Sunny Fenland!

A small group visit to the Isle of Ely by train

A recent group trip to Ely, suggested by one of the travellers on the Jewellery Quarter visit a few months ago, only took a small number of participants, a universally available date being hard to find at this time of year, but those who went had a really good day. No rain this time, and quite a lot of sunshine. We began a little later than we usually do, taking the 10:00 train direct from Stamford to Ely, a journey of well under an hour but to a completely different world. The train was on time and the ride smooth; although we did not have reserved seats we were able to find seats together easily enough, and once the train left Peterborough we enjoyed the view across the fens, looking out for Ely Cathedral in the distance. Soon we enjoyed the classic experience of curving around the city and watching the changing shape of the cathedral above the trees, with a final view across the marina as well prepared to leave the train.

We walked down to the riverside from the station and found mooring for the excursion boat. The service times were not posted but there was a note inviting a telephone call for information, so I rang and was told the next departure would be in about ten minutes. We went off for coffee, thinking the following departure might be better - for everyone wanted coffee! Boats operate every half-hour. I have taken the river trip before so after coffee and cake I left the others to enjoy their cruise and set off to do some things of my own, starting with a cycle, toy and model shop where I bought a couple of things for my next railway modelling project, a Swiss Alpine layout which would be quite different from anything I've ever built before. I then went to the Ely Museum in the former gaol building, well worth a visit, but it is to close for a while this autumn for improvement works, so bear this in mind if you want to copy this trip! I met one of the others for "lunch", which following the cake of the morning consisted of just a couple of pints of ale ... and then I had some work to do for my religious order while they went off and visited some of the other attractions that the city of Ely has to offer. If you want somewhere to go on a summer day, I can thoroughly recommend this little city with its history, charming streets, grand cathedral (with its unique lantern roof) and river. It is so easy to reach from anywhere by train, too.

The Riverside Inn:
More of a restaurant than a pub

Two of us met again by chance and went for afternoon tea at the cathedral tea shop - tea and cream scones are a very reasonable price here, and excellent quality. All of us then attended Choral Evensong at the cathedral: during the summer the cathedral's own choir is on holiday but the services that week were sung by a visiting choir from Tucson, Arizona and this was beautifully done. We then set off for dinner together by the riverside. Normally I have pre-booked the evening meal for group outings, but with such a small group I thought it was safe to chance finding a table as the fancy took us, and we decided to go for fish and chips at The Riverside Inn, with a bottle of house white wine between us. The others had ice-cream, too, but after a cream tea I did not feel the need to join them!

And so to the train home, and during this otherwise uneventful trip back it transpired that the postponed trip to Canterbury might happen this autumn - see the Come with me! page for rudimentary information. We happened for some reason to start talking about aircraft and fell into conversation with a young Portuguese resident of Peterborough sitting near us who is modeller of vintage aeroplanes. A great thing about train travel is the people you meet - and even on a short journey entirely in ones own country it is possible to meet some very diverse and interesting people. Travel broadens the horizons if not the mind, and nowhere more so than in the fens.

If you live near Stamford, Oakham or Peterborough and are interested in joining me on some of these day trips, please see the "Come with me!" Page.

Mediterranean Sunshine, part 2:Exploring Marseille

Swordfish steaks on sale direct from the fishing boats at
Marseille quayside

Breakfast at the Grand Hotel Beauvau in Marseille was in the room adjacent to the bar where we'd had supper and had a similar view of the quayside below. Before breakfast I had taken a stroll along the quayside looking at the well-known fishermen's market with fish on sale the like of which we seldom see caught around England: huge slices of tuna, swordfish and shark, for example, and some unidentified shellfish, too. There was no fish in the continental breakfast but we did have lots of fruit and, of course, croissants and coffee. And then off for a walk to explore Marseille.


