Archive for October, 2009
October 29th, 2009
LONDON — This morning I went to the London Metropolitan Archives to try and find a reference to Joseph Coles in St Thomas’ Hospital’s patient admission register for 1817. Unfortunately this particular item was classified as not fit for consultation due to bomb damage suffered during the Second World War, but I was able to fill in a form to request conservation. Hopefully it will be available for the next time I visit!
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October 28th, 2009
LONDON — Getting from Bristol to London went a lot smoother than I’d are hope. The walk to the railway station, pushing one suitcase and pulling another, only took ten minutes. I probably got to the station too early but it meant I was able to be one of the first to board the train—and when you’ve got more bags than hands, it helps. One unexpected but pleasant surprise was that though my seat was standard class the coach itself was first class.
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October 27th, 2009
BRISTOL — The first task to do today was to get the car back to the Hertz depot. Actually, the first thing was to locate a petrol station to fill up the tank. Hotel reception pointed me in the right direction. There are not many petrol stations in central Bristol. After getting in the wrong lane a couple of times I managed to deliver the car to the depot. One of the staff very kindly offered me a lift back to the hotel in the car I had just used—the first time I had sat in the passenger seat!
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October 26th, 2009
BRISTOL — This morning began with an early walk to the railway station to reserve a seat to Paddington (the advanced ticket office is closed Sundays). That done, I returned to the hotel to get the car and drive to Mells, the birthplace of my ancestors Benjamin and Joseph Coles.
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October 25th, 2009
BRISTOL — This morning I decided to explore Bristol and quickly decided that it is not an easy city to get around on foot. Bt the end of the day I still hadn’t found the high street and the maps I had weren’t much help in that respect. Bristol’s maritime heritage is very much to the fore and I did manage to find the SS Great Britain.
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October 24th, 2009
BRISTOL — This morning I crossed the Severn from Wales into England and by-passed Bristol. I headed for Tyntesfield—I wasn’t sure what it was other than it being a National Trust property. I arrived just after noon and it started bucketing down. Thankfully the rain only lasted for twenty minutes or so. It turns out that Tyntesfield is a country house. Unusually, the house is in the middle of a conservation, preservation and restoration project but is still open to the public.
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October 23rd, 2009
CARDIFF — I walked back into the city centre this morning and visited Cardiff Castle. The castle grounds are very spacious what with the castle’s surrounding earthworks having been built over the top of the walls of a Roman fort giving it a square shape. I climbed to the top of the keep to get some good views across Cardiff before taking a tour through the castle apartments.
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October 22nd, 2009
CARDIFF — I left St Clears with the windscreen wipers going but it wasn’t long before the sun came out. My first stop was at Burry Port as this was where my grandmother’s brother had once lived. I managed to find the street and the house without too much trouble but finding a park was another matter.
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October 21st, 2009
ST CLEARS — I awoke to a clear blue sky and the promise of a good drive to St Clears. And for most of the day it stayed fine, only beginning to rain mid-afternoon. I stopped at quite a few lay-bys (those that didn’t appear suddenly) to view the scenery and snap some photographs. After a while I realised I couldn’t do this at very lay-by as I’d never get to St Clears!
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October 20th, 2009
PONTERWYD — The day dawned wet and miserable. Showers kept coming and going; some light and some heavy. My first stop was the Llechwedd Slate Caverns. Some 120 man-made caverns exist within the mountain on 16 levels. I went on one of the tours that took you by train into the mountain to see a cavern where slate was mined; followed by a demonstration of how the mined slate is split. Still done by hand as no machine has been developed that can do it better.
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