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Category: UK

  • Ryanair (Norwich to Faro)

    Ryanair (Norwich to Faro)

    When in the airport lounge, I could see the Ryanair aircraft arriving into Norwich.

    The flight to Faro was the last one of the day and so all felt orderly and well managed. It’s somehow a little better to be in the calmness of an operation about to close down rather than in the midst of chaos and overcrowding. And I don’t think that Norwich Airport is often overcrowded…

    We waited outside ready to board the aircraft. I do wonder if they might have covered this area, but maybe now they’ve stopped collecting their £10 departure tax perhaps that investment will have to wait. A new roof is all very well, but one must not rush into these decadent infrastructure commitments I suppose.

    Ready to board and it was aircraft 9H-VUJ, which I don’t think I’ve been on before.

    I rather like these little steps at the front and these are the ones that fold-up into the aircraft. This is really clever, it saves airport fees, it’s quicker and it allows them to land in more places.

    It’s a rather move convoluted affair to board using the rear steps, which definitely do not fold back into the aircraft.

    The seating Gods gave me an aisle seat and I was slightly annoyed to find someone sitting in it. He willingly moved, his logic was that he thought the flight would be quiet and so he would sit in the aisle seat rather than the window seat. I did rather think he could have just sat in his actual seat and moved later on, but I kept those thoughts to myself.

    As for the flight, the aircraft was a little grimy, but there is a limit to what the cabin crew can do in the 25 minute handover. The crew were friendly and helpful, but they appear to knock into the chairs with their trolleys more than Wizz Air crew. It seems that the Ryanair aircraft are slightly narrowed, as they use Boeing and Wizz Air using Airbus, so I suspect it’s just that. Or perhaps I was just in the trolley danger zone, which would be very on-brand for my travel arrangements.

    And safely in Faro. It was too hot.

    All of the European Entry System (EES) machines were on and the set-up here is that passengers go through the process using the kiosks and then a member of border force checks the passport but doesn’t stamp it. The whole process took around fifteen minutes which felt reasonable.

    The queue for EU citizens was longer but they only had to go through the EES machines and didn’t need to see a member of border control.

    There was one of the worst altercations I’ve seen at border control when two people at the neighbouring counter were told that they needed to step aside and wait for someone else to look at their passports. I don’t know why, but the two refused to move. The member of border control shouted at them to move back, then the border control officer who was serving me ran out of his counter and warned that they would be immediately deported. This rather raised the temperature of the room, which was already too hot in Portugal (as I may have mentioned) and therefore did not need further assistance.

    The younger of the two women cried and said that she was confused and didn’t know what was happening. I did feel some sympathy, as border control is not the ideal environment in which to become confused or muddled up, especially when the staff are now discussing deportation with the energy of people who very much mean it. But I also quite liked this little bit of excitement, in the limited and selfish sense that it was happening near me rather than to me. My own border control officer then came back and was lovely, which was reassuring. It is always pleasant when someone returns from threatening deportation elsewhere and then smiles at you.

    And here is the list of arrivals, because I remain committed to documenting the full glamour of international travel. Aircraft, queues, signage, crisps and border control tension: the modern European journey has everything.

    The whole flight was entirely agreeable and it was £20 which is more expensive than my Wizz Air arrangements, but I didn’t have to pay to go to Luton. In terms of efficiency, this worked out well as the Luton rail line was closed after the crash, so this saved a bus replacement service and allowed me to enter the European Union cheaply. A smooth Ryanair flight from Norwich, a local beer beforehand and only a modest amount of border control theatre at the other end. That is about as much excitement as I require from budget aviation. So, all rather lovely.

  • Norwich Airport Lounge

    Norwich Airport Lounge

    I haven’t been to Norwich Airport lounge before, or I’ve forgotten if I have. It is a relatively small affair, but it was clean and organised. I do not need a champagne bar, rainfall shower and someone silently folding towels in the corner. I mostly need somewhere to sit, plug something in and eat cheese with the quiet dignity of a person who has walked to the airport, so my expectations were based around that rather than anything too decadent.

    The staff here are particularly helpful and engaging, but I think that they know a fair number of the visitors so I imagine that they are commuting to Amsterdam or similar. My first impressions were positive given the friendly welcome and it didn’t look too busy. The lounge remains open for all the flights and there’s the usual rule that there’s a maximum three hour stay.

    The food is mainly cheese, mugshots, croissants, cakes and the like.

