I've been in the midst of a flurry of writing activity recently, mostly academic in nature (papers, grants, job applications, all the fun stuff), and none of it blog-related. I realise that I am a bit behind schedule and haven't got around to putting up some pictures from our trip back to the Motherland in March. So here I am to rectify the situation. As it happens, I only took photos when we headed up to the northern reaches of the country - Newcastle and Liverpool. I guess after living in Southampton for seven years, I had enough images seared into my memory to not need any more :-)
So with further ado.....
... we ventured out of the safe bosom of the south of England to ventured into the frozen wastelands of the north to visit the lovely Cara and Tom, fellow Wessex Lane survivors
(I'm not sure if Omar was wincing with cold here or just working the camera)
Ahhhh...... the seaside. Being in Tynemouth reminded me of how much I miss the British coastline (and being near the coast generally), which can always be relied on to be striking
If only Ohio wasn't so land-locked (lakes and rivers just aren't the same, in case you were wondering)
I think we're going to make this the front cover of our next album...
....although I think Tom's expression in this one would give the album a certain gravatas
And while I'm talking of things that I miss about the UK, here's another one.... cream teas, although I was prepared to overlook the poor choice of cream on this occasion. Desperate times call for desperate measures and all that.
And keeping with the food theme (is there any other?) - Tom and Cara took us to an awesome restaurant in Newcastle called Blackfriars (
this is their website). The building dates to 1239 and is suitably atmospheric. There was a liberal application of wine (and gin & tonic, and mead), so some aspects of the meal are a little fuzzy to my recollection, but I do have extremely found memories of what was definitely the best scotch egg I've ever had...
... I know that that isn't often saying much, but this hen's egg scotch egg with a duck scratching and mustard hollandaise was the business. Mmmmm..... *drool*
In between bouts of eating we also did a bit of sight-seeing, which included sights such as Earl Grey's column (apparently famous for other things than tea, who knew)...
... and a fine selection of bridges over the Tyne.
We also saw the 'New Castle', from which Newcastle got its name, although if I was being picky (unlikely, I know), we could debate the 'newness' of this particular castle
A particular highlight of our trip oop norf was a stop-off at Anthony Gormley's Angel of the North statue. The little guy at the bottom gives you a sense of the scale of the thing
And of course many photos were taken, from a variety of jaunty angles
And as the statue comes to life, Omar makes a desperate dash for safety. Ok, my imagination is getting a little carried away, but it would be funny if it really happened, right?
And of course no trip to the North would be complete without a greasy fry-up, which was provided courtesy of Matt in Liverpool and his local greasy spoon. Marvellous.
So that was but a brief snapshot of our trip back to England, which also incorporated stops in Leicester/Nuneaton, London and Southampton. It was a hectic trip but we both really enjoyed it (especially because I got my pimped-up visa approved) and relished the chance to catch up with people (although not as many people as we would have liked). So much so that we wish we could bring everyone back with us. Instead, I hope that adding pictures of Athens on this blog persuades people to come and visit us instead ;-)
But that trip feels like an age ago already, and now Spring is officially springing in Athens and everything is green and beautiful (and wet as Spring also seems to be monsoon season), which almost makes up for the Arctic Winter we had to endure.
So I guess it's time to get the camera back out and prepare the Spring instalment of my 'Athens through the seasons' series...... :-)
