Glasgow (1) Irn Bru, The Clyde and La Lanterna: Scotland '22 Part 1

Scotland's National Drink, Most Important River and Best Italian Restaurant

Getting There

Scotland

Glasgow

My satnav tells me it is 404km from home to our hotel in Waterloo Street, Glasgow. That is a long way, over four hours driving plus a coffee and sandwich stop, but it was a surprisingly easy. The M6 ran freely past Stoke and Manchester, became less busy as we progressed further North and once in Scotland, where the M6 becomes the M74, the traffic was refreshingly sparse. It became busier and more complicated approaching Glasgow but the urban motorway system decanted us onto the city streets only a few hundred metres from our destination.

Every British person knows where Glasgow is (or should do) but this blog has visitors from around the world, so here is a map.
 Glasgow, Scotland's biggest city is remarkably close to Edinburgh, the second biggest.
Thank you Lonely Planet for lending me your map

Meeting the Real Glasgow

We checked into our hotel. Our room had a jokey welcome message on the television, …

Welcome message, Ibis Styles, Glasgow Central

….while a can of Irn Bru and a Tunnock's tea cake sat on the bedside table.

A can of Irn Bru and a Tunnocks's Tea Cake

The humour may not be international, so for non-British readers here is an explanation - which I feel moved to make in verse. It’s a sonnet of sorts (well, it has fourteen lines).

The Delights of Scotland Explained for All

You maybe imagine that whisky is Scotland's national drink,
And you would be right.
Distilled, nurtured and bottled in the northern third of our shared isle,
It is exported to the world,
And the world is grateful.

But there is a soft drink, a soda, a fizzy pop, called Irn Bru
With long rolling 'r's in Bru and Irn both.
Made in Scotland from girders, they claim,
And exported to Scots worldwide,
Where locals remain inexplicably ungrateful.

And a Tunnock's teacake? South Lanarkshire made,
With a concept not unique to Scotland,
A hemisphere of marshmallow balanced on a crumbly biscuit,
All within a chocolate shell. What's not to like?

I have headed this section ‘Meeting the Real Glasgow’ and there is, of course, more to Glasgow than pop and cakes.

Glaswegians have a reputation for toughness, even aggression, and an accent which makes a friendly greeting sound like the prelude to a headbutt.

But

Everyone we spoke or dealt with during our brief stay was friendly and helpful and many were also amusing. Twenty or so out of 600,000 may not be a statistically significant sample, but it left us with the impression of a friendly and welcoming city quite at odds with its reputation.

The Clyde

Needing to stretch our legs, and attracted by the possibility of the sun breaking through, we took the short walk down to the River Clyde.

On the way we passed a mural, these are a feature of Glasgow, and there will be more in the next post.

A Glasgow mural

We reached the river a little downstream of the Squiggly Bridge.

The Squiggly Bridge

Most major cities have a river, for some it is incidental, like the Irwell in Manchester but for many it forms a major part of their identity. London is defined by the Thames, Liverpool by the Mersey and Dublin by the Liffey. Glasgow would not exist without the Clyde and the shipyards that once lined its banks made Glasgow the ‘Second City of the Empire’. But here, in the heart of the city, I was surprised by how small it is, bigger than the Liffey, maybe, but much smaller than the Thames and a mere brook beside the vastness of the Mersey.

The Clyde and the Squiggly Bridge

And why is that footbridge in the photo called the Squiggly Bridge? It is not obvious from a distance.

From close up the Tradeston Bridge (to give it its official name) clearly takes an S-shaped journey across the river. Allegedly this lengthens the bridge, allowing it to reach the height required by river traffic without having a steep gradient. The bridge was opened in 2009 and was part of the Tradeston regeneration scheme, giving the area a direct link to Glasgow 's main financial district.

The Bridge is Squiggly

The middle of the river is a fine place to view the city's architectural mix.

Just a small corner of Glasgow's architectural mix

The Armadillo and the SEC

We followed the riverside walkway, past an upmarket hotel, riverside apartments…

By the Clydeside apartments

… and the occasional reminder of the industrial past until we reached the Armadillo - the building that every news reporter in the city feels they have to stand outside to prove they are really in Glasgow.

The Armadillo, Glasgow

Opened in 2000 as the Clyde Auditorium, the architects' (Foster and partners) concept of interlocking ships hulls celebrating Glasgow’s industrial heritage was instantly dubbed The Armadillo.

The SEC and Industrial Heritage, Glasgow

It's is now officially the SEC Armadillo, part of the SEC (Scottish Exhibition Campus) along with the OVO Hydro which appears in the photo above along with a big chunk of industrial heritage.