    As well as crisps and fruit.

    The view over the airport apron.

    There’s a limit of two alcoholic drinks per customer, although I only wanted one and that was an agreeable chilled Woodforde’s Wherry. It’s nice when lounges make some effort to provide local beers and they also had Heineken for those who aren’t fussy about what beer they drink.

    On the limited number of alcoholic drinks, I’ve some sympathy for the lounge as some airports are struggling with the number of customers who are treating it as an all you can drink affair. That isn’t quite what lounges were really designed for and it’s forcing the cost of them up, so controversial as it might be, I’d be happy if every lounge limited customers to two alcoholic drinks.

    I had a quick espresso although there were some issues with cleaning the coffee machine which I decided that I didn’t want to know more about. There are moments in life when curiosity is a virtue, and other moments when one should accept the coffee, drink it and not ask too many questions.

    Dr Pepper, Cathedral city cheese and Mini Cheddars, this is what travel is all about.

    This lounge was included in my annual Priority pass card, but walk-up availability can be purchased for £27.50. That’s possibly pushing it a little bit, but the surroundings are comfortable, the staff members were friendly and I was able to have as many crisps, cake and cheese snacks as I wanted. I think that’s a result.

  • Norwich Airport McDonald’s and the Drop-Off Fee

    Norwich Airport McDonald’s and the Drop-Off Fee

    As a little reward for walking to the airport from the centre of Norwich, I thought that I’d pop into McDonald’s that’s only a couple of minutes from the airport itself. I’m not sure that elite athletes generally use McDonald’s as part of their recovery and reward strategy, but there we go.

    I don’t usually have such decadent Chicken Selects, but they were part of the McDonald’s Monday app offer. And a coffee as I realised I hadn’t had my usual 8 in JD Wetherspoons and didn’t want my body to become alarmed by the sudden absence of routine. It was all very nice incidentally for what that’s worth.

    The team member in the restaurant, or whatever you want to call it in the modern corporate food environment, was very enthusiastic. He was checking customers knew how to order, he was doing check backs, cleaning the windows where people were sitting and I liked how he welcomed a German visitor by using what he told her was his GCSE German.

    Personally, I thought the engagement was a bit much, and I preferred the grumpy-looking team member who was less conversational. This is not a criticism exactly, more a reflection of my own social expectations. Sometimes I want warm hospitality, and sometimes I just want to be handed coffee by someone who looks as though they too have accepted the basic futility of the modern world. But I would never knock enthusiasm, especially in hospitality, where cheerful effort deserves more credit than it usually gets.

    This is bloody ridiculous and just greedy of Norwich Airport. The airport is operated by Regional and City Airports who also operate Exeter Airport and Bournemouth Airport and I’ve written about the latter where they’ve tried to ban walkers in a desperate attempt to get more revenue.

    This is Norwich Airport, and it’s fair to say there are no real congestion problems here. We are not dealing with Heathrow at half-term or Gatwick during a systems collapse. This is an airport where the main traffic management challenge often appears to be identifying whether anything is happening. The drop-off charge therefore feels less like a necessary operational measure and more like an unnecessary little money grab with barriers and CCTV cameras.

    This is Norwich Airport and it’s fair to say that there are no real congestion problems here, this is all an unnecessary money grab. Anyway, it’s McDonald’s that had to deal with the airports policies, their car park had four taxis in it and several people being picked up and dropped off as the fining regime can’t reach them there. Anyway, my usual slight complaining aside, it meant that I had reached Norwich Airport ready for my early evening flight.

  • Norwich City Centre to Norwich Airport

    Norwich City Centre to Norwich Airport

    I’ve decided I’ll have to leave some stories of the last trip untold for the moment and it’s back to this week. This is slightly unfortunate for the chronological order, but I have long since accepted that this blog now operates less like a diary and more like a lightly confused archive with opinions.

    I thought that I might as well walk to Norwich Airport as it isn’t that far. Here’s the delights of the riverside walk near Cow Tower.

    And Cow Tower itself, which seems to have been locked again after a recent period of being left open. It was built between 1398 and 1399 and is one of the earliest purpose-built artillery blockhouses in England, designed to defend a strategic point in Norwich’s medieval defences by the River Wensum. That is a rather more dramatic original purpose than its current role of standing photogenically beside walkers, dog owners and people like me trying to get to an airport without paying for a bus or taxi. The name comes from Cowholme, the meadow that was once located here

    This is St James Mill, built by the Norwich Yarn Company in the late 1830s as part of an attempt to revive Norwich’s textile industry. The company itself did not last long, because Victorian industrial optimism was not always matched by the accounts department, but the building survived and later became associated with Jarrold’s printing works. And, yes, it was too hot.

