January 2021 – A Traveling Fool

January 31, 2021

My First Real Trip to Anywhere – Part 2

In 1983, my first real vacation trip to anywhere, inside or outside of the US, was to London with my mom. We had both wanted to go there all of our lives. We were finally there and were overwhelmingly thrilled.

After finally getting a good night’s sleep, we headed out to the Museum of London. One of the things that I love about this museum is that its exhibits are in chronological order, beginning with what has been unearthed in London from prehistory. The building itself straddles part of what remains of the Roman wall that used to surround Londinium and was enlarged to surround Medieval London up until the time of the Great Fire of 1666. Many of the exhibits take you back to a specific time in London’s history, such as Victorian London or during the Great Fire of 1666.

From the Museum of London, we walked a few blocks to St Paul’s Cathedral. I was especially interested in the crypts with the tombs of Admiral Horatio Nelson, Sir Christopher Wren, and the Duke of Wellington. This version of the cathedral had been built by Wren after the Great Fire destroyed the previous version. There had been a cathedral on the site since 604 AD.

From St Paul’s, after lunch, we set off for the Tower of London. On the way, we stopped at the former Roman Forum where the Bank of England, the Royal Exchange and the Lord Mayor’s Residence could be seen. Then we headed towards the river so we could take a look at the Monument to the Great Fire at the head of Pudding Lane, where the fire began at a baker’s shop. I have a real interest in history and love to visit places where historic events took place and picture what happened there.

We should have backtracked up to Eastcheap instead of making our way along Lower Thames Street. Rookie mistake. I did not realize that the area was not the best until I saw that we were totally alone and then noticed that we were being followed by a couple of men. That was when I steered Mom north towards Eastcheap. Fortunately we made it safely to the Tower. It is always important to be aware of your surroundings and try to walk along in more populated areas.

In 1983, not as much of the Tower of London complex was open as there is now. Many, many changes have be made over the years to make it a truly remarkable experience. One thing that hasn’t changed, however, is the wonderful Yeoman Warder (other than that there are now females as well as males). These folks are very, very knowledgeable and very personable. Talking to one or more of them during a visit can give you a lot more knowledge as well as some cool ghost stories (and often a lot of legends). They live there at the Tower and experience some amazing things after all of the visitors are gone. Starting your tour of the complex by joining one of their tours is well worth it.

The Victorian Tower Bridge is another structure that I find fascinating. On this particular trip, we did not cross the bridge, but did so in 1991 so we could also explore the part of London over on the other side of the Thames.

Instead of taking the underground back from the Tower, we started a tradition of taking the boat back to Westminster Pier and walking back to our hotel from there. Since that trip, every time I have been in London with or without Mom, I have always taken the boat to Westminster Pier, no matter how I got to the Tower in the first place.

The following day, we started out at the British Museum. I was really impressed by the Babylonian and Assyrian monuments as well as the Greek statues and Elgin Marbles. The Rosetta Stone was wonderful to see. We were amazed that we could get so close to it. Then there were all of the Egyptian statues and mummies. I had seen one mummy in a small museum when I had been a child. Here there were rooms full of them. It wasn’t until I went to Egypt and visited the Cairo Museum that I saw an even larger display of mummies and other Egyptian artifacts.

We also visited the British Library and looked at some original works by Charles Dickens and William Shakespeare, as well as a copy of the Magna Carta.

After lunch, we visited Dickens’ London home on Doughty Street. This was where he completed The Pickwick Papers, wrote Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickleby, and began Barnaby Rudge. Mom and I were the only visitors at the time and had a costumed guide all to ourselves. We enjoyed having a private tour with a fellow who knew all about Dickens and the house and looked like he had just stepped out of one of Dickens’ novels.

Before heading back to the hotel, we took the tube to Marble Arch. This monumental arch used to stand in front of Buckingham Palace until Queen Victoria had it banished to its current location at a roundabout. We walked along Oxford Street towards Piccadilly to do a little bit of shopping. I ended up getting one of those bulky, cable knit, highly British sweaters for 14 GBP.

Next time – My First Real Trip to Anywhere Part 3 – where Mom and I experienced the Trooping the Colour (and saw the entire Royal Family, including Princess Diana), visited the Royal Tombs in Westminster Abbey, and took the boat to Greenwich.

