Winchester

Had a city break with Mum in Winchester a couple of weekends ago. Think our previous break was in Birmingham, which looking back at the blog was in 2014 - longer ago than I thought.

Mum caught an early train to Reading on the Saturday morning and I drove us down, having elected to drive given the location of Winchester’s Premier Inn not far off the M3 – though in the event it wasn’t quite as easy to locate as we’d expected, thanks to unclear signage from the motorway. We parked and walked down into the city centre, visited the tourist information place in the old Guildhall and then went to find somewhere for lunch, ending up at Bistro La Place close to the cathedral.

After lunch we did a short walk around the city courtesy of a leaflet we’d picked up at the tourist place. This started from King Alfred’s statue at the end of the High Street and set off towards the City Bridge, where we diverted to visit the City Mill thanks to our National Trust cards. Quite interesting, especially the lower level where you can cross over the millrace to look at the waterwheel. Nice little garden area out the back. After that we walked along the pretty River Itchen past the city walls, paused briefly to watch some charmingly polite prep school boys playing cricket (sporting shouts of “Oh, good fielding!” from one boy as one of his colleagues managed to stop a ball) and went to look at Wolvesey Castle, the ruined former bishops' palace.

Walked past the house where Jane Austen breathed her last and went to have a look at the darling little church of St Swithun-upon-Kingsgate, accessed by a staircase to one side of the medieval city gate. Briefly visited a secondhand book fair outside the Deanery before finishing the walk outside the cathedral. We spent some time looking round the cathedral, though Mum was disappointed that the full view down the nave wasn’t possible due to it being screened for some building work. Visited the crypt – I’m never sure whether Sound II is actually meant to be standing in water, or whether the crypt just floods intermittently – on the day we visited the floor appeared largely dry but with distinct damp patches. This says that the crypt does flood during rainy months.

On the Saturday evening we went for dinner at The Wykeham Arms, a pub that appeared from a bit of pre-trip research to have a decent reputation. Indeed it was very nice, with an atmospheric bar and cosy restaurant area, which was certainly packed out with diners. Ruth, who got her degree from what’s now the University of Winchester but was then King Alfred’s College, informs me that she had her family graduation dinner there, though that would have been some years back. Although this 'top 10 places to eat in Winchester' resource reckons it's a favourite of Colin Firth's, we didn't spot him.

King Alfred	Mum by the City Mill
The River Itchen	Wolvesey Castle

On the Sunday we had breakfast at the hotel before setting off to do a walk courtesy of a Ramblers’ Association '14 Walks in and around Winchester' booklet Mum had bought at the tourist information place the day before. I’m saying Ramblers’ Association, but in fact I’ve just noticed that the organisation appears to have renamed itself The Ramblers. Perhaps the word ‘association’ was considered to sound too earnest for the modern age.

The walk we chose was the 'Winchester - St Cross - St Catherine's Hill' walk of about 4 miles, though in fact for us it was about six miles due to the walk in from the hotel and back. Followed the 'Weirs' walkway from the City Bridge along the old City wall, then past some school buildings to follow a pretty path between the River Itchen and a mill stream, where we saw some adorable weeny ducklings. Further on we passed the stunning Hospital of St Cross, apparently the largest medieval almshouse in Britain. Later we moved into some interesting transport history, joining Five Bridges Road, now closed to traffic but apparently formerly the A333 - hard to believe now. One end of it met the former Winchester Bypass at the Hockley Interchange, an apparently notorious crossroads - the good chaps at SABRE have an article on the Winchester Bypass plus lots of pics of it at various stages of its life. It's now completely gone - seemingly as some sort of compensation to the locals for putting the M3 through Twyford Down.

Part of the old city wall	Water meadows
Hockley Viaduct	Mum descending St Catherine's Hill

Close to the old junction there's also the remains of a Victorian railway bridge and a path leading up onto the Hockley Viaduct, which once carried a railway line but is now a footpath. We went up onto the viaduct to have a brief look, before turning back towards Winchester along a path that follows the Itchen Navigation, a disused canal. Detoured off the path again when we got to St Catherine's Hill, as I fancied going up it - in fact we didn't go all the way up, but far enough to get good views of the surrounding area. After that we followed the Itchen Navigation back into the city and ate some M&S sandwiches sitting in the Abbey Gardens, before Mum walked back to the hotel and I looked around the shops briefly. In the evening we ate dinner at Prezzo.