Marseille would be the only place we would stay for more than one day and we'd had no plan for it on our arrival but reading the information provided by the hotel had set us up for the day's activities, although we would, as we usually do, allow them to develop as we explored. One disappointment was was that MuCEM -  Musée des Civilisations de l'Europe et de la Méditerranée - was not open on Tuesdays, sot hat would have to await a future visit. There was, however, no shortage of other things to see. We began by walking along the north quay of the Vieux Port, amazed at the size and sophistication of some of the super yachts moored there and interested by the architecture of the flats overlooking the marina. We climbed steeply up to explore the old Panier district with its narrow streets, and walked around the outside of the Cathedral but did not, on this occasion, venture inside.

MuCEM museum with the cruise ship terminal beyond

We had lunch at one of many little restaurants built in the vaults under the cathedral and accessed from the road running along the quay, and we went down to the modern quayside where there was a substantial cruise ship moored and where the museum was located. All of this part of the town is quite new, some built on reclaimed land, and has been part of what has lifted Marseille from its reputation for crime and squalor to the smart tourist destination that it is today.



One place we had to visit, mainly for the view, was the church of Notre-Dame de la Garde on the other side of the Vieux Port and on top of a very high and steep hill, a building which dominates the view for miles. It was a long way up and the weather was very hot, but there is a bus, and it starts from a stop by MuCEM which was, as the museum was closed that day, not busy ... so an easy ride up the hill!

From the level of the car park and bus stop there were fairly breathtaking views over the city and the sea, but the church itself involved a climb up many more steps and the view was greater still. We visited the two shops, one spiritual and one souvenir, at the church and spent some time admiring the views from all around. Like all decent churches with lots of visitors, this one had excellent catering facilities and we enjoyed a drink and a snack lunch here before walking back down into the city.

The view over the city from Notre-Dame de la Garde

The walk back took us through a park and back to the quayside where we'd been the night before. We wanted to visit the soap museum gift shop to buy souvenirs for people at home, and we found all we needed here - real souvenirs of a part of the life of Provence and Marseille that we'd discovered while here. We'd bought our postcards in the city centre in the morning, and we returned to out hotel to write them and then posted them just before the post office closed in the hope that they might arrive back in Lincolnshire before we did (they did).

Although we had read a few menus while out we ended up back at the hotel bar for another salad supper, paid our hotel bill and did all the packing we could before retiring to bed, because our next train was another early morning one! This time we would have time for breakfast but only if we were completely ready, and took our cases into the dining room with us (I've never done that before!). We waited for the doors to the dining room to open, went in and sat in the window and enjoyed another great breakfast before walking back to the Gare St Charles, and so begins the next chapter, which I'll post in due course!

All my photographs can be seen on Flickr, and the Trip Advisor reviews can be found by following the link in the right-hand column.

The North Yorkshire Pullman

The North Yorkshire Moors Railway between Grosmont and Pickering is the most popular preserved railway in Britain and is set among the splendid scenery for which this part of England is renowned. It has a reasonable collection of steam and heritage diesel locomotives and preserved coaches. I had thought of including it eventually in a classic “adventure” tour of North Yorkshire, taking in York, Scarborough, Pickering, Whitby and Middlesbrough (which we may still do one day) but a visit to this line was brought forward by a kind birthday gift from some good friends who gave me a voucher for afternoon tea on the North YorksPullman. I looked up the dates and found that it was available during the school Easter holiday which meant taking the usual “post-Easter” holiday before Holy Week (!) as I have had to do once before, so I snapped up a pair of tickets for then and set about booking train tickets to get there.

One feature of the North Yorks Moors Railway is that some of its trains continue past its northern extremity at Grosmont onto the national rail line to Whitby and back, and the Pullman meal tickets include travel by these trains to connect with the Pullman at Grosmont, so we could stay in Whitby for a short break with the Pullman tea trip as the centre-piece. It is just about possible to do the trip from Stamford to Grosmont, take the Pullman trip and get back to Stamford in one day but it does rely on nothing going wrong, and with antique railways that is just too much of a risk to take! In any case, a stay in Whitby is always worth doing, especially if a visit to the Magpie Café can be fitted in … An adventure was beginning to take shape.

