Beautiful Bergen

Posted on September 8, 2015 by borysSNORC

Big itinerary today with so much to see in Bergen… did I mention that I can’t believe I’m in freaking Norway! This time last month I was checking out the terracotta warriors in Xi’an, China… and this time two months ago, I was at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo… This is just such a crazy whirlwind year I’m living at the moment.

Bergen sits nestled in a gorgeous fjord and you can’t tell to look at it, but it has a population of about 270,000 people – which is about half the size of the Norwegian capital, Oslo. I was not aware that Norway only has a population of 5.5 million… Don’t ask me why, but I just assume that all countries have a larger population than Australia – and most places I go, do.

Anyway, Bergen is a city filled with the legacy of its Viking forebearers. From approximately 800AD to 1066AD, Viking traders (not raiders) travelled along the coast of Europe through the lakes of Russua, Germany and even Central Asia. This important trade led to Bergen’s rise as a successful port and it was founded by King Olav Kyrre in 1070AD. By the mid 19thC, it was the largest seaport in Scandinavia and the capital of Norway. The Viking tradition and history is evident throughout the city particularly in the old Bryggen district.

We were all prepared for wet weather today and given that Bergen has an average of 262 days of rain per annum that’s a pretty safe bet. They have a saying here, ‘there is no bad weather, only bad clothing’… But we were very lucky and had gorgeous blue skies by mid-afternoon.

Our first stop was the Gamle Bergen Museum or the open air, Old Bergen Museum. The Gamle Bergen is a reconstructed town that has been saving beautiful old Norwegian house from urbanization. The museum took the ‘peacefulness of Elsa’ estate, and built it into old Bergen of 18-19thC with around 50 traditional wooden houses making up village life from that period, all filled with objects from the city’s history. Houses were rescued from all over Norway and moved here to bring the museum/village to life

There is a dentist’s office complete with archaic torture implements, an early glassmaker’s home and studio, the original building from Bergen’s primary newspaper – theBergens Tidende – which obviously now operates out of large new premises.

There’s a quaint bakery, with a pretzel for shop sign for the illiterate (and a watch for the watchmaker, stained glass for the glassmaker etc, etc). Apparently of all these professions, being a baker was quite a wealthy occupation, even though traditional Bergen bakers only made bread, pretzels and a ‘schillings bun’ (like a cinnamon bun), and apprenticeships to become a baker was quite prized. Go figure.

There are merchants houses in the village too, in particular a textile merchants house, which of course is wealthier and more lavishly furnished… and painted white. White paint was apparently quite expensive and only the well-to-do could afford it. Red paint which is seen far more commonly in this area is dyed with animal blood and was used always to denote servants quarters. The tradition is still kept up today and people prefer to paint their ‘main’ house white and their garages, sheds or lesser houses, red. These wooden houses are highly treasured and Norwegians absolutely love wood. The ‘Norwegian Dream’ is apparently to own a traditional wooden home, with a wooden fence, painted white, and have a wooden cabin in the fjords somewhere painted red, and a wooden boat to take you back and forth to your cabin. The Bergeners still have a storing affinity with wood for building and with the water and the fjords. Naturally with so many wood houses in suc a cold climate, fire is a very real hazard and buckets of water are stored everywhere around the wooden houses… Having said that the fire stations all over Bergen are constructed of, you guessed it – wood.

The merchants, in their ostentatiously white houses to display their wealth and status, further would also burn wax candles in their parties in summer, even though this is the land of the midnight sun. Of course the more wealthy and prosperous one appeared, the more other merchants would want to do business with you – so there appears to have been a lot of brinkmanship going on in the summer party excess department.

The many streets of Gamle Bergen are cobbled to maintain the traditional building styles and the cobbled pavers are laid in opposing directions to make the steep streets less slippery for the horses. Much of Bergen is still cobbled in keeping with traditional appearances (even though motorists would prefer better surfaces) as Bergen works hard to maintains its historic appeal.

Our next stop was the Schøtstuene Museum, (and before anyone asks… No. I can’t pronounce it) which is a rebuilt medieval assembly room from the days of the Hanseatic League. In the 13thC the Hanseatic merchants lived in rows of wooden houses in the middle of Bergen plying their trades in selling flour, textiles, beer, candle wax, dried fish, cod liver oil and other goods… and each row of merchants would have an assembly house. Dried cod was the most commonly produced and traded commodity in the region – it would be cut and hung and dehydrated naturally and was widely desired all over Europe as far away as Portugal, where it would be soaked and rehydrated for soups or stews.

