Later this morning, Shirley and I are bound for London to see our boy Ian. It will be a costly excursion - train tickets, tube tickets, food, staying overnight in the Best Western on Seven Sisters Road. One hundred and fifteen pounds for a modest London hotel room! I ask you. They don't even provide a full English breakfast - just a "continental breakfast". But I don't want a "continental breakfast", I want fried eggs and bacon, beans, mushrooms, fried bread and hash browns and a big pot of tea! You can stuff your continental breakfasts - unless of course the continent in question is Antarctica because then we'll be eating roasted penguins and braised seal meat which I adore.
But the title of this post is not "London" but "Rotherham" - Sheffield's smaller and poorer relation and its twin town. Two places that once merged together in a smoky fog of noise and industry - the steel industry to be precise. I was there yesterday - walking in the sunshine and here are just five of the pictures I snapped:-
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| "Lost dog" notice on a bus shelter at Herringthorpe |
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| Kids fishing on the Rotherham Cut - a canal that shadowed the awkward River Don |
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| A Peacock butterfly at Dalton Magna |
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| Clifton Avenue |
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| Sign of the times outside the lost "Donfield Tavern" |
Have a lovely weekend Sir & Lady YP. I like the look of that Peacock butterfly.
ReplyDeleteCarol - I took a dozen pictures of that flirty butterfly only to find this one picture that was worthwhile.
DeleteThat is the most beautiful butterfly!!! If Sheffield does not have this particular butterfly, then I would say you are the poorer relative. If you have such a beautiful creature, well, forget I said anything!
ReplyDeleteWhat an interesting street with an amazing number of chimneys! Are these apartments or businesses? Odd that all the doors open right onto the street with no awnings or anything to protect from the rain!
ReplyDeleteThe butterfly is stunning! (and sunning?)
Hilltohomesteader...Such streets are still common in northern industrial towns in England - terraced houses that accommodated lowly paid workers. Inside they are quite cosy. I have never seen houses like this in America.
DeleteYou did a sterling job here.
ReplyDeletePrior to reading this I would have defied anyone to find anything attractive in Rotherham.
Have a good weekend away.
I'm with Adrian on this, I saw the title and decided perhaps I'll pass. But wait, it is me ole mucka YP, so I'd better show willing and read it.
DeleteYou could have stayed here and had a plate-sized Yorkshire pud filled with all of the above, topped off with Sugar Puffs, Coco Pops and Arthur Scargill two Shredded Wheats.
LLX
ADRIAN & LETTICE Rotherham has many beautiful corners and its people are generally kind-hearted - the salt of the earth as they say. You should give it a visit some time if you can pull yourself away from your "Travels With Charley" and "Downton Abbey" lives!
DeleteYou'll have to pack some RYP in your emergency rations...
ReplyDeleteEh? What the hell is RYP colonel?
DeleteReal Yorkshire Pudding! Sorry, am I going mad? Weren't you the one that introduced me to it? Didn't we work together to create a cunning marketing strategy?
DeleteI always stay in this place:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.vsc.co.uk/accommodation/
It is a club for ex servicemen but as members we can invite guests even if we are not accompanying them. The food is excelente, the bar well stocked, the accommodation comfortable and the club is within walking distance of the Marble Arch end of Oxford street and the tube station.
Next time you want to overnight in London, let me know. All I have to do is send them an email and you my membership number.
I haven't stayed there for over a decade but kept my membership up so I might as well let a friend enjoy the place. Obviously, being the Victory Services Club, it should be British enough even for you! Probably a lot cheaper and far better than a Best Western!
HIPPO - Thanks for this tip Tom. Another time I might well take you up on it but this past weekend we wanted to be near our son in the Arsenal area. I know we'll be back in London before too long.
DeleteThe steel mills must be gone. The air looks clean and clear. Good pictures!
ReplyDeleteI'm with you on the breakfast. Give me something hearty or nothing at all.
DAVID - Yes. Margaret Thatcher butchered much of our steel industry just as she harnessed the power of the State to squash the coalmining industry. We import moist of our coal now but my city Sheffield is still a very important producer of specialist steels. Stainless steel was invented here.
DeleteYou have a said a lot here that interests me. I've never took the time to read anything about her but she was usually spoken of well here where I live. Of course it is a very conservative area. The elder who has been to England on business said a lot of the people where you live hated her. This explains some of that, thank you.
DeleteI believe it was 410 stainless we often used to make parts for Brown's Ferry nuclear plant. I had no idea stainless was invented there.
The largest city closest to me is the quad cities - Florence, Muscle Shoals, Tuscumbia and Sheffield. :)