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  • Neatishead – Death of James Cubitt in 1821

    Neatishead – Death of James Cubitt in 1821

    I hardly dare let myself read old newspapers as I get endlessly distracted, which has happened again when looking at what was happening in Norfolk exactly 200 years ago. I thought that this (clicking on the image makes it larger) was really rather sad, a mother left begging in the local press after her husband James Cubitt died. The advert notes that the farmer and his wife were already in “pecuniary difficulties” and there were five infant children.

    James died at the age of 40 on 18 September 1821 and was buried at Neatishead Baptist Church on 23 September 1821. This church was relatively new, having opened in 1811 and it’s still there and used for worship over 200 years on. The first pastor at the church was William Spurgeon and it was he who supervised the burial of James. James had married Clarissa Harcourt (daughter of John) on 18 July 1810 in the Church of England building in Neatishead and he was the son of William and Mary Cubitt.

    The financial arrangements lingered on for some time, there was ultimately a creditors’ meeting held in January 1823 to discuss the matter, held at the White Horse pub in the village which is still trading. Which is something that I find quite intriguing in itself, as James would have known the village church, the baptist church and the village pub, all of which are still standing and used for their original purpose. Clarissa died at the age of 61 in January 1843, 23 years after the death of her husband.

    Anyway, an irrelevant distraction and a little reminder of how different things were 200 years ago.

  • Dublin – National Gallery of Ireland (The Virgin and Child Triptych by Tommaso del Mazza)

    Dublin – National Gallery of Ireland (The Virgin and Child Triptych by Tommaso del Mazza)

    Following our visit to Dublin’s National Gallery of Ireland a couple of weeks ago, I felt the need to post separately about a few of the artworks.

    Not wishing to sound even more dull than usual, but I do find medieval artworks such as this really quite intriguing. Primarily as they were produced for a religious purposes, which means that they would have been extremely important to someone at some stage several hundred years ago. This triptych was painted on panel by Tommaso del Mazza, an artist working in Florence at the beginning of the Italian Renaissance. The gallery put this work at circa 1400, but the Getty Museum note that he wasn’t active after 1392, so this is probably from around 1390.

    I’m not an art expert, so I’ll pinch the text from the gallery themselves:

    “In Christian art, saints are usually easily identifiable by their attributes. In this case Saint Lucy, standing on the right, is recognisable because she holds an oil lamp, while Saint Bernard kneels beside her wearing the robes of the Cistercian order. The identities of the two saints in the left panel remain a mystery. The small figures are portraits of donors, individuals who commissioned the altarpiece as a votive offering to God. They are depicted comparatively small, while the Virgin and Christ Child, the most important figures, are large. Tommaso del Mazza painted in a stylised late-Gothic manner using brilliant colours.”

    There’s more information about the artwork on the gallery’s web-site, but other than it was presented to them by the mining magnate Sir Alfred Chester Beatty in 1951, there’s no further provenance. Which is why I’ve posted this really, it’s one of those artworks that has such a potentially fascinating history, as this was likely in a church or used for private prayer by a wealthy individual. They’ve done well working out who painted it, which was a relatively recent discovery, but its provenance seems to be lost. I very much enjoyed my visit to Florence last year and I perhaps walked by the very location where this was painted. I suspect I’ve decided to wax a bit too lyrical here so will stop now….

    So, there are no great revelations or thoughts here, but it’s a painting that I liked and decided I’d better briefly write about before I forget it.

  • Dublin – National Gallery of Ireland

    Dublin – National Gallery of Ireland

    I’ve been to the National Gallery of Dublin a couple of times before, but have forgotten about that as well (there’s a theme here). As entrance is free, I pre-booked tickets for Liam and I to spend an hour here before going to another museum nearby, the Archaeology Museum. It’s quite a substantial gallery, larger than I remember, although that’s not entirely surprising as I don’t remember it.

    The galleries weren’t exactly packed with visitors, although it was busier than these photos suggest.

    I thought that this was quite eye-catching.

    Anyway, I took photos of several of the artworks, always with the intention of writing some sparkling commentary about them. I’m not sure that’ll be happening, but I did note that there were paintings by artists including Titian, Canaletto, Rembrandt, Sisley, Monet, Caravaggio, Rubens, Gainsborough and Hogarth. My own highlight was “Parody of Raphael’s School of Athens” by Joshua Reynolds, but more on that in another post.

