Recent Outings

 A few interesting things have been happening in the bishop's world in recent weeks, so time for an update on where I've been and what I've been up to.
This photo was taken in Southwold while on a one-night camping trip with my wonderful wife. Methodists are supposed to be teetotal - very few of them are in my experience. I was grateful that this church was over 100 miles from home, or I could lose half my congregation. The church building is actually situated next to the brewery and they seem to coexist quite happily cheek by jowl. This would not have been the case a century ago- there would have been pickets, prayer meetings and demonstrations, and the Methodists would have been even worse.

 Weather was glorious, and we walked into Southwold from Walberswick, which was a delight. The return at sunset across the golf course and common after fish and chips was idyllic.

Not sure if I have posted about this, but on August 5th my first grandchild, Rowan, was born. My little daughter is a wonderful Mom, and my son-in-law a great father. Rowan is gorgeous, but I thought I would make this the first picture - think this mouthful of Mom's milk didn't quite pass quality control.

 Here's a gorgeous one to compensate. He really is a lovely cute baby. So proud of my daughter and son-in-law.
Four weeks later the twin girls were born - more on that to follow in another blog. But to have a grandson and two granddaughters as well as two sons and two daughters, two sons-in-law and one daughter-in-law with another to follow next year,all of whom are wonderful, is wealth beyond imagination

 Last night Mrs. L and I went out to the theatre, but first dinner at Wagamama. Really impressed with this place in Highcross in Leicester; very tasty noodle dishes at reasonable prices. These two meals look similar but don't be fooled - mine has no chilli, garlic or spice in, and Mrs. L's has another use - blasting rock in the local quarry.

 A rather revealing outfit my gorgeous wife was wearing made the view very enjoyable. Anyone for dumplings?

On to the theatre to see the new Alan Bennett play "People". Script and storyline and general air of comforting melancholia up to his usual very high standards, but I was irritated at the stereotypical portrayal of Church leaders. Mrs. L. pointed out that they were only Church of England clergy so it didn't matter so much. Fair comment I suppose. Then I thought through the cast and realised that all the characters were stereotypes, and the clergy were not singled out for special treatment.

Perhaps I was just disappointed because Mrs. L got to see a man's bare bottom (why women find this part of a man's anatomy attractive is completely beyond me) and I was not really similarly rewarded. I won't say more for fear of giving too much away.

 On the way out we were able to see what went on behind the scenes, and just how complex the whole operation is.

 Some of the many props....

 ... including several chamber pots that had been filled with the pee of famous people (don't ask!)

And a glimpse onto the stage; it all made me want to tread the boards myself; perhaps one day when I am retired.

Well we're off to Rhodes in a few weeks time for our main holiday - delayed this year by the arrival of grandchildren, and a price well worth paying. Now that will probably take a few blogs, if there is nothing much to report in the meantime.

Three Days with Benji in Picardy Part 4

Now when you wake up on a French camp site on an August morning that looks like this you really don't want to be leaving. So it was rather depressing to put the tent away after breakfast, load the bike and head off.

In order to make my visit to the World War 1 battlefield sites more eclectic I decided to go to Ypres - Ieper as the Belgians now call it, and since it is in their country they should know. It was a flying visit, negotiating the motorway round Lille and thankful for my excellent TomTom  motorbike satnav which was superb, an attribute that could hardly be ascribed to some of the French drivers on the busy roads. What is it about people that changes them from thoughtful, considerate drivers on rural roads to morons once they are on four-lane city perimeter roads? Anyway I knew I had crossed into Belgium not only because of a change in the road signs but because the road surfaces deteriorated significantly - one way of enforcing the speed limit for motorbikes! Ieper has a lovely cathedral - and lots of impressive buildings.

I only had time to call into the entrance to this museum, but it is pretty clear that the WWI battlefields are a major contributor to the tourist trade. I was surprised that here, just over the border from France, everything is in Flemish that isn't geared to the English tourist.

A scorching hot day, and I had my bike gear on - could cheerfully have stripped and lay down in this, but doubt it would have improved the prospects for the tourist industry.

First sight of the monument I had come to Ypres to see - the Menin Gate. Bought a couple of bottles of Coca Cola on this street, spoke not a word to the shop woman, who nevertheless wished me a "good morning." How did she know I was British? "I can just tell." This is depressing, but at least I didn't have to demonstrate my ignorance of the language.

You get a bit nearer and start to appreciate the scale of the thing

There were a whole host of places like this, offering tours of battlefield sites and various other "reality" experiences. I would have liked to have tried one, but had insufficient time.

Close up it becomes even more impressive

Some boards explaining what happens here on a regular basis and what the monument is all about

thankfully all in English

This is what is morbidly impressive - every inch of every wall is covered with the names of the people who were killed in the fighting around Ypres.

But these are only the names of those who were never buried because their remains were never found. As I understand it some simply disappeared under the water and mud and their bodies were never recovered.

Even allowing for the possibility of the odd few having escaped and who sat out the war incognito in some Belgian bordello this is gruesomely impressive. Every archway reveals another series of walls covered in yet more names.

It simply never seems to end. Now they are just names, but of course they were once real men who were loved and missed and mourned.

Just time for a quick walk around Ieper. Some really nice architecture with religion dominating the skyline.

