Calis Beach and Fethiye Turkey Discussion Forum
General Topics => All things that have nothing to do with Turkey => Topic started by: Colwyn on January 20, 2015, 15:45:48 PM
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Part I: The Centre and Floating Harbour (Seaward)
Yesterday Hilary went off to Cardiff for a bit of shopping with one of her sisters so I decided to take my favourite urban stroll in Bristol. I started at The Centre. Now,
other towns and cities have central areas maybe even an area known as “the centre”, but in Bristol there is a specific location, a large open space formed when the River Frome was culverted and built over, which is The Centre – and when you are there you are “on The Centre” (never “in the centre”). Standing on The Centre is the statue of Neptune, staring out along St Augustine’s Reach, which was my starting point. Do you want to join me for a virtual tour?
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St Augustine’s Reach leads into the main part of the Floating Harbour. The Bristol Cannel has the second highest tides in the world - a 40 foot rise and fall - so the harbour is only opened to the tidal River Avon twice a day at the high tide. The rest of the time it “floats” above sea level. The Reach is now the site of posh eating houses, trendy bars, an art-movie cinema and an arts gallery, and similar. We set off on the right hand side. It joins to the other side via Pero’s Bridge with its oddly shaped horns. Pero Jones was a African slave brought to Bristol from the Caribbean by his master to become a household servant. The bridge that is named after him, built 1999, is part of Bristol recognizing and coming to terms with its slave trade past over the last 25 years – a movement much applauded by me.
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Now we turn right and past the Kaskelot – a replica three-masted barque – which is, apparently, something of a star having been in so many films. Across the harbour is a replica of The Mathew, the ship in which John Cabot sailed from Bristol in 1797 to become the first European to find North America since Lief Ericson (Columbus found the Caribbean 5 years earlier). I chose not to say that he “discovered” America since people had been living there for several thousand years having arrived from Asia long before any European arrived across the Atlantic. We’ll have a better view when we get to the other side.
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Now we come to the star of the harbour. This is not a replica; it is the real thing. Salvaged from the Falklands, towed back across South and North Atlantic, up the Avon, back to its original dry dock, and restored. It is, of course, Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s S.S. Great Britain. Finished in 1843 it was, by far, the biggest ship afloat. It adopted a steel hull and screw propeller making it the first ocean going vessel with these features. Wow! The amount of innovation almost drove the shipbuilders into bankruptcy. No wonder one of the Bristol pubs named after Brunel is called “The Reckless Engineer”.
Brunel’s vision was that a passenger could go to his Paddington Station, and buy a direct ticket from London to New York. They would travel via Brunel’s Great Western Railway (GWR aka God’s Wonderful Railway) to Brunel’s Temple Meads Station and then on to Brunel’s SS GB and sail away to New York (which wasn’t designed and built by Brunel).
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Walking on we come to the Grain Barge which is a pleasant place for a sunny drink and, being owned by one of our independent brewers, the Bristol Beer Factory, you know the ale will be good. But it is too early in our walk for a pint yet.
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We are now passing, on both sides of the harbour, new apartments in a splendid location. Up ahead is a reminder of Bristol’s slavery legacy: the red brick (former) tobacco warehouses of W.D. & H.O. Wills where the crop of Deep South slave plantations were stored for manufacture. Behind them lies open countryside indicating we have walked from The Centre to the edge of Bristol.
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The massive lock gates mark the end of the Floating Harbour and the furthest part of our walk. The pub that stands beside them looks nice but too “trendy” for my taste.
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Most interesting Colwyn - thank you.
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Well, that's saved me a journey! ;D
Very good photos & detail Colwyn, looks like your wife left you alone for a very long time ;)
Thanks for taking the time to post this 8)
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Thanks. Many of the photos were shot against a bright, low, winter sun which proved very difficult for my little compact camera - but I couldn't be bothered to lug my big one about. I think they'll get clearer once I get onto the "home leg".
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Part 2: Floating Harbour (Return)
At the end of the lock is a swing bridge to let vessels into the harbour at high tide – and cause traffic chaos on the roads. From here you can see Bristol’s mini Spaghetti Junction where, according to a famous Bristol poet:
The cars goes by like thunder,
And up and round and under,
Just where they goes,
Nobody knows,
‘Taint no bleeding wonder.
(Adge Cutler)
On the other side of the bridge the water merges into the Avon and travels into the Avon Gorge past the wooded hillside of Leigh Woods.
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Continuing the stroll we pass the handsome Nova Scotia and, if the Underfall Boatyard is open we can cut through there. It was shut and we have to follow the road route back to the harbourside.
