2022 - A Trip to the United Kingdom
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The Hendersons 2022 - A Trip to the United Kingdom - Glasgow |
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2022 - A Trip to the United Kingdom |
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1 August 2022 Monday Up early to get the boat back to Chirk. We had breakfast
then set off. We probably misjudged the distance as I had just finished the last
of washing up when we pulled into the marina. I thought it would take at least
30 minutes more. While checking the boat in we had a nice chat with one of
the staff members. He was very knowledgeable about the canals – he told us there
are some canals that are underground. That sounds dark and damp. He recommended
a canal history by Tom Rolt, which I’ve added to my Goodreads list. We needed to fill the car so son Tom programmed us to go to
Ellesmere where we noticed an excellent price on petrol (for this country). The
nav system took us over a farm road that was barely a tractor path. Sigh of
relief from all of us when we got onto pavement. Our destination was Glasgow. The traffic was terrible. It
took us a couple of hours more than we had planned to reach our destination. We
had rented an apartment just off the main square, George Square. It is a lively
neighborhood with a lot of restaurants. We had a very nice Greek dinner
(pastitsio) and the portions were so generous we took leftovers to the
apartment. No real sightseeing that day. 2 August 2022 Tuesday We bought Hop on Hop off tickets so we could familiarize
ourselves with the city. While there are some beautiful buildings in Glasgow,
many are grimy with years of soot and grit. The streets are packed with young
people, likely because there are three universities in the city. Lots of
tattoos, body piercings and weird hair color. We hopped off at the Riverside Museum of Transport. What a
find! Excellent displays including cars, motorcycles, bicycles, carriages,
busses, ambulances, trams, emergency vehicles and a tall ship, Glennlee. There
are two ‘streets’, one with shops from the late 1800s, the other from the early
1900s. The visitors were all ages. Like most of the museums in the UK, admission
was free but a donation could be made.
Back on the bus for the tour. The newer parts of the city
aren’t particularly attractive, some of the architecture is weird, including a
performance hall said to have excellent acoustics, but has been dubbed ‘The
Armadillo’ by Glaswegians as it resembles that animal. We had dinner in an Italian restaurant across the street
from our apartment. It was mostly notable for the noise level. 3 August 2022 Wednesday Rain. Darn. Son Tom and I took the Hop on to Glasgow
Cathedral, but couldn’t get in because we hadn’t pre-booked. We walked to an
Aldi and bought dinner supplies, lunched on Monday’s leftovers, then got back on
the bus to head to the Kelvingrove Museum. The building is quite imposing and
the central room has a great pipe organ. The collection is interesting as works
from a country are grouped together regardless of the age. I’m partial to Dutch
works and was impressed with the paintings done on copper instead of canvas as
the colors are more vibrant and the artists could accentuate texture. There were
some impressionist works in the French gallery, including a couple by Van Gogh,
I suppose in the French gallery because he lived there the last years of his
life.
Dinner in the apartment ended our Glasgow stay.
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