english lake district

After breakfast at the Melrose, Uncle Yan, Auntie Val, and I headed out for an adventure in the southeastern portion of the Lake District.  We began with a visit to Wray castle, which I had spotted across Windermere the day before, not realizing it was one of our planned destinations.

map showing our route

three of us in front of the entrance to wray castle

The castle was built in 1840 with "new money" made from industry, and built to mimic a Gothic style castle.  There were interesting details such as the use of pine interior trim - imported from America and therefore a sign of great wealth.  The history of the castle included use as a place families could rent and stay for a season.  It served as Beatrix Potter's introduction to the Lake District at age 16 when her family's usual trip to Scotland was cancelled and they stayed at Wray Castle instead.  The weather changed from heavily overcast to pouring rain as we toured the inside, so we didn't spend any more time outside when we finished.

Our next stop, after an unintentional circumnavigation of Esthwaite water, was Hill Top, Beatrix Potter's house.  She never actually lived there as it was considered unacceptable for a single woman to live on her own, so lived with her brother but stayed there sometimes, using it as her place of work for writing and keeping herds of Herdwick sheep, but never fully moved in.  When she did marry, she chose to move into her husband's house, not wanting a man to change the way she had her house set up.

hill top

From there we went to the village of Hawkshead, where we visited the Beatrix Potter Museum, housed in the former law offices of her husband and his father.  A revolving selection of her artwork is displayed there, as well as some of her collections of fossils and insects, old letters, and writings.  Despite the rain, we walked around the village with our umbrellas.  It was a quaint little place with narrow streets and beautiful views from the church atop a small hill.

beatrix potter museum, hawkshead

Our next stop was the village of Coniston, situated on Coniston Water.  Auntie Val had memories of arriving there as a teenager with several friends and hiking out to a hostel to stay for a few days.  We made our way down to the lakeside and enjoyed the view.

you can see the bottom of  "the old man of coniston" fell behind us

After we returned to Ambleside and had a little nap, we had dinner in an old mill building.

The next morning we packed everything into the car and headed from southeast to northwest across the Lake District.  First stop was Rydal Mount, the family home of William Wordsworth.  We opted out of the tour and instead walked the grounds of neighboring Rydal Hall - a large estate now used as a "holiday, retreat, and conference center." It boasts an early 20th century formal garden including a croquet court, a waterfall with a little hut built so one could sit under shelter and enjoy the view, and is currently home to "rare, ancient, and specimen trees,""diverse flora and wildlife," and "art and sculptures in the landscape."

route from ambleside to cockermouth

formal garden at rydal hall

Our path led next past Rydal Water to Grasmere, both the lake and the village of that name.  We toured Dove Cottage, another of Wordsworth's homes.  He lived there with his sister, then his wife after he married.  They only moved when the family became too large for the cottage.  Included with the cottage tour was the Wordsworth Museum, full of the life of not only Wordsworth but several other notable authors and poets of the period.  Dove Cottage sits somewhat outside of the village itself, so we strolled over to the village for a cup of tea before continuing our journey.

reflections on grasmere

dove cottage

We stopped next in Keswick, on Derwentwater.  After stretching our legs and finding some lunch, we headed uphill and found the Castlerigg Stone Circle.  Erected 4500 years ago by prehistoric farming communities, it is believed it was used for many purposes, including religious ceremonies, negotiations, trade, and gatherings.  The sun came out while we were at the circle.

castlerigg stone circle

Our final destination for the day was Graysonside, a bed and breakfast outside the ancient market town of Cockermouth.  We took a very scenic, albeit direct, route over Whinlatter Pass, with sweeping views over Bassenthwaite and its surrounding valley.  Graysonside was a pleasant former farmhouse, where my room was more than adequate with a huge bathroom, and Auntie Val and Uncle Yan had a two bedroom suite with a sitting room.  We walked about a half mile to Hundith Hill Hotel across the road where we had a pub style dinner.

graysonside - the top three windows facing are all uncle yan and auntie val's suite!