The League merchants would gather at the assembly house to conduct business, trade goods, dine and recreate (read: drink beer which they believed was more hygienic than the water) in the assembly houses as fires were prohibited in the row houses. Each assembly house had a manager and two very important deputies – the Wood Keeper and the Beer Keeper… the only two important things in medieval Norway apparently. The assembly house would also have a journeyman – to conduct travel between Germany/Denmark and Norway. The managers role was primarily one of record keeping to ensure transactions were recorded but also one of arbitration should disagreements arise. Furthermore his role would also include judicial duties when members of the Hanseatic League stepped out of line.

If someone in the Hanseatic committed an infringement, they world find their name added to the ‘black list’ to be dealt with at the next assembly – and to be honest, it sounds like it wouldn’t be hard to find you self in that list, as the Hanseatic League had no women – marriage wasn’t allowed, fraternizing with women wasn’t allowed and they were supposed to be celibate. So the most common way to end up on the black list was to be with a woman. Given the local red light district was directly behind the wooden row houses of the Hanseatic merchants, I imagine people ended up on the list a LOT.

Mostly people on the black list who had been caught with women were given fines or had to provide beer. If you committed the worst crime and got a woman pregnant then you’d be fined an entire barrel of beer and then the entire hall would get drunk on your dime – which sounds more like a head wetting than a punishment to me! *shrug*

The apprentices to the Hanseatic League are the ones who seemed to cop the real raw end of the stick – literally. Apprentices were regularly beaten quite brutally for even perceived misdemeanors to keep them in line. By all accounts the Handeatic merchants were quite ruthless. Apprentices were only chosen from Germany and were usually from low class families in society – because who else would send their child off to an apprenticeship in such harsh conditions. When apprentices did something wrong, they were not black listed and fined, but instead were beaten with a ‘knut’ – a whip with a large knot at the end with needles in it. Not a good life for a kid.

Sometimes cunning apprentices would attempt to make money by blackmailing the assembly manager. The manager had a white staff of office which a cunning apprentice might try to steal while the manager was drunk and would subsequently ransom it back to him before the League found out he had been careless with it. It sounds like it was a talent to figure out when the manager was drunk enough to risk stealing off with his staff.

New apprentices were routinely hazed really badly: sometimes with life threatening ‘castle’ rituals where the youth would have his hands bound, he would be beaten until nearly unconscious, then dragged through the rows, and thrown in the fjord to wake them up (often right near sewerag outlets). Obviously only the strong survived this sort of thing but it seems pointless to treat your employees like this as I’m pretty confident it hampers their ability to do their work!

The Hanseatic League left Bergen in the 17thC and the 13thC wooden row houses were taken over by Bergeners. In 1702, however an explosion in a local bakery burned down 90% of the city leaving only one of the old Hanseatic houses remaining – a solitary house built of stone which housed cod liver oil, believed too volatile to be housed in wood, which is still there today.

Bossroom – the boss isn’t who we think he is… garbage room.

In 1537 Norway became Protestant but one church, St Mary’s remained exclusively for the Hanseatic merchants who operated like an independent Catholic German state inside Norway.
After the Hanseatic merchants house we wet to Håkon Hall which was built in the 13thC to serve as royal residences for King Håkon Håkonsson. Completed in 1261 the hall was intended to celebrate Royal celebrations such as coronations and weddings. Given the Viking/Norwegians primarily built in wood, King Håkonhad sent to England for stonemasons to build his hall, and found some in Scotland instead. The Hall was eventually finished in time for his son, Magnus (known as Magnus the lawmaker for putting many laws into writing) to be married.

In 1944 a Dutch cargo ship called into Bergen for ship repairs on the opposite of the fjord from the Hall and exploded with 120 tonnes of dynamite on board. The entire bank near where the cargo ship was moored was destroyed with only a few stone buildings surviving. Håkon Hall survived but with considerable damage particularly to its timber, longship style, construction roof.
In 1905, Norway was still in an official union with Sweden and was controlled by the Swedish govt/monarchy and there was a good deal of discontent with the situation. The Swedes unsure what to do, held a referendum that returned a 98% vote against continuing the union with Sweden. Sweden promptly dissolved their ‘ownership’ because With those numbers they seriously feared revolt.

