Monday 31 March 2014

Driving in the UK (added 28/3/14)

I had “promised” that I would write up some things about our experiences driving in Great Britain. For our record anyway, I still want to do that.
Where does one begin? What I am writing here is about the challenges of driving in the UK – not the scenic beauty, not the other drivers, not the state of the roads.

1) Roundabouts. BIG roundabouts.
We had never experienced such confusing signs at roundabouts. Prior to the roundabout would be the usual big sign with the exits diagrammed, sometimes even numbered. But going ‘round the circle, what was an exit and what was not? Sometimes there was a little side entry or exit that didn’t count. And by the time we stopped for the traffic lights and manoeuvred the lanes it was easy to get mixed up about just how many exits we had passed or where we were in relation to the diagram.

But we could always circle the roundabout again, couldn’t we? And we did. But that posed its own problem: figuring out the meaning of the sign at each exit. Maybe we better circle it a third time…

And yes, the roundabouts were often controlled by traffic lights at major intersections. Imagine driving around a roundabout and stopping for a traffic light at every exit or entrance! We avoided peak travel times when possible.

2) Branches covering the signs.
It didn’t help that some of the signs before the roundabouts were half covered by branches of trees. And this wasn’t just at the roundabouts. We concluded that trees partially covered signs about 70% of the time. Some citizens – or visitors – put this down to the depressed economy, so that not much maintenance has been done the last few years. It seemed to me that trimming the offending foliage was a wide-open opportunity to promote employment!

3) Lack of signage.
No signs just when we needed them. Following Google instructions didn’t necessarily get us there!

But I’m not convinced we’d opt for a GPS system next time we travel. That was also a challenge for people using it. I still certainly prefer my big U.S. atlas for travel in the States. That seems to work pretty well when coupled with Google instructions and map – though sometimes we couldn’t agree on which was best to follow! Ah, there can be too much of a good thing.

4) Street signs within a town.
We had to look for these. They might be down low on a wall or up higher on a building. Or, of course, non-existent.

5) Arrows pointing the wrong way.
Just when we thought we had the right street, we would reach an impasse. Retracing our steps, we discovered the arrows on the sign were pointing at a 90-degree angle to the correct direction.

6) Narrow streets and narrow footpaths.
Some of the old cities and small villages had very old streets (all interesting, of course). As the main highway led through the centre of a small town, it would narrow to the point, at times, where two vehicles could hardly pass, particularly if one of them was a bus. Just when we were ready to turn around, thinking we’d missed our road, it would open out again.

In the cities the old cobblestone and brick streets might be so narrow that buildings loomed right next to the street. Add a footpath that was less than a metre wide, and one might be forgiven for feeling that he risked being squashed between traffic and building. All this could make for interesting walking. (We were not usually driving ourselves on city streets like that. We took the buses or underground into the city and walked from there.)

We did have the opportunity to ride with a “local” in London (a former Kiwi who had lived there for about seven years). What an experience! But one thing was certain, you shouldn’t count on getting anywhere in a “usual” amount of time.

7) Better signs elsewhere?
We found ourselves relaxing when we arrived in the U.S. (the signs were better), only to find ourselves noticing – you guessed it – branches blocking signs, arrows pointing the wrong way, unclear directions. But this was nothing on the level experienced in the UK. We have to admit also that back here in NZ we have become accustomed to “what’s wrong with” our signage: we learn when there won’t be signs for major cross streets, for instance. 

So what we were dealing with was, in part, differences. What one expects is not there, but does that make it worse? or just fascinating?

Tuesday 3 December 2013

Return to New Zealand (covering 3/10/13 to 7/10/13)
Well, we left Phoenix and Los Angeles on the 3rd and arrived in New Zealand on the 5th. How time does fly . We enjoyed the remainder of Saturday and then Sunday in Christchurch with our children, including seeing our newest grandchild, Therese (Bevan and Elrike’s third daughter), and also being present for the baptism of Hannah (Bryan and Alexia’s baby born in July). Monday it was back to Oamaru and readjusting to our usual lifestyle!