Dinner at Prezzo

On the Monday morning we went for breakfast at the lovely Forte Kitchen, where Mum had Eggs Benedict and I had a stack of pancakes and bacon. We rounded off the stay with a walk through the Winnall Moors Nature Reserve. The link suggests quite a range of wildlife that one might see there, but we failed to see anything though were taunted by interesting-sounding bird calls from within the reeds. We also failed to spot a single water vole the entire weekend, despite lots of signs telling us there were voles aplenty in the area. Here's a photo of one on the Itchen Navigation.

Boardwalk at Winnall Moors Nature Reserve, where Mum didn't see a sedge warbler

Miscellaneous burblings

Wolverton Park

Moved into flat at Wolverton Park on 6 February, re-using the efficient services of Bruce Wilkinson Despatch, who tactfully didn’t allude to having transported my possessions from Milton Keynes just over a year ago. Ruth hitched a lift up with the chaps and stayed over until the Sunday to help me get the place in order. It seems a nice spot so far, though there would appear to be a few snagging issues with the maintenance of the blocks along with an issue with lurking local youngsters making a nuisance of themselves. The Wolverton Park Noticeboard on Facebook appears a useful source of knowledge re what’s going on on the site.

Spent my final week in Travelodges at the MK Central hotel, where there was a brief flurry of snow on the Monday evening.

Xscape, Milton Keynes

Had a fun evening on 11 Feb joining several colleagues from both my office and the Strategy Office, with whom we are to be as one, for bowling at the Hollywood Bowl at Xscape. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to bowling as the last time I did it, some while ago, I was resoundingly crap. Went along essentially to be sociable and also because I hadn’t been to Xscape before. It’s an absurd structure that looks a bit like a giant top-heavy woodlouse and apparently houses a ski slope with actual snow. In fact according to their blurb, it houses the country’s biggest indoor REAL snow slopes. Photo from http://myhotelbookings.co.uk/listings/xscape-milton-keynes/.

Surprisingly, didn’t perform badly at all, perhaps because I was so keen to get the actual bowling over with, I just quickly chucked the ball down the lane as hard as I could. John from the Strategy Office won our lane, but Sara and I were a close-fought second and third, I think both surprising ourselves. John took this photo of the scoreboard, showing – if you squint a bit – my not-too-embarrassing-at-all score of 102.

After the bowling, several of the Strategy lot decided to go for food at Wagamama, and Matt, Guy and I went along with them, though Matt, a vegetarian, had a clash with the menu and accidentally ended up with a huge slab of fish. I had the yaki udon, which I think may be all I’ve ever had at Wagamama, but then it is delicious.

Ruth and I marked Friday 13th by going into town for a bite to eat at Tampopo – crowded, as was everywhere along the riverside; I suppose it’s good that it’s doing well. Image nicked from TripAdvisor. After that we made our way to the Global Café to join Claire and assorted friends to mark her birthday. The idea was to hear the Oubliettes, who were performing – unfortunately, there were two support acts on before them, the first of which (Decoda) was so loud that several of our party left claiming they couldn’t hear themselves think; the second was better but by the time they finished and the Oubliettes were warming up, it was 11.30pm and I was only half an hour off turning into a pumpkin. Ruth and I made our farewells and took a cab home. Perhaps I can catch a clip of the Oubliettes on YouTube.

We then spent a quiet weekend to recover from the trauma of going out. We did get around to watching August: Osage County, which Ruth had had from LoveFilm for the past month but hadn’t thus far been in the mood to watch. Pretty dark stuff – well acted though we did feel Meryl Streep chews the scenery a bit. Julia Roberts is excellent. Both were apparently Oscar-nominated, for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress respectively.

Other movies watched recently have included the Disney movie Brave, which I had recently shoved on to my LoveFilm list along with Frozen (the latter just because I’m curious to find out what all the fuss is about). I’d not heard of Brave but Victoria mentioned recently that it’s one of her and her daughter Orla’s favourite films. Orla is six, so not sure why I thought I’d necessarily enjoy it, but I thought I’d give it a go. It’s pretty good. Story thus: Merida, princess of some Highland clan or other, gets narked at her mother’s attempts to find her a husband. An attempt to get her mother off her back goes badly wrong when she foolishly consults a witch for something that will make her mother ‘different’, resulting in Mum being turned into a bear. (Ruth and I digressed at this point to muse on whether there have actually ever been bears in Scotland. Must check that out.) The remainder of the movie features Merida frantically trying to find a way to get the spell reversed before her mother is faced to stay that way forever. It’s quite sweet and Merida has splendid red hair and is a whiz with a bow and arrow.