Given that Norway had always been handed around as dowry or payment between Germany, Denmark and Sweden, the Norwegians now had to decide what sort of government they wanted. Strangely they decided on a constitutional monarchy, even though there was no obvious Norwegian prince who should be Norwegian King, so they ended up asking a Danish prince to be King! I forget his name just off hand, (he was Danish so it was probably Christian), but he came to Norway, was duly coronated with a new moreNorwegian name and they’ve been a constitutional monarchy ever since.

In spite of their pride in their constitutional monarchy, the labour movements started very early in Norway due to poor working conditions. Unions are very strong and account for much of Norways prosperity ensuring equality of work, pay and conditions for men and women. Two Norwegian guides today were keen to make sure we knew this and not to have tourists leaving Norway thinking it owed its prosperity to North Sea oil. They’re very proud of their egalitarian society… Which is awesome. We should all be so lucky.

The other thing we have seen everywhere today are funny little tolls. The trolls actually come from old Swedish stories but Norway has more recently claimed the trolls for themselves. Original Swedish trolls were evil and meant as warnings to small children, but in Norway, given they’ve been adopted as a symbol of the country, they are now merely considered misunderstood and somewhat lucky.

Tomorrow – Lerwick in the Shetlands!

William Morris and Covent Garden Adventures

Posted on September 5, 2015 by borysSNORC

“I have never been in any rich man’s house which would not have looked the better for having a bonfire made… of nine-tenths of all that it held.” – William Morris on why the rest of us shoudl not give up our day jobs and become interior decorators.

Went out the the William Morris Gallery today in Walthamstow somewhere, and found a wonderful little free gallery that illustrate Morris’ art, his life, work and influence. Naturally I was very interested to see the works, but somewhat worried for my credit card as there was bound to be a bookshop and giftshop full of lovely reproductions of William Morris’ designs (I LOVE the Compton design on just bout anything) where I would surely buy some truly beautiful, but enormously expensive scarf, that I would never wear back in Brisbane … but I needn’t have preemptorily panicked as the gift shop was modest and filled mostly stationery and small knick knacks, and both myself and my credit card got out un-scarfed and unscathed respectively!

The exhibition has many printed, woven and embroidered fabrics, rugs, carpets, wallpapers, furniture, stained glass and painted tiles designed by Morris himself – as well as items painted and designed by his Chums from the Pre-Raphaelite Bortherhood – Edward Burne-Jones, Philip Webb, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Ford Madox Brown, and others. Together they eventually borrowed some moey from Morris’ mother to create the firm of Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Company in 1861… eventually Morris & Co.

There were pleny of outstanding items on display including, Morris’ medieval-style helmet and sword that were made as props for the Pre-Raphaelite murals at the Oxford Union. I also saw the original design for the Trellis wallpaper (the first of many Morris’ wallpapers). They also have the gorgeous and famous Woodpecker tapestry woven at Morris’ Merton Abbey workshops, the Beauty and the Beast tiles and the Labours of the Months tile panels. As well as works printed at Morris’ Kelmscott Press such as his own writings and the Poems of William Shakespeare and The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer.

They also have a substantial collection of furniture, textiles, ceramics and glass by Morris’ contemporaries in the Arts and Crafts movement, (the height of which was about 1880 to the 1920). Among those represented are Arthur Heygate Mackmurdo and the Century Guild, May Morris (Morris’ exceptional daughter who turned household embroidery into a thriving artform), William De Morgan, Ernest Gimson, Sidney Barnsley, Selwyn Image, George Jack, C. F. A. Voysey, Harry Powell, Henry Holiday, and Christopher Whall.

Much of the collection of is complemented by the Brangwyn Gift – Sir Frank Brangwyn was a former student of William Morris who collected many paintings, drawings and prints by Morris and the other Pre-Raphaelites that were later donated to this collection.

Upon leave the Gallery, I had the most unusual encounter in Walthamstow High Street… a good looking young man in a well fitting suit approached me and said, very amiably, “Hello. Have you had a good morning?”, to which I felt free to reply, “Why, yes. I have thank you.” He then proceeded to ask me if I have internet at home. Ah, the penny drops, “Yes, I do, but at home in Australia.”… then the poor lad incapable of letting go of someone willing to reply to his innocuous opening questions starts asking me if I would consider changing providers. I had to stop, look him dead in the face and say, “As I said, I live in Australia… I strongly doubt your company wants to solicit customers that far from their network.” He then said, “Nooo. You’re not Australian, you don’t sound Australian at all… c’mon, where are you from?” I had to flash him my passport before he would believe me. He walked off very confused, and I wished him better luck with his next potential customer.