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Opposite us is the view that John Betjemen described as “the finest urban prospect in Western Europe”. Of course, that was before those ugly redbrick houses were built just back from the harbour. In the centre of the view are the grand houses of Cornwallis Crescent with, on the far left, another glimpse of Brunel his spectacular Clifton Suspension Bridge. On his wedding day, after the service, he took his bride to the uncompleted bridge (it was finished after Brunel’s death). The two towers were linked by a cable slung across the Gorge. Brunel decided to haul himself over to the far side by breeches buoy. The mechanism ceased in the middle and Brunel had to climb up the breeches ropes to the cable and pull himself, hand over hand, back to the Clifton side. The new bride must have pondered her decision to marry this reckless engineer.
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Betjemen had a lot to say about Bristol. He said it had a railway station that looked like a cathedral and a cathedral that looked like a railway station. Having gone to the Cathedral School, and having gone into the cathedral six days a week for 7 years – I can only agree with him. Anyway, he made up for any hurt by also saying Bristol was “the most beautiful, interesting and distinguished city in England”. But, as far as I know, he failed to note the Bristol tradition of rows of gaily painted terrace houses wherever there is a suitable hillside to show them off.
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We carry on past the nice little Cottage Inn with Cabot Tower – Bristol’s 1897 tribute to the great mariner - opposite us looking down on the harbour.
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Soon we come to Cabot's ocean-crossing vessel (replica) The Mathew. It seems a very small ship, especially in comparison with its near neighbour the huge SS GB. Cabot landed in Newfoundland which – by magical coincidence – is the only place in the world where tides, in the Bay of Fundy, are higher than they are in the Bristol Channel.
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We are nearly at the end of the main arm of the Floating Harbour where some of the old Bristol docks, closed in the 1950s, have been preserved. Much though young boys (and grown men) might like to suppose these great giants are from Wells’ “War of the Worlds” they are just cranes.
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We have been walking for an hour now; time to look for a pint or two.
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Part 3: Famous and Historic
Crossing another swing bridge we can see the spire of St Mary Redcliffe which, according to Queen Elizabeth is "the fairest, goodliest, and most famous parish church in England” (that’s QE1, of course).
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If we turn towards it we soon come The Hole in the Wall. It is not a pub I would chose to drink; more of an eating place. But it once had the most famous landlord in the English-speaking world: Long John Silver. OK, OK, it is one of those poetic license things. It is said to have been the inspiration for R.L.Stevenson in creating the Splyglass Inn in Treasure Island which was supposed to have a small window overlooking the wharf so Silver could give a warning to the drinking seamen and pirates that the press gang was coming along the quayside.
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Going around the pub we come into the large open space of Queen Square, most famous for the 1831 Bristol Riots. The House of Lords had rejected the Reform Bill intended to bring democracy to the old rotten boroughs (of 104,000 Bristol citizens only 6,000 had the vote). When a local magistrate, a firm opponent of reform, came to open the new Assize Courts an angry mob chased him into Queen Square. He escaped but the Mayor and officials were besieged in the Mansion House (the current Bristol Mayor enjoys about the same level hostility). The riot continued for three days before it was put down by a bloody charge by cavalry with drawn swords.
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A short road leads from the Square to one of Bristol’s most famous streets; the cobblestoned King Street. Toward the harbour end is a crossroads on one corner of which is The Old Duke which has been Bristol’s most famous jazz pub since I was an underaged drinker, half a century ago. For about the same time the pub sign has shown the Duke in the pub’s name as Duke Ellington.
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Great pub though this is I’ll skip it in favour a grand pub on the opposite of the cobbles – the absolutely splendid Llandoger Trow. Originally a five gabled tavern, it is now down to three after some architectural redesign by the Luftwaffe. Look at it. Isn’t that a grand place to go for a
drink. Even if you didn’t know its history.
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Llandogo is a village on the Wye across the Bristol Channel that sent cargo barges to Bristol where they docked on the Welsh Back – the wharf on which the Llandoger stood (in its 5 gable form). The pub has a R.L. Stevenson connection although, in my view, this one is less certain. It is supposed the model for Jim Hawkins’ boyhood home – the Admiral Benbow. (A sign in the pub says it was the model for The Spyglass. Tat is patent nonsense. Just ignore it). With a degree more certainty we can say it was the pub where Daniel Defoe met Alexander Selkirk and talked of Selkirk’s experiences as a marooned sailor. This was, of course, the inspiration for Robinson Crusoe.
Generations of corporate pub owners have done their very best to rip apart and destroy this grand old pub but, somehow, it has survived all this and continues to be fine tavern.