Walking through Trafalgar Square early on 19 February en route to another HESA seminar – this time on the KIS return – I was saddened to see that the blue cock has gone from the Fourth Plinth. It was undoubtedly the jolliest thing I’ve seen there and a wonderful shade of blue. Took the train from and back to Wolverton. Living right next to a station is a fine thing. As is not having to stock up on M&S sandwiches and/or fast food before returning ‘home’ to a hotel room. Luxury hotels where someone else is paying and there’s room service would be a different thing, obviously.

Had a day and night in London with Mum on 21 February, staying over in the Premier Inn London Southwark Tate Modern (where Ruth and I stayed for my birthday last year) as a belated 70th birthday present to her. We met at Paddington and took two buses over to Stamford Street and walked the short distance to the PI, where we left bags and set out to follow part of a ‘Cultural Walk’ I had found on the internet, heading east from the PI past Tate Modern. Digressing briefly, I hadn’t realized that Bankside Power Station as was was so comparatively recently built; according to this it was commissioned in 1947 and started generating electricity in 1952. There's a picture here of it under construction. Apparently it replaced a Victorian power station on the same site; this article has a picture. I remember walking past Bankside with Ray sometime in the 1990s and being quite intimidated by its then semi-derelict looming presence. Bankside Power Station closed in 1981, so stood empty for nearly 20 years before being reborn in 2000. To my mind, the gallery alone would stand as a fine Millennium project for the country – and the Millennium Bridge is quite fun now it’s actually open. The Dome project should, of course, have been abandoned in its infancy.

We walked eastwards along Bankside and passed the remains of Winchester Palace, apparently the London home of the Bishops of Winchester until the 17th century. The blurb I downloaded off the internet noted that the Bish licensed the area’s brothels in the 12th century. How public-spirited.

We passed Southwark Cathedral, though didn’t go in because we were looking for lunch by that time. Amazing to think that the incarnation of London Bridge that stood from the 12th to the 19th centuries had houses, shops and a church on it.

We had lunch at Jamie’s on London Bridge Street, at the foot of the Shard, then continued down Borough High Street where we had a quick look at The George Inn, apparently London’s only surviving galleried coaching inn, and then crossed the road to look at Cross Bones Graveyard – or what you can see of it through the fencing. Apparently it’s now become a shrine to the poor of London. The gates along one side are crammed with ribbons, photos, notes and other mementoes. There seems to be a campaign afoot to protect the gates and to establish a memorial garden.We walked past St George the Martyr Southwark, aka Little Dorrit’s Church, apparently, bringing to mind the Dickens novel on my A-level English syllabus that I completely failed to read, and then after a bit of faffing about in side streets arrived at Guy’s Hospital. We visited the Old Operating Theatre Museum, located opposite Guy's in the roof space of the former St Thomas Church. Very interesting; the museum displays included some scary gynaecological instruments and a little 'bedside font', presumably for administering the last rites.

We had a nice dinner at The Real Greek on the Saturday evening, and Sunday breakfast at the Albion, before taking a walk along the South Bank in the other direction, crossing the river and returning via a circuit of St Paul's churchyard and across the footbridge. Paid an extremely brief visit to Tate Modern, pretty much just to use the toilet, then collected our bags and I dragged us on an unrewarding walk to find a bus stop that would take us back to Paddington. Did eventually make it back, after I'd been forced to test whether contactless payment with a bank card really does work on London buses (it does).

St Mary's, Haversham, with snowdrops

Spent the weekend of 28 and 29 Feb in MK, as Ruth had to work through the weekend and I had to finish an assignment for the OU maths module I started last year and have recently picked up again. I had planned to sand my bike’s brake blocks (advised by Ray in order to get rid of current screeching noise) and take it out for a ride; in the end I did do the sanding, but failed to actually ride it anywhere. I did, however, take myself out for a walk on the Saturday to explore some of the surrounding countryside. Started by heading north out of Wolverton through the village of Haversham, which seems to be in two bits, with an older bit surrounding the church and the Greyhound pub. After a brief detour down to the church, trekked on out of the old village and turned right down Mill Road, hoping I could get down to the canal and back into New Bradwell. Mill Road is a very small road and in a moment of doubting that it was open to the public, I turned left onto a footpath heading across fields. As I crossed what seemed like a third field and the footpath signs ran out, my phone decided to pack in (seemingly the known Black Screen phenomenon) and I was left standing in the field ineffectually tapping at it. Was forced to retrace my steps to Mill Road and carry on down it the way I’d intended to go originally. Luckily, being over 40, I hadn’t relied totally on the GPS and had also brought two maps with me, so was able (eventually) to work out where I was. Returned south(ish) past the lakes, stopping to look at the ruins of St Peter’s Church. It had protective fencing round it on the day I visited, but there are photos here and here. Poor little place. There does appear to be a campaign to preserve it. Seemingly, there is also a local werewolf legend associated with it.