After this I head back to Covent Garden to have a look around the shops and find some lunch. I have to admit, Covent Garden is nothing like it used to be… it used to be filled with heaps of fancy stores on the inside and surrounded by market stalls – the type you’d find in any market – nearby. Now it feels like the market stalls are overtaken by people who are probably on Etsy selling over priced crap that no one needs. Not a hat stall or glove stall in sight and loads of custom printed aprons, over priced handmade silver jewellery, and 3D printed plastic London monuments. Mind, you could still get a bobble headed Queen so maybe I was over thinking that ‘too classy bit’, too much.

On my way back to the flat, I stopped at Marks and Sparks for what turned out to be another unusual encounter. I’m off on my cruise tomorrow, so I decided to buy a bottle of Shiraz to take with me. As I am going through the self service point, the register sets off an alarm for a store attendant to come check me out, I guess because alcohol is a restricted product and they want to check you’re not 12. The store clerk comes over to me, and logs into the machine, and say “You’re right aren’t you? Over the age for alcohol.” I laughed and said to him, “I’m 43, how much more ‘right’ do you need to be to buy a bottle of wine.” He looks at me and says, “No, you’re not! Can I see your ID please?” I was a bit taken aback… carded at Marks and Sparks! But not because he didn’t think I was over the legal age, but because he didn’t I was as old as I was claiming to be! *scoff* Weirdos.

Tonight I caught up with Stephola for a few pints at the Prince of Wales in Covent Garden before heading out to the most amazing dinner at a lovely place called Sarastro with Stephola.

Sarastro has the most crazy and quirky decore. Outside it is an overgrown cottage garden climbing the walls. Insider there are delightfully cosy booth spaces and hidden balconette tables amidst a veritable feast for the eyes in an all round fabulous atmosphere and the most delicious Mediterranean inspired food.

We talked about old times and mutual acquaintances (there surely were plenty of ears burning back in Australia!), giggled like high school girls, and there may have even been a tear or two over lost loves, lost family members and the sadder dramatic moments of our lives. It occurs to me that I am truly blessed to have friends like these – ones that I may not see for years, but when you do get together, you realise how much they mean to you and how much they have your back should you ever need them… and thanks to the Internet, the miles just melt away.
I had ever such a lovely evening, and if it weren’t for the hideous 30 hour transit, I’d suggest we meet up and do it every year or so!

A Quintessenitally British Day Out

Posted on September 4, 2015 by borysSNORC

Being in London for the fourth time has been lovely… it has given me the option of doing as much or as little as I choose and I don’t feel the pressure to run around like a headless chook, playing tourist and trying to cram it all in – and there is a LOT to cram in if you want to see even half of what London has to offer.

I wasn’t initially intending to, but on walking past the British Museum today, I saw there was a special exhibition on that piqued my interest – A Rothchild’s Rennaissance, the Waddlestone Bequest, so I had to pop in. The Waddlestone Bequest is a collection of approximately 300 exceptionally beautiful and some iimportant objectfs from the medieval and Renaissance periods, as well as numberous 19thC copies. The items were left to the Musuem in 1898 by Baron Ferdinand Rothschild and there were many items of Renaissance jewellery that I felt were worth popping in to have a look at. Waddlestone, btw, is/was the family manor in Buckinghamshire, and apparently is a particularaly beautiful house. I can just imagine old Ferdinand sitting on this enormous collection in his favourite library or smoking room, congratulating himself on having amassed such an impressive collection of objets d’art. 🙂

I collect nail polish, travel pins and dust bunnies. 😛

Anyway, there were some extraordinary pieces on display – some very fine and typically Renaissance items of jewellery (large gold, enamel and pearl pendants etc), some limoge enamel pieces, majolica ceramicware, some match lock and wheel lock longarms, a gorgeous medieval helmet and various reliquary items and plate etc. It was well worth stopping in to have a look at these beauifully preserved decorative arts objects. Just lovely. The catalogue for this exhibition is avilable on the Book Depository if anyone is interested – GBP24.00, big heavy book full of lovely photos and delivered right to your door… if you’re guessing I didn’t buy a copy at the museum, you’re spot on!

