For anyone who wants to see the exact spot (and I’m not holding out much hope that this will be more than around two people), this is the GeoGuessr result screen…… It’s the image with the little black and white flag logo on.
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GeoGuessr – Location 1 (A Little History)
I won’t go on about history for too long (well, not yet), but this is our first location, St. Osyth, from over 150 years ago. The exact location that we were given by GeoGuessr is on the right hand side of the above map, in what was then a much less built up area. A bypass has since been built across the northern edge of the town and a residential area has developed near to our random location.
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GeoGuessr – Location 1 (Working It Out)
OK, so we have our first location.
The web-site allowed us to explore the location area, using Google Streetview in the usual way. We used numerous clues to try and work out where we were in the country, trying to read from bus stops and signs, but they didn’t help initially. We were able to follow a bus on Google, although that only told us that it was a First bus, which didn’t help.
We then saw a logo, which Nathan thought was Wales and I thought was Cambridgeshire. But then a bus-stop gave us a clue after some more exploring and we knew that we were in Essex. Hardly great sleuthing, but this is new to us. At first this was disappointing, as I thought that Essex wasn’t entirely glamorous. But that’s entirely unfair, just because it’s sort of close to Norfolk.
There was another clue in that we saw a sign with the town name on, which I accept is a bloody big clue. And it was St. Osyth, which I had never heard of. I went off to explore Google Maps and discovered it was potentially in Jaywick, which I think is still the poorest area of the UK. I wasn’t entirely sure that this GeoGuessr thing was doing much for us at this stage….
But, after some more analysing maps, we discover that St. Osyth is a pleasant looking village a few miles away Jaywick, not a huge distance from Colchester. This was sounding better….
Then we discover that there was an episode of Time Team filmed there, as well as two pubs, a priory and a fish & chips shop. I’m now bloody delighted at this new game of ours. Nathan got excited that the pub had a burger meal for under £5 and I was already starting to watch the Time Team episode.
So, this little adventure is underway and we have train tickets now to get near there. I’ll leave the excitement of that journey for another post, especially as we’re not going until October, but the train tickets were a bargain £16 return with Greater Anglia. We might not be so fortunate when we select our next location, which will be at the moment that we physically reach our first location.
Quite where this adventure leads us who knows, but I’m sure it’ll be one of our better ideas. Which, frankly, wouldn’t be difficult.
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GeoGuessr – Location 1
There’s some background to this……
This is our first location. I’ll be bloody impressed if anyone I know is aware of this location that was randomly provided to us by GeoGuessr……
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GeoGuessr – The Beginning of the Challenge
Sometimes it’s not sensible to let two idiots (well, part idiots) go to the pub unsupervised by adults, as bad things can happen. Fortunately, Nathan and I set off on a pub crawl making sure we limited ourselves to no more than three pints. It’s important to set a self-imposed limit so ensure that things don’t go wrong, although we decided that since we imposed the limit we could also break it.
Anyway, that’s a distraction to this little story. Although I get distracted easily, which is usually evident in my long-winded and often winding dialogue of events. So, at the moment there’s this really awesome guy who has decided to walk across Wales in a straight line. What he has done is fun, and pointless really, but is also quite inspirational.
The guy who has posted these videos, who incidentally has a great sense of humour, also posts a lot of videos about GeoGuessr. These videos are surprisingly entertaining, and to cut a long story short (see, I can do that!) the web-site gives viewers a random Google Streetview image and they have to guess where it is.
I’ve found this a highly entertaining web-site, but I thought also that it was likely to be a little bit niche. However, when discussing this walking across Wales in a straight line video, it transpired that Nathan was also a fan of GeoGuessr. How wonderful to have such an equally distracted (that’s the most polite word I can find in my mind at the moment) friend….
Right, back to why this is relevant. I like adventures, and I’d been toying with the idea of just going to wherever GeoGuessr came up with. And so, the rest of this story is probably starting to fit together, but for those who are confused (I can name them, but they’re mostly Nathan’s friends and I can say that because they’re not likely to read this) we thought that’s what we should do.
Our rules, I think, were that we’d go to anywhere in England and Wales. It was surprisingly exciting, as when the image loads we firstly have to find clues to work out where we’ve got to get to. And, unless it’s impossible, we need to get there by public transport. And yes, this is all a bit pointless, but there’s some excitement in having no idea where we’re going.
Or is it pointless? There’s a theme behind this, which is that I believe there’s fascinating history and culture nearly everywhere (I said nearly) and that there are very many places that I don’t know about that I would want to visit. However, how can I visit them when I don’t know about them? This is where random comes in.