Phoenix (covering 27/9/13 to 3/10/13)

Last but not least we flew to Phoenix where Lois’ father lives with Renie (Lois’ sister) and David Totel. They are taking wonderful care of Dad in spite of his increasing dementia. He was having a few extra health problems at the time, but it was so good to be with them – and also extra good just to share a few days in the life of the Totels, something we have not done on any of our trips back since the 1997 one. We took a day to visit the Musical Instrument Museum. This is a highlight when it comes to museums, so we were very appreciative that Renie introduced us to it!

Our times with Dad were special even if communication was not all it used to be. One of the highlights was listening to a ‘sermon’ he had preached there at the Totels, and Renie managed to get it recorded. It must be something like 20 minutes long, and he developed the theme that has been on his heart and mind over the past year: I am ready “against that day” – are you? He had three specific points that he elaborated on, telling the meaning for him and challenging the listener. (If I remember correctly, the only listener was Renie, but he was definitely addressing his sermon to a wider audience. Correct me, Renie, if I’ve described any of this inaccurately.) I will look forward to hearing more of the recordings of Dad’s thoughts, which Renie hopes to get put on a CD. The others that she has recorded are not so extensive as this one, she said.

It is hard to know how to summarise visits with family! so if anyone has questions that come to mind from this brief report, just write and ask. How can I describe conversations, insights, visits to their churches (three Sundays in the States), and many other interesting details of the visits?

Iowa (covering 23/9/13 to 27/9/13)

On to Bruce’s brother Loren and family. Becky and Loren now have only three children at home, although Kendra was there during our stay. Here Bruce got involved with Loren in finishing off the reconstruction of one side of the house: tearing off the old weatherboards, putting in substantial insulation, adding a few extra power outlets, and adding the new vinyl siding. That’s a quick summary. Lois’ brother John, who lives only about 50 minutes away, also came and helped one day when he was off work.

It was good to see Loren in pretty good health. The new heart seems to be functioning pretty well! Of course, Bruce was also glad to be given a full explanation of Loren’s heating and cooling and plumbing systems in the basement. We failed to take photos of that – we should have thought to do that – though Becky and I took photos of the outside construction.

Knoxville (covering 16/9/13 to 20/9/13) and St. Louis (covering 20/9/13 to 23/9/13)

In Knoxville live the Holders (Lois’ sister Marti, husband Ron, and daughter Hannah) and in St. Louis Lois’ brother Tom and his wife Susan. It was a privilege to be in their homes again: for Holders that is their home of thirty years; for Tom and Susan it was our first visit to their new home after their move last year. We also had an evening in Hannah’s home, what seems an ideal spot which she found a year or two ago, and it was a treat to see so much of her artwork “on site.” Of course, the down side at the Holders was being reminded of the daily struggles of Ron and Marti with his Parkinson’s.

Philadelphia (covering 10/9/13 to 16/9/13)

Visiting Lillian and Jeremy and Shanna was, of course, a highlight of our time in the U.S. We introduced Bruce to the Reading Market (I had been there in March with Lillian) and also stopped in the Macy Department Store in downtown Philly. We made a point of being there at the noon hour so that we could hear the famous Wanamaker organ, the largest operational pipe organ in the world. If you are at all interested in organs, read the interesting article in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wanamaker_Organ

While in Philadelphia we had the opportunity to visit Sherwood and Sharon Hoyt, and they came to visit us at Jeremy and Lillian’s place as well. We enjoyed a good evening with Jeremy’s parents also and, in addition, met up with Uncle Russ and Aunt Nancy Ebersole for lunch. We appreciated this visit, and it was only a couple of days before they were off for five weeks in several Asian countries to minister there.

Friday 13 September 2013

Tuesday 10/9/13 (covering 2/9/13 to 10/9/13)

I’ll back up to last Monday since I didn’t write for several days prior to our travels on Friday.
The ICRC conference continued with its various meetings, but there’s not too much to describe about that without going into the whole aim of the ICRC. Suffice it to say that we enjoyed meeting church leaders from many countries. This was quite encouraging; understanding the English of some of them was quite a challenge, however!