And of course once one is in the British Museum, it is hard to just walk on out again. So I whipped around and said, ‘hello’ to my old friends the Lewisham chessmen, the Sutton Hoo exhibit, the horology room, the Rosetta Stone and the winged bull from Ashurnasirpal.

Time got away from me a little and I had to run to make my afternoon tea date with KPeth down at the Brumus Bar on Haymarket. We had decided we would got for afternoon tea or high tea somewhere nice while in London – it’s just the done thing you know – and were tossing around options on where we should go, when my friend Stephola recommended The Brumus Bar at Sulfolk Place. Never heard of it, but Stephola’s very posh friends had remarked that it was ‘just as good as Claridge’s afternoon tea’, so with this high praise in mind, we made a booking. And were not disappointed… our afternoon tea was delightful. We had a lovely corner table which allowed for engaging in one of my favourite past times – people watching – and a fabulously English waiter who was extremely attentive and kept offering us more food, though we were struggling to get through the very beautifully plated items already offered. Was a lovely way to spend a couple of hours – a glass of champagne, fancy delicate nibblies, nice tea and good company. 10/10 – would definitely go again. 🙂

After that I did a bit of tourist shopping – ie: bought a decent sized coffee mug to take on the ship, as I had intended to pack an old one I was happy to throw away, but in my rush to fit so many Tim Tams in my suitcase, I had completely forgotten to do so. It is probably the one thing I do not like about the cruise lines – melamine coffee mugs everywhere except the main dining rooms. So if you want a decent cup of tea, you need to order room service or go to the dining rooms. I’m much happier to make one in the buffet and take it back to the room and not bother the staff. Anyway, bought a touristy London mug (sans sparkly paint, sorry KPeth – just not my thing!), which may or may not make it home. And then headed back to the B&B for a few hours before continuing my Quintessentially British Day Out with a show – The Book of Mormon.

Okay – have probably stretched the truth a bit on that one. But I didn’t want to see Billy Elliot or Kinky Boots or *insert Random Shakespeare Play* to round out my Big Day O’British Stuff. I thought I’d give The Book of Mormon a crack – which was a bit of an odd choice for me given I am not a South Park fan and generally have a less than favourable reaction to that sort of humour. But I went in with an open mind and was not disappointed. The show was fantastic. Just hilarious, irreverent, surprising, unique and down right funny.

Written by Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Robert Lopez, the story ‘The Book of Mormon’, follows two mismatched Mormon missionaries who, upon graduation from Missionary School, are are sent to fucking Uganda of all places to spread their religion and try and baptise locals. As you might expect, when they arrive, things are not exactly what they expect and much of what they encountered definitely wasn’t in the brochure. It was extremely earthy and frog-fucking funny. If it comes to Australia, and I assume it eventually will, we shall all have to line up and go see it. Brilliant. And while it heavily pokes fun at the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints – a lot of it could just as easily apply to any organised religion. I laughed out loud so much my cheeks were hurting.

Great way to finish my evening, even though it did’t fit into my Quintessenitally British Day Out. 🙂

I’m in London Still…

Posted on September 3, 2015 by borysSNORC

Had a bit of a late start this morning. The workmen outside my window mightn’t want to let me sleep in, but they can not force me to leave my bed before I am ready to face the day! 😉

For a day that started out without much on the agenda, I somehow seemed to alter that considerably and did my fair share of wandering around aimlessly – well, not aimlessly per se… just wandering. And often in the wrong direction! I’ve not been here for many years and occasionally seem to lose my bearings entirely, most evidenced by today getting out a Tube station and not once, but twice!, turning the wrong way and attempting to follow my predetermined directions. Took me forever to find the Beretta Gallery – which in all fairness if they had on their website as being on the Corner of St James and Jereym Streets, I might have found much more quickly… hell not even a copper standing around Picadilly could point me in the right direction.

Anyway, as you see – The Beretta Gallery was my first stop for the morning. I had decided I’d try my luck at finding some screws for my 87 Target, seeing they are terrible pain in the arse to purchase at home, and an extremely tedious and BYO sort of pain in the arse if you decide to import them. It took me a while to find the place (looking at the wrong street named St James, because of course everything over that way has St James written on it!).

The one on the right please!