La Lanterna

Established in 1970, La Lanterna is Glasgow’s oldest family-run Italian restaurant. It has won, and keeps winning, awards for its cooking and wine list, and was declared Scotland’s Best Italian Restaurant, 2021. Even better, it was just a 6-minute walk away, round the corner in Hope Street.

The walk took longer than planned. Phone in hand, we continued straight past the restaurant and failed to notice our error for another 50 metres. In our defence, it has a smallish entrance leading to a large basement. Perhaps we were distracted by the enormous façade of the Voco Grand Central Hotel which separates Hope Street from Glasgow Central Station. The hotel’s website describes it as ‘Victorian glamour’, adjectives that, for me, sit uncomfortably together.

Huge façade, Hope Street

On eventually finding the entrance, we were asked if we had booked. The answer ‘no’ caused a little consternation. Last year, Covid regulations meant almost everything had to be booked, this year we were to discover that even without social distancing rules, Scotland, like the West of Ireland has too few restaurants for those wishing to eat. Booking, we would find, is necessary in some unlikely places and my easy assumption that a popular spot like La Lanterna would have space on a Tuesday evening was optimistic. We were relieved when, after a five-minute wait, we were escorted to a small table in the packed basement.

The Dinner

We were soon equipped with a Negroni each. I thought I was too old to start bothering with cocktails until we went to Cuba in 2020.

Toasted focaccia, made in-house for us to dip into olive oil and balsamic vinegar – the suggestion of our waiter – was simple and moreish. This was real focaccia, not the stuff sold in supermarkets, and better balsamic vinegar and Italian olive oil than most can supply.

From the lengthy and impressive wine list I selected a bottle of Primitivo from Salento, reasonably priced, deep, dark red and full of Italian sunshine. ‘My favourite,’ said the waiter – I bet he says that about all the wines.

Lynne’s vegetarian moment was well rewarded by her Penne all Sorrentina, penne with courgettes, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms and garlic. I chose Maniche Alla Barese. Maniche, a tubular ribbed pasta (and, co-incidentally, a retired Portuguese footballer – Chelsea, Atlético Madrid, Porto), with Tuscan sausage, broccoli, tomato and chilli. The sausage was meaty, the sauce spicy and the broccoli actually tasted of broccoli, which is not always the case.

Penne alla Sorrentin, La Lanterna, Glasgow

For dessert Lynne had Affogato (lit: drowned), first encountered earlier this year in Kings Lynn. The bonus at La Lanterna was not just having espresso to drown her ice-cream but also a glass of Bicherin chocolate liqueur.

My Zabaglione was a delight. Lynne reminded me that many years ago I used to make Zabaglione – I should never have stopped. The bonus here was a small scoop of vanilla ice-cream - vanilla that actually tasted of vanilla. I frequently moan about the ice-cream world’s use of vanilla to mean ‘plain’ that is not what it is supposed to be. There was nothing plain about this gem and it slides effortlessly into my pantheon of great vanilla ice-creams alongside Borza’s Ice-cream Parlour in Porthcawl (long departed but a happy childhood memory) and the Michelin starred Walnut Tree in Abergavenny.

We walked back through the streets of Glasgow as dusk fell (sunset is around 10pm in mid-July) with a general feeling of well-being.

Scotland 2022

Part 1: Glasgow (1) Irn Bru, The Clyde and La Lanterna:
Part 2: Glasgow (2): A Walking Tour
Part 3: The Battle of Culloden and Cawdor Castle
Part 4: Fraserburgh and Portsoy
Part 5: Huntly and Fyvie
Part 6: Findochty, Portknockie and Cullen
Part 7: Stirling

In This Place, but in Another Time

The Place: Mỹ Sơn, Quảng Nam Province, Central Vietnam
The Time: 04-Apr-2012
Another Time: 1965-73 The Vietnam or American War, depending on perspective

In this place, but in another time,

Jungle paths, My Son

A callow youth I could have been

(But for an accidental of place of birth),

Armed to the teeth with guns and fear,

Might have peered, myopic before his time,

Into the dark tangle of alien thorns

And wondered if death was being dealt that day.

I photographed a butterfly and moved away.

The Knight butterfly, Lebadea Martha (I think)

The Place: Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina
The Time: 25-May-2012
The Other Time: 1992-5 Bosnian War

In this place, but in another time

The former front line, Mostar

The baleful rat of nationalism was freed to run.

