December 23, 2011- Westminster Cathedral & The Grenadier Pub

Greetings All,

Fred and I headed out in the morning to explore the Westminster area of London.  On our previous visits to London we have said we really should visit the cathedral that John and Adrienne had pointed out on one of our pub crawls.  The weather again was amazing, springlike as we headed out.

The Westminster Cathedral (the Roman Catholic Cathedral) was built on a site that originally belonged to the Benedictine monks who had established the nearby Westminster Abbey.  It was purchased by the Archdiocese of Westminster in 1885 and is the largest Catholic church in England and Wales. After two false starts the Cathedral's construction was finally started in 1895 and was built in a style heavily influenced by Byzantine architecture.  The Cathedral opened in 1903, however, the interior design was hardly started due to economic reasons and the death of the principal architect John Bentley who did not leave any designs or sketches.

As a result the subject and styles of the mosaics in the cathedral have been influenced by donors as well as designers and is overseen by a committee formed just for this purpose.  The first mosaics were installed in 1912-1916 and a second set were installed between 1930 - 1935.  No more were installed until 1950.  Installation of mosaics appears to be completed on a decade by decade basis.  What has been completed is absolutely breathtaking.  Check out my Facebook or our Flickr site or additional pictures.

After our visit we continued to walk along Victoria Street to the Parliament Buildings and then along Whitehall to Trafalgar Square.  We stopped at the Silver Cross Pub for lunch which is across the street from Horse Guards.  We then headed down the Mall and decided to cut across St James's Park.  One of the things I love about the UK is that flowers continue to bloom all year round.  The winter pansies and other seasonal flowering plants were in bloom in the park.  As it started to spit rain we cut our walk short and hopped on the tube back to John and Adrienne's.

We relaxed for a few hours at the flat before heading to Zuma to meet with Keith and Sandra for sake, wine and for Nicholas a cola.  After Zuma we headed to the Grenadier Pub for a family dinner.  We all had a different variety of food and I had the best salad I have had for some time.  After supper we hopped into cabs back to the flat for dessert and a nightcap.  As well the pups Ziggy and Casper got to open a couple of their Christmas presents as they had quite a few and J&A didn't want them to get over excited on Christmas Eve.  Nicholas tried to get into the act as

well but his Dad said he must wait for his presents.

Another great day for us and a good night with family.



Cheerio for now,

Sandy & Fred

December 22, 2011- London: Borough Market & Aquarium

Greetings All,

After an uneventful but busy drive from Liverpool on the 21st we headed out early to meet Keith, Sandra and Nicholas at Borough Market.  John and Adrienne had a few odds and ends to get for Christmas and the Market is one of the places I love to visit whenever we are in London.  The market is extremely busy with the queue (line up) at Neal's Yard cheese store being a 45 minute wait just to get in.  A decision to pass was quickly made by Adrienne and we headed off deeper into the market.  I wonder what the poor shrimp thought when he was placed in this rather large ugly fish's mouth.  LOL.  The sights, smell and colours while always amazing, seem even more so at Christmas time.  We all grabbed lunch from one of the various stalls that are in the market then headed off on our separate ways.

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Fred, Nicholas and I walked along the South embankment as Nicholas and I were off to the aquarium, a place Nicholas wanted to visit.  We found Nicholas very entertaining and had a good laugh at him, as typical with kids he wanted to know how much farther it was to get to the aquarium.  Fred asked him how he played hockey if he was tired already.  Once at the aquarium I made arrangements to met Fred in about an hour as our next stop was to be Hamleys and I was somewhat worried about getting lost if I went off alone with Nicholas.

The aquarium was very well done and rather deceiving from the outside.  It covered a large underground area with all regions of the earth being represented.  There was a huge tank in the center that contained various species of shark, sea turtles, rays and fish.  There was also an area that showed what fish and plant life now exists in the River Thames now that it has been cleaned up.  We spent over an hour at the aquarium and could easily have spent longer there but Nicholas was concerned about getting to Hamleys, and making Fred wait.  I think he was more concerned about getting to Hamleys, a major toy store we've mentioned in a previous blog.

We took the tube to Oxford Circus and then walked along Regent Street to Hamleys which is a major zoo.  I hate crowds and unruly kids and they were all there.  Thankfully, Fred walked around with Nicholas and I found myself a corner out of the way until Nicholas had made all of his purchases with the Xmas money from his parents, a radio controlled helicopter with a video camera.  Mission completed, we headed back to John and Adrienne's for a supper of Coq au Vin.  After supper we headed out again to Somerset House so that Nicholas could go skating, unfortunately a booking was needed so no skating for Nicholas this night.  We did a quick tour of Covent Gardens before heading back for a good nights sleep, as the Mowatt family was fading quickly after their first full day in London.


