Retrospective: Travelling Britain, Part 2

Travelling around the UK I got to visit some very beautiful and richly historical cities. Each of these towns has so much to present!

York

The York Minster is a working cathedral in the centre of York, built in the Decorated Gothic style with an impressive history beginning in 627AD. Destroyed and rebuilt several times, York Minster continues to be improved upon and even today undergoes renovation.

According to Wikipedia, "York Minster is the second largest Gothic cathedral of Northern Europe and clearly charts the development of English Gothic architecture from Early English through to the Perpendicular Period. The present building was begun in about 1230 and completed in 1472. " To me, all that matters is that it's a gorgeous, old building!

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="399"] York Minster Chapter House - image from Wikipedia; photography wasn't allowed inside.[/caption]

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="560"] Detail of the Chapter House ceiling - image from Wikipedia.[/caption]

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="458"] York Minster interior - image from Wikipedia[/caption]

There's more of York's medieval past to see!







St Leonard's Hospital sits in the York Museum Gardens, and although it is now in ruins it was very much a working, and even one of England's largest, hospital in the middle ages. I think I've said this before, but I love ruins - they're a reminder of a time gone by and there's an old-world charm that nothing but age can give you! I didn't get the chance to go far into the Museum Gardens, but there's more ruins further in, such as the remains of St Mary's Abbey and a Roman fort.



It seems buskers are everywhere in the UK, and I love it! What's not to love about music on the streetside? You wouldn't find pianos out in the open in Singapore, but here where the rain doesn't pour the way it does in the tropics this piano was even opened to reveal its working hammer-action interior.



A guy was even playing the fiddle while at the same time setting a puppet dancing!





York was first founded by Romans, and to this day retains features of its Roman heritage, such as defensive walls surrounding the city. Busy even in the medieval eras, some of the buildings and houses in the city are centuries old! It's amazing to be walking on a 600-year-old street with buildings that overhang the walkways and look like something out of Diagon Alley. There are horse-carriage rides available, too, so the sound of hooves clip-clopping on the streets adds to the old-world vibe.

Windermere and the Lake District

TALK ABOUT SWANS! A huge flock of swans lives on Windermere Lake, one of several lakes within the Lake District National Park in Cumbria. These swans were super friendly, too - well, friendly enough to come within a metre of me! I love how beautiful they look once they're on the water, (seemingly) effortlessly swimming on the water.

We took a public bus that took us from Windermere to other towns, like Grasmere and Keswick. The scenery between the towns is gorgeous!!!

William Wordsworth lived and died in Grasmere, and I got to visit his grave!





Besides the graves of the Wordsworths, Grasmere is also home to delicious gingerbread!



Sarah Nelson's Original Celebrated Grasmere Gingerbread (long name omg) is delicious! I didn't think I'd like it as much as I did, because I've never particularly liked gingerbread - I only tried it because a guy at t the B&B we stayed in recommended it. I really liked it! It's more like a biscuit than the usual spongey gingerbread men that you'd get at Christmastime. The flavour is nutty and slightly spicy, and although it's biscuit-like it's not overly dry. I'm not usually a fan of gingerbread, but this is a must-try!

The Gingerbread Shop
Church Cottage, Grasmere, Ambleside
Cumbria, LA22 9SW

Did I mention? The ruins of the Castle of Penrith are gorgeous.

Manchester

Manchester, I have to admit, isn't one of my favourite places in the UK. My parents and I spent three nights there, but I feel like it's pretty much your average urban city. The first time I visited Manchester in 2008 with my choir, though, the hotel I stayed in was haunted - so the city isn't entirely unexciting!

We did, however, visit Old Trafford, home to Manchester United football club!









The megastore at Old Trafford is HUGE! There's Man U memorablia and fan items of every type - jerseys, pants, balls, scarves, pins, badges, mugs, and even golf balls and golf bags (I didn't know Man U had anything to do with golf - can anyone tell me why they're selling golf stuff too??)! I'm not a huge football fan myself, but I can imagine a Man U fan going crazy in here.

Llandudno

Llandudno in Wales is a beautiful seaside resort town. It was my second time to Wales, and the Welsh towns and countrysides are every bit as beautiful in Llandudo as they were in Llangollen!







All signs in Wales are printed in two languages - English and Welsh, as part of an effort to revive the Welsh language. I tried teaching myself Welsh a few years ago, and while it didn't work out that well, I still think Welsh is a beautiful language!

My parents tore their hair out trying to pronounce Welsh with its strings of consonants without vowels, ha ha. Try pronouncing 'Llandudno' out loud! It's pronounced something like lthl-ann-did-no. I know, I know... 'Lthl' isn't particularly pronounceable either ha ha ha!



I visited a place called Happy Valley - I love its name, ha ha! It's home to several interesting features, such as a hill called Y Gogarth (The Great Orme, in English), an Alice in Wonderland walk, and even a Bardic circle that was used at the National Eisteddfodd in 1996!









I climbed up Y Gogarth, and who would've thought I'd chance on a whole bunch of sheep grazing that high up?!







I'm born in the Chinese year of the sheep (1991), so I guess I found my herd up there :p











It's fine to insert a whole bunch of pictures of myself right, cos how often do you get to take jump shots from up on a hillside? :p



I love how the green on my shoelaces matches the green of the grass! Haha.



Aaaaaaand that's pretty much it for Retrospective! Hope you've enjoyed reading the posts I've put up here so far :) Remember to stay tuned for more of my adventures around the UK!

Until next time ♥

Cheryl Keit xx