    Anyway, all recommended, not just because it’s free, but also because the staff were particularly friendly, the galleries are substantial and everything is clearly labelled. An hour isn’t really long enough for a comprehensive visit, but allowed for a reasonable walk around the collections.

  • Dublin – Guinness Storehouse

    Dublin – Guinness Storehouse

    One of the attractions in Dublin that we had to pre-book as there were limited slots, and indeed none on the Saturday of our trip, was the Guinness Storehouse. I had visited before several years ago, but I’ve managed to forget nearly everything about the experience, which is really why I have a blog as a handy reminder of my travels. It was also an essential I thought for Liam, on his first trip to the city.

    I look hassled and tired in the photo….. Masks were required throughout the Guinness Storehouse, part of the rules in Dublin when we visited. Our tickets were checked on entry and we also had to show our NHS Covid passes, which were all carefully checked. There was an odd arrangement where we got near to the till counter and everything stopped for ten minutes, which was likely just to prevent over-crowding, but they instead over-crowded the ticket area and could have perhaps explained the situation. But, everyone was friendly, so all was well.

    Someone wanted me to take a photo of their group, but I nominated Liam as he’s a civil engineer. Apparently civil engineers don’t get trained in this specific project work, but Liam did a very good job anyway.

    Above are a heap of photos, although that’s really quite self-evident, but I thought I’d mention it in case anyone thought I’d forgotten to caption them individually. The self-guided tour starts with an explanation of the brewing process, then there’s information about the history of Guinness and one of the most interesting areas to me was the collection of advertising items. I hadn’t realised that Guinness had its own transportation network including boats and trains, with a section devoted to those forms of getting their beer across the world. There was also a large room where previous Guinness television adverts were shown, some of which were really quite innovative.

    Well, indeed…… It’s possible to have a beer included and sit in a bar elsewhere at the site, but one of the highlights is sitting in the Gravity Bar and so we paid a bit more for that. We were seated by the window which was really rather lovely, with excellent views over the city and the hills.

    With every ticket to the Guinness Storehouse comes a free pint and although there are a few options such as Hop House 13, it felt appropriate to have Guinness. I think Liam is a convert to Guinness now, so that’s some form of result for them. I was already a convert, it was my gateway drug into a whole world of stouts and porters. Although Guinness probably don’t want their beer referred to as a “gateway drug”, but there we go.

    Our seats gave us excellent views over the city and we were never rushed during the visit.

    Views over the brewery complex from another part of the bar.

    And some of the Guinness branded gates as we walked around the exterior. As an aside, I had been following the situation with David Amess as I received a BBC news alert when inside the Storehouse that he had been attacked. It was when walking past these gates that the news alert arrived saying that he had died, all very sad.

    As an experience, the Guinness Storehouse is something of an essential for many visitors to Dublin, it’s part of the heritage of the city. I’m not sure that the self-guided tour would be worthwhile in its own right, but as part of the whole experience it worked well. It’s not the cheapest at £20 each, but at least there was a free pint as part of the arrangement. As for whether Guinness tastes better in Dublin, I think it does, it seems just that bit creamier. Guinness is made nearly entirely in Dublin (which wasn’t always the case) and so it’s the same stuff, but perhaps the minimal transportation and the knowledge of how to pour it and keep the lines clean is what makes the difference. Anyway, a very enjoyable visit.

  • British Airways (Dublin to London City)

    British Airways (Dublin to London City)

    This was our flight back to London City Airport from Dublin Airport. It’s a decent terminal in Dublin and the boarding process at the gate was timely, albeit slightly clunky in terms of group boarding which seemed to be Group 1 and then everyone else, but the staff were friendly and helpful. The check-in staff did want to see my passport, which is the first time that I’ve been asked for it on this trip, as it was never needed at Heathrow. We were flying back to City Airport as our flight back to Heathrow was cancelled a few weeks ago, allowing me to change it free of charge to a different airport in the capital.

    The aircraft was G-LCYR, an Embraer E190 aircraft which is nine years old and has been with the airline since it was produced. This flight was serviced by BA CityFlyer, a wholly owned subsidiary of British Airways, but they do have different service standards.

    There are our two seats, both by the emergency exit giving us extra legroom.

