Last month, I went
for a holiday in the UK with my family. We had a great time. My
youngest daughter, who was studying in Edinburgh, joined us in London where we
spent two days. In London, we watched the Andrew Lloyd Webber classic, Phantom of the Opera at Her Majesty’s Theatre.
Unfortunately, my daughter’s good friend, who is studying at the Imperial
College in London, could only get tickets for Friday evening (at a very special
price apparently), the same day our plane landed. Tried as I did, I could not
keep my eyes open throughout the whole show. As I was sitting near the centre
of the second row, I fear that the ‘phantom’ and his colleagues must have
spotted me dosing off and thought; “Stupid China-man. Why come here when you
don’t know how to appreciate beautiful English music”. Actually, I enjoyed the
show tremendously; especially the life orchestral music and the two well-known
songs, Music of the Night and That’s All I Ask of You.
Besides viewing a few of the usual tourist attractions like Big Ben and London
Bridge, we also attended Sunday worship service at the Metropolitan Tabernacle
which is pastored by Dr Peter Masters. Many years ago, as a young Christian, I
had already come to know of Dr Masters through his articles in the publication
Sword and Trowel. I was surprised
that he was still preaching and was so glad that at least, I had the chance to
listen to him preach in person. As my wife and son are avid plant lovers, the
Kew Gardens was another compulsory stop for us.
After London, we drove north in a rental car, stopping
in Cambridge and York to visit my friends Brian Mitchell and John Harper who
had been blogging regularly here in Goodmorningyesterday; and who I have
already met in person here in Singapore. Unfortunately, due to time and geographical
constraint, and the fact that I had four other members of my family with me, it
was not feasible to meet up with other blogger friends like Tim Light, Mike
Robbins, Derek Tait, Geoffrey Pain, Stephen Harshaw, and Tom O’brien. I had arranged to meet Tom Brown in Edinburgh
where we stayed in my daughter’s rented flat, but due to communication
problems, that meeting did not materialize. Anyway, I hope that Tom and my
other UK friends can make their way to our shores one day, and we can still
meet here in tiny Singapore. Singapore’s smallness has its advantages after
all.
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| With Brian and Tessa Mitchell at their home in Cambridge |
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| Being taken for a ride by the Mitchells ..... down the River Cam. |
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| With John and Ann Harper at the York old city wall with the River Ouse behind us. |
From York, we drove westward to our next stop, the
renowned Lake District detouring on our way to see Malham Cove in Yorkshire
Dales National Park. After spending two nights in Lake District, we proceeded
to Edinburgh stopping briefly at some sections of the Hadrian Wall. After a
couple of days’ rest in Edinburgh, we drove to the Scottish Highlands visiting
places like Inverness, Loch Ness, Isle of Skye, Glencoe, Loch Lomond and the
Wallace Monument. Of course, in
Edinburgh, we visited many places, such the Scottish National Gallery, the Royal
Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh University, Carlton Hill and Arthur’s Seat. We
returned to London by train before boarding the Emirates flight back to hot,
humid and hazy Singapore.
The driving was surprisingly easy as the UK drivers
were generally quite disciplined, and their system was similar to ours. I was
particularly happy with the car allotted to us by Sixt, our car rental
company. It was a Skoda that came with a very user-friendly navigation system.
I had always thought that Skoda was a lousy car, and was surprised that it was
such an easy car to drive; and the diesel engine was very powerful. One strange
thing about the car that took a bit of getting used to, was that the engine
switched off by itself every time you stopped the car at a junction or traffic
lights; and then automatically started when you took your foot off the brake
pedal. I think this must be part of the effort to reduce air pollution. There must be a way to override this auto-off
function, but I did not bother to find out. And of course, having been driving
Japanese cars most of my adult life, the position of the indicators and wiper
switches took quite a bit of getting used to.
By the way, if you intend to go on a similar holiday in
the UK, please note that you do not need to get an International Driving Permit.
Prior to the trip, I had visited many websites which all said the same thing;
as long as your driver’s license was in a language that used Roman alphabets;
such as English, you do not need an IDP. But, being a kiasu Singaporean, my
wife checked with the agent who booked our rental car, and she told us that we
needed the IDP. And when I went to the Automobile Association office in Kallang
Leisure Park to purchase 2 licences at $22 each, the lady there said the same
thing. However, when we collected our car at Sixt, we were informed that had we
checked with them directly, they would have told us that we did not need the
IDP to drive in the UK. There you are … $44 plus time and petrol down the drain
through no fault of ours.
Anyway, all in all, I have really enjoyed my two weeks
in this lovely country that I already knew so much about. I loved the beautiful
scenery; especially the lakes and mountains (In Chinese, we say, 山明水秀).
We were also blessed to have fine weather with the sun out on most days,
although it was surprisingly cold for summer – at Fort William it was down to
12 deg C. Even though I generally disliked crowded cities, I enjoyed seeing the
ancient architecture of the many heritage buildings like churches and castles;
such as the Eilean Donan Castle in Dornie and the
Urquhart Castle in Loch Ness. Last, but not least, the beautiful flowers that
we saw everywhere were a joy to behold. You can view the photos that I have
uploaded to Facebook here.
I was very happy to be able to see the
Urquhart Castle looking exactly like what I remember from documentaries of the
Loch Ness Monster I had seen years ago.
Another interesting surprise was this
train station. Readers will probably recognize this as the famous Waterloo Station
from the movie, the Bourne Supremacy. With my two 千金’s.