Next we can take a quick walk over Bristol Bridge and turn along in the direction of St Mary Redcliffe. The Seven Stars isn’t much of a pub, nothing very special ... apart from its history. When Thomas Clarkson, one of the founders of the association for the abolition of slavery, came to Bristol to investigate the trade it was to William Thompson, landlord of the Seven Stars, to whom he turned. The Stars was a rooming house for sailors and Thompson found them new berths to ship out. But never on slavers; the seamen hated slaving ships and had to coerced into voyaging on them. Thompson disguised Clarkson and arranged for him to meet ex-slaver seamen to gather information to build their case against slave trading. It was thus vital in the rise of the Abolitionist movement. As the pub sign says “Cry Freedom. Cry Seven Stars”. Worth having a pint just to sit and reflect on that history.
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Retracing our steps we cross Bristol Bridge again in medieval times, once across the bridge, we would be arriving at one of Bristol’s four gates in the city walls, with the spire of Christ Church at the top of the hill marking the centre of the old city and county of Bristol.
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Nearby is the old Corn Exchange and standing outside are ... well, you may well have heard the expression “To pay on the nail” meaning to settle up straight away ... standing outside the Corn Exchange are the “nails” to which the phrase refers. You can imagine banging down your pile of golden guineas on these.
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Going back to the church and down Broad Street we can see the sole remaining gate – surviving because it is built into St John the Baptist church.
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Turning left we come back to The Centre (at the far end from where we started) and my favourite pub on it: The White Lion which proudly boast to be smallest.
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It isn’t particularly historic; unless you count the fact that it is a lean-to with its back wall not actually part of the pub building but a fragment of the old city wall. It has one room, the bar, on ground floor with the “Gents” and cellar directly below in the basement, and the “Ladies” and other rooms above on the first floor. To get to the Gents you have to down a tight, spiral, iron staircase salvaged from the old Bristol Prison. Fifty years ago this staircase was boxed in so that the new visitor came across the spiral unexpectedly and, if they were inattentive or a little tipsy, might find themselves unexpectedly and suddenly 15 foot below where they thought they would be – to the great amusement of the regulars. Even today those who are ... err ... “large boned” need to take care not to get stuck. In fine weather you can sit outside and watch the constant flow of the inner city, admire the art deco simplicity of 33 Colston and pretend you don’t notice the traffic fumes.
And that’s the end of the stroll. It takes rather less than an hour and half, plus drinking time. Perhaps you’ll do it sometime.
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Lovely post Colwyn. Thanks for the tour :)
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So Colwyn, are you about to start a new career as a tour guide? 8)
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It has crossed my mind, Hamlet. However, I have rather particular job requirements: good weather, agreeable company and a route that takes in a range of fine ale establishments.
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i hope you had a few pints after all that walking colwyn ;)
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A very entertaining tour Colwyn, thank you. Thirsty work that, you're fully justified
in consuming the odd pint en route.
I have (in Turkey) a book on unusual UK pubs, and it features a very old Bristol Inn
whose large black main entrance door is rumored to be covered in human skin.
a/ Have you heard of it.?
b/ Is it on your tour route.?
c/ Did you have anything to do with it's construction.?
Without the book I can't give you it's name.
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Very interesting tour Colwyn, many years since I visited Bristol (over 30) and in many ways its completely changed, but it doesn't seem to have lost all its charm. The harbour has seen the most changes I think.
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Great pictures with write ups, i feel like i have been there.
Thanks for sharing it.
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Kevin
The pub is reputed to be Bristol's oldest - The Hatchet Inn built in 1606. I didn't contribute any skin to the construction of the door. I used to walk by it every day between school and my bus stop on The Centre, one of our teacher's was rumoured to use it on a lunchtime; as sixth formers we roamed much further away from school. It is not a place I have used very often. The last time I was there it was late on a Saturday and the place was heaving. It seemed to have been "renovated" (i.e. had the guts ripped out of it). It is, apparently, a popular meeting place for people going of to gigs. I didn't contribute any skin to the construction of the door. It isn't on the route I took but it is only a 100 yards from my start at Neptune. I might pop in the daytime and get a better impression of it.
Echogirl
Bristol planners have wreaked considerable devastation on the city; you might consider they made as much damage as the Luftwaffe (because of the aircraft industry here Bristol got a pretty good pasting). Bristol was very slow to rebuild after the war. I think the planners waited to see how other cities got on, picked the worst mistakes and applied them all to Bristol. However, the eventual redevelopment of the harbourside has been a great success both aesthetically and commercially. I prefer it to Hilary's favourite which is Cardiff Bay, although I have to admit central Cardiff is also a splendid area and they've done very well with the Bay.
Cheers, Sunlover.
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Thanks Colwyn,