Thursday afternoon Pam e-mailed us and suggested that this would be a good weekend to come to Nottingham. Actually B&P are living in a small town named Southwell, about 30 minutes outside of Nottingham. We checked with the Internet and found a direct train from Bristol to Derby (as close to Southwell as practical). We had the applications for a Senior Train Pass (there's that horrible "senior" word again) that would reduce the fare by one third.
Friday morning we took the bus to Temple Meads (the train station) with the Senior Train Pass application in hand and found the right line to have them processed. It is amazing how much faster permits you pay for get done. We then bought our discounted tickets (32.60 bp round trip for each of us) and were on the train headed north by 10:00 AM. The trip to Derby was complete by 12:10 PM. B&P were waiting at the gate. Trains are a nice way to travel.
Several train companies operate out of Bristol and we took Virgin Trains for this journey. The trains are fairly new, sleek, clean and modern. The car we traveled on had a snack bar and a WC at one end. The seating is four across, two on each side of the aisle. There is an electronic display over each pair of seats informing the passengers if the seats have been reserved. Near the middle of each car there are tables with seats on either side facing the table. Every seat is equipped with a plug for computers (220v) and some sort of jack for a headset (volume control but I didn't see a channel selection).
We grabbed a seat at one of the tables and read the sign to mean that it was open to York - actually it was reserved to York but the mother and 8-year old boy who had the seats reserved showed up and took the facing seats. They didn't mention our error until much later and then refused to change seats. They were very nice and we ended up talking to them the whole way. They told us a lot about England and answered some of our questions.
Just a general impression - most of England and Wales is rural - mostly small farms and sheep land. We didn't see a lot of wildlife from the train but we could spot some rabbits. The sheep hadn't been shorn and Nancy asked the mother about them and she text messaged her brother-in-law who had worked on a farm and he would know the answer - turns out that the farmers shear in mid-to-late May. Spring is busting out all over with everything being a bright green. Lots of trees are in blossom - but nobody we talked to seem to know what kind of trees. Periodically there are fields of yellow blossoms that look something like mustard seed. We have been told that these fields are "rape seed." Rape seed oil is used in cooking.
We left Costco and ended up at Sainburys (a large grocery chain like Safeway). Did some more shopping and once the car was full to the brim headed for B&P's exchange house. I'm not sure that I would have a clue as to where we were or how we got there, but we ended up in a very rural area and came to house surrounded by tall hedges.
Bruce and Jerry helped unload the car, did a quick look around, and headed next door to a very nice 9-hole golf course. All but one hole is a par 4, and the house owner had left two sets of golf clubs on electric motor driven carts. There are priorities!
Both Bruce and I put on a brilliant display of golfing incompetence. Because of the location of the house relative to the golf course, we started on the seventh hole, paid when we got to the clubhouse and added two extra holes at the end. So our nine hole course was eleven holes total. Bruce has found that his proximity to the course allows him to find lost balls on his morning walks, so the balls that we lost were replaced during the next mornings' walk.
With nothing left to prove on the golf course, we returned home to a very fine dinner, prepared by our ladies and retired to a scintillating evening of British Television. We tried to educate B&P on the virtues of snooker. B&P feigned a complete disinterest in snooker. The Championship is now into the semifinals and I fear the telecast is almost over.
One small episode worthy of report is that on our way to Temple Meads, as we got off the bus and were waiting for the light to cross the street, a man brushed passed and rather than wait for the light stepped into the street (everybody does it). The street in front of us was three lanes wide with the two center lanes stopped. A car came zipping down the curb lane and struck the man leaving a dent in the bonnet. Amazingly, the man bounced off the hood, apologized to the driver, assured him that he was fine and both went on their ways. I have no idea what happened to the guy that was hit when the adrenalin wore off, but at least he would have some good bruises. You really have to be careful out there.