Walked on past St Peter’s and followed the canal back down to New Bradwell, and then trudged along Newport Road back to Wolverton. This snippet from the MapMyWalk route tracker shows the point at which the GPS cut out. Plotted the rest of the walk manually when I got in. 5.7 miles according to MMW.

Prior to the weekend, had posted a plea on the OU noticeboard for a sheet of sandpaper to tackle the bike with, as I didn't want to buy a full pack. The OU being full of lovely people, I received loads of offers of sandpaper, including several sheets in the internal mail. Now have more than I'll ever need.

Continuing with increased walking, motivated by MapMyWalk. Very pleasant walking in the early morning now that it's becoming more spring-like. According to this notice in Campbell Park, the sheep have been re-released into the grazing area, which I assume means spring. Also in the park, took this dead artistic photo the other day of some snowdrops.

Dead artistic photo

Attended a lunchtime seminar the week before last entitled ‘Beyond Gay: Sexuality Research and Being ‘Out’ at The Open University. Was mildly curious about the content as I wouldn’t have thought that the OU was a particularly difficult place to be ‘out’. The content turned out to be substantially focused on bisexuality, as the OU turns out to be something of a hotspot for research on this topic – the three academics on the panel had evidently all been involved in authoring The Bisexuality Report. One of them, one Meg John Barker, has written an interesting-sounding book on relationships called Rewriting the Rules and has an associated blog of the same name, though this does include an alarming list of instructions on how she likes to be addressed and referred to. The panel also included Rebecca Jones of the OU’s Faculty of Health and Social Care – also a blogger - who seems to have done some interesting work on various aspects of ageing and later life.

Day in London with Ruth last Saturday as she had been wanting for a while to see Di and Viv and Rose, which I think started out at Hampstead Theatre but has now moved to the Vaudeville on the Strand. The play was enjoyable viewing on the whole, though there was a sense of the loud aggro in the last part of the play not really having had sufficient buildup not to seem all a bit randomly histrionic. Also - understandably, given that they're all in their 40s - none of the three actresses - Tamzin Outhwaite, Samantha Spiro and Jenna Russell - made a very convincing teenage university student, particularly not Spiro, though her character's 1940s outfits didn't help. It also probably didn't help that Ruth and I were sitting in the front row almost on top of them and their every minor wrinkle, though that did at least mean a decent amount of leg room. There's a Guardian review of the play here.

Before the play, we had arrived in London around midday and gone to visit the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons, which Dave visited recently and which I had been wanting to visit for a while. The museum is a fantastic little place and doesn't charge for entry. It houses an amazing collection of exhibits of body parts from a variety of birds, fish, humans and assorted other animals. As Ruth noted, the specimens are so old that they've all taken on rather a uniform colour which doesn't help with identifying them, but luckily they're labelled in meticulous detail, e.g. "A sexually immature female house sparrow dissected to expore the genito-urinary system".

Popped into the Kimchee Restaurant afterwards where I had a light lunch of the Tofu Kimchee off the starter menu (delicious). Then had a go at getting over to the King's Road by bus, as Ruth fancied the idea, but were stymied by seeming bus chaos due to a) a large demonstration taking place in central London - they'd been mustering in Lincoln's Inn Fields as we came out of the museum; b) lots of roadworks. Ended up filling a couple of hours wandering around the Covent Garden area before having an early pre-theatre dinner at Bella Italia.

As of 1 March, am now relieved of my acting role as Senior Manager (Returns), due in no small part to my having declined to continue with it - I was asked if I'd extend the acting contract until the end of April but was concerned re vaguely open-ended feeling to the whole thing. Am quite relieved in both senses, and am now trying to remember what it is I do when I'm not responsible for four other people's work as well.