We left Wednesday afternoon – missing the last evening and its special events – because Bruce had, right from the beginning, the wrong date for the finish of the conference! Apparently he was not the only one, so they said there was some confusion in initial information. But Bruce had agreed to speak that evening at the church where Chris and Julie Kavanagh attend, telling about the ICRC and the RCNZ, so we went ahead with that plan.

We stayed with Chris and Julie that night and the next one. On Thursday they took us to Oxford University, which is about an hour’s drive from their home. What a privilege to have them to introduce us to the highlights. But it is hardly able to be described. There are nine colleges – but each of these is a whole complex of buildings, each with its own students halls, chapel, gardens, lecture halls. These are all such large structures (as most every other historic building is in this country – don’t think Wheaton or Grace College dormitories and lecture halls).

In the UK the history behind each building, each college within Oxford, each old church in each town, each mansion, each castle, is something that boggles the mind. With Chris and Julie we also visited a couple of the small villages and towns; ‘small’ is relative, anything from 1500 to 45,000 in population, it seems, but each making the most of its history. Every village or city, by the way, seemed to have as a draw card their old church. I’ve never seen so many St. Mary’s Church or Church of St. John the Baptist. Most of these were, at least in part, 500 or more years old.

As for other old structures, I guess our photos that Bruce is posting on Google+ show best the variety we are seeing. On Friday on our way to London we detoured to visit the Salisbury Cathedral; the immense construction they managed in medieval times and the outstanding architecture make me wonder if our technology is really so advanced! Well, we have different technologies and different skills.

Saturday we began our sightseeing in London. We could not have managed much of this without the detailed help of Rob Boere, with whom we were staying. He not only gave us advice on what to see and where but also introduced us to the complex transport system and explained how to make the most of it. (That’s a summary, for I can hardly describe what he did.) 

Anyway, I’ll just highlight a few of the places we visited: Greenwich with the Maritime Museum, the observatory, the Market, and the Cutty Sark; walked across Tower Bridge (which some people wrongly call London Bridge) and viewed Tower Castle from outside. We did not, however, pay the many pounds required for tours of any number of things.

Sunday we attended All Souls’ (Anglican) Church, evensong at St. Paul’s Cathedral at 3:15, and the evening service at St. Helen’s Bishopgate. It was good to know that a couple of these old churches (All Souls’ and St. Helen’s) now have a faithful witness to the truth. St. Helen’s is a very old church that was down to about 15 or so people, I believe we were told – or maybe it was 50; but a faithful rector began a work that has mushroomed through diligent teaching of Reformed doctrines. The church now has over a 1000 attending its three services, and the vision of the church is to teach and train what is a rather mobile church population. They are planting new churches as they are able, but this mother church meets in a building that is centuries old.

Well, I could write more about Sunday. At All Souls’ there was wonderful organ accompaniment for the first and last hymns and a band or orchestra for the others (well played). Overall a good service with a challenging sermon. The evening service at St. Helen’s used a band (again, things were well played), mostly contemporary hymns by the likes of Townend and Getty. (Note to Berwyn: “In Christ Alone” was used only once in our four Sundays in the UK – and chosen very appropriately for the text on that occasion.) The message was once again excellent – and these churches don’t aim for brevity; I guess if they have the people there once a week they want to pack it in. Getting to church in London for most people, by the way, takes commitment in itself – not cheap, not quick, and twice would be difficult for most people.

Evensong at St. Paul’s was well performed, though the choir could not be understood very well because of the 2½ second reverberations in the huge (and magnificent) cathedral, and there were a few other drawbacks. The evensong we attended in Salisbury Cathedral was better in that respect. Evensong often has no sermon, as far as I know, but at St. Paul’s there was a very short sermon since on this occasion there was a formal induction of young boy choristers. The rector of All Souls’ Church had been asked to present the message! and he did an excellent job in scarcely over five minutes using the text of John 5:30-47 and challenging the ‘audience’ (which always includes many visitors to this historic cathedral) on the topic of missing the point (of the scriptures) and thus missing eternal life.

