Saturday Aug 27th, 2011: Southampton
Bob: Although I always worry a bit when turning in a rental car, this time it went smoothly if a bit slowly. After breakfast at Polygon Villas we retrieved the car from the nearby parking lot, stopped by at a petrol station to fuel it, and dropped it off at the Hertz agency near the Western Docks. After a quick cup of coffee and doughnuts at the Ikea across the road, we walked eastward on West Quay Road until we encountered the remains of the old city wall. The remains of the medieval city wall in Southampton are quite fragmentary, but that fragment was large enough to give us an impression of how it looked back in the old days. We could even mount the ramparts on a small section of the wall and have a nice view out over the docks. |
Monika: Our first order of business, after another good English breakfast of course, was to fill up and then return the car. Through a Google enquiry from our room, we figured out the closest (and cheapest) gas station, and I looked at the Google map long enough to be able to get us there. We then drove to the Hertz place. It opened at 9 and it was still a little before. But we were so glad to get the car there without any (new) blemishes or dings that we gladly waited. Both at the Manchester Airport and here at Southampton, the Hertz representative were efficient and friendly and the car we ended up getting was really nice and even had AC, which we did use. Well, after that we had a full day to explore Southampton, and to my great surprise, there really was a lot to explore. Walking along West Quay Street we reached the old city wall. When we were here before, I had seen the wall from the ship, but did not realize how extensive it really was. We walked through a perfectly intact gate, the west gate, and up onto the wall itself. From there we could see a Celebrity ship, that was docked on the West Dock. |
Bob: Just a block or so further down West Quay Road was the Maritime Museum, housed in a building used to store wool for shipment to Italy in the Middle Ages. Inside we found a very nice collection of ship models, some crafted by prisoners-of-war who had been housed there in the 1700s, and a large scale model of the harbour area, complete with explanations. In addition they had some small exhibits upstairs and one large area devoted to the Titanic which was quite interesting although not as extensive as the exhibit I saw in St. John, Newfoundland, on Wanderung 15. But especially while perusing the Titanic exhibit, I encountered one puzzling feature of British society: despite the fact that being "polite" vs. "rude" is apparently a core value in British culture, people are quite commonly extraordinarily rude and seem to think nothing of it. In this case the museum had signs plastered all over the place stating that photography was prohibited, which is why I didn't take any pictures. But every single one of the British couples or families in the museum with us was busily snapping flash photographs of all the exhibits with either cameras or cell phones. Not only were they taking prohibited photographs, but they would also butt in front of those of us trying to read about the exhibits in order to lean over and take close-up shots of all the exhibits. I had asked Monika not to take pictures in the museum, but after seeing every other visitor publicly make a mockery of that rule, I was the one who ended up feeling foolish. |
Monika: We kept walking along the wall until we came to the Wool House, a stone house where they used to store wool before it was shipped. Now it houses the Maritime Museum, a "must do" for Bob. The museum had a rather nice diorama of the Southampton waterfront, a good description of a steam engine and of the difference between sailing and steam ships, and Fred, the diving suit with hard helmet, used to salvage items from sunken ships. I joined the scofflaws and took a picture of Fred when Bob was not looking. Up on the second floor was an exhibit about the Titanic. It was not nearly as complete or interesting as the one we had seen in the Geology Museum in St. John, Newfoundland. So altogether, as maritime museums go, this was no great shakes and we spent less than an hour in there. |
Bob: From the museum we continued working our way eastward to positively identify Gate 4 where we now knew our ship was leaving the next day. Our thought was to work our way back up from that point along a High Street and Above The Bar Street to see if that would be a good route to roll our bags down on the morrow. But then Monika pointed out that further to the East was the Solent Sky Aviation Museum. Since I am attracted to aviation like a bee to honey, that was a "must see" in my book. We found the museum in an oddly-shaped building with what looked like unpainted aluminum sheathing on the outside. That turned out to be a purpose-built museum that had been constructed to house the "Beachcomber", a Short Sunderland flying boat that had been built during WWII but then modified into a Sandringham version for civilian transportation after the war. It was used around Australia and New Zealand to travel to various islands up until the 1970s as I recall. Well, I have read about the spaciousness of those big old flying boats, so I leaped at the opportunity to actually get inside and take a good look at one. The interior was, in fact, beautifully preserved and as spacious as I had read about. I was also given a short guided tour of the flight deck, and felt a tang of nostalgia that the instrument panel had the old-style round dials and gauges that I had learned to fly with. All the controls were cable-operated except for electric flaps, and that is just the setup that I had on N 5642 R, my old Cessna 172. The Short was, however, at least one or even two orders of magnitude larger than my old Cessna (28 tons vs. 1 ton), so the person who engineered those controls must have worked very hard at counter-balancing to keep the forces manageable. I would have dearly loved to have heard those 4 Wright Whirlwind engines power up and taken a flight in Beachcomber, but as it is now completely surrounded by the museum building, that was impossible. |