Cheerio,


Sandy & Fred

December 15, 2011- Williamson Tunnels

Hi Ya All,

Today after haircuts we headed out to the Williamson Tunnels to explore this archaeological site.  Now, I must tell you at the very beginning I was rather confused on this little adventure as I thought we were going into the tunnels that go under the River Mersey and could not understand why we walked away from the river a good mile from our starting point which, was the hair salon.  The Williamson Tunnels have absolutely nothing to do with the river tunnels as I was about to find out.  You can go on a tour of the tunnels that go under the river but that will be another adventure in the future.
The tunnels were built by Joesph Williamson an eccentric business man between the early 19th century and 1840 when Williamson passed away.  The tunnels vary in size from 70 feet long, 20-25 feet wide and 20 feet high while smaller tunnels are 4 feet wide and 6 feet high.  There has been a great deal of speculation as to why the tunnels were built, but the most probable is that it was a way for Joseph to extend charity but allow men to keep their self esteem.  At the end of the Napoleonic War, many men were returning home with no hope of finding work.  Williamson employed whole families and paid them all for their labour.  The men dug and built the tunnels, children cleared the rubble and women made the bricks that went into the construction of the walls and roofs.  After Williamson's death the tunnels became unused and over time they became dump sites for the homes that had been built above them; all nature of garbage was tossed in.

They remained sealed off until the early 20th century when soldiers from the West Lancashire Territorial Forces Association explored the tunnels.  Their drill in Mason Street stood on top of one of the tunnels and in 1907 the Association produced a map of the tunnels.  It was incomplete because many of them were filled with rubble.  The London and Northwestern Railway which ran between Edge Hill and Lime Street stations also ran through the area of the Williamson tunnels and was also noted on the map and we were shown where the tracks ran through.  In 1995 a geology student from Liverpool University carried out a micro-gravity survey of the site with some of his findings being ambiguous because of the rubble that filled the tunnels and not all of his findings corresponded with those of the Forces Association.  Later that year a professional firm, Parkman, carried out a survey on behalf of the Joseph Williamson Society and since then further investigations and excavations have been carried out. On the tour we were regaled with some very interesting stories about the tunnels.  One story was about a construction company that was pouring a cement footing for student housing after 8 truckloads of cement the footing was still not filled.  They discovered that they had drilled into a tunnel, probably the most expensive error ever.

The archaeological finds in the tunnels range from pottery, ink wells, cutlery and various jars.  Some items were in very good condition considering that they were dumped down chutes that were built into the houses of the time.  Our tour takes about forty minutes and was informative and somewhat amazing when you realize that the tunnels were all constructed by hand, right down to the bricks.

We headed back into town and got caught in a quick downpour.  As we were near the Philharmonic Dining Rooms, a pub, we stopped for some refreshment and to dry off.  Refreshed and the rain had stopped we headed back to the car.  On arriving at the car park reindeer were being unloaded so we stayed around so that I could get some photos.  We have had a full day as we started out at 11:00 a.m, with haircuts and end with reindeer viewing at 5:30 p.m.  Pictures were posted on Facebook in December as I am rather late in posting this blog.

Ta Ra for now,

Sandy & Fred

December 2, 2011 - Last Day in Berlin

Guten Tag All,

On our last day we revisted the Gendarmenmarkt market in daylight as we wished to take photos of the buildings in the area and explore the two buildings that appear to be churches/cathedrals.  The buildings turn out to be the German Dom and the French Dom.  The French Dom was built by the Huguenot community between 1701 - 05 and houses the church, a restaurant, Huguenot museum and has a viewing platform.  It was open and for a small fee (3 Euros) you could climb the 254 stairs of the cupola tower to the viewing platform for panoramic views of the city.  The picture at the top is a panoramic view which Fred took.  The climb was not pleasant in a heavy winter coat though the stairs themselves wind around easily and were not steep.  It was worth the climb and we got a chance to cool off and catch our breath on the viewing platform.  Venturing back inside and up a few more steps we arrived beneath the carillon bells.  We commented that we wouldn't want to be here when they went off as we had heard them earlier very clearly on the street below.  We headed back down and then walked around to the front of the building to the entrance to the church itself.  We were rather disappointed in the church as it was very plain with the organ being the only thing worth taking a photograph of and we were not willing to pay the fee to take one picture.  The German Dom was originally built in 1708, however, was completely destroyed by fire during WWII.  After German reunification it was restored to its former glory and re-opened in 1996 as Museum of German history.  The other building of note in Gendarmenmarkt is the Konzerhaus Berlin built in 1821.