    There’s a bit of a gap in this narrative here as I already posted the photos that I had taken of Anglia Square as I walked by.

    This is the former King Edward VII pub on the Aylsham Road, now used as a mosque. I never visited this pub and I think it was something of a music venue towards the end, but it’s always sad to see a licensed premises closed. It first opened in 1903 and was a Morgans, then Bullards and then a Watney Mann pub which finally closed in 2014.

    I had a little stop to cool down here.

    A now closed Lloyds Bank.

    The former Falcon pub which Lacons opened in 1926, later owned by Whitbread and Enterprise Inns. It was destroyed by the Co-op in 2014 when they turned it into a supermarket, but then after doing that damage, they ditched it in 2018. It looks now as if it’s being turned into a residential property.

    This is a small remaining stretch of the old Norwich to Cromer road, rerouted when an airport was put down on its route.

    The former Firs pub which was opened in 1933 by Bullards and was owned by a series of breweries including Watney Mann, Brent Walker, Chef & Brewer, Pubmaster and then Enterprise Inns. This was probably ultimately a viable pub, but it was snapped up by Tesco in 2011 and so that was the end of that. Fortunately, planning changes have made it harder for supermarket, and indeed McDonald’s, to do this.

    And an hour after leaving, walking into the retail park next to Norwich Airport.

  • Stoke Gifford – St. Michael’s Church (Michael John Hayman War Grave)

    Stoke Gifford – St. Michael’s Church (Michael John Hayman War Grave)

    This is the grave of Michael John Hayman, who died on 14 September 1963 at the age of 19. I did try and find out more about him, but haven’t been very successful. I made a mistake here as I looked up how many war graves were at the church and CWGC noted that there was just one, which I assumed was this. I had forgotten that they don’t list graves that are from after 1947, so I only took this photo.

    The incident wasn’t directly related to the military, but as he was a senior aircraftman in the RAF, he was given a war grave. I don’t know why this church was chosen, but it was very close to RAF Filton which has now closed, but the site is used by Aerospace Bristol.

  • Newport to Bath Spa Rail Journey

    Newport to Bath Spa Rail Journey

    I accept that these blog posts are entirely out of order. I particularly mention in the chronology sense with that statement I’d better hasten to add. I’m going to post what I can today and then move on to my current trip and I am unanimous in that… This is the sort of firm editorial control my two loyal blog readers have come to expect, assuming they are still trying to work out why I was apparently in three places at once.

    Anyway, this is Newport railway station which I think is quite an ugly building, but each to their own as I’m sure that some thought that it was a bold modern transport experiment.

    The station opened as Newport High Street in June 1850 and is on the mainline between Bristol and Cardiff.

    This was my first train, the GWR service from Newport to Bristol Parkway.

    I was pre-annoyed as it required me to have a seat reservation and, as I’ve mentioned before, I don’t like them. Invariably someone will be sitting in the seat or there’s some other inconvenience, so I’d rather sit where I want. Anyway, I boarded the train, which was going to London, and just sat where it said there was no reservation. It transpired that the train’s reservation system was down so it didn’t matter anyway and this no doubt annoyed the people who did want to have a reserved seat, which is one of the pleasingly democratic qualities of British rail travel, namely that eventually everyone gets disappointed.

    Crossing the River Usk at Newport.

    Safely at Bristol Parkway. I went off to look at an old church at this point, I’ll come back to that another time. Although this is how the blog chronology collapses, one church and one railway platform at a time.

    Back at Bristol Parkway, this station opened in 1972, although it was heavily modernised in 2001.

    Many people come to look at this plaque noting the unveiling of the new platform by Chris Grayling, then the Transport Secretary and now in the Lords, in April 2018.

    I found a Tesco when church hunting so that was lunch sorted. Note all that fruit. I mention this because it gives the whole arrangement a faintly healthy glow, even if the broader dietary context of my travels may not withstand close academic scrutiny.

    The GWR train to Bath Spa turned up six minutes later and I wondered whether Delay Repay would kick in, but they got the train back on track so to speak.