Birmingham; local blurb

Got this flyer through the door a few weeks ago, from a young couple interested in buying a house in our area. I’m sure Antony and Emma are perfectly lovely, but we were turned off by all the socially acceptable boxes they’d managed to tick: professional couple, check, reference to starting a family, check, deposit in place and mortgage ready to go, eh? We binned the flyer with an uncharitable ‘sod you, you smug gits’. However, it’s obviously good to know that the house might be in demand.

Retracing steps back a few weeks … Mum and I met up for a city break in Birmingham from 8 to 10 June – our fifth, having now done Glasgow, Manchester, Cardiff and Chester. Pictures here. The decision to go to Birmingham was because Mum was keen to see the Staffordshire Hoard, the treasure trove of Anglo-Saxon gold found in a field near Lichfield in 2009, some of which is on display at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. We had decided to stick with Premier Inns and went over a Sunday and a Monday night when hotel bills are cheaper. We met at Birmingham New Street and walked from the station via the new Mailbox development (still on my quite old A-Z as the Royal Mail Sorting Office) to the Canal Side PI, where we left bags and lunched on some nice fishcakes at Red Peppers Grill and Cantina. After lunch we went for a walk, starting with a visit to the new Library of Birmingham in Centenary Square. Not entirely sure what I think of the exterior view, but it’s certainly eye-catching, vaguely reminiscent of a giant dolly mixture, or perhaps a colourful cottage loaf. The interior is jolly nice and Mum was reassured to see that it does contain books, among all the computers, relaxation pods etc. The finest features, I thought, were the two garden terraces, which are a lovely idea and I was particularly taken with the beautiful planting of green fennel, which was very effective.

But but but … I personally think it’s a bit of a tragedy that this has meant that the old (1970s) Birmingham Central Library is now scheduled for demolition. It’s perhaps inevitable given the current vicious backlash against Brutalist architecture (and that term doesn’t help), but depressing all the same. I never got the chance to go inside it, but it’s a striking building with an interesting central atrium. English Heritage have apparently twice tried to get it listed, but been unsuccessful both times, apparently due to lobbying from Birmingham City Council, who have now managed to get it a Certificate of Immunity from Listing, meaning that it can’t be protected from demolition until 2016. They must be so proud of themselves. And the poor architect – architects put all this effort into designing something they think is beautiful, just for it to get destroyed, in a way that doesn’t happen to painters and sculptors. The architect of the Central Library, Roger Madin, is now dead, though it sounds from the Wikipedia entry as though a fair amount of his output has already been flattened.

Brief departure on the subject of demolition of brutalist architecture: I noted from a video posted recently on Facebook by the University of Reading Alumni that Sibly Hall, formerly one of Reading’s halls of residence, has been demolished. I lived in Sibly briefly during my final year at Reading – only for about a term, I think, as I went off the whole hall living thing and, from memory, even more briefly moved in to my parents’ attic room in Hungerford.  I was never particularly enamoured of Sibly as a building and don’t think it was particularly architecturally interesting, but still think it was a bit tasteless of Reading alumni to post a video of its demolition, as many students must have enjoyed living there. Perhaps inevitably, the redevelopment of the site seems to be causing some controversy.

Returning to Birmingham. After visiting the new library, we wandered through Chamberlain and Victoria Squares; the latter houses several pieces of modern sculpture, including Antony Gormley’s Iron: Man which when we visited had fencing right up against it around some work being carried out. Also, this creature (left) with the most enormous buttocks. Didn’t take a picture of Dhruva Mistry’s The River, which forms the centrepiece of the square, but it is quite nice. We had dinner on the first evening at the Water's Edge branch of the Handmade Burger Company.

On Monday morning we had a not-bad breakfast at the PI, after a few problems with the Costa coffee machine had been overcome, and then walked from the hotel to Cambrian Wharf, which claims to mark the beginning of the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal. We walked down past the Farmer’s Bridge flight of locks (apparently unusual in having only a single lock gate) and a bit further along past some flats, before heading up into the Jewellery Quarter. We had a fairly brief walk through the Jewellery Quarter before heading back down via St Paul’s Square to a branch of the Urban Coffee Company, where we stopped for a drink. Then paid a brief visit to the cathedral and walked past the Bullring out to the junction of Hurst Street and Inge Street to see the Back to Backs. I hadn’t checked their opening hours in advance and Monday is the one day of the week they’re closed, which was a bit tiresome after the trek out there. Another time perhaps.