We took the early morning East Midlands train from Stamford to Peterborough, connecting for York by EastCoast. With Advance First tickets (booked free-of-charge using our East Coast loyalty points!) we had a full English cooked breakfast on the train to York: these trains are so fast that there was only just time to take the order and cook and serve the breakfast so that we could eat it before we had to leave the train. The real adventure began at York when we saw that our Transpennine Express connection to Middlesbrough was running late. Not very late, but late enough, because we had a connection to make at Middlesbrough for the long, meandering Esk Valley line to Whitby, a service with only a handful of trains a day and if we missed our connection we'd have had to amuse ourselves for three hours, with our luggage, in Middlesbrough. We had visited Middlesbrough before and were fairly confident that we had seen all that it had to offer …

We waited at the indicated platform for our train at York and the train crew who were to take it forward were there, too, so we told them that we needed to make that connection. Meanwhile the train made up a little time and the new crew got it smartly away from York. The guard checked all the tickets and found several people for Whitby and telephoned ahead: Northern Rail would hold the Whitby train for up to ten minutes if necessary, but any longer and they'd provide a minibus for connecting passengers. That was fair enough, but we'd have awaited the next train rather than go by road and miss some of the most spectacular scenery of the trip. In the event, several minutes were made up at Northallerton where the booked length of station stop was not all needed and by the time we arrived at Middlesbrough we were comfortably in time, even having to wait a couple of minutes for the Whitby train to arrive at its platform. Much ado about nothing, as it happened, but the train crew and the Middlesbrough station staff did a wonderful job with the contingency plans and ensuring that we all caught our onward train.

The line between Middlesbrough and Whitby is well worth travelling, featuring hills and moors, rivers, waterfalls, woods and charming villages with little stations, once clear of the Teesside industry and suburbs (and those are interesting enough, including the famous transporter bridge). The train reverses at the station at Battersby which used to be a junction but the through line from York was lifted long ago leaving a v-shaped line. There is still a water crane on the platform, and occasional North Yorks Moors steam trains work through to Battersby from Whitby.

We arrived in Whitby on time and made our way across the road to our hotel, the George, rather different from its namesake in Stamford! Its main advantage was its proximity to rail and bus stations and the town centre, its downside being that it was very pub-like downstairs which meant that the continental breakfast, taken in a semi-basement bar, was not like being a hotel dining room. Staff were very friendly and helpful, looking after our luggage when we'd arrived before check-in, and we relaxed over a pint of beer before setting out for a stroll around the town, a place we'd visited several times before, including two week-long stays. The room was really pleasant with a view over the street to the river and beyond, though strangely lacking anywhere to hand coats – which was all right as we'd had no rain and so our coats could go in the wardrobe, but that would not always be the case.

We took a bus ride out to Sandsend, at the west end of the long sandy bay at which Whitby is at the east end and tried to locate places we had visited before – memory can play remarkable tricks and it took some time before we recognised where we were. We enjoyed a hot drink at a beach café (bear in mind this is April!) and shopped for greetings cards we needed to send, then caught our bus back, dropping us right outside the door of the George Hotel.

I had booked a table in advance at the famous Magpie Café which is not really a café at all but a fish and chip restaurant, one of many in Whitby but the only one with an Egon Ronay recommendation and the only one with long queues, queues we avoided by advance booking.

This was dinner on the first day of the adventure. The fish is landed at the wharf opposite: it cannot be any fresher, and we had a superb meal with very friendly service. Between that dinner and the anticipated tea the following day, the continental breakfast included in our room price at the George Hotel would be perfectly adequate, we felt. No need to pay extra for the full English …

On the second morning we made our way to Whitby station and caught the steam train to Grosmont, where we had a couple of hours before the departure of the North Yorkshire Pullman. There was plenty to do. We explored the preserved side of the station and watched the train being prepared, a locomotive being coupled to it to provide heat and power, and we walked to the locomotive sheds where other engines were undergoing restoration or repair.