    This train wasn’t overly busy and GWR hadn’t burdened themselves by cleaning it.

    Playing music loudly from his phone and feet wiped on the seats numerous times. The train guard didn’t say anything, although I hardly blame the staff as they don’t want the risk of being attacked. I limited myself to silent disapproval, at which I am becoming increasingly professional.

    And safely into Bath Spa railway station, although it was rather harder to leave it later in the day.

  • Letchworth Garden City – Letchworth Library

    Letchworth Garden City – Letchworth Library

    I always used to visit the public library when going somewhere new, as there is an element of it showing how much effort and enthusiasm has been put into a place. I think it’s fair to say that libraries can say quite a lot about a town. Some feel loved, active and properly used, while others have the faint atmosphere of a civic obligation being kept alive with a printer, three chairs and a display about recycling. This one was certainly not in the latter category. It was evident that there was a fair amount going on here, with regular events taking place and a genuine attempt to make it feel part of the community.

    This library opened in 1939, having moved from their previous Commerce Way location, and it has kept its well designed building which is spacious and large inside. From the outside, it felt like a proper library building.

    It has a more traditional feel in the rear room and the book range seemed well curated from what I saw. However, libraries like this have entirely lost some of their appeal to me. It was impossible to sit down with a laptop, as all the seated areas near the front had been reserved and there were dedicated children’s study areas which were empty. There were a couple of low chairs visible in this photo and it was all very lovely, but it wasn’t overly conducive to work. Low chairs are fine to contemplate life, read a magazine or slowly lose the will to stand up again, but they are not ideal for laptop-based productivity.

    This is the reason I so often find myself in JD Wetherspoon venues to get work done. For all their many quirks, they have worked out seating, power points, comfort and the useful social contract that one can sit there for a while with a coffee without anyone looking faintly wounded. It feels a little sub-optimal that the national pub chain has become more useful to me as a working environment than many public libraries, but here we are.

    Libraries used to have this pretty sorted, they’d have a lending section which was all about selecting a book and maybe having a quick sit down, then a reference area at the back where people could sit with a newspaper or to write. Now the whole thing appears to have verged into some sort of event space and people are displaced. But, if it works for the local community then that’s good as too many public spaces are closing and there are no shortage of places that cater to my urgent laptop and research needs….

  • Letchworth Garden City – Crafty’s Beer Shop

    Letchworth Garden City – Crafty’s Beer Shop

    I wanted to visit a pub that wasn’t JD Wetherspoon operated, although the Three Magnets was very lovely, and with the only Good Beer Guide pub in the town closed, I went for Crafty’s Bottle Shop which felt like a reasonable compromise.

    The list looks quite broad, but there were six beers that weren’t available. However, there were some interesting ones that were and it’s not a bad list. There is always a little moment of emotional recalibration when a venue has crossed-out beers, unavailable beers or beers that exist only in theory, but I am used to disappointment in licensed premises

    When I went to order it later transpired that a customer at the bar and the member of bar staff had guessed what I’d ordered. They went for the Beaver Town Neck Oil so we were all annoyed when they discovered that’s what they thought I’d order. I’m not sure what it says about me that strangers looked at me and thought “Neck Oil”, but I shall try not to dwell on it.

    Before I realised they had incorrectly pre-judged my order, I had ordered two half pints and this was the Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier, an agreeable gentle wheat beer with banana notes.

    And the Broken Dream from Siren Craft Brew, which was verging on decadent as it was smooth with tastes of coffee and chocolate. A entirely agreeable beer.

    It wasn’t the busiest of venues, but I like calm.

    There was a decent selection of bar snacks though.

    I rather got the impressions that this venue had been a little more craft beer orientated in the past with a wider range of keg and can options, but a few reviews have suggested that the management has changed. Either way, the service was friendly, the surroundings were clean and there were some interesting beers available at reasonable prices. It’s certainly worth popping in, well, for beer drinkers anyway.

  • Letchworth Garden City – Pleasant Signage

    Letchworth Garden City – Pleasant Signage

    The phrase “Paradise is a promise as well as a memory” comes from Joseph Rykwert’s architectural history book ‘On Adam’s House in Paradise’, where it appears as part of his exploration of the “primitive hut” as an imagined origin point for architecture. Rykwert was interested in the way people have repeatedly imagined an ideal first dwelling, not just as something lost in the distant past, but as a model for what human shelter and society might still become.