Our third all-Lake-District-day involved a loop that brought us by four different lakes, so we ended up seeing ten of the nineteen major lakes in the park.  Our first stop was to admire the beautiful reflections on Crummock Water.  We stopped at a high point above the lake, then stopped again to walk down to the water's edge at the south end.  We drove past Buttermere, then headed up to Honister Pass.  The valley leading up to the pass was breathtaking, so we stopped a couple times to enjoy the view and stretch our legs.  At the top of the pass, we stopped at Honister Slate Mine, the source of Honister green slate.  We learned that Honister green slate is 450 million years old - older than dinosaurs and that the location was the wettest place in England with 12 FEET of rain per year!

loop route from cockermouth

honister slate mine

On the other side of the pass, we stopped in the village of Rothswaite to have tea at the Yew Tree Inn.  The proprietress of Graysonside had mentioned it as a place patronized regularly by Prince Charles when he visits the Lake District as a protector of the Lakeland Herdwick sheep.  Our route next took us along the eastern shore of Derwentwater to Keswick again.  This time we went to the north end of Derwentwater and rested on a pier on the lake.  The next stop was Bassenthwaite Lake (the only body of water in the Lake District to have the word "Lake" in its name).  We stopped at two different places along the shore, and then went over Ouse Bridge en route to the Wildlife Park we saw on signs.  When we got there, we realized it was an ordinary zoo and turned around to head back to the town of Cockermouth.

panoramas of crummock water from above and from the south shore,
valley leading to honister pass, bassenthwaite, and ouse bridge

We wandered a bit around Cockermouth, skirting the road construction that has been nearly continuous since a disastrous flood in 2009.  We walked by the Wordsworth House and Garden, but didn't visit as they are closed on Fridays.  I spotted a "free library" that was a gift of Andrew Carnegie (CARnuhgy to Americans, carNEEgy to the English!) in 1903 - that led to an interesting discussion of whether he was American or British - turns out he was a Scottish American, emigrated when he was a tween, and when he'd made his fortune, part of his philanthropy included building free libraries all over the United States and United Kingdom.

the floodwaters got pretty high in the middle of the town

carnegie free library

We walked under a bridge and along the river Cocker for a little distance, and talked to a resident who said the floodwaters were near ten feet along the river.  The following photo shows how high the river had to rise to even get above its banks - as far as I can figure that bridge was nearly submerged in the flood!

bridge over river cocker

We finished off our day with Indian food in Cockermouth, and when we went back to Graysonside, we prepared to head to York the next morning.

heading north

Monday morning Uncle Yan, Auntie Val, and I loaded up the car for a week's worth of travel and drove off to our first destination - Liverpool.  It rained off and on, culminating in a downpour as we arrived at Albert Dock in Liverpool.  We actually sat in the car for ten minutes or so just to see if it would lighten up a bit.  It didn't, so we slogged our way over to the Albert Dock buildings and found a restaurant to get some lunch.  Uncle Yan and I both ordered fish and chips with mushy peas, as there was a two for one special.

liver building in the pouring rain

albert dock in the rain

fish and chips with mushy peas

When we walked out of the building after lunch, we were surprised to find that the rain had stopped, and blue skies and sunshine were making their presence known.  We wandered down Albert Dock past the Museum of Liverpool toward the Royal Liver Building.  The two birds on top, the Liver Birds, are 18 foot tall bronze statues of not clearly identified birds - some cross between a cormorant, an eagle, and perhaps a spoonbill.  By the museum, there were odd-looking animal sculptures, which I later found out were "mini superlambananas" - the Superlambanana is a 17 foot tall sculpture, symbolic of Liverpool's formerly common cargo of lambs and bananas.  The mini ones we saw were all decorated differently.

no rain and the beginnings of blue skies and sunshine

uncle yan with "lambanana" statue decorated with
the history of chinese in liverpool

auntie val and me in front of king edward vii and the liver building

We took a quick stroll into the Museum of Liverpool, then headed away from the docks to look in on the Liverpool War Museum, located in the Western Approaches underground bunker.  Unfortunately it was already closed for the day, so we were unable to tour the bunker.  After checking in to our hotel, we wandered up to Chinatown for a very good dinner.  While there, we discovered a sign identifying Liverpool Chinatown as the oldest Chinatown in Europe.

underground headquarters for world war ii bombing raids

auntie val and uncle yan at the chinatown gate

In the morning, we continued north toward the Lake District.  Our first stop was in Windermere, then on to Bowness-on-Windermere where Auntie Val and I visited the World of Beatrix Potter, an attraction featuring three dimensional scenes from many of her stories including Peter Rabbit, Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle, Tom Kitten, and other characters.  We wandered a bit more around Bowness-on-Windermere, including having a look at Windermere (the lake) itself before stopping for a cup of tea.