We spent some time in the gift shop, seeking an appropriate gift for the new-born baby of a young friend, settling on a toy model of Toby the Tram Engine, Toby being the child's name. We imagined it might just be too predictable and the poor boy would get nothing but tram engines to mark his birth but were later told that ours was the only one. The former village school has become a community centre and we had a cup of coffee there, overlooking the railway and river and then went back to the station to board our special train.

The train had been made very special, with red carpet laid on the platform and a pedestal of flowers by the entrance door. An attendant checked our tickets and offered to take our camera and photograph us together, and we were handed a glass of Bucks Fizz and taken to our seats in the traditional wooden Pullman car. There were three Pullman cars on this train and I had asked for this one because it is the only traditional art deco one of the three, the others being very much younger. We had a table for two with a brass lamp and fully set for a very good tea. The welcome drink, unlimited tea and/or coffee and all the food were included in the ticket price, paid with the voucher I had been given, and other drinks according to choice could be purchased from the bar, with orders taken and drinks brought by the waiting staff who were very attentive. We can thoroughly recommend this experience, and having subsequently read others' reviews on Trip Advisor it would seem that the lunch and dinner trips are also of excellent quality and well served.

The sandwiches and cream scones are served on the way from Grosmont to Pickering, there is an opportunity to stroll on the platform at Pickering while the locomotive is watered and then cake is served on the way back to Grosmont. It is a trip to nowhere but well worth doing! We were somewhat late getting back to Grosmont, having started from there rather late to await a couple of late passengers, but we just made the connecting steam train to Whitby and so back at the end of a marvellous day out.

The second night there was karaoke in the downstairs bar, but we were well above that and suffered no loss of sleep from the noise. We could have done without the noise made by some of the customers while waiting for their taxi after they left, though. Still, that is a hazard of town centre dwelling and is not unknown at home in Stamford.

I had booked the trip home on the third day to ensure the East Coast leg of the journey would be over the evening meal time so that we would enjoy the First Class all-day meal, but we decided to leave Whitby mid-morning and spend some time at the National Railway Museum in York on the way back. I had been there a year before but it was some time since Alison had visited it and the exhibits are being developed all the time. The ride along the Esk Valley Line was naturally as scenic as it had been on our way there but somehow seemed more interesting the second time round – especially as we passed Grosmont station and saw “our” Pullman car in one of the preserved line platforms. The connection at Middlesbrough was not as tight as the one we'd had on the way out and we'd resolved to repair to a bar for refreshment. Because of work being carried out on the station, though, it was a bit of a trek to the nearest pub from the only remaining exit. And then we tried the wrong door! But the local people were very friendly and we enjoyed a pint and crisps before continuing to York by Transpennine Express. The route between Middlesbrough and York, while not as wild as the Esk Valley Line, does have some very pleasant scenery and there is a spectacular view of the town of Yarm from the embankment.

From York station there is an exit from the footbridge direct to the forecourt of the National Railway Museum, and we were soon there, sorting out the right change for the right size of luggage locker and then round the museum for a couple of hours. Even for those not especially interested in the technical aspects of railways, exhibits like several generations of royal coaches and other social documentary displays can be fascinating, and the look back at things remembered from childhood and youth is always worth doing, too.

Finally, back to York station for the train to Peterborough. Like all East Coast trains, this was marshalled with First Class at the London end so we were in good time to walk along the platform to where our coach would stop: the coaches' identifying letters are displayed along the platforms so we know about where to wait, and there are plenty of seats at this station. Coach M, our reserved seats and some very nice sandwiches, cake and wine for our supper, followed by the customary (for us) glass of Famous Grouse before arrival at Peterborough for our connection to Stamford and the homeward walk across the Meadows.

A couple of years ago we had been out for fish and chips, involving a whole-day trip to and fromGreat Yarmouth. Now we had been out for tea, involving three days in Yorkshire – and fish and chips as well. Our recent holiday inSwitzerland had been the holiday of a lifetime, and now we had also had the tea of a lifetime: 2014 was becoming a memorable year!