Former friends and neighbours set to killing with a will,

And once this sixfold harvester of souls had turned

Mosques, churches and cathedrals into rubble,

They shelled the link that had bound them all.

Then, knowing they had gone too far, they stopped, the rat was fed.

I photographed the rebuilt bridge and shook my head

The Old Bridge, Mostar (2012)

The Place: Auschwitz II-Birkenau, Poland
The Time: July 2002
Another Time: 1942-45 The Holocaust, World War II

In this place, but in another time

Just part of the Birkenau camp

Men and women, counting themselves civilized,

Denied the humanity of others, not so different from themselves,

(A difference found and magnified simplifies this trick).

The tourist throng I stood among,

Well-fed and wearing bright-coloured, comfortable, casual clothes,

Shifted from foot to foot and made no sound,

I photographed the railhead then stared at the ground.

The Railhead, Birkenau
The half destroyed gas chambers and crematoria are just to the right

The Place: The Choeung Ek Killing Field, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
The Time: 17-Feb-2014
Another Time:1975-9 The Cambodian Genocide

In this place, but in another time

Human Bones in the path, Choeung Ek

To recreate a nation’s Golden Age

‘New People’, City dwellers, teachers, wearers of glasses, intellectuals all,

Found incapable of change, had to be removed.

Brutalised child soldiers brought them to this field,

Hacked adults to death, bashed out their children’s brains upon a tree.

Now every rain unearths a crop of bleached bone,

I photographed a grave, men, women, children, all unknown.

Mass grave, Choeung Ek killing field

The Place: Somme Department, France
The Time: 06-July-2009
Another Time: 07-July-1916, The Welsh Division Attack on Mametz Wood, Battle of the Somme, World War I

In this place, but in another time

The Welsh Division Memorial and Mametz Wood

An army of young men I could have marched among,

(But for an accidental date of birth),

Strode down the open slope where now our Dragon stands

To storm the hill of mud and stumps beyond.

Machine guns spat their welcome.

The Dragon tore at the cruel wire, but death must have its say.

I photographed a poppy and slunk away

Poppies, Mametz Wood

All text and photographs © David Williams. No reproduction without permission

Heartfelt thanks to Lucinda Wingard, for giving me the title (in a comment on the Mỹ Sơn post) and for subsequent encouragement.

Torquay and Around (2): Buckfast Abbey, Newton Abbot and Compton Castle

A Resurrected Abbey, a Fine Local Museum and a Historic Castle

A Brief Introduction

Devon

Torbay

Torquay and Around (1) dates back to April 2016, but we have spent a few days with Brian and Hilary every year (Covid permitting) since their move to Devon. The lack of blogs from the intervening years is no reflection on our generous hosts, it is just a combination of what we did, the weather and other commitments, bloggy or otherwise.

They live in a spacious third floor apartment with a fabulous view of the sea from their living room window, and a sheltered sun-trap of a balcony on the landward side. There was, though, precious little sun to trap this year.

B & H's sea view, Torquay

Never mind, we got about between the showers. The following visits took place on the 23-25 of May in roughly the order below.

Buckfast Abbey is near Buckfastleigh, and Compton Castle is roughly half way between Newton Abbot and Paignton

Buckfast Abbey

The little village of Buckfast and its larger neighbour Buckfastleigh, sit on the edge of Dartmoor a 40-minute drive from Torquay.

A Benedictine Abbey was founded in or near Buckfast in 1018. The site of the Saxon church is unknown, but by Benedictine standards it was ‘poor and unprosperous’ (Buckfast Abbey History). In 1136 King Stephen gave Buckfast to the Savignacs, who merged with the Cistercians in 1146 who could easily afford to build a sizeable Abbey on the current site.

The modern Buckfast Abbey, not the 1146 version (photographed on a sunny day in April 2017)

The abbey thrived, and by the 14th century fishing and the wool trade had made it one of the wealthiest in south-west England.

Buckfast Abbey interior

In 1539 the Dissolution of the Monasteries saw the lead stripped from the roof and the walls demolished, the stone being eagerly re-used by local builders.

The hair shirt of St Thomas More, above the altar of a side-chapel, Buckfast Abbey

In 1882 a group of French Benedictine monks bought the site with the intention of re-founding the monastery. The Abbey was formally reinstated in 1902 and Abbot Anscar Vonier, finding materials and expertise where he could, set about building a new church on the footprint of the former abbey church. The work was completed in 1938 and the Abbey has continued to the present day, now having about a dozen monks.

