Well yesterday we got up a bit later than the first day (late night at the clubs as you might tell from my drunken explanation of my time here so far) we popped down to doncaster for the day and went to conisbrough castle and then shopping. conisbrough is the castle that motivated sir walter scott saw to write the novel ivanhoe… i’ve got an info brochure on it and i’ll be sure to bring it home.. no thimbles sold there but it is a very odd looking tower, circular keep. in the outlet mall i discovered that brad was right, apparently i do dress fairly european and adapting to their style should be a breeze, i’ve already picked up a few new items, but what i can’t wait for at all is to buy some new shoes (of course). after shopping we went to tony’s favorite pub and i’ve found a lovely drink called cider, wonderful, slightly apple flavored alcohol, just fantastic… after a few drinks in the pub we went back to the house and sat around drinking a bit into the night and then i packed up. this morning i got up, showered and we popped back down to doncaster for my train.. it was sad saying goodbye but i’m sure i’ll be back in sheffield again soon, i love my cousins they were absolutely amazing, so hospitable (but don’t be fooled by thinking all englishmen are polite, americans are just too thick to notice we’re really being made fun of most of the time ;^), but i got a few jabs in back…found the mchaffie’s straight away after unloading off the train and they’ve been wonderful.. brought me back to the house and set me up in the room i didn’t stay in last time. i remember the house but not how small it is, houses here are all tiny, rooms are like my closet twice and no bigger. it’s incredible, i’d have an entire house filled with just the crap from my bedroom, not like i couldn’t do that already in a house in the states.then ian, who is an ancient history professor and picked me up wearing royal tartan colors on a plaid scarf, and averil took me around kirk cramdon which is a church (kirk) on an old roman fort site and ian lectured me all about the history of the roman fort, the barracks, the lookout, the granary, the bath house, and then in a recent excavation they’ve even found remnants from ca 8000 BC at the same site. the roman fort was last used during the reign of african emperor septimius severus in perhaps 208AD and Rome didn’t end up in britain until 41AD, so 8000BC is quite old, mesolithic even… anyway kirk cramdon, a church since maybe 1400 is beautiful and they’ve even got roman stones in the modern building… i’ll post pictures soon. graves dating all the way back to the 1600s with medieval images on them. we also went down a brae road (road on a hill) to see the original cramdon bridge which crosses over the river almond (like the nut) and so i’ve walked along the only bridge in the area that existed way back when. according to legend king james V was walking along the bridge and was attacked by robbers, because he was a friendly king, always interesting in his people’s business, and a man from the area saw his attack and saved him, not knowing he was the king… james then told the man to meet him in holyrood and he’d be the only one wearing a hat, so the local man, jock b (someone) went to holyrood and there found himself in the audience of the king where every one else out of respect had removed their hats… there the king granted the local all of the land in the area out of thanks… legend perhaps but the land was all owned by the a guy with local man’s name for many years. anyway we’re just about to set down to afternoon tea (it’s about 5:15 local time) so i’m off… tomorrow starts orientation and i’m a bit nervous but hopefully it’ll go well and i can get settled and into the swing of things. before orientation ian is going to take me round and show me some of his collections from his digs in britain and some other sites…
well
well
21 Jan 2007
me
hi
21 Jan 2007
18 Oct 2011 – start of travelblog
posted Saturday February 2007