    Liam, who I kindly gave the window seat to again.

    And me. Cabin crew were all personable, with the announcements made by them and the pilots being appropriate and useful.

    Boarding was well managed other than there were problems again with trying to fit all the bags on board. I write here regularly about the situation where people who bring a small bag are forced to put it by their feet, whereas those who bring their entire spare bedroom in a bag get to put it in the overhead lockers. It was a bit irrelevant for us as we had emergency exit row seats where bags have to go in the lockers, but it’s not an ideal arrangement. Where flights are nearly full, as this one was, there perhaps needs to be a change in emphasis now and maximum bag sizes could be brought down a little.

    This being a CityFlyer flight meant that we got free food and drink. The food options weren’t decadent (a small brownie, crisps or corn nuts), but it was perfectly acceptable for an hour long flight. The Brewdog beer was very handy, although given I’d had a Guinness in the airport lounge, I probably didn’t need it. But it was free and so I panicked and ordered it. I decided not to drink any more beer that day…… This is where service standards differ a little from regular British Airways short haul services, as the only free drink offered on those is water.

    And here we are back in London, all on time and without any issue. The delight of London City Airport is that it’s a short hop on the DLR back into Stratford, where Liam had parked his car, taking us no more than 25 minutes after landing to be back at the car. After Avios discounts and the like, this flight cost me about £20 (so, £40 return) which I think is excellent value for money and indeed so cheap I’m not sure that BA made any money on this little expedition of mine.

  • Dublin – Dublin Airport (T1 Lounge)

    Dublin – Dublin Airport (T1 Lounge)

    I’m still merrily writing up the trip that Liam and I made to Dublin two weeks ago, but that increases the anticipation for my three readers. Anyway, this is us arriving at Dublin Airport after being transported there via the Crowne Plaza shuttle bus.

    There’s only one lounge operational at the airport at the moment due to the reduced capacity and it’s oddly placed in the middle of the security area. Or, the entrance to it is at least. There were no issues with me guesting Liam in, so we then went upstairs to the lounge area after a wait in the queue of around three minutes.

    It’s a sizeable lounge, with some basic food options available such as cereals, yoghurts, olives and biscuits. The lounge is operating on reduced hours at the money, so closes in the early afternoon, so I suspect that this was the limit of the choice for the day. There was also a self-service hot drinks machine, although there was a more decadent coffee maker that staff could use for those customers with more precise needs.

    I went for a can of fizzy orange, olives and a mini carrot cake. We’d already had a really rather substantial breakfast at the Crowne Plaza about thirty minutes before, so this was already more than we needed.

    It was all relatively busy and there weren’t many free seats available across either of the two sections of the lounge. It was clean and tidy throughout, with staff members winding their way around the tables on a regular basis cleaning them quite thoroughly.

    The alcohol wasn’t self-service, so I asked at the counter if they had any small beers to calm my nerves before the flight. I accept that my nerves don’t need calming as I like flying, but it’s a handy excuse to myself. Anyway, the friendly lady behind the counter mentioned that they had Heineken or something equally pointless (my words, not hers) in small bottles, but they had pints of Guinness in cans. I’m not sure that I needed a pint of Guinness at 10.00 in the morning, but I panicked and said yes to that. Anyway, it was lovely and I was in Dublin. I noted that Liam didn’t order a Guinness, he’s a bit more moderate and sensible.

    There were announcements in the lounge when flights were departing, but I get stressed easily about potentially missing a flight, so I thought it would be a good idea to leave earlier than needed. The lounge was comfortable though with plenty of power points and suitable snacks and drinks, although I’m not sure that it’s worth the €20 per person for a maximum two hours which is the walk-up rate (and I think that’s discounted at the moment). I got access with British Airways, but it’s included in the Priority Pass and similar schemes as well.

  • Dublin – Brewdog

    Dublin – Brewdog

    Since I’m trying to visit every Brewdog that there is (one of many slightly pointless hobbies I’ve picked up), a couple of weekends ago we meandered down to the financial area in Dublin to visit this outlet which opened in late 2019.