Until we get bored of this, we’re going to try this theory, by going to whatever random place GeoGuessr comes up with. We’ve set our first location, but more of that in the next post…..
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Birmingham – Rudy’s
I hadn’t heard of this small chain of pizza restaurants before and we found it by chance on a Saturday night in Birmingham as other restaurants we tried were full. It has only recently opened but it seemed a popular location given by how busy it was.
Rudy’s don’t take advance bookings of any kind, which means they’re prepared and experienced in how to deal with waiting diners. We gave a phone number and a text was sent around ten minutes before our table was free. This gave us time to pop to another Good Beer Guide pub, so win-win.
I think that this pizza looks reasonably good, but it tasted even better. A soft crust, but sufficiently crispy base, gave contrasting textures. The sausage was spicy and full of flavour, the tomato base was sweet and the cheese wasn’t too strong. All rather lovely.
The tiramisu, which was well presented and light in texture with a suitably rich taste of coffee.
The pricing here is off the scale, but in a good way. Pizzas were reasonably priced at under £10 each, side salads were £2 and desserts under £5. The quality was far better than the prices might have otherwise suggested.
The service was excellent as it was efficient, engaging and knowledgeable. We were never left waiting for service at any time, with the pizzas being brought over promptly. There were also some pizza and dessert specials to add to the fixed menu, with plenty of interesting choices. There is also an open kitchen, so you can watch the pizza being prepared. Well, you could if you didn’t have your back to the kitchen, but it’s a good concept.
The storage set up reminded a little of Five Guys and how they stack their potatoes up in the restaurant. And everything about this restaurant felt on-trend and fun, without being too artisan or overdone. The pricing makes this particularly good value and I’d certainly return here again, and also to other outlets in the chain. How lovely.
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Birmingham – Turtle Bay
I visited the Turtle Bay in the centre of Birmingham as I had a complete set of rewards stamps which got me a free starter, side and main. I’d add, as a background, Turtle Bay was my favourite chain of restaurants as it was quirky, innovative, reasonably priced and the staff were engaging and welcoming.
The chain mildly irritated me by scrapping their loyalty scheme and replacing it with an inferior one a few months ago. They did send push notifications out to those with the app, but I checked at the time and they decided against mentioning it on social media. I have to admit to wondering whether their decision was financial, but it was sufficient for me to temporarily abandon going to Turtle Bay.
The loyalty scheme did though rollover my rewards so I kept three free dishes, and I’ve wanted to pay a visit to Turtle Bay as I’ve been disappointed hearing three people in different locations telling me that the standards have fallen substantially in recent months. I didn’t quite believe them, so that’s the back story of why I visited this well reviewed branch of the chain.
There’s also one other reason, which is that I had poor food in the Peterborough branch last year and I felt guilty that I wrote up a negative review of it (especially when I saw the access numbers for that post), and have yet to post about my many positive experiences from the chain. So, I was hoping for lots of positivity on this visit.
The interior was large and bright, with the normal quirky and fun decoration. The service was fine, with a prompt welcome and I was taken to a table without any delay. And, being positive here, the service was actually very good as it was attentive, thoughtful and pro-active. The staff member also made an effort to engage with me, making conversation and I felt that she did a good job at trying to build up a rapport with me. Obviously being British there’s a limit to how much engagement I want with anyone, but this was well measured.
I’d also add, before my comments about the food, that everything was brought out after a reasonable amount of time. My drinks were at the appropriate temperature and tasted fine, with plates also cleared away promptly. So, in terms of technical service, everything was fine.
The menu has changed since my last visit, and my first impressions were that it didn’t feel as exciting or as on-trend. There seems to have been a slip back to generic menu items and a rather complex menu structure that has moved away from the previous much simpler one.
This is the chilli squid, which was well presented and the portion size was reasonable. The squid was over-cooked and so rubbery, but it was evenly battered and the coating had a pleasant taste. The jerk mayo added some extra flavour, although I’m not sure why they’ve put so much mayo and mole on top of the squid, as this just made the coating soft instead of crisp.
This is the new jerk chicken and it was possibly the worst attempt at a main course that I’ve experienced in my last few hundred restaurant visits. The quality of the chicken itself was exceptionally poor, it oozed out water and was entirely flavourless. There was clearly no attempt to marinate this chicken in anything, it’s just been briefly cooked in the sauce. I would say in the restaurant’s defence that it was entirely cooked through, but I can’t recall such watery chicken.
I don’t know what the jerk gravy was, it tasted like water and just made the chicken wet. In terms of flavouring, these was absolutely nothing here, with no evidence of any jerk seasoning at all. One reason I liked Turtle Bay is that they have some interesting sauces, so the only way to try and bring any flavour to this dish was to pour on sauce myself. Although that succeeded in me just eating poor quality food in a sauce….
