2023

  • April 25 Glencoe

    We wake late and have a wonderful home-cooked breaky after which we drive to the Glencoe Visitor’s Center in a woodland under some nice hills whose names we forget but probably have “glaich” or “clathearn” or “morloch” in them. The… Continue reading

  • April 24 Glasgow to Glencoe

    April 24 Glasgow to Glencoe

    We leave our hotel in a flurry of German giants who say they are off booze for the next week because they have sampled all the scotch in Glasgow. A jovial fellow from Arnold Clark car rental picks us up… Continue reading

  • April 23 Glasgow

    April 23 Glasgow

    Our last day in Glasgow, a city that easily opens itself in little moments and grand displays to strangers and offers its history and ongoing reformation to strangers like ourselves, we wake and eat a brunch of eggs benedict and… Continue reading

  • April 22 Glasgow

    April 22 Glasgow

    We board the tube for The Huntarian Museum and Mackintosh House on the grounds of Glasgow University, getting to them just before they open at 10 AM. The house is where he and his wife lived for about 10 years… Continue reading

  • April 21 Glasgow

    Glasgow is not London but it’s like a smaller, earlier version of London. How do we think of it? Strangely: like John Knox’s passionate, puritanical spirit leavened London’s wilder culture … reformed it (all puns intended) … but gave it… Continue reading

  • April 19-20 London to Glasgow

    Our last day in London turns out to be somewhat anticlimactic because we have not fully planned our trip to Scotland: what to see and where to eat and how, exactly, to get to each place during the remainder of… Continue reading

  • April 18 London

    After another groaning board breakfast, we bounce on the tube — Cynthia with her preserved Oyster card and David tapping on with his Capital One (because … not to put a finer point on it AGAIN … David lost his… Continue reading

  • April 17 London

    Monday morning’s late breakfast iPhone browsing reveals a day destined for sunshine and bodes well for outdoor endeavors so we dress snugly, tube and bus about an hour north of central London to Highgate Cemetery, designed by David Ramsey. One… Continue reading

  • April 16 London Bankside

    April 16 London Bankside

    Bankside Walk, Witness, Hunters Moon Lowering skies but not a drop today. Good show, we say, “brill, wizard and hunky dory.” We’re off to London Bridge — not the one with towers, but the modern version of the wooden one… Continue reading

  • April 15 London

    April 15 London

    Dennis Severs began life in California but escaped to London five days after graduating from high school in 1967. A dozen years later, he bought a derelict house in Spitalfields, the market area in the East End where Jack carved… Continue reading

  • April 14 London

    April 14 London

    Despite last night’s prayers, we wake to pouring rain and slanting wind but another nice English breakfast after which we are misdirected from street to street by Google Maps, trying to find the wash-and-fold laundry that says “get it tomorrow”… Continue reading

  • April 13 London

    April 13 London

    Thursday’s weather was immeasurably improved: We only needed three layers under our technical gear and, after an English breakfast whose ingredients cover two sides of the hotel’s dining room, we swiped our Oyster cards on the 14 bus in front… Continue reading

  • London April 12

    London April 12

    After we greet the six South Africans who in retrospect must have spent three days in our basement washing clothes — lovely family actually — we take the Silver Line for the first time to Dulles Airport and board an… Continue reading