    I’d say at the outset that this appears to be a troubled bar and it has slumped into nearly the lowest rated restaurant in Dublin on TripAdvisor. We were a bit time limited on our visit, partly due to my not realising just how far away this Brewdog is from the city centre, and there was a sign saying to wait at the entry desk to be seated. That’s in line with the rules in Dublin, but we waited for a few minutes and no-one was visible. Very conscious of time we went on in anyway and were then noticed by a team member who took us to a table.

    This is a very large venue, the ground floor has this brewing equipment, but there’s a similar size floor above with outside terraces on both levels. I’ve been reading reviews of how the venue often has no tables available, so they must be taking some serious money at weekends and other busy times during the year.

    The downstairs bar which we were seated near to, in what was pretty much an empty venue when we visited on a Friday lunch-time.

    The upstairs bar which was shut, other than for customers to use the toilets.

    The view from the terrace.

    The upstairs shuffleboards, a popular feature of many Brewdogs, but I still haven’t played.

    From our table, looking down the ground floor. It’s fair to say that the ordering process for drinks was muddled. The wrong beer menus were on the table and the pricing of the beers on the app was clearly wrong. I queried it with a team member, who didn’t have a clue what the situation was and he couldn’t tell me what the prices were meant to be, but he accepted that they were wrong. I ordered via the app to try and reduce the issues given the slightly chaotic situation, but we had fewer beers than we really wanted (well, I had fewer beers than I wanted to be more precise) due to the confusion.

    I went for two beers, this is the Quench Cake brewed by Brewdog, which was a decent fruit sour.

    And the Goodbye Blue Monday from Galway Bay Brewery. I probably wouldn’t have had this beer had I realised how many Galway Bay Brewery pubs we’d be going in during the rest of our stay in the city, but it was an agreeable IPA.

    The service was always polite, but a little muddled and duplicated. The wave of negative reviews are often about staffing, but many are about pricing, including a very angry person who paid €9 and got three chicken wings. That’s not ideal if true, Brewdog should be doing better than that. Pricing here is though going to be challenging, it’s the only Brewdog in the country and these already expensive craft beers have to be transported here and there are clearly huge overheads. But, there’s money aplenty in this area, there’s a JP Morgan office next door and they even have their own table number on the app. Money talks….

    I can’t say that I was overly impressed by this Brewdog, it felt formulaic and designed to make money rather than prioritise customer care. Obviously their priority is profits, but it all felt a bit overly decadent and style over substance here. The beer list was though well curated and there were a range of beer styles, with the beers we had being of a decent quality. The bar gave up a year ago responding to reviews, probably not an ideal sign and I guess they are just trying to avoid the now mostly negative comments that are being made. Although some of the replies aren’t really very illuminating, the reply to queries about high pricing was:

    “It is true that our beers can cost more than those from more commercial breweries, but that’s because everything we serve is craft”.

    That lack of explanation of craft is a little disappointing without any further details. Anyway, I digress. The bar is named Dublin Outpost, which leads me to suspect that the company might be planning to open another venue in the city centre at some point. So, everything was fine and it’s great to see craft beer of this quality being made available in Dublin, but given the money being taken here it really shouldn’t be bottom of restaurants in Dublin on TripAdvisor, that’s far from ideal.

  • Dublin – Black Sheep

    Dublin – Black Sheep

    This was another in the series of Galway Bay Brewery pubs that Liam and I visited in Dublin last weekend, just a short walk away from the Paddle and Peel. As noted in my other posts, anyone wanting craft beer in Dublin is unlikely to go too far wrong by looking out for pubs operated by this brewery.

    As with the other pubs, it was possible to either look at the menu on-line or on the blackboard by the bar.

    I think the staff member seemed a little disappointed when we mentioned that we weren’t ordering food, although she still showed us to a suitable table in the heart of the pub rather than something out of the way. It was a Saturday afternoon and wasn’t yet very busy in the pub, although I saw a few food orders being taken out. I thought that the pub had a traditional and community feel to it, with the craft beer adding an on-trend element.

    The floral display…… A pub has to know that it doesn’t have a rough clientele, as this sort of foliage isn’t really something suitable for a venue where the locals take to throwing things about the place.

    I went for the Stag Stout from 9 White Deer Brewery and that was a really decent beer, as well as the Weights + Measures from Galway Bay Brewery. Reasonably priced, I was pleased with the quality of both of these, although conscious that I had worked through nearly the entirely beer menu in all the city’s Galway Bay Brewery pubs.