We headed back into the Christmas Market the entrance to which was free, a nice little surprise as we had to pay a 1 euro fee on the first night.  We found out that the fee is levied from 2:00 p.m. onwards and Fred thinks it is to help supplement the cost of electricity.  We stopped for some refreshment and I had a mug of Grog, a rum based drink with raisins and nuts of some sort.  I did not know what grog was but we figured it made sense that it was rum based as you always heard pirates drank grog and rum was their preferred poison.  It was rather sweet and strong and the raisins were heavily soaked in rum.  I spoke to a couple beside us, asking what they were drinking because I wanted the blue mug their drink was in as a souvenir.  They were drinking Gluhwien, a type of mulled wine to which you could add a shot of liquor.  Fortunately, I was able to trade my clear glass mug for the blue mug I wanted so I left a happy camper with my only souvenir of Berlin.  We headed back to the hotel for a late checkout and because the weather had turned with heavy rains we spent our time in the lounge downloading and sorting pictures.  Our driver for the trip back to the airport was much more informative than the one that we had on our arrival and I only had one tense moment near the airport as he cut across three lanes of traffic to get to the cutoff.

We hope you have enjoyed these blogs on our trip to Berlin and check out our Flickr site:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fredparkins for our photo's.

Stay tuned for Christmas in London later this month.

Auf Wiedersehen for now,

Sandy & Fred

December 1, 2011 - Schloss Charlottenburg

Guten Tag All,  

We had a bit of a lie in this morning before heading off to Schloss Charlottenburg, the largest palace in Germany.  The Palace was originally built as a summer house for Sophie Charlotte wife of Friedrich III, Elector of Brandenburg in what was then the village of Leitzow.  Designed in the Baroque style, it consisted of one wing, two stories and a central copula.  The palace was originally named Leitzenburg by Sophie Charlotte.  The inauguration of the palace was celebrated on 11 July 1699, Frederick's 42nd birthday.  When Sophie Charlotte passed away in 1705 her husband Friedrich now king of Prussia (Friedrich I) renamed the palace Charlottenburg in her honour.  We spent just over four hours exploring the original palace and the new wing that was added 1740.  During WWII the palace suffered extensive damaged, however, has since been reconstructed.  The beautiful gilded work in the rooms are breath taking and the detail in the craftsmanship really needs to be seen to be appreciated.

The picture on the left was taken in the new wing of the palace in the silver room.  After wandering through the old palace and the new wing we headed outside to spend some time walking through the gardens and the Belvedere, a summer residence, built in 1788 and used by Friedrich Wilhelm II.  Today it houses Germany's precious porcelain objects.  While walking there Fred was approached by an elderly man and he started talking to Fred, in German of course, and quickly got very angry.  Fred was somewhat dumbfounded and I quickly said to him English only.  He still continued to rant and waved his arms but does point at Fred and said camera and vroom. We could only surmise that maybe he wanted to take Fred's picture for him.  Sadly the Belvedere was closed, being open only on weekends during the winter, so another one for the to do list next time.

There is a large Christmas market outside the palace, so we spent time wandering around and found it to be more upscale and very much like Gendarmenmarkt market.  There were a number of cloth and paper mach sculptures throughout the market as seen in the picture on the right.

The time flew by and having spent a good five and half hours, we boarded a bus to the the U-Bahn station to get back to the hotel.  Supper this evening was chicken ceasar salad and lemon rosemary chicken to the accompaniment of a bottle of Nero d'Avola.

Auf Wiendersehen,

Sandy & Fred

November 30,2011- The Long Walk in Berlin

Guten Tag All,

We were up and out early as we had planned a full day and wanted to get in at least five of Berlin's best known attractions.  The trail Fred had planned took us along were the Berlin Wall used to be before it was torn down in 1989.  Our first stop was "Checkpoint Charlie" which was a 10 minute walk from our hotel.  This checkpoint was an iconic symbol in the Cold War.  While here I was approached for directions by a women who talks very rapidly in German.  I smiled and replied sorry English.  She excused herself and walked off; I am sure that if she had asked the two men at the checkpoint they could have helped her.

