial amount of money, I think that I would buy a house on its shores or in one of the small towns that surround it, such as Bowness-on-Windermere or Ambleside.

The Lighthouse Cafe-Bar Windermere

Unfortunately I have no photos of the lake of my own, so if you would like to see a whole array of pictures I suggest you head to the Flickr Windermere Group.




A popular destination, a little farther on is the poet William Wordsworth's home, Dove Cottage at Grasmere, which is now a museum dedicated to his life and work.

Dove Cottage, Grasmere

Spiking Whitehaven's cannons.

Beyond the Lake District along the coast there are a number of small towns such as Workington and Whitehaven which look out across the Solway Firth towards Dumfries and Galloway in Scotland. Whitehaven, once a major coal exporting port, from mines which used to surround the town, was attacked by the newly formed American Navy under the command of John Paul Jones on 23rd April 1778 during the American War of Independence. Jones, a Scot, had started his maritime career in Whitehaven and knew the importance of the coal trade to the north of England, in the end the raid was of limited success for the Americans with only one merchant ship destroyed although they did manage to spike the town's defensive cannons, today commemorated with a bronze statue.

Holiday Reflections; Central London.

Inevitably I regularly have to deliver or collect cars in and around London which frequently involves passing through the central area of the capital. Dr Johnson said "He who tires of London tires of life" and it is true there is always something to catch the eye, here are a few photographs that I have taken on my wanderings.

HMS Belfast from London Bridge.

Asply House, the Duke of Wellington's residence, Hyde Park Corner.

Parliament from Trafalgar Square.

St Pancras Station.

The Serpentine, Hyde Park.

St James's Palace.

St Martins in the Fields.

Tower Bridge.

Holiday reflections; Lincoln

This week I am on holiday - staying at home, so I will take the opportunity to reflect on some of my favourite places that I have visited during the course of my work. Today's subject is Lincoln.

The city is dominated by its magnificent Gothic Cathedral set on a hill overlooking the surrounding flat lands of Lincolnshire, it draws the eye where-ever you are in the city. Getting up to the Cathedral entails a stiff climb up probably the worlds most accurately named street - "Steep Hill".








Lincoln Castle shares the hilltop location and contains one of the four surviving original copies of Magna Carta.

The city's river, the Witham flows into a  small lake known as Brayford Pool around which the town first grew.

From Brayford Pool the river flows through the city centre passing the new, vibrant Waterside shopping area and several pictureque pubs such as the Witch and Wardrobe.

 
To see more photographs of Lincoln please go to my Flickr Photo Set; Lincoln.

Chesterfield and its famous church.

Today I had to take a Ford Mondeo to Chesterfield for a taxi test, arriving early I had time to take a few photographs before my appointment. Naturally, the famous crooked spire of the town's parish church, St Mary and All the Saints was bound to take centre stage.

It used to be claimed that the cause of the spire's crookedness was that the builders in the 14th century used wood that had not been properly seasoned for the framework. However, recent research has suggested that the malformation took place later, when the original  wooden tiles were replaced with heavier slate tiles which the timbers were not intended to support.

Of course there is more to Chesterfield than a church with a wonky spire, The Royal Oak, an inn since the 17th century, was originally a rest house for the Knights Templar.

The town was granted a market charter by King John in 1204 and the open air market continues to thrive in the large Market Place square.

Sutton-on-Sea Connections

Today I had an early start (05.00) to make sure that would be in good time for a taxi test at 09.00 in Sutton-on-Sea on the Lincolnshire coast. 

As I said in yesterday's post, last time I was at Sutton-on-Sea I must have been in short trousers. It would have  been my summer holidays (along with my parents) in the early 1960s staying at my Aunt Ruth and Uncle Eric's home. My uncle was an officer in the Royal Air Force and the officers' married quarters for the local air base were in the town, - very convenient for us. In those days, before cheap package tours to Spain and other parts of the Mediterranean, it was a popular resort for families, a bit more upmarket than the nearby, larger, Skegness and the beach would be full of children building sandcastles, paddling in the sea and generally doing what children do at the seaside.

Today, although there is children's paddling pool just  behind the seafront, there appears to be few youngsters around to use it. The town seems to have become  popular retirement destination, according to the owner of the garage carrying out the taxi test, many of the retirees are former RAF officers who were billetted there during their service careers.

And one last personal connection, the garage was just round the corner from my uncle's old house where I spent my childhood holidays.

A more historical connection is indicated by this unusual style of street name sign. It refers to Alex Henshaw who's  famiy had business interests in the area and who learned to fly at the nearby Skegness and East Lincolnshire Flying Club. Henshaw went to make record breaking flights before World War II and during the war he was Vickers Armstrong's chief test pilot at their Spitfire production plant at Castle Bromwich. He later wrote his memoirs of this period under the title "Sigh for a Merlin".

Hertford Collection.

A dull day today, just a trip to Hertford to collect a van. Apart from viewing some of the damage from last week's riots while waiting for a train connection at Tottenham Hale nothing of note so instead here's a photo taken last week of the Houses of Parliament  as I was passing through central London.

Tomorrow, I'm off to the seaside in a taxi with an early start to get to Sutton on Sea on the Lincolshire coast for 09.00. I think I was still in short trousers the last time I was there!