I’ve probably bored any readers since it is hard to enter into the experiences of others (unless they are very good writers, which I’m not).

But on to Monday. We visited the British Museum (dozens of highly recommended museums to choose from in the city of London, but we chose the ‘big name’); walked around the area of Westminster and other Parliament buildings, saw and heard Big Ben, and looked at Westminster Abbey on the outside. The tour was hugely expensive so it was one of those we gave a miss. However, it would have been a good day for a tour since it rained all day; that literally put a damper on some of the walking we had intended to do. But we got in enough activity. We then took a boat ride on the Thames and had all the famous sites pointed out to us – though this was not so good for me because I couldn’t understand the recorded talk very well. Bruce took plenty of photos; do I need to mention that? :-)

And now today, Tuesday, we headed off early to be sure to make it to Heathrow Airport in time, which was on the west side of London while we were staying on the east side. We didn’t want to take any chances after the long traffic delay we had on arriving in London. Of course, today it was smooth sailing, and we’ve spent nearly six hours in the airport. I must say, however, that a whole lot of the time is spent going through the steps of checking in, checking luggage, going from one place to another at the appropriate times for boarding, etc. A huge airport for a huge city. Even the one terminal we were in after dropping off our rental car is huge, huge, huge.

We arrived safely at Jeremy and Lillian’s house at 10:00 p.m. Tuesday evening with no trouble finding our way from Philadelphia airport to their house. The signs are much better here than in the UK!!

Sunday 8 September 2013

Friday 6/09/13
Well, we’re sitting here stuck in a traffic deadlock, so I’ll pass the time by writing about it. We’ve had a good trip from Salisbury after staying for evensong at the Salisbury Cathedral. But just over two miles from our exit off the M25 (the big motorway around London), traffic came to a halt. Of course, this was just after the last exit before the one to Rob Boere’s, so there was no way to escape. We have come about one mile in that last hour. Now I’ll tell you, seeing four lanes of traffic (one way) bumper to bumper and not moving is quite a sight. But I’m wondering how far back it is behind us. I suppose people would have tried to get off once the traffic had backed up to the previous exit. 

It was interesting that probably 20 miles back there were already messages flashed above the motorway warning to avoid Dartford. Of course, we didn’t know where Dartford was, but it turned out it was just north of the exit we wanted to take. Anyway, we are expecting to hear of a huge accident or something serious.

We got here to the stalled traffic about 9:30 p.m., with only a few miles yet to go. But it might be midnight before we get there. It looks like all the traffic that has built up might be getting off on ‘our’ exit. (Late addition: we finally got off at ‘our’ exit at about 11:00 p.m. And then made it to Rob’s by about 11:30 p.m. Here's a news item about the delay: Dartford Crossing Closure.)

Sunday 1/09/13
Lois writing again. We are enjoying the conference; Bruce is enjoying it more now that he has been able to relinquish his chairman’s duties after the first morning when the new chairman took over! Now he only has smaller advisory committee meetings and discussions with delegates from our sister churches.

I have enjoyed singing various psalms and hymns to different tunes in the ICRC meetings and also in the services we attended today. The singing was exceptionally good, of course, with so many delegates plus some of their wives in the services. The morning message in the church we attended was on 1 Peter 2:9-10 by Rev Ray Sikkema from the United Reformed Church (North America), and the evening message was on Psalm 73 (the minister, Rev Iain Campbell from the Free Church of Scotland, had quite a good way of bringing out the ideas of the psalm, particularly the last half). 

Not too much else to write about unless I go into our “day off” yesterday. I joined the trip to the Cardiff Castle and Mansion and to the museum of Welsh life. 

I, Bruce, took a tour through Big Pit coal mine. What was most impressive was the terrible working conditions in the mine for the miners who worked deep underground, often with their wives and their children as young as 6 until early in the 20th Century. Children 6-8 years of age operated the doors in the mine which were to be shut or opened to regulate the ventilation. Young boys up to about age 12 shoveled the coal into the trolleys which their fathers dug out with picks. Young girls and women pushed the trolleys with 500-1000 lbs of coal to the cage (mechanical elevator) that took it to the surface. The children were often in total darkness for most of the 12 hour working day, six days a week. The miners were paid a pittance, barely enough to survive.