As you may or may not know after WWII the allied powers (The Americans, British, French and the Soviet Union) divided Germany into four different sections.  This was also done in the capitol, Berlin. However, relationships quickly disintegrated and the East became ruled by the communists while the west was ruled by the three remaining allies.  The Communists, however, had a great deal of trouble preventing people leaving and by 1961 2.5 million had escaped.  In August 12 -13 1961 the wall was erected between the east and west to prevent further migration.  The wall itself followed a very zig-zag route because of how the city was divided after the war. It covered over 100 miles and in its 28 year period the wall went through many transformations for it to be a more formidable structure.  The "Wall" was actually two walls with a no-man's land of a few metres to a hundred metres between them.  The no-man's land was of course well lit and patrolled by the East Germans who had  a shoot to kill policy for anyone trying to escape to the West.  Between 100 - 200 East Berliners died trying to escape to the West.  Just as suddenly as the wall went up it came down on November 9, 1989.  The majority of the wall has been torn down but there are a few sections that have been left as a monument to that period of history.  The picture on the upper right is of a section of the wall that has been preserved and is also the site of the Topography of Terror a museum in the area that once housed the Gestapo and Nazi SS headquarters.  As well, in order to preserve just how extensive the wall was, markers by way of a double row of cobblestone are embedded in the roads.

After visiting the museum, we continued our walk to Potsdamer Platz and its Christmas Market.  We were rather disappointed as it was cheesy compared the Gendarmenmarkt market that we visited on our first night.  It was a lot of food stalls and the crafts on sale were somewhat downscale.  The market does have a huge snow slide that you can tube down should you so desire and the kids seem to enjoy it. While at the market Fred is approached and asked if he speaks English.  He responded "I speak it very well" and they proceeded to ask him directions.  LOL, you would think that with a camera around his neck it would be a pretty good indicator that he was a tourist as well.  We continued on, passing the Canadian and US Embassies, and a large memorial to the Holocaust.  The memorial is row upon row of square granite or marble stone.  To view pictures of the memorial visit our Flickr site (www.flickr.com/photos/fredparkins) or my Facebook account.

Continuing on we arrived at Berlin's best known landmark the Brandenburger Tor.  The Gate was built between 1789 - 91 by Carl G Langhans and was modeled on the

temple portico's of ancient Athens.  The Gate was behind the Wall in East Berlin during the Cold War and was not maintained as a result in 2002 it was part of a restoration project.  While taking pictures and wandering around the Pariser Platz there were a number of buskers in uniforms of the various militia that have passed through the gate over its history.  There was also the shortest and stockiest Darth Vader we have ever seen, if he reached 4 feet in height I think that would be a stretch.

We continued on a relatively short distance and came to the Reichstag, the official seat of the Bundestag the German parliament.  The building was originally erected in 1884 - 94 by Paul Wallot and was destroyed by arson in 1933 and bombed during WWII.  In 1994 - 99 British architect Sir Norman Foster transformed it into one of the most modern parliamentary buildings in the world. We had hoped to go inside but were advised that we had to go online to book an appointment in order to get in.  They wanted 48 hours lead time in order to complete a background check on you.  That will have to go on  the to do list for a future visit.  Across the street from the Reichstag there was a Memorial for the Victims of the Wall.  The wall ran only a few steps away from this spot.  One cross commemorates 18yr old Chris Geoffrey who was shot and left to bleed to death on February 5 1989.  In addition, there was a cross with the inscription "Nothing is Forgotten or Forgiven" in honour of Gustav Rust who was a political prisoner because of his writings during this period.

We continued onward to Kaiser-Wilhem Christmas Market and on the way came across Siegessaule, the Victory Column.  This is a memorial to Prussian victories over Denmark, Austria and France in the 1800's.  The friezes around the base of the column depicted the victories over the French.  At the end of WWII the French hoisted their flag on the column and declared victory and in 1946 they petitioned the Allied Powers to have the monument destroyed but were vetoed.  So they took the granite friezes that depicted the Prussian victories over the French to Paris.  On the 750th anniversary of Berlin as a show of reconciliation France returned the granite friezes but mysteriously some parts where missing so some of the panels depicting the war are not complete.  Fred's comment when we read this was "Typical French!"