That and various memorials - more names, emotional anaesthetic generated by anonymity and by the sheer scale of the slaughter

Loads of churches like this - we could do with just one of these in Leicester to replace our rather flea-bitten and unimpressive cathedral

Funny seeing religious icons like this just adorning the walls of commercial premises. Mary keeping an eye on the place while the owners are out to lunch?

O dear

The motorbike park in the middle of the town - and Benji was keeping company with some pretty impressive machines - some rather posh Harleys and a top of the range Gold Wing in particular. Personally I still prefer BMW's but they did stand out from the crowd.

Met one or two bikers who had just taken off from the UK, crossed the channel, and were spending 2-3 weeks just going where the fancy took them. This gave me ideas!

More impressive buildings to admire during lunch and then the return trip to Dunkirk, where I thought I had plenty of time to buy some wine for my lovely wife before driving down to the ferry, only to discover that the ferry terminal is in Dunkirk in the same sense that London Stansted airport is in London. Good job I allowed plenty of time.

Benji had a good crossing with some new friends at the front of the boat.

This is the one thing about cross-channel ferries I have never understood.Half an hour before arrival people start queuing at the stairway to the car decks in order to be at their vehicles before anyone else, rather than enjoying the view, or having a comfortable seat and a coffee while the ferry docks. Do they think that if they get to their cars before anyone else they will be off the ferry first? Answers on a postcard.
It was all rather fun, as the bikes were at the front of the ferry, and we ended up disembarking long before the people at the front of the queue.
Anyway an uneventful 3 hours back to Leicester sampling the delights of the M25 and M11 in the rush hour followed making me so thankful I don't live in the south-east of England and longing for the remoteness of my beloved Northumberland.

Three Days with Benji in Picardy Part 3

Now call me biased, patriotic, or what you will, but for me this was the best bit of architecture to be found in the area.

It's called the British memorial, but it has a large British and French cemetery. I found it impressive that scattered across the countryside of this appealing corner of Picardy there are monuments like this that are kept immaculately by various associations, and obviously treated with the utmost respect by visitors and residents alike. There was something about the design of this one that seemed to me to embody both the horror and the heroism of the struggle - sort of Gothic yet dignified

There is a small museum attached telling the story - this a rather impressive (if that's the right word) montage of pictures of some of the many thousands who simply disappeared and whose remains were never found.

Superb large display boards telling the story of this bit of the struggle

I think a lot of places have this kind of thing - books with lists of names, each one someone's son, father, husband, sweetheart...

... and walls covered with the names of those who were missing by regiment

 

The symmetry was suitably disrupted by the French and British sectors of the cemetery with different style grave markers. I preferred the French version

 

 

Simple stone crosses with nameplates...

 

... or not in many many cases. I think the French version of "unknown" is more poignant

 

than the wordy British "A soldier of the Great War ...

 

Now very late in the afternoon and wanting to visit the Newfoundland memorial before travelling to Amiens I just found myself driving by the Ulster memorial. So I just stopped to take a picture

 

I think it is meant to be a replica of a tower somewhere in Northern Ireland.

 

Now the Newfoundland memorial at Beaumont-Hamel is one of the must-see places.

The mound topped by the caribou is impressive enough, as is yet another story of heroics - a courageous if senseless assault on German positions from which only 68 men emerged unscathed after just half an hour's combat and in which every single officer was killed.

 

But it was here of all places I visited that you could best see the layout of the original trenches

 

No mud, duckboards or military paraphernalia, but you get the idea

Over the top anyone? I was just trying to imagine what those men felt as they looked at the top of this trench before doing something really really stupid.

 

Now in theory this was one of the better ideas of the planners of the Battle of the Somme. Digging under the German lines and planting lots of explosives to be detonated before the assault began. This is at La Boisselle, not far from Albert.

 

Why it is called the Lochnager Crater I don't know, but it is an impressive sight

 

No marked graves, but nevertheless a final resting place for many soldiers, it looks as if visitors really do follow this instruction.

 

It was difficult, with my little camera, to capture the scale of the crater generated by the explosion

 

 

but this might offer some idea.

 

The following attack was, of course, part of the story of disaster.

 

 

An earlier attack by the French in December 1914 in this vicinity was also a disaster with well over 1,000 losses in a very short space of time

 

Now owned by an Englishman there is a service held here every year on 1st July, moving on to Thiepval and Beaumont-Hamel and ending at the German cemetery at Fricourt (which I didn't have time to see. 

 

Time for something other than war - an evening in the delightful town of Amiens, very pretty and very French...

 

 

... in the main!

 

Lovely waterways lined with more restaurants than you could shake a large baguette at

 

A stunning contrast to the story of carnage on the Somme battlefield

 

And a very impressive cathedral.

Well I was missing my wife rather a lot by now, and regard a meal out at a French restaurant to be somewhat inadequate without her company, so I repaired to the McDonalds on the route back to the camp site, before collapsing into bed in my tent. I didn't take a picture of McDonalds - I expect you know what they look like. But here's a funny thing - my French is just about passable in restaurants, supermarkets, shops and camp sites, but not in McDonalds. I think it is the way French versions of the place mix English and French together - "Le Big Mac" for example.

Final part of the story to be posted soon