In the afternoon we went to BMAG to view the Staffordshire Hoard, though I fitted in a peruse round a few other galleries including the Buddha Gallery, which houses the Sultanganj Buddha, apparently the largest known complete Indian bronze sculpture, and the interesting 'Birmingham, its people, its history' galleries. Apparently a new public gallery for a permanent display of the Hoard is due to open this autumn. We had tea in BMAG's capacious but distinctly lacklustre café - apparently it’s just about to undergo a refurb. Dinner that evening at Strada followed by breakfast the next morning at Carluccio's, before travelling back. I could get used to the constant eating out.

Birmingham is a bit of an architectural mishmash of a city – but perhaps more interesting for that – and large swathes of it appeared to be being dug up when we visited. Its network of canals is probably one of its most striking features and one it appears to be rather gradually making the most of. I had visited a few times before, two brief trips with Ray, during one of which we went on a boat trip around then-derelict stretches of canal – v. interesting – and once for a conference with Progress South Central.


Another classic top story this week on BBC News' 'Most Popular' slot this week, right. Here's the detail.

Local news to finish: 1) Escaped llamas and alpacas in Whitchurch; 2) the apparent planned demolition of Didcot Power Station - seems rather a shame in a way, as it is part of the local landscape. Surely everything's ripe for conversion into luxury apartments these days, even cooling towers? 3) initial success in the latest bid for lottery funding to preserve Reading Abbey. The ruins have been closed for five years, which does seem a shame.

Crusty pubs; Cardiff; Millennium trilogy

The electrical work is now officially complete, except that I think some tweaks are needed to the new porch light's motion sensor. Probably need to consult the manual I was left, though Adam has offered to come back and tweak it if need be. The new LED downlights in the upstairs hallway and stairwell look great. Just need to do up the rest of the décor to match now.

After an unrewarding meeting at Oxford & Cherwell Valley College last Friday afternoon, met Claire at the Hobgoblin where we met up with some friends of her boyfriend, who has recently returned home to the US. The Hobgoblin is a small, quirky pub, very real ale-oriented and with a strictly-enforced rule about not using your mobile phone inside - one girl near me who tried to received a bellowed "Outside, please!" from the American barmaid. A number of people seem to have their own tankards behind the bar - unfamiliar with this but I guess it goes on. Spotted one woman sitting at the end of the bar with a handle-free tankard with what looked like Elvish runes on it. Probably sums up the clientele. I had a pint of something quite nice that I've forgotten the name of.

Had lovely long weekend with Mum on another UK city break, to follow on from our trip to Manchester last year. Cardiff was this year's destination, suggested by me as I thought Mum might enjoy visiting her hometown; also not too far to travel. We met at Cardiff Central station mid-morning on Friday and went straight to The Plan in the Morgan Arcade for a second breakfast. We then went and dumped our bags at our hotel, the Premier Inn Cardiff City Centre, before walking back into the city and picking up a map for the Cardiff Centenary Walk, which began with St John's Church (where we were accosted by an enthusiastic young woman asking if we wanted her to pray with us) and then moved on to Cardiff's indoor market which still has rabbits and kittens (among other things) on its upper level. Resisted the urge to a) become extremely depressed; b) buy all of them and take them home with me. The route also took in the Animal Wall that runs alongside Bute Park (apparently a programme to restore the animals kicked off in July of this year, which will include restoring the anteater's missing nose) and the exterior walls of Cardiff Castle. We gave the Great British Cheese Festival a miss as it was £8.50 to get in - you'd want quite a few free cheese samples for that.

The walk then took us to Cathays Park via a quick peek at a little stretch of water that was the dock feeder for the defunct Glamorganshire Canal - the pedestrian underpass that leads under the main road was formerly part of the route of the canal. Apparently the towpath is still visible, but we couldn't see it. After a look at the impressive civic buildings at Cathays Park we went to visit the National Museum of Wales, where we tried to find the leatherback turtle that Mum remembered from previous visits, but discovered on enquiring that he was in one of several galleries closed for refurbishment. We were able to admire the impressive entrance hall and staircases, and have tea and cake in the ground floor café.

We had dinner on the Saturday evening at Giovanni's, a long-established Italian restaurant that Mum had heard good reports of. Kitschy decor, largely involving Giovanni in poses with assorted minor celebrities, and over-loud music which Mum gamely asked them to turn down (which they did, ever so slightly). Had a delicious seafood pasta.