    The pub is generally very well-reviewed on-line, although I liked the:

    “Ordered the Penne Arrabiata with meatballs, bad idea. Sauce was lukewarm/cold, meatballs were dry, tough and also cold, dish covered in toasted grass?? Which was hugely unpleasant.”

    I’m intrigued by the toasted grass and slightly disappointed that the customer didn’t upload their photo.

    There’s still table service at pubs in Dublin (or was when we were there) and the staff member was helpful and knowledgeable about the beer options. The food looked tempting, but we’d had pizza in the pub before, so another meal seemed unnecessarily decadent. As a pub, I liked this one and it’s just a short walk from O’Connell Street.

  • Dublin – Silver Penny (Wetherspoons in the European Union)

    Dublin – Silver Penny (Wetherspoons in the European Union)

    Although I’ve been in a JD Wetherspoon operated outlet in Belfast, I’ve never visited one in the Republic of Ireland or in the European Union (not that they have any other than in Ireland). This is a relatively new opening (July 2019) which is located just off of O’Connell Street and a few minutes from our hotel. Given that it was getting late by the time we arrived at the hotel, this seemed like the most convenient to start the weekend off with.

    I’ll just pinch the pub’s own history as to why it has its name:

    “Irish coinage can be traced back over a thousand years to around AD995. These early ‘hammered’ coins were made from silver by striking a coin blank between two hand-cut dies. The silver pennies were produced for the Scandinavian King of Dublin, Sigtrygg II, also known as Sigtrygg Silkbeard. The silver pennies bore the king’s head and name, along with the word ‘Dyflin’ for Dublin.”

    There was a short queue to get in and it enabled us to work out what the current situation is with regards to pubs in the country. In short, they need to see evidence of the NHS PDF download showing that we’d had both vaccines, as well as identification to show that we were the people listed on the download. Liam, who had forgotten his mask, was provided with one by the pub, before we were then walked over to our table. A perfectly efficient little operation, although I think these rules are all being swept away next week.

    These photos don’t really capture the building very well, but they’re the best that I have and so they’ll have to do. JD Wetherspoon have converted two buildings and joined them together to open this pub, one half is a former church and the other half is a former bank.

    Liam in the main bar area. The pub is only taking orders via the app at the moment, with the pricing being broadly in line with London prices for food and drink. I was surprised just how little localisation has taken place for the Irish market though, it’s nearly exactly the same menu. The relatively low prices for Dublin did though appear to be popular with locals and visitors, so I can see why JD Wetherspoon are investing so much money in the country.

    Wetherspoons don’t sell Guinness in Dublin, but they do sell Beamish and I’m just as content at that. Our drinks arrived after around ten minutes and then there was quite a lot of nothing going on in terms of staff bringing food out.

    After forty minutes I thought that I’d meander over to the bar and in my very politest way ask if there was a delay on food, pretending I hadn’t seen the app estimate that food orders were taking under ten minutes. It was quickly concluded by the manager that there was no delay and our order had been lost somewhere. In all fairness, a replacement was delivered to the table promptly and the manager came over and got us a free pint each as this. I’m easily pleased, and very much liked this gesture. The chicken wrap with chips was more generously filled than it usually is in the UK, although I’m not intending to count the chips as in the now infamous Facebook group that is Wetherspoons Paltry Chip Count….

    All told, I thought that this was a decent transformation into a pub, with the staff always being helpful. The losing the food wasn’t entirely ideal, but they were friendly in resolving the situation. I suspect that JD Wetherspoon will be successful in Dublin, if nothing else just because of their low pricing.

  • Dublin – Famine Memorial

    Dublin – Famine Memorial

    Mostly photos again in this post, from when Liam and I were in Dublin last weekend. This is the Famine Memorial which commemorates the Great Famine which took place in Ireland between 1845 and 1852. The famine, caused by potato blight, saw over one million people lose their lives and over two million people leaving the country. The country’s population is still lower than it was in 1845, a long-lasting legacy of the serious effects of the famine.

    These eye-catching sculptures have been in the Docklands area of the city since 1997 and were designed by Rowan Gillespie, an Irish sculptor. There are six life-size figures as part of the memorial and and there are some information boards nearby about the famine. Their formal name is the Famine Memorial, often just called the Famine, and similar figures were placed in Toronto in 2007.