What a cool shop though. Three stories of very British shooting accoutrement – everything the fashionable hunter could be needing this season from fabulous argyle socks and blazers, to lovely engraved shotguns, thermos flasks, collapsable shot glasses and the obigatory cufflinks, tie pins and mugs shaped like shotgun shells. The lady serving at the main counter sent me up to the third floor when I mentioned I was after a part for my Beretta – I should have been more specific.

Upon gaining entrance to the Gun Room, I asked about the weight screw to my Beretta 87 and he looked at me blankly and said “Is that a pistol, madam?”, to which I replied in the affimrative that it was indeed a sports target pistol, and he stated “I am sorry madam, we do not have any pistols in England.” *blank stare from me* “What? None at all?” And so ensued a discussion about how there are no competitive pistol target shooters in the entire country and that in order to shoot pistols, one had to go to Jersey where they are a law unto themselvse and pistols are available under very strict conditions. THE POLICE HERE STILL DON’T CARRY! I forgot about that – thought things might have changed with the times, but rather glad to find they haven’t.

Anyway had a good look around, had a lovely chat with most of the staff here, they were all delightfullly helpful, and lusted after a shotgun that I had seen at the Brisbane Shot Show last weekend (seriously? was it only last weekend?) and then head off out to play a bit of tourist around Picadilly and Trafalga Square – some things do never change, nothing looked different here.

After a late, quick and very ordinary bento box lunch (dammit but if Japan hasn’t destroyed sushi for me forever!), I head back towards Leicester Square to meet up with KPeth for our afternoon’s entertainment – Tim Minchin’s interpretation of Matilda which has been running at the Cambridge Theatre for about three years now. I had wanted to see it in New York last year, but knew after dragging Mr K to an opera at the MET, I’d be pushing my luck. It was a delighful show – I would highly recommend fans of the book, the movie, Tim Minchin fans and teachers and parents all go see it… yes, I know that is a sweepingn demographic, but there is a lot of appeal in this incredibly creative interpretation of the story. The lovely little girl playing Matilda was delightful, she was confident and sung beautiful and had such an expressive range for someone so young. And the Trunchpool was FANTASTIC…. just brilliant, so much Tim Minchin in this character and the actor’s portrayal of it. I am gald to see it is currently auditioning and is going to have a run in Australia, people at home are going to fall in love with it.

After such a delightful show KPeth and I popped across the street to a quaint little pub called the Crown to kill a bit of time before our respective dinner dates. Had a pint of cider and discussed our impending travels to Norway, Iceland and back to Canada. Absolutely can’t wait to set sail – with a bit of luck, we will see the Northern Lights too, which would just be the icing on the cake.

After that I made my way to Cosmoba – a fabulous Italian restaurant recommend by Stephola in the Russell Square/Holbourn area – via a wrong turn out of the tube station yet again! I am all turned around at the moment, twice today I have stuck off walking about a kilometer and a half in the wrong direction only to disheartenedly discover I should have gone right instead of left on coming out of the Tube! It’s very strange not having been here for so long – many things look so familiar and yet entirely different at the same time… so I think I am on the right track and then discovering – err… not so much. 🙂 Cosmoba was quite a lovely little Italian place and I had a delightful meal with the MusicMan. We discussed politics, travel, food, relationships, you name it – it feels like we’ve been friends for years… a very odd and yet lovely feeling. After dinner we stopped by the Princess Louise for a pint – chosen by the MusicMan for it’s fabulous historical cred as a gin palace and it’s amazing decorative arts interior. Such an amazing little pub. I forgot to take some photos so had to find some as it is difficult to desribe. The establishment is a labyrinth of etched glass and dark timber with high solid bars and tempting beverages on tap, the design motifs scattered throughout the decor keep the eye busy, and there are pommegranates, acorns, oak leaves, and greek inspirted cornice and roses and ribbons and so much to look at… it’s busy and a little overwhelming, but somehow cosy and wonderful – I think I have just found my favourite London drinking establishment.

After such a lovely night out, it was just a quick walk back to Covent Garden whereupon I collaposed in an exhausted heap – so much for an easy day of wandering about. 🙂

Blenheim Palace… as you do.

