Local travels--Granada theater

After our return from the UK we had tickets for an English Beat show at the Granada Theater last night.  This was our second time seeing them at the Granada, and they were again fantastic.  The show was sold-out, and at the close of the concert Dave Wakefield stuck around to meet fans at the stage.

Best song of the night was a toss-up between Save it for Later and Ranking Full Stop.

Other fantastic shows at the Granada--OMD (2011--best actual songs from the show here and here), and Adam Ant (Sep 2012 music from the show--Rich and I are on the far righthand side in the crowd, pic below of the marquee is mine, and of AA from the Granada site),

UK holiday 2012

Another UK holiday--this time to parts of Scotland and northern England.  Sites include Pitlochry, Scotland were we spent Christmas, Northumberland for the New Year holiday with Richard's friends, and points of interest along the drive.  Not as many pictures, but worthwhile hikes through mountains, along beaches and in and the Cheviot hills.

Entries are as follows  1) Mixed Pics, 2) Bamburgh and Lindisfarne, 3) Northumbria and the Cheviots, 4) Siccar Point and Hutton's Unconformity, 5) Schiehallion and Pitlochry.

As always, click on the pictures for bigger views!  For background, consider the Scottish sounds of Big Country, the Proclaimers, or Teribus.

UK 2012 Misc sites of interest

A mixed bag of remaining pictures--

The Angel of the North, in Gateshead (me at the foot of it).

The Forth Rail Bridge, crossing the Firth of Forth.

Durham Cathedral, near Durham University where Richard did his master's in geophysics.

UK 2012 Bamburgh and Lindisfarne

On the coast were several great places, including Bamburgh Castle and Holy Island/Lindisfarne. 

Bamburgh Castle is currently in private hands, but open on weekends to the public and worth the visit.  The interiors are exquisite, filled with great collections of china and armory.  From the castle you can walk the beach for miles.

Lindisfarne is only accessible when the tides permit driving across the causeway, though walking the island requires that you keep track of when the causeway will close again.  We walked the island with Josie and Viunce and tried to spot some of the geological/historic highlights including the shingle beach, lime kilns and priory. 

Though it was winter birds were abundant, including Northern Fulmar, curlew, oystercatcher and several owl species including Barn Owl and Short-eared Owl.

UK 2012 Northumbria and the Cheviots

We spent the time around New Year with Richard's Cambridge friends in a cottage just outside of Wooler on the England/Scotland border in Northumberland.  The region is known for rolling hills, castles, as well as the remnants of Roman forts and iron age settlements.

We were joined by three other couples with a tradition of meeting up regularly for a new year trip.  Josie and Vince are currently living in Duxford, Cambridgeshire, where Josie works in the bursar's office at Newnham College and Vince works as a mechanical engineer.  They travel a lot and participate as redcoats in historical reenactments of the Napoleonic era (they plan to be there for the 200th anniversary of Waterloo, and have done the Waterloo reenactment several times before).  Matt and Charlotte are currently living in Kazakhstan where Matt works as an accountant for a mining company and Charlotte works for their HR department.  They've set a wedding date for May, and will finally be moving back to the UK.  Dickie and Rasa both work for the Royal Mail in Chester--Dickie was with Richard at Durham for graduate school, and Rasa recently came to the UK from Lithuania.

Matt and Vince brought their Land Rovers--the roads were wet and sometimes flooded and they seemed to enjoy fording various streams and ravines.

The Roman fort in the photo above appears now as just a square on the hillside, but along with some remaining Roman roads and walls is all that remains of Roman Britain.

The Cheviots are beautiful--even in rain and cloud there were great views.

On one of our walks we could also see old terraces left over from medieval farms, now covered by sheep folds.

The Scottish borders also have several remaining castles, including some that date to the history of conflict between Scotland and England.  Two castles--Ford and Etal--are associated with the Battle of Flodden.  Etal was the only one open to visitors.

Our first day in Northumberland we walked to Flodden Hill (where the Scottish troops camped prior to the battle) and to the battlefield at Flodden with Josie and Vince.

UK 2012 Siccar Point and Hutton's Unconformity

Between Pitlochry and Northumbria we stopped in at Siccar Point, on the North Sea coast.  The site is one of several places in Scotland where Hutton's Unconformity can be seen.

The unconformity marks the boundary between rocks from the lower Silurian (known as greywackie) that were produced about 425 million years ago, and overlaid by rock of upper Devonian sandstone.  The disjunct between the two different rock strata were predicted by Scottish geologist James Hutton as part of his theory of rock formations.  Hutton and several others approached the specific unconformity at Siccar Point by sea--it can be difficult to approach from the land due to the steepness of the slope and the strong tide.

The unconformity helped to cement the idea of an Earth that was very old--tremendous amounts of time were required to produce such a disjunct between an initial layer of of sedimentary rock, followed by an uplift and additional sedimentary rock formation.  The scientist John Playfair who accompanied Hutton said of the site "The mind seemed to grow giddy by looking so far back into the abyss of time".

Richard had seen the unconformity previously while in other parts of Scotland, but this was his first visit to Siccar.  Though we tried to reach it from the land, we had to give up a little higher and see it more from above.

Siccar Point also allowed a great view of the coast!

UK 2012 Schiehallion and Pitlochry, Christmas

For Christmas we stayed in Pitlochry at Scotlands Hotel with Richard's parents and his brother David's girlfriend's family for a somewhat different Christmas tradition.  Our time in Pitlochry included a tour and whisky tasting at Edradour Distillery, the smallest distillery in Scotland, short walks through the town and a Boxing Day hike up Schiehallion.

We climbed Schiehallion from the Brae of Foss car park, and the day was clear and bright and ideal for hiking.

 The mountain is one of the Munros, which include all of the mountains in Scotland greater than 3,000 feet.  The view from the parking lot showed the mountain covered at least halfway up by snow.  Through the day we only encountered seven other groups that decided to walk the mountain that day, making it for a relatively quiet walk. 

The snow was older, and the icier top made for occasional chances to walk on top of the snow instead of sinking down. Unfortunately some of the ice also made for easier slipping/falling, which Richard did twice and Marcy did once (the fewer falls only due to reliance on poles...).

Ptarmigan were common on the walk up to the summit--they frequently crossed our path or could be heard making small chucking sounds behind the rocks.

We hit the summit at about midday, and by then the weather was starting to close in from the east and snow began to fall.  The wind was fairly sharp and we were happy to make our way to the lee side so that we could stay a bit warmer.  But the view was worth the walk--