The presence of the watermelon was ridiculous, there were no flavours for it to try and moderate and its presence is perhaps a little pointless at the best of times. This is seemingly a new innovation from the restaurant, but I’d rather they just served chicken which has flavour. I’m not sure why they’re removed the side which they once gave with the jerk chicken, but I was disappointed given that this was once my favourite dish. I didn’t bother to finish much of the chicken, it was a waste of calories.
The spiced fries which I ordered as a side were entirely devoid of any spicing, they just tasted like cheap and generic oven chips. Luckily I had put lots of sauce on the equally bland chicken, so that meant at least I could add some taste to the fries.
In terms of the service, there was nothing wrong here. But, unfortunately, the news I’ve received from others about the decline of Turtle Bay certainly seems to have been borne out here as well. Normally I would have queried the dishes with the staff, but I felt that the decision to serve this quality of food was deliberate from the company and so I was content in just leaving Turtle Bay as quickly as possible.
Personally, I found this quite dreadful, but I’m conscious that other on-line reviews don’t seem to be universally negative, so perhaps this was an entire aberration and my experience was a one-off. I’d already stopped organising group meals here, but I suspect that this is the end of my Turtle Bay visits until I start hearing positive things once again…..
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Birmingham – Barber Institute of Fine Arts (The Blue Bower by Dante Gabriel Rossetti)
The word ‘bower’ in this painting’s title refers to the private apartment of a medieval lady, with the subject of this artwork being the artist’s mistress. It was painted by Rossetti in 1865 and the mistress was Fanny Cornforth who had worked as a servant and found it a difficult transition to associate with some of the friends of Rossetti.
What was interesting to me is that the Rossetti Archive have listed the prices which have been paid for this work over time. It was purchased in 1865 for £120 (around £7,000 in today’s money) and was later sold to a Mr. Agnew for £500 and then eventually sold to the Barber Institute for £1,900 (around £40,000 in today’s money) in April 1959.
The same archive site also lists that the work was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1883, at the Manchester Royal Jubilee Exhibition in 1887, at the Wembley British Empire Exhibition in 1924, in Newcastle in 1971 and at the Tate in 1984. I think it’s intriguing to think of people who came to these locations over the last 150 years and spent time looking at this artwork.
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Birmingham – Barber Institute of Fine Arts (A Portrait of Bartolomeo Savona by André Derain)
This painting was purchased by the Barber Institute in 1997, with funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund and the National Art Collections Fund. The notes located by the artwork suggest that this was painted in 1906 and it’s of Bartolomeo Savona, who was a Sicilian student staying in the same guest house as Derain when he was visiting London. In return for acting as a translator during a visit to the dentist, Derain painted the student in three sittings of twenty minutes. A very nice gift….
Derain was in London during 1906 as he was painting a series of artworks of the city, but he had a quite different style to previous painters. He created 30 artworks during his time in London, of which 29 of them are still in existence. Ambroise Vollard was the art dealer who suggested that Derain go to London, with the artist being 25 years of age at the time.
The artwork remained in the family of the sitter until it was sold in the 1990s and brought to Birmingham. There was a detailed article written about this painting in 1997 by Richard Verdi and he noted that the family were keen for the artwork to remain in the UK. It was also discovered during cleaning that there were traces of pink under sitter’s lapel, suggesting the Savona at first sat for the painting whilst in shirtsleeves.
I like the boldness of this artwork, it feels as though the painter had much sympathy for Savona and wanted to portray him in a youthful and positive light. It’s a colourful artwork and it’s the first that Derain is thought to have painted in London.
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Rochester – Coopers Arms
This was the nearest pub to Rochester Cathedral that I could see was listed in the Good Beer Guide and it is thought that monks who brewed beer once lived here. There are also records that there has been an inn here since at least 1543, making it one of the oldest pubs in Kent.
The beer selection, of which nothing particularly excited me, but my half pint of Thwaite’s Wainwright tasted fine and was well kept. I say tasted fine, but it’s a slightly drab beer with little discernible flavour, perhaps some caramel overtones.
The interior, perhaps a little dated, but that’s hardly inappropriate in a pub of this age. The service was fine, all friendly and efficient. The set-up here rather reminded me of the Adam & Eve in Norwich.
Nice way to raise money for charity at the bar. Incidentally, the pub doesn’t allow children other than in the garden, but they do make that clear through signage. I didn’t order food, but the lunch-time selections looked good value for money and seemed popular with locals.