Posted on September 2, 2015 by borysSNORC

Having been to London and the UK several times before, my list of places that I wanted to see is pretty narrow. I’d like to go to Fingal Caves which I missed seeing due to dreadful weather back on my first trip to the UK, but that is hardly a day trip from London, so strike that from potential itineraries. I have also wanted to go to Blenheim Palace… mostly since seeing portions of it in Kenneth Brannagh’s epic 4hr ‘Hamlet’ that Mr K took me to on our first date. So it’s somewhere I’ve wanted to see for nearly 20 years. Unfortuantely, when I was here in 1997/98, it was closed for the winter (they don’t do this anymore – there is obviously financial reward to being open for Christmas functions etc) at that time and I missed out.

Anyway, Blenheim Palace is a monumentally huge country house (can’t believe anyone could call it just a ‘house’), in Woodstock, Oxfordshire. It is the principal residence of the Dukes of Marlborough and has been since it was commissioned in about 1705. It is apparently the only non-royal non-episcopal house in England that is officially called a palace, which makes plenty of sense seeing it hardly fits the usual definition of a ‘house’! Blenheim is one of England’s largest manor houses, and was built between 1705 and 1722 and was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987 – but more importantly, Kenneth Brannagh filmed Hamlet here! 😀

Originally, the palace was intended as a reward from a grateful nation to John Churchill, the 1st Duke of Marlborough in return for the Duke’s seriously cool military triumphs against the French and friends during the Spanish Succession War, which culminated with the Battle of Blenheim in 1704. Queen Anne, was ever so grateful and bestowed upon the good Duke about 200 square miles of deer park in Woodstock on which to build a monument/palace. However, not long after the construction began, the palace became the subject of political infighting; and the fickle bitch, Queen Anne decided she wasn’t going to pay for this enormous pile of rocks, and that apparently led to Marlborough’s exile, the his and his Duchess’ fall from grace and power until Queen Anne carked it and her successor agreed to pick up the tab again. Now, apparenlty we were talking about some £220,000 that Anne only partially paid for leaving the Duke enormously in debt (modern day equivalent of about £400,000,000!). The Duchess blamed the architect Sir John Vanbrugh entirely for the blown out costs of building the palace and his reputation suffered considerably and he never gained another huge public commission. Whatever, it was messy, there are probably books on that.

The palace was designed in the seemingly rare, and short-lived, English Baroque style (was it because it was so bloody expensive?!), and architectural ‘appreciation’ of Blenheim is apparently as divided nowadays as it was at the time of building. It’s MFMH (Multi-Function Manor Home) status renders it to be a bit of an oddity as it was supposed to have the combined states of family home, mausoleum (somewhat morbid for the family pile) and national monument. After the building of the palace was complete, it was to be the home of the Churchill and then the Spencer-Churchill family for about 300 years? And of course various family members made additions and changes accordingn to fashion and taste over the intervening period, in the manor’s interior, the park and formal and informal gardens.

The whole place nearly went to hell in a handbasket at the end of the 19th century, but was saved from ruin by a fortuitous marrage (that came with a fuckton of cash – about US$2.5million and $100,000 for life, approximately $67M in 2007) between Charles, the mercinary 9th Duke of Marlborough and an American railroad heiress Consuelo Vanderbilt. Charles apparently abhorred anything American, and refused to ever return to America after collecting his bride who was said to have locked herself in a room for over a week refusing to submit to the marriage. But her mother would have her made a Duchess, and her father was paying for the priviledge and a lovely loveless marriage was entered into. Delightful huh. Anyway, it saved Blenheim from the auction blocks (much of Blenheims treasures had been flogged off to keep it afloat until Charle’s marriage to Consuelo) and now the palce remains in excellent repair, being a wonderful desitnation for tourists who are probably now the main source of income to foot the enourmous upkeep bills, why the gardens alone must cost a fortune to maintain. 🙂

The other thing Blenheim is most well known for, and which you see at every turn here, is that it is also the birthplace and ancestral home (scoff – yes, Carina is the seat of my own ancestral home!) of Sir Winston Churchhill. There is a serious exhibition on Churchill, his youth growing up at Blenheim, his political and military achievments and loads of his personal affects on display at the palace… though looking through the exhibition, all I could think was how I simply could not imagine what it must have been like growing up in such a place. It’s enormous, and would be like living in a museum. It must have been a very surreal childhood.
Anyway, we had a lovely day out at Blenheim and even the weather played nice for us, and I am quite glad to have finally had a chance to go visit. Would definitely go back again to just enjoy the magnificient views and the gardens. Simply lovely.