auntie val with peter rabbit

did you know peter rabbit is eating a long scarlet radish, not a carrot?

the tale of peter rabbit was originally written as a letter

We next headed to Ambleside where we were to spend two nights at the Melrose Guest House (bed and breakfast).  It is a very picturesque village, with many of the houses including out lodging built of the grey lake stone.  I have no photo of the Melrose as it had scaffolding going up when we arrived - the owners were having the window frames repainted for the first time in several years.  Despite the scaffolding, the Melrose and its owners were lovely.

windermere from a lookout point on the way to ambleside

view from my room at the melrose guest house -
the scaffolding nearly blocked my view the next evening

Our rooms were very nice and very comfortable and we slept well in preparation for some more exploring the next day.

england!

Although I was well enough to travel, I was still coughing pretty ferociously when I left for England.  My transatlantic flight was on Virgin Atlantic, and for various reasons, I had ended up with a middle seat.  While waiting for the flight in LAX, I decided it was worth it to pay for an upgrade to an aisle seat in an exit row so I wouldn't be stuck between two people for 10 hours, unable to avoid coughing in the direction of one person or the other.  The upgrade put me in the upstairs of the 747, in a bulkhead row.  It ended up being quite comfortable.

I arrived at Heathrow just before noon, and walked out from customs to see Janine, Geoff, Grace, and Ewan waiting for me with big smiles and a poster to welcome me!  Janine informed me that sometime before I arrived, the following exchange occurred:
Ewan: Mommy, will she be in a wheelchair?
Janine: NO! WHY would she be in a wheelchair??
E: Well, you said she was older than YOU!

ewan and grace with my poster
(i was too out of it to take a photo at the airport)

We piled into their car along with my luggage, their luggage, and their bikes and drove off to Stanwick to Uncle Yan and Auntie Val's house.  Janine and family stayed for three nights, and we enjoyed time playing with the kids, taking a walk to the Stanwick Pocket Park, enjoying Auntie Val's birthday tea/ barbecue, and Friday I went cycling at Stanwick Lakes with Geoff and the kids while Janine had a girls' day reunion with childhood friends.  On the first night, this brief conversation happened:
Grace: I like Nancy.
Janine: Why?
G: Well... she's very nice, and she's STRONG!

grace, geoff, janine, and ewan
outside the church where j & g got married 10 years earlier

celebrating auntie val's birthday
geoff, uncle yan, auntie val, jeff, sharon, tony, jayne, and janine

grace, ewan, and geoff cycling at stanwick lakes

Saturday morning, Janine and family returned home.  That afternoon, Uncle Yan and Auntie Val took me via the town of Oundle to see Lyveden New Bield.  Oundle is an ancient market town that received its market charter in 972.  It's very picturesque, with centuries-old stone buildings on both sides of the narrow main street.

main street in oundle

Lyveden New Bield is an unfinished banqueting house or "secret house" on a site with an intricate history, from the Roman settlements in the valley to the schism between Catholics and the Church of England to the Gunpowder Plot.  The building stands almost exactly as it was left in 1605 when the death of the landowner was followed by the builders walking off the job as they were no longer being paid.  The building is boldly filled with Catholic symbolism incorporating the numbers 3 (the trinity), 5 (the number of the Christ), and 7 (the number of the Godhead), carved symbols representing sacraments and events in the life of Christ, and a Latin inscription just below the cornice along the top of the walls.  It was meant to be reached from the manor house along a very planned set of experiences in the gardens, including orchards, a moat, sheep pastures, a wildflower meadow, and carefully located mounds of earth to climb.

looking up in the south wing of the building,
where the stairwell was planned

view from one of the spiral mounds
incorporating the building and the "wildflower meadow"

Sunday, we just relaxed and prepared for our trip northward, to be covered in the next post...

cross-country road trip version 2014

The day after graduation, we completed cleaning out my little house and fully packing the car.  Although my parents didn't believe it was possible, I packed all my things except my bike (we had shipped that a few days earlier) into the car and rooftop box, leaving not only the two fronts seats open, but a comfortable back seat as well.

