Wednesday morning breakfast at the Cumbria Grand Hotel

The hotel served a good buffet breakfast and when we went in the waiter seated us at a lovely table by the window.  We could look out onto the bay and see the sun rise over the water.  Once you have your table assigned to you, that is where you have breakfast for the rest of your stay.  In a little while another couple came and sat at the table next to us.  We found out they were from Lockerbie, Scotland and that immediately brought up the subject of the Pam Am airplane that fell out of the sky on top of Lockerbie.  I asked them how many years ago that had been and they told me twenty five.  The next day at breakfast we were conversing again and I asked them if it had landed anywhere near where they lived.
The lady's eyes got big and sad and she said, 'yes, about a hundred yards".
"What", I said.
Yes, it had landed in their neighborhood and at the house next door the son had gone across the street to the neighbor's garage to get help fixing his bike.  At about seven o'clock in the morning the plane fell.  It hit his house, killing his mom and dad and sister.  He was the only member of the family that survived.  She said he had not been able to deal with the stress and had eventually committed suicide.  Pieces of the plane fell in their back garden (or as we would say in America) their back yard.  At the house across the street an airplane seat landed in a neighbor's garage with a dead body still strapped into it.  The trauma had been so great they had to have help coping with the stress.  She told me that even now she has flash backs...I just can't imagine.
The entire episode has made me think about a lot of things.  For one thing, man's inhumanity to man.  Another thing, where humans have a unquenchable quest for power, all it can do is wreck havoc on other humans.  Nothing good ever comes from it.  And thirdly, there is no safe place.  Safety in the present system of things is just an illusion.   You just hope you don't meet with a fatal accident that can snap your life like a rubber band, but then you can never be sure.  Sometimes we feel safe if we are at home, but her children had been upstairs dressing for school when it happened.  Her comment was she had no idea how her family had survived,  but it had made her realize that each day of life we are permitted is a gift.
They were such a lovely couple and we had breakfast with them for three mornings before they were due to leave.  I admired their courage and their desire to carry on with their lives.  They told us they had been to America two or three times.  So they didn't stop flying or experiencing life because of their tragedy.  When it was the morning for them to check out, we hugged each other and said goodbye.  It was such a lovely thing to meet them, to see a part of the culture and livelihood of someone in another part of the world.   And to realize that after all is said and done, we are not very different.  We all face the same challenges and problems, but that if we try we can rise above and sometimes even soar....

Cumbria Grand Hotel

It is Wednesday, March 26 and things are much improved after a good nights sleep and a real English fry up in the morning.  The breakfast comes with the room, which is a real money saver.  It's quite easy here in the U.K. to pay as much as $50 for breakfast for two people, and this one is really nice.  All kind of sausages, even black pudding, which we are very careful to avoid.  Unfortunately they put it on almost all the breakfast menus here and the very thought of it makes me sick, so I just choose to avoid the sausages altogether. They have eggs both pouched and scrambled, wonderful cheese, what they call bacon is more like our ham,  more like Canadian bacon, I think.  Fruit, an array of juices, several types of cereals, include porridge (aka oatmeal), several different types of breads, including croissants, (which I love and have every morning we are here).
This hotel is a relatively new one for the U.K.  I think she told me it was only about 120 years old.  And it is indeed grand.  Looks just like a castle.  It was one of the grand hotels the railroads built back when they were new and wanted to bring people up here for holiday, as the Brits say.  At home we would simply say we were taking a trip or going on vacation...One of the reasons we decided to come this time of the year was to see the daffodils, and I must say we are not disappointed.  They are everywhere!  Even going into the hotel they line the roadway, grow on the hillside, in the hotel garden...and they are at their peak.  Looks like we hit the jackpot as far as that is concerned.  Later today we will off to the Lake District, but that is another story, the details of which are to follow shortly.

Renting the car

I've tried to take care of all the paper work ahead of time so there will be no surprises but things are different in the U.K.  You can only reserve the car, not pay for it ahead of time.  The instructions are that you will be charged when you return the car.  I pick a car rental agency that says it's at the airport to avoid riding the shuttle to get the car.  No such luck.  The kiosk is at the airport.  You do have to ride the shuttle to get the car, and what is worse no one is at the kiosk.  Just instruction on a posted card telling you to catch the bus shuttle to the car rental agency.  I had the approximate price the car should be along with the make and model we wanted all written down, so that is what saved us.  The guy at the agency was so nice.  He looked at our luggage and decided we would need more room.  He looked at where we were going and decided we needed a more fuel efficient car.  He also decided we need diesel instead of gas, since that would be much cheaper.  Then he showed me the price in pounds.  I asked him to please print that out in American dollars and nearly fell out when he showed me the bottom line.  Over $600 dollars more than what it should have been.  I told him that was way over budget and he needed to start all over again from scratch.  I don't know if it was because I was super tired and frustrated or if he really was becoming less friendly by the moment, but one thing I did know what that price and that car wasn't going to happen!  So we started over.  Since Earl was the primary driver the credit card had to be one that had his name on it.  In my haste to get things ready I had neglected to take a card that was in his name, so I had to be added as a secondary driver.  That move cost us an extra $200 so I guess that made the nice gentleman somewhat happier and it taught me something important.  I already knew that, but I had just forgotten.  At any rate, we did manage to get the car and get out of the rental car lot and headed north without too much more trouble....Here we go...Traveling up the motorway toward Cumbria...driving most of the day in the rain on the left side of the road.  Are we having fun yet.  No, I don't think so...but hoping it will improve soon.  We arrive at the Cumbria Grand Hotel around four o'clock after a little trouble finding the place....but we are here. To say we are tired, stressed, and worse for wear would be the understatement of the year.  And at this point we are wondering why we ever decided to do this.   Today is Tuesday, March 25, 2014.  Third leg of our U.K. adventure...

Traveling to Raleigh, North Carolina for the take off to London

We spent most of the day packing.  Hard job to decide what to take.  At 3:30 our daughter in law Shelby and our grandson Kheltyn take us to the airport.  Nice uneventful flight.  We arrive at the airport in Raleigh Durham about 9:40 and then call for the shuttle to our hotel.  I have been very careful in booking to make sure we get a hotel near the airport.  When we call we are told to call a cab and the hotel will reimburse us.  We obediently comply and after what seems like an eternity we finally arrive at La Quinta....They never told me it was eleven miles from the airport.  So much for close by.
Our flight to London doesn't leave until seven o'clock the next night so we have the day to do pretty much what we please.  What we please to do is sleep late and go down just before the stop serving breakfast.  Around eleven we call for the shuttle to take us back to the airport where we arrive just in time for lunch.  We decide on a restaurant called 'The Ale House' and have a sandwich and an ale for Earl and a coke for me.  So far the trip is off to a good start!
Our flight is on time and we are on the flight.
So here we go!
Off to London first and then off to the north country.....
We arrive in London the next morning around seven o'clock AM and are kind of loopy from being awake most of the time.  Not a good time to rent a car and start out driving out of London on the left side of the road. But we are brave, either that or stupid, so that is what we do....Today is Tuesday, March 25 and we are off on the second leg of our U.K. adventure....two senior citizens who should have more sense but obviously don't.  So please pray for us.  Its seems we're off in more ways than one.