January 17, 2021

My First Real Trip Anywhere – Part 1

Since I have now run out of trips for a little while, I have decided to talk about some special, silly, and/or interesting experiences from my travels. These will include more personal details or be from different perspectives than some of my previous posts, especially the earlier ones.

When I was a kid, we didn’t really do traveling. We rented a lake cabin a couple of times. We traveled to visit family. But we never took any real trips.

So, as an adult, not too long after re-joining the rest of my family, which had moved to Minneapolis, my mom and I decided to take a trip to London. She and I were both what you could call Anglophiles plus we had shared British heritage on her side of the family and I had additional British heritage on my father’s side of the family. If we were going on an adventure, it was going to be to London.

This was in the days before the Internet. A travel agent was how it was done back in 1983. In the building where I worked was just such a travel agent. So I picked up a couple brochures and we figured out what we wanted to do.

The choices were to take a fully escorted tour or to book a package through the main airline that served Minneapolis/St Paul. The package would include airfare, hotel, a rail transfer between the airport and the hotel, one or two day trips out of London, and tickets to a play. We chose the package and I met with the travel agent.

We put together a 10-day trip that would coincide with the Trooping the Colour Ceremony for the Queen’s official birthday. We picked two day trips — one to Stonehenge & Bath, and one to Oxford & Stratford-Upon-Avon. We also chose to attend a medieval banquet and to see the play “The Real Thing”.

I had become enamored with an actor named Roger Rees from when “David Copperfield” played on Broadway. He was starring in “The Real Thing” along with Felicity Kendall (who had been in several British TV shows I had seen on PBS) and Jeremy Clyde (who had been part of the singing duo Chad & Jeremy before switching to acting).

Our hotel was at Piccadilly Circus and the theatre was The Strand — quite a walk from the hotel. But I figured it out on the map. The day trips and the medieval banquet would pick us up from the hotel. Because I had lived in New York City for several years and had ridden the subway there, I felt no trepidation about riding the underground (the Tube) in London to visit the other locations we wanted to see.

Once we arrived at Gatwick Airport, we found the train we needed to London’s Victoria Station. This particular train still had the cars with doors opening out from individual compartments. It was an extra special experience as this would be the only time in all of our visits to London where we had that type of rail car. By the next trip in 1991, the trains were all modern with totally conventional rail cars.

From Victoria Station, we took a taxi to the hotel. As we were rounding some very high walls, Mom said, “I wonder what that is.” “Buckingham Palace”, the driver and I responded simultaneously. Mom and the driver both said, “How did you know that?”

There was nothing indicating what it was. I just knew. Somehow. The cab driver was amazed. Mom was thrilled. It gave her the idea that I would know where we were at all times and we would not get lost. To be fair, I had been studying the map so thoroughly that I had nearly memorized it. I still use that same map.

The day before we left on our trip, the travel agent gave us tickets for “The Mousetrap” for our first night in London. The original owners of the tickets had canceled their trip, so we benefited from some freebies. We then made the mistake of trying to take an afternoon nap.

We had not slept on the plane and all and were quite tired. But we were also very excited about being there. We could not sleep. We ended up not being able to sleep that night either. So, by the next day — our first full day in London — we were exhausted. But we had a full day ahead of us.

I had overestimated how much we could cover in a day. On the list was: The National Gallery, the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, the Wellington Museum (Apsley House), the Royal Mews at Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, and Parliament.

At the National Gallery, partially due to a late start, we only had time to take a quick look at some paintings by Michelangelo and Leonardo de Vinci before we needed to take a quick hike up the The Mall to see the Changing of the Guards. The Mall was lined with flags. Mom and I were overcome. We were really in London!

As short as I am, plus we arrived just before it started, meant that I didn’t get too many decent photos of the Changing of the Guards itself. We could see it fairly well however and I did get one good shot when they were right in front of me (and nobody else was) and another of the Horseguards approaching. Then we went to Apsley House and had a good tour there.

After a light lunch we toured the Royal Mews which contains the carriages and motor vehicles used by the royal family. I really enjoyed that tour. Part of the reason was because we were on the palace grounds, behind that tall wall we had passed the day before.

We walked from there to Westminster Abbey. We were able to see the parts of the Abbey that were free (now there are no parts that are free), but couldn’t see the Royal Tombs due to a funeral that was taking place there. I asked if they would be open after the Trooping the Colour on Saturday and was told they would be. So Mom and I shifted our plans for Saturday to be able to include that visit.