i even left space to see out the rearview mirror

my fully packed car outside the little house - last look

We took off right on schedule around noon, returned my parents' rental car, and began the westward drive.  On the Saturday night before graduation, I had begun to suspect my dad's affliction was more than mere allergies - I took his temperature and found he had a fever.  He felt okay on graduation day, but still wasn't feeling well.  On the drive, he went back and forth between feeling a little bit better and a little bit worse.  We went through Alabama and Mississippi and made it to Memphis, Tennessee by dinner time.  We met up with my friend Josh for dinner - I'd met him the previous semester at Emory in Graduate Christian Fellowship, but he didn't return to Emory after Christmas break, so it was nice to have a chance to see him again.  We went to Corky's Ribs & BBQ which is well-known, especially for their ribs and Memphis pulled pork.  Apparently they ship ribs worldwide!

dinner with josh at corky's

After dinner, we continued on into Arkansas.  The rain that had started before dinner turned into a torrential downpour, and I drove through a couple hours of it passing many large semi-trucks in order to get out of the spray kicked up behind them.  Finally, we made it to Little Rock and ended up getting a hotel in North Little Rock for the night.

The next morning we headed to Sand Springs, Oklahoma to see Aunt Kathy, David, Jeff, Rocky, and Charlie.  We arrived in time for a late lunch.  As I was driving, I began to get a slight headache, so I took a nap after lunch.  Jeff and the boys arrived after school and work, and we had a good time with them, watching and joining the boys riding their bikes up and down the street.  We had a delicious ham dinner and spent a nice time catching up - although my dad and I had both seen them, my mom hadn't seen Aunt Kathy since the 80s, and Jeff since 1995.

bike races

jeff, rocky, my mother, david, me, aunt kathy, charlie, and my father

We spent the night at Aunt Kathy's, and headed off the next morning to Marilyn's.  A good friend of my mother's from college, my brother and I had always called her Aunt Marilyn.  We had a very nice brunch there, although my dad was still under the weather, and I not only had a headache but had started to get a cough and congestion.

in front of aunt marilyn's house

We spent the rest of that day driving, arriving in Amarillo well before sunset.  We used my phone to find an AAA office, which was closed.  There were still a couple of employees there, despite being half an hour past closing, so one of them opened the door for us and was kind enough to give us a couple of maps and a guidebook.  Using the guidebook, I found us a hotel on the west edge of Amarillo.  By this time, we were all sick.  We walked next door to the hotel to "Famous Dave's Bar-B-Que" where the three of us again shared ribs, this time with "Burnt Ends" - little bits of beef.  It was our fourth barbecue meal and third time eating ribs in the space of a week!  The next morning, our first brief stop was Cadillac Ranch, just a few minutes down the road from the hotel, so my parents could see the oddity.

my parents at cadillac ranch

We continued on to Los Lunas, New Mexico to visit another one of my mom's college friends, Debbie, and her husband Michel.  We had lunch there, and although we had originally planned to spend a night there, a phone conversation the night before revised the visit to include lunch and a brief afternoon visit.  We drove till we reached Gallup, New Mexico where I felt sick and tired enough to make the executive decision to stop there for the night.  We all felt ill enough to order chicken noodle soup at Denny's for dinner.

michel, my father, debbie, my mother, paco (the dog), and me

The next morning we made our first stop in Flagstaff, Arizona where we found a drugstore and refilled our over-the-counter cold and fever remedies - between the three of us we had exhausted the supply I had in Atlanta!  We crossed the rest of the state of Arizona and into California, initially aiming for perhaps Bakersfield as our last overnight stop.  Sometime before crossing the border into California, I noted that if we continued with the same types of stops we had done so far, we could make it home before midnight.  My thinking was that it might be helpful to have my father (and the other two of us for that matter) sleep in our own beds instead of more nights on the road.  Thanks to fairly dense cloud cover, even driving directly into the sunset wasn't a problem, so we pushed on and arrived at my parents' place before midnight.  I had driven all 2600+ miles myself!

southeastern california landscape

random stop along a highway to get photos with a joshua tree

wind farms visible from the freeway

sunset in the central valley

Unfortunately, arriving in Cupertino did not result in a miracle cure for any of us.  We spent another week and a half before even beginning to feel better, including doctor's visits, prescription medications, and lots of rest.  I gave up on my plans of seeing local friends, taking a trip to Tahoe to drop off a carload of stuff at my house, and taking a day trip to San Francisco to visit with a friend from Atlanta who happened to be there visiting with his family.  Eventually, my only goal was to be well enough to fly to England on May 27 to visit family.  Monday, May 26 I felt nearly well enough to travel, and fortunately I was even a bit better on Tuesday, so I'm currently in England!  More on that trip to come...