Sunday was mainly spent visiting Cardiff Bay - we decided to walk from the hotel down through Butetown, which Mum remembered as an area of densely-packed terraced housing but which apparently underwent a massive clearance and rebuilding in the 1960s. The area to the west of Bute Street still looked depressed to us and as though it hadn't been significantly uplifted by the new Bay development. After some difficulty we located the Butetown History & Arts Centre, which appeared to be undergoing a refit and consisted of only a smallish number of books and photographs, but did come complete with a chatty elderly man who regaled us with stories of the history of the area before talking Mum into buying a book.

We went for lunch at the lovely Bosphorus overlooking the Bay before walking out along the Cardiff Bay Barrage Coast Path to have a look at the Barrage, and then back to Mermaid Quay (the main hub) to catch the Waterbus back up the Taff into the city. In the evening we went for a curry at the Juboraj, which apparently enjoys the 'very enviable position of being at the pinnacle of Bangladeshi and Indian cuisine in South Wales today'. Hmm. Meal was nice enough though we were the only diners in the restaurant, which never adds to the atmosphere. Made our respective ways home on the Monday morning after another breakfast at The Plan.

My Book Group has just romped through Part 3 of Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy, which seems to have been a major hit with all of us except Claire. We are, of course, all completely in love with Blomkvist - which I can't help now pronouncing musically Blooom-kvist after seeing the Swedish film of Part 1. Also had a surprisingly OK Singapore chow mein from the Chinese takeaway across the road from Lesley's.

Real ale; Manchester; zoology

Last weekend began well with a real ale tasting hosted by the University’s Senior Common Room. I joined the SCR shortly after starting employment with the university, partly to have a potential bolthole to go and eat my sandwiches at lunchtime, but had never actually attended one of their events – this seemed a good one to start with. Staff from the Hammerpot Microbrewery in Sussex gave a brief presentation on the brewing process before letting us taste a range of their ales. I liked the Madgwick Gold, a light golden ale that’s probably at the wussy girly end of what Hammerpot produce, although Claire’s and my joint consensus was that the Woodcote Bitter was our favourite.

Amazingly, we did rather well in the evening’s quiz and won ourselves three bottles of beer in addition to the free bottle of Madgwick Gold that everyone was given – though I was less appreciative of the winnings by the time I’d carried them home.

The Bottle Wreck Porter was a bit much for me. What is porter anyway?

Then spent a lovely long weekend in Manchester with Mum - a follow-up 'British city break' to the weekend we spent in Glasgow a few years ago. Pictures here. Weather was rather grey and our hotel was only so-so (adequate but uninspiring) but we had a great time in spite of that. We spent most of the time walking around and looking at impressive buildings - took in the Royal Exchange Theatre, the Town Hall and extension, the Central Library, Urbis, a number of huge old hotels including the gloomily imposing (from the outside, at least) Palace Hotel and the brand-new Beetham Tower, home of a Hilton hotel and luxury apartments. Popped briefly into St Ann's Church (where the invitation to quiet prayer was being stymied by the shrieking laughter of a group of ladies serving tea at the back) and Manchester Cathedral. Had a couple of nice dinners, one at the down-to-earth El Macho on Portland Street and one at the fantastic Dimitris - great atmosphere, food and service. We also did an interesting urban canal walk following part of the line of the 'Rochdale Nine'. Didn't get time to do everything I'd have liked to do - including visiting Salford Quays - will have to go back.

Went for an interesting tour this evening of the Cole Museum of Zoology (again, courtesy of the Senior Common Room). The Cole Museum is one of the University of Reading’s three museums, the others being the Museum of English Rural Life (which I have been to) and the Ure Museum of Greek Archaeology (which I haven’t – it’s somewhere in the depths of HumSS formerly FOLSS). We sat through a reasonably interesting talk from the curator – buoyed up by a free glass of wine – and then were allowed to have a bit of a poke about the displays. The skeleton hanging from the ceiling in the foreground of the picture on their homepage is a False Killer Whale (not sure what makes it false – haven’t bothered to look this up yet) and the one in the background is a male Indian elephant – an ex-circus performer acquired for the Museum in 1921. I was personally more charmed by a Trumpet fish (a dear little thing that apparently swims head-down) and a Microbat. Ruth briefly admired the delicacy of the 5-metre long Reticulated Python’s 400 vertebrae before becoming squeamish and having to be led quietly away.