We continued on making our way to Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church Christmas Market.  As we neared the market a lady approached us and starts talking rapidly in German.  I quickly say sorry we only speak English.  She apologizes and spoke very clearly in English that up ahead we were about to see the world's ugliest Christmas Tree and hoped we enjoyed our visit.  I am thinking that maybe my heavy furry jacket from Canada makes people think we are German as I am more appropriately dressed for the cold than some of the tourists we have seen, but who knows.  This market was much nicer than the one at Potsdamer Platz, with a good mix of food and craft stalls though still not up to the level of the Gendarmenmarkt market.  We wandered around for a bit looking for the Church which was bombed and heavily damaged during the war.  It was completely covered as the exterior was under restoration to make it safer to visit.  As a result we almost missed it, but I went through a somewhat hidden door and discovered the remains of a section of the church that was still open to the public.  The picture on the upper right really does not do it justice.  The remaining mosaics and structure were outstanding, additional pictures can be viewed on our Flickr site or my Facebook.  Due to the dangerous condition the remainder of the church was in we only had access to this one large room.  We also visited the new Kaiser-Wilhelm - Gedachtpis Kirche.  The deep blue stained glass is absolutely beautiful and made up the whole front of the church with a large golden statue of Christ at the altar.  We stopped in the market and grabbed a bratwurst.  Now I must admit I thought I knew what bratwurst was but turned out it was not the fat sausage I thought it was but more like a foot long wiener.  Tasty and messy to eat as they put it in a kaiser bun that leaves most of the meat exposed and I managed to get mustard all over myself.  We now headed back towards the Zoologischer Garten to take the subway (U-Bahn) back to the hotel as we had now been walking for six hours.  We found the station (according to our map lines 1, 2 and 9 pass through it) and we know we need to take line 2.  The signage doesn't show line 2, only lines 1, 12 and 9.   At our wits end and flustered (there was no attendant) we decided to just leave and started walking back to the hotel.  Outside the station, quite by chance we came across an information booth for the transit system and asked how to get to Spittalmarkt the stop nearest our hotel.  It turns out line 2 is under refurbishment and line 12 is a temporary replacement.  He gave us written directions and sold us our tickets.  I thanked him very much and let him know what a life saver he was explaining that we had walked from Spittalmarkt to which he asked if we realized how far that was and proceeded to explain to his workmates in German probably something to the effect that we were crazy to have walked that distance.  I replied it was a good way to take in all the sites and thanked him again.  Once you know what line replaced the one we needed the trip back was quick and easy.  I must say once Fred figured out the distance in miles I was surprised.  For six hours of walking we only covered 6 miles.  Our bodies certainly told us a different story at the end of the day.  We elected to have supper in the hotel and come across the most miserable person in the restaurant.  She accused the waitress of messing up her order, eats the meal then insists she will not pay.  I heard what she ordered as her voice was extremely harsh, loud and she made a big deal about getting the dressing on the side not in the salad. She got what she ordered but as you know it takes all kinds.

I did make a point of letting the waitress know she did not screw up the order and her supervisor comes and thanked us.  We ave enjoyed a very full day and took in a lot of sites.  Tomorrow we are using the transit system to go to Schloss Charlottenburg and also to have a bit of a later start.

Aud Wiedersehen,

Sandy & Fred

November 29, 2011- Berlin Germany

Guten Tag All,           

We headed off to Berlin, Germany from Liverpool John Lennon Airport.  This was our first time leaving from this airport and it turned out our neighbour from number 8 works for easyJet, the company we were flying on, so we got bumped up to priority boarding.  Nice to know people especially when there is no seat assignments as it's first come first served.  It was a short flight of one hour and forty five minutes to Berlin.  At customs I was asked a number of questions as I have a Canadian Passport but we were through in no time.  Our ride from the airport to the hotel provided me with some Holy Shit moments as the driver seemed to race, then brake at the last moment in very heavy traffic.  He was also talking on the phone while driving which we were not sure whether or not this was legal.

Once we settled into our room Fred tried to sort out where the nearest Christmas Market was.  I wondered why he couldn't just ask at the front desk but he was determined to sort it out.  Finally, he asked and we were given a map with more details than the one we were given by our limo driver.  It was very different trying to get your bearings at night versus in daylight.  It turned out we were only a 10 minute walk from the Gendarmenmarkt Christmas Market.  There was a small fee of one Euro to enter it and it was well worth the fee.  The market was very busy and the atmosphere wonderful.  We took in all the sights and enjoyed a pizza that was baked in a wood burning oven.  We thought the cheese was a goat cheese but were not sure other than the fact it was not mozzarella.  We stopped and watched a Cirque Circus type act on a stage that had been erected by the theatre.  It was cold night and as Fred was getting chilled we headed back to the hotel after a couple of hours.

We enjoyed a drink in the hotel bar.  Fred had a Berliner Pilsner beer and I had a glass of Nero d'Avola with the best bruchetta we have had in some time, while planning our first full day in Berlin.



Bis morgen,

Sandy & Fred