    The phrase has also been used in Letchworth Garden City, where artist Bettina Furnée incorporated it into her 2003 public artwork Paradise Is, commissioned for the centenary of the original Garden City. And here, across three photos, is this rather pleasant and slightly quirky signage.

  • Letchworth Garden City – Three Magnets (JD Wetherspoon)

    Letchworth Garden City – Three Magnets (JD Wetherspoon)

    It’s not always easy to find somewhere to sit to get work done which doesn’t get in the way with the operations of the venue. I’m not going to take up a seat in a cafe where they need the tables because I do have some moral limits, even if they are inconsistently applied. But JD Wetherspoon has the perfect set-up for me and so that’s how I ended up here.

    I did try the town’s library as an alternative, but that was louder than this pub, which feels like a sub-optimal development for civilisation. I appreciate, begrudingly, libraries have changed and are no longer silent temples of paper and mild fear, but it is still slightly disconcerting when the pub is the better option for concentration. Somewhere, a Victorian librarian is turning in their grave, probably while tutting.

    As I’ve decided to keep every photo from the last 15 years, this is when Liam and I popped into the pub on 4 November 2018. I’ve included it for the sake of completeness…. One day historians will thank me for preserving these moments. Well, maybe.

    Using the chain’s website to explain the pub name:

    “Letchworth was the first ‘Garden City’, inspired by the work of the urban planner Ebenezer Howard. He illustrated his idea for ‘Garden Cities’ with his famous three-magnets diagram, from which this Wetherspoon pub gets its name.”

    That is quite a pleasing bit of civic context. Ebenezer Howard’s Garden City idea was all about combining the best of town and country, which is a noble ambition. I’m not sure he specifically envisaged his planning philosophy leading to refillable coffee, curry club and someone checking Untappd in the corner, but social progress takes unexpected forms.

    There was a decent selection of real ales, around seven in total, and all reasonably priced with the options here from Thornbridge, Elgood’s and the Cairngorm Brewing Co.

    I went for the Wildcat from Cairngorm Brewery Co and it was fruity, malty and rich. And not only was it well-kept, it was just £1.95 with the CAMRA discount.

    The rear section of the pub, which isn’t enormous and some of the seating is a little tightly stacked in.

    My now obligatory carpet photo. Some people collect art, some climb mountains and I document the floor coverings of national pub chains. I won’t pretend this was my original life plan, but I must work with the gifts that I have been given.

    When it’s just over £6 including the 0% Guinness then I can’t resist. This was all cooked well other than that gravy could have been hotter.

    Obviously I felt the need to have a little look at the online reviews and they’re towards the lower end of the chain’s scale.

    “Went for a dinner few nights ago and we ordered Indian chicken jalfrezi meal and fried halloumi burger. The food was atrocious. The waitress only bothered to tell us AFTER we had paid for it that the Indian food was reheat and eat.”

    I’m not sure if they expected the JD Wetherspoon chef to be making curries to order in the kitchen, perhaps grinding spices by hand while someone asks whether table 42 has got their chips yet. There are many things to enjoy about JD Wetherspoon, but I’m not sure bespoke Indian cuisine is quite the business model.

    “Charged £4 for 2 halves of Stowford press when the menu said £1.99 a pint, something going on here, maybe bar staff are fiddling”

    Sub-optimal, but hard to imagine the team members are fiddling if that’s what the till comes up with.

    “The chavs like smoking their cigarettes at the main door of the pub – with the door wide open – no surprises – the pub stinks of cigarettes. Manager doesn’t seem to care.”

    I wouldn’t refer to smokers as chavs, but this smoking at the front door has annoyed a few reviewers and it’s still going on….

    “The overweight barmaid…..”

    I ignored the rest of the review, this sort of review really shouldn’t get accepted.

    “Dogs are banned even in the outdoor space. Utterly ridiculous.”

    Always reassured to see at least one person annoyed at the chain’s dog policy.

    “Don’t sell carling”

    I’m not sure why that deserves a one star rating.

    Anyway, I digress. I had wanted to explore more pubs in Letchworth, but a number were shut on Mondays and Tuesdays, although I did find one interesting one I’ll post about soon. This JD Wetherspoon seemed competently managed, cold gravy aside, it was cheap, cheerful and was a suitably comfortable place to sit. Although they need to sort out the number of flies around their coffee machine, that was a little ridiculous.