We found that we could not see the inside of Parliament, so headed up Whitehall to return to our hotel and get ready to see “The Real Thing” that night.

Next time – more adventures in London on that first real trip anywhere.

January 3, 2021

Virginia: The Battle of New River Bridge, the Village of Newport and the Village of Appomattox Courthouse

In fall of 2017 I was invited out to Virginia to visit one of my cousins and his family. As part of my visit (since they know I love history) we visited the site of the American Civil War Battle of New River Bridge, the also nearby village of Newport, and took a drive to where the Civil War ended — Appomattox Courthouse.

Not far from where my cousin lives was the town of Radford, Virginia. Just outside of town, the Battle of New River Bridge was fought in May of 1864. Although called the New River, it is actually one of the oldest river systems in the world, coming in second to the Nile River in Egypt.

For strategic reasons, the Union decided it needed to burn the covered, wooden, railroad bridge spanning the New River. As the Federal troops approached, the outnumbered Confederates retreated across the river. An artillery battle took place for several hours while Union soldiers placed several rail cars containing hay inside of the covered bridge. During the artillery barrage, Captain Michael Egan of the 15^th West Virginia Infantry Regiment (which was on the side of the Union) swam out, climbed the piers of the bridge and set it on fire. Well over a hundred years later I photographed what was left.

Also near Blacksburg, was the village of Newport. They had a lovely covered road bridge, dating from 1916, as well as a very old, antebellum (pre-Civil War) church.

The tiny Virginia village of Appomattox Courthouse was the site of the Battle of Appomattox Courthouse and the surrender of Confederate General Robert E. Lee (Commander of the Army of Northern Virginia) to Union General Ulysses S. Grant (Commander of the Army of the Potomac).

The village started out in roughly 1819 as Clover Hill, named after its tavern. By 1845, it was determined that it would be the county seat for Appomattox County and so the Appomattox Courthouse building was constructed across the road from the Clover Hill Tavern. A jail was built behind the courthouse.

After abandoning Richmond, General Lee hoped to meet up with some of the other Confederate troops. By the time he reached Appomattox Courthouse, he encountered Union troops commanded by General Philip Sheridan instead and found himself involved in the Battle of Appomattox Courthouse.

As more Federal troops arrived, Lee found his troops seriously outnumbered and trapped with no avenue for escape or retreat, he realized he was going to have to surrender. Brigadier General Joshua Chamberlain of Maine collected the Confederate arms, but the troops were allowed to keep their horses and other possessions and go home.

We began our visit at the Old Appomattox Courthouse, which held some exhibits, and had an introductory message regarding what we would be seeing. Then we headed for the Clover Hill Tavern to listen to a reenactor talk about his experience in the battle and during the surrender. It was a really hot day and we we gathered on the front porch to catch whatever breeze there was. Back in the day, the tavern had also been a stagecoach inn.

After listening to the reenactor, we went on to explore the rest of the village. This included a few houses, a law office and a general store. The other major structure was the McLean House (and outbuildings), where the formal surrender took place.

Wilmer McLean was a wholesale grocer (who made his living during the war as a sugar broker for the Confederacy) who originally lived near Manassas, Virginia. One of the first battles of the war (the First Battle of Bull Run in 1861) took place on his farm. Afterwards, he moved to Appomattox Courthouse to escape the war only to receive a knock on his door in 1865 asking him if his home could be used for the surrender. He said afterwards that, “The war began in my front yard and ended in my front parlor.”

The McLean House had been restored back in the 1940s and furnished with as many original pieces as could be found. The parlor was recreated to appear as it did at the time of the surrender, based upon a painting. There were also a separate cookhouse and slave quarters.

I found the entire village to be fascinating to explore. There was nothing modern there. It was all historic. There was a definite feeling of “stepping back in time”. I had visited a fair amount of Virginia before — Yorktown, Jamestown, Williamsburg, Alexandria, Mount Vernon, Richmond, Monticello, and Fredericksburg — some with Colonial connections, some with American Revolution connections, some with American Civil War connections and some with links to all three eras. So much history in Virginia.

Next time – since I didn’t have the opportunity to travel in 2018, 2019 or 2020, I am beginning a series on memorable experiences while traveling. I do have a trip booked for later in 2021, so will have new adventures to report on afterwards.