Saturday 31 August 2013

Wednesday 28/08/13
Beginning at 9:00am I (Bruce) met with the Interim Committee of the ICRC to do the final planning for the conference. We took longer than expected and only finished our work at 2:00pm. The prayer service was held in the host church, Immanuel Evangelical Presbyterian Church, led by several of the ministers from UK churches.

Tuesday 27/08/13
Hay-on-Wye was our village today. It really was a village only, but such an interesting one. It is full of secondhand book shops. An idea of one man to make it the booksellers capital of the world got support and it really became that for the the English-speaking world. A bit more to the story, but I won’t go into that here.

Leaving there, we allowed double time for wrong turns before dropping our rental car off at the airport before the ICRC conference began. And we needed all the time we allowed. Yes, one of these days I’ll write about the signs here...

Monday 26​/08/13
Back to Llandudno late Sunday evening, but it was on Monday that we began to realise what we had ‘gotten ourselves into’ as I mentioned above. It turned out it was a bank holiday, good weather too, and people had come out in droves for the weekend and more on Monday. Well, we were leaving and heading for Caernarfon Castle so that was okay; the cars coming into Llandudno non-stop were going the opposite way from us.

But we got down near the Castle and missed our turn (nothing new and different for us here), and suddenly there was a mile of traffic coming our direction and scarcely moving. Bruce almost decided not to turn around to go back for the castle as he thought we would be in that long a line of traffic. However, common sense prevailed as we eventually realised they couldn’t all be going to the castle! More people heading for the beaches, no doubt (now miles away) – perfect weather for that. We turned around and fairly quickly were able to get to our turn-off. The castle was busy but not exceptionally so. It was a very good choice of castles to visit as so much of it is well preserved and well explained.

And then we meandered through the town of Caernarfon itself before heading towards our evening stay. It is really nice to be going the opposite way of all the traffic; even the secondary roads were quite busy.

Saturday 24/08/13 and Sunday 25/08/13
Tatton Park visit: the wonderful mansion (see photos posted by Bruce) was well worth the tour. But no wonder the proletariat felt the wealthy were getting too much. For all that the spending of the wealthy supposedly helps an economy, they were very selfish and proud in their spending, not to mention oppressive. And most of the wealthy seemed to get themselves into deep debt and eventually had to sell the family inheritance: people always like to spend more than they have no matter how much they have. Has anything changed???

And then on to Knutsford, a childhood hometown of Elizabeth Gaskell. They had a special display this month of the various homes of Elizabeth G., and we also enjoyed the Millennium Tapestry, a huge project of embroidery depicting the whole town of Knutsford in 2000, 40 feet long with 6.3 million stitches.

Getting lost once again after taking a wrong exit, we made it to our booked B&B in Llandudno, a seaside town of about 20,000. We did not know what we had gotten ourselves into for the weekend! I had pictured another small seaside village. It is one of the big seaside resorts, but what a special one. It has quite a history, but most impressive are the dozens and dozens of hotels built on the seaside front with the ‘promenade’ between them and the sea – a planned Victorian resort. The hotels are virtually all alike, and what a row of white buildings that made. The photos don’t do it justice. On other streets the Victorian homes and hotels and B&B’s are mostly stone, and all of these are also quite a sight. I can’t stop asking Bruce to take photos of the stone buildings.

We also did the ‘chapel’ walk to see six of the Welsh chapels. These ‘chapels’ are really big stone churches of various denominations. The independent Welsh spirit really took to the nonconformist (dissenters) movement and endured quite a bit of persecution when they refused to sign an agreement of conformity, but once there was freedom the various denominations each developed their own identify and built a chapel.