9 days till graduation

Despite not feeling 100%, I still managed to get out and hang out with as many friends as I could fit into my schedule before leaving Atlanta.  I started out May 2, the morning after I finished school, by picking up my friend Lois from the Emory climbing wall.  I hadn't seen her since December for various reasons, but we managed to get together and take a walk up Stone Mountain.  It was clearer than I've ever seen it up there, with just enough breeze to make the temperature pretty perfect.

clear view from the top of stone mountain, and me with lois

After dropping Lois off I visited Ashley, an Emory PT second year who also attends Passion City Church, at her new place.  Her current clinical runs Sunday through Thursday, so I hadn't seen her at church in weeks (she did make it to Good Friday Atlanta).  That evening was Graduate Christian Fellowship's First Friday Dinner.  Due to CSM in Las Vegas in February, the Dominican Republic trip in March, and the Vestibular course in April, I hadn't made it to one since last semester.  It was fun to hang out and catch up with people, and make a couple of new friends.

steffi, amara, lydi, lily, me, jonathan, then the whole group shot from first friday dinner

Saturday morning I got up early and headed out to Dunwoody to meet up with James and Jonathan for another hike.  We headed north to a piece of the Appalachian trail, hiking up Blood Mountain, the highest peak on the Georgia portion of the trail with an elevation of 4458 feet.  Following directions I found online, we made it a "lollipop loop" where only the beginning and end of the trail were the same.  It was nice, with the route we took up the mountain being longer, less steep, and much less traveled.  We saw only a couple of people before we rejoined the Appalachian trail but found a crowd of probably 30 people having lunch at the summit.  As promised in what I read online, there were sweeping views from the top and also on the way down.

james, me, and jonathan atop blood mountain

Sunday was my second-to-last time at Passion City Church, then in the afternoon I headed over to my classmate Dan's place.  He had a 5 month old baby boy I had yet to meet, and I hadn't seen his wife since before she gave birth.  I had a pleasant time hanging out with them before meeting up with Debbie and Laura from Veritas Church for dinner at La Parrilla.

Monday started off with Caleb from Graduate Christian Fellowship coming over to hang out at my place and sing songs together - we'd done it once before during Snowpocalypse round 1 and agreed we wanted to sing together again.  Then, I met Gina, my climbing wall co-worker, for a leisurely celebratory lunch after her last undergrad final followed by Frappuccinos at Starbucks since there was a half-off special for a few days.

A bonus I garnered from Saturday's hike is that both James and Jonathan are pilots, and they offered to take me up with them sometime in the coming week.  I managed to rearrange my schedule to meet James, who is also a flight instructor, at PDK (Peachtree-DeKalb Airport) on Monday afternoon.  I had the incredible experience of sitting in the pilot's seat of a single-prop Cessna and actually flying it for some of the time we were in the air.  We headed southwest over Passion City Church and near downtown, then headed east toward Stone Mountain, passing south of the Emory campus.  We looped around Stone Mountain and then I got to fly us north out past Lake Lanier.  James flew us lower down over the lake before having me take us back near the airport.

1980 cessna 172p, inside the cockpit, and a statue near the passenger terminal

view of cdc and emory from the air

Later that evening, I got together with Kelly, one of my good friends from Passion City Church, and walked a bit of the BeltLine that is near her place.  On Tuesday, I went around 10:30 am to get an oil change since my car was about to be driven across the country.  I had been assured on the phone that it would take 45 minutes, so I figured I could still meet Karen at Stone Summit to climb by noon.  Over 2 hours later, my car was finally done, and I still had to get back home.  We ended up meeting at Starbucks for half-off Frappuccinos instead.  My friend Brian from Intown Community Church came over for dinner - I hadn't seen him since fall since neither he nor I were attending Intown any more - I wanted to congratulate him on his engagement as well as catch up and then say goodbye.  I headed out again after dinner to hang out with another Passion City Church friend, Nick.  We were planning to take a walk, but I ended up bringing leftover dinner for him and we just sat and chatted while he ate.

