More about our trip: Yesterday we drove down to northern England, Northumbria, over to the east coast in Newcastle-on-Tyne. The drive was all scenery-- they dont have any billboards on the roads, or advertisements of any kind, and very few gas stations. I didnt see a single convenience store on our 3 hour drive. You look out over long vistas of rolling hills and only see charming little towns, lots of green fields divided up by stone walls and hedgerows, and cows and sheep out to pasture, wildflowers like yarrow and little purple thistles and tall grasses. The scent of fresh manure. Lots of little stone and old brick houses with slate roofs, many with solar panels. Nothing is oversized or mega, the roads are narrower, the cars are much smaller. The gig was good, just a 40 minute set at an Americana festival, on an outdoor stage on the Tyne River. Our hotel overlooked the Tyne. Breakfast in the hotel was a typical English breakfast of black pudding, pork and beans, tomato, ham and eggs. Im not really into all that but did enjoy the muesli and fresh fruit. Toast is served in very cute little metal toast holders, and the fruit jams are delicious. Drove back towards Scotland today and we had a little extra time. I started noticing all of the funny sounding town names, like Throckley, Heddon on the Wall, Blucher, Muggleswick, Middleton in Teesdale, Blaydon on Tyne, Kirkwhelpington, Barrow-in-Furness, Edmundbyers, Thorngrafton, Haltwhistle, Staggyford, Plumpton, Cockermouth, High Hesket. We also realized that our drive was along he site of Hadrians Wall -- a fortification built almost 2000 years ago by a Roman emperor. (Btw, Lisa says theres a statue of Hadrian next to the Iberia Bank in New Iberia, LA). This area of England was taken over by the Romans between the 1st and 5th centuries and there is a lot of Roman archaeology here. We stopped and checked out a Roman fort and town where there is a whole area of Roman ruins and displays of glassware, pottery, metal that theyve recently uncovered. It was so long ago, and definitely gives you a lot of perspective on how recent our modern civilization is.. Another pretty drive. You look out and see old gothic-looking church steeples and castles up on the rolling hills. Lots of long views of low rolling hills with taller mountains in the background. Our gig tonight is in a really charming town called Moniaive, Scotland. Its one narrow street through town with cute little shops. They have set up a tent and dance floor behind the oldhotel/pub/ guesthouse where we are staying. Out the window I can smell peat smoke and hear the din of Scottish people talking before our gig. Since we are here, they are eating a gumbo in the courtyard.
Posted on: Sun, 20 Jul 2014 18:07:32 +0000
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