Sunday we went to Bangor, about 20 minutes away, to the Ebenezer Evangelical Church (a church that subscribes to the Westminster Confession – bar the clause on infant baptism in order to allow baptists as members), where we appreciated the services and also the fellowship with the Finnies and another visiting young couple who are missionaries.

Sunday 25 August 2013

Friday 23/08/13
We were highly impressed by the Glasgow Cathedral – if you visit Scotland, visit it! But just as impressive was the huge cemetery associated with the church and later with a broader ‘clientele’. Huge grave markers and monuments as well as more ordinary ones, a well-planned park to surround the ‘necropolis’, and the 70-foot monument of John Knox all added up to make a memorable time.

But time marched on, and we continued our travels south, enjoying the Lake District, spending a couple of hours in a yet different historic town, Keswick, in the Lake District, and snapping innumerable photos. Every area has different architecture and building materials.

And from the Lakes District onwards our travel fun began! A whole chapter could be written about road signs here, going in circles (confusing roundabouts), getting off and on the motorways when looking for a place to eat, and following directions to our abode. I plan to write up something about “interesting things we’ve noted.”

But several hours later we did find our B&B and enjoyed a full night’s sleep in a house that was constructed in 1625 and repaired in 1701 after a fire. There we enjoyed a really pleasant experience of hospitality.

Saturday 24 August 2013

Thursday 22/08/13
The drive through the rest of Skye and down through the Scottish highlands was awesome – photographs won’t do it justice. It was a long drive since we took the windy route down along Loch Lomond and then over to Stirling to view Stirling Castle and the Wallace Monument. Passing south to Falkirk, we viewed the Falkirk wheel. It was too late in the day to enter any of these last places even if we had wanted to pay for this or to see the Falkirk wheel in operation. Then on to Glasgow for a late dinner and a night in a rather cramped room in Charing Cross Guest House right in the centre of the city. Not classy! But we are enjoying sampling the varied accommodation and hospitality as well as the quite different types of towns and cities.

Wednesday 21/08/13
We drove south through the Isle of Lewis and then through north and south Harris. It was cloudy and drizzly while we travelled through the rugged and impressive area of north Harris, but when we got to south Harris it turned fine – a few fluffy clouds and blue skies. Quite beautiful but rugged scenery – granite rock everywhere in South Harris. There are some nice beaches on the west coast of south Harris but New Zealand has plenty just as nice.

At the tip of South Harris is the St Clement’s church – an empty ruin still in decent condition.
We got back to the ferry, located between north and south Harris, on time for our 4:00 sailing; reporting was 45 minutes prior to sailing, similar to the NZ ferries. It was a beautiful, smooth ride to Uig, Skye. We then drove through country which was the closest to New Zealand that we have yet seen – high hills covered with green grass – only the granite showing through at places giving away that we were not it New Zealand.

Tuesday 20/08/13
We viewed local sites in Stornoway – a bit of a relief after yesterday – and also drove out to the tip of the Eye Peninsula on which we were staying. Just about every information site where we stop we’ve bought a book of some sort. We’ll have to share these out.

In the evening we had tea with Bethany and Ewan Finlayson, a young married couple (now with a first child) who had visited our church in Oamaru last year when they were working/visiting New Zealand for three months. It turned out they live near Stornoway less than two miles from our host family, the Macivers! We had haggis, neeps and tatties (turnips and potatoes). Can’t say we liked the haggis – a sticky, heavy, peppery mince with a small amount of oats in it and some onion. Ewan said it should have had more oats and thus been less sticky.

Monday 19/08/13
Today we travelled to the various places of interest on the west and northwest coast of the Isle of Lewis: Calanais Stones (huge stones along the lines of Stonehenge but without so many specific ideas about their pattern and purpose), historic blackhouses of crofters, a broch (double-walled stone dwelling and defence structure – the brochs had quite an amazing construction), an old Norse mill and kiln, an old church right on the coast near the top tip of the island, and then the Butt of Lewis itself with its historic lighthouse. At each stop the fierce piercing wind and some showers made for very cold sightseeing; I didn’t quite bring enough wraps (on the day trip) to handle this, but I’ve recovered.