hanging out with (clockwise from top left) karen, kelly, gina, and nick

Wednesday morning I did some more last-minute errand running before meeting up with Elizabeth from Graduate Christian Fellowship for lunch on campus.  Steffi also stopped by briefly to say hi, so we got a photo of the three of us:

elizabeth, steffi, and me

My parents arrived that afternoon, so I picked them up from the airport.  We went back to my place, then walked around campus before getting half-off Frappuccinos from Starbucks (yes, I was doing my best to make the most of the deal while it lasted!).  I took them to pick up their rental car, then we went to my father's grad school friend's (David and Lucy's) house where they would stay for a couple of nights.  We went out to dinner with David and Lucy at Downwind Restaurant, coincidentally at the Peachtree-DeKalb Airport.  The next day my parents and I had a lazy morning before heading up to Acworth to visit cousin Linda for a night.  I hadn't seen her for a year and a half, since Thanksgiving 2012.  My parents hadn't seen her since my cousin Annie's wedding in 2009.  Before she got off work, we had half-off Frappuccinos again, then met her for dinner at Chili's - my parents and I shared a full rack of ribs.

with my parents and cousin linda (and apollo)

The next morning I got up super early and drove to Woodstock to meet my clinical instructor from my short-term outpatient clinical in July 2012.  We had a good 45 minute chat before his first patient, then I headed back for breakfast with my family at Linda's house.  We got back into Atlanta in time for me to meet the professors and other preceptors from the General Medical Conditions course for a late lunch.  My parents met up with David and Lucy again, and had dinner with them at Saba, around the corner from my place.  I joined them briefly before going to pick up a couple of friends to climb at Wall Crawlers.

with david and lucy

last time climbing at wall crawlers:
marius, tiffany, david, me, katherine, and brent

Saturday morning was a "Legacy Breakfast" at Glenn Memorial Church.  Since my mother got her Master's degree at Emory, I am therefore a legacy.  After a continental breakfast, my mother placed a Legacy Medallion around my neck during a ceremony in the church building.  In the afternoon, we met up with Laura, a family friend from our days in Seaside, CA, her husband Ernesto and mother America for a late lunch at Atlanta Fish Market.  The food was delicious and company delightful.

legacy medallion

ernesto, laura, my mother, me, america, my father

Sunday my parents joined me for my last Sunday at Passion City Church, we had lunch at a Vietnamese/ Thai place, and then we just lounged around my house as I attempted to sell all my furniture on Craigslist.  My bed was the first to go on Saturday night, so I had to sleep on my air mattress for the next three nights.  Lounging around was not unwelcome, as my father had started feeling poorly on the day after my parents arrived - we put it down to allergies as he had bad hay fever with Atlanta pollen in the past.

Monday morning I got up super early and headed over to campus for the Emory Commencement ceremony.  It was scheduled to begin at 8, we were supposed to line up at 7, and I was trying to meet friends in other departments for photos by 6:50.  I only managed to meet Caleb for a photo because the others were late, but it was good to say goodbye before he heads off to do his PhD at Indiana University and I return to the west coast.

pre-commencement photos with friends

After the commencement ceremony in the quad, we proceeded to WHSCAB (Woodruff Health Sciences Center Administration Building) - the site of our interviews, orientation, many lectures, and now graduation ceremony.  Along with my parents, Anika, David, and Lucy attended graduation, and Marius showed up to say hi before we left.  We had lunch at Mary Mac's Tea Room, a historic Atlanta restaurant offering a Southern experience.  Anika joined us and my cousin Rachel met us there.  My father, Anika, and I shared a full rack of ribs with fried green tomatoes and collard greens as sides - DELICIOUS!

with my parents at graduation

my parents and me with rachel at mary mac's

My parents and I went back to my place where I started packing up my car and waiting for more Craigslist customers to buy furniture.  I ended up selling most of it and making a deal with the new tenant in my place for a bunch of the rest of it.  The next day was our scheduled departure date - beginning of Cross-Country Road Trip Version 2014!