Monika: We were still rather fresh when we finally reached gate 4, where we were going to board the ship on the morrow. I looked at the map of Southampton and found that only a few blocks onward was an Aviation Museum, an even greater "must do" for Bob. And this one did not disappoint at all. The centerpiece was a large flying boat, the Beachcomber, that had been built in Southampton and used during World War II to hunt for submarines. Afterwards was used for passenger service first in New Zealand and later in the Caribbean. When I say centerpiece I really mean it. When the city acquired the airplane for display, they built the museum around it. They actually have a little alcove for the tail, the nose is by the window on the other side and the wings almost touch the sidewalls. They even gave tours where we could walk into the airplane, sit in the seats, and admire the spacious, nicely-furnished interior. |
Bob: There were other marvelous old airplanes in the museum as well, of course, but the one that captured my attention was a Supermarine Spitfire also from the WWII era. The graceful lines of the wings and body just look sleek and elegant to me, and that airplane plus the Hawker Hurricane are, essentially, the reason that Britain could finally win the Battle of Britain and turn the tide of WWII. So yes, the Spitfire also had a special place in my heart. Monika gamely came with me through all the exhibits, but after a couple of hours we ended our tour at the gift shop, where I purchased four ties with airplane motifs on them for 2 pounds each, which I considered a bargain, plus associated postcards and other aviation knicknacks. |
Monika: All around this beautifully restored airplane where smaller airplanes manufactured in and around Southampton. There were stories about some of the different companies. It seems that the Spitfires also were built here and there were several examples. But the highpoint came, when we were taken up into the command post (i.e. cockpit) of the Beachcomber. Bob could actually sit in the captains chair and admire all the instruments, most of which reminded me of the ones in his old Cessna 172. One of the docents told us all about the airplane, its history and its construction. It was really a lot of fun. |
Bob: After having a jacket potato in a nearby cafe for lunch, we backtracked westward to High Street and began walking North to check out the feasibility of that street for rolling our luggage down to the Crown Princess. The sidewalks were quite broad and parts of High Street and Above The Bar Street had been converted to a pedestrian mall, so it looked like an easy path to pull our rollies. A lot of street vendors had set up shop there, and the mobs of people surging around gave it quite a festival flair. We were there on a Saturday, of course, so it might be quieter at other times, but we enjoyed the hustle and bustle of the carnival-like atmosphere. By the time we returned to our B&B, however, our feet were throbbing after pounding the pavement from 9:30 a.m. to about 3:00 p.m. I was happy to shuck my shoes and lay down a bit and give them a chance to recover. We rested and read a bit, but then made one final foray out to find the source of the "Big Ben" bell ringing that had been wafting through our open window every quarter hour during the day. |
Monika: After this we stopped at a cafe for lunch (jacket potatoes, what else?) and walked over to the main shopping and partially pedestrianized street that runs straight down the middle of Southampton. We stopped at a Lidl store where I found nice Coolmax shirts (moisture-wicking polyester sports shirts) for both Bob and me, and a 2011 driving map for all of Europe for only 2.99 pounds. Walking on, we came to the pedestrian mall. Here, near one of the gates, several tents were sat up selling everything from clothes to books to meat. The butcher was actually hawking his wares, reminding me of the fishmarket in Hamburg. A little farther on we saw a Tesco express where I picked up two sandwiches for the evening. But after that we were glad when we reached a little park that would lead us to the Polygon, the street where our B&B, Polygon Villas, was located. For both of us our feet were really starting to hurt and we figured that most of the walking we had done these last two weeks was actually on natural surfaces whereas today we spent 5 hours on concrete. |
Bob: We suspected an old church on the other side of the block from us, but were much surprised to find out that the church had now been converted into a bar and restaurant. But the proprietor, who graciously showed around the very nicely appointed restaurant, said the bells were from an isolated bell tower on the next block over. We had seen that tower, complete with its big clock face, but I had not suspected it as the source of the chimes because one of the tunes I heard chimed on the hour was "Our God, Our Help in Ages Past", and that to me is clearly a religious tune. But so it was. We returned to our room to finish "The Railway Detective" by Edward Marston, and update our journals before trying to stuff everything in our suitcases (moderately but not totally successful) and turning in for the evening. |
Monika: So we were just happy to put up our feet and rest them a while. We also figured out how to smuggle our wine on board tomorrow and packed most of our clothes. We then wrote and read a while. But the sun was still shining and my feet had recovered and I was curious where the Big Ben type bells every 15 minutes were coming from. We walked to the next street where there was a beautiful old cinema, the Mayflower, and across from it an old church. But when we walked up to the church, we saw that it had been turned into a pub and restaurant, called the Vestry. We looked in, and one of the waiters let us in and started chatting with us. Across from the entrance was the bar with a beautiful picture depicting an old legend from the area. The young man told us all about it, and how this place had been open only a couple of weeks, but the church had been closed already for over 10 years. Walking back to our place, we took a picture of a tall, free-standing clock tower that was probably the origin of the chimes that let me keep track of the time. |
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