One of  the delights of previous visits has been the shop, with handicrafts from abbeys all over Europe and, more to my taste, treats like Trappist beers from Belgian monasteries and rillettes – strangely difficult to find in this country – from an abbey in France. This time the shop was almost empty, the treats vanished. There was no clear explanation, but this is another of the ‘advantages’ of Brexit.

Coleton Fishacre and a Picnic

The full story of Coleton Fishacre is told in Torquay (1), but we also visited the garden in 2017 and again this year. The house, just outside Brixham, is owned by the National Trust, but was built for the D’Oyly Carte family in the 1920s. It is a fine example of an early 20th century country house.

Coleton Fishacre

The garden tumbles down a narrow valley to the sea. Aided by a warm microclimate the gardeners have produced something special, though there was more colour in our visits in the April sunshine than on this dank May day.

Gunnera - huge and heavily armed it feels a most threatening plant, Coleton Fishacre

We had taken a picnic, so braving the weather, we drove up nearby Scabbacombe Lane to a suitable spot. For a brief while the clouds obligingly parted and the sun shone, though with negligible warmth. Even this half-hearted reprieve was short lived and we opted out of the planned coastal walk.

Cool Picnic, Scabbacombe Lane

Newton Abbot

For most visitors, Newton Abbot is the gateway to Torquay. Whether arriving from Exeter on the A380 or Okehampton on the A382, you have to deal with all or part of the town. On a couple of occasions, I have spent more time traversing Newton Abbot than I considered reasonable, and I did not think fondly of the town. However, when a visit was suggested, I went with an open mind. I had set wheel in Newton Abbot but never foot, so it deserved another chance.

The Newton Abbot Town and GWR Museum

Recently rehoused in a 19th century church in the town centre, the cunningly designed and well thought out museum packs a great deal into a relatively small space.

Local History

Between 1246 and 1251 the New Town of the Abbot (that’s the Abbot of Torre in Torquay, not Buckfast, there were plenty to choose from in those days) was given the right to hold a weekly market on Wednesdays. Across the little River Lemon, Newtown Bushell (the Bushells were local landowners) gained the same right for Tuesdays. There was enough trade for both to flourish and the arrangement continued until 1633 when the markets and towns combined under the name of Newton Abbott. The Lemon, rising on the flank of Haytor on Dartmoor and 10 miles later flowing into the head of the Teign estuary, now runs beneath the centre of Newton Abbot in a 400m long tunnel. Lemon is derived from a Celtic word for elm, the citrus groves of Devon remain just a potential benefit of global warming.

The South Devon and the GWR

The South Devon Railway arrived in Newton Abbot in 1846. Brunel used the Teignmouth – Newton Abbot stretch to experiment with an ‘atmospheric railway’, a train driven by air pressure. It was a popular idea at the time and the small-scale model in the museum works perfectly but even Brunel could not make it work at large scale.

By 1876 most railways serving the southwest had become part of the Great Western Railway. The GWR developed repair and maintenance sheds at Newton Abbot and by 1930 they employed 1,000 workers. The sheds have all gone now and Newton Abbot’s days as a railway town are over, but the museum has a mock up of an old signal box, and where signals along the line were changed by pulling levers directly connected to them. Anyone can have a go, it is great fun for children of all ages, and for children of my age (70+) it is a comforting moment of 1950s nostalgia.

Two other exhibits to catch my eye were the ‘diving machine’ and the ‘foeffee chest’.

John Lethbridge’s Diving Machine

Wool merchant turned inventor, John Lethbridge perfected his diving machine in his garden pond in Newton Abbot before taking it to London and displaying it to the masses. On that occasion he was lowered into the water from a boat and stayed there for half an hour. He could see, downwards at least, through a glass ‘window’ and could use his arms inside the leather sleeves. To what purpose? One might ask. In his first commercial venture off Cape Verde, he retrieved 27 cases of silver, 868 slabs of lead, 64 cannons and 11 anchors.

Modern replica of John Lethbridge's diving engine

‘Silver fishing’ was big business, but highly dangerous. Fishers were dependent on being hauled up at the right time, and failures of the winch, ropes, pulleys or seals were usually fatal.

John Lethbridge died in his bed in 1759 aged 83, having made his last dive two years earlier

Feoffee Chest

A wonderful word and a wonderful chest: the Parish of Woolborough (long ago absorbed into Newton Abbot) kept its important documents in this chest. It has eight locks and each of the eight feoffees (trustees) had a key to one of them so all had to be present to open it. Eventually it was replaced by a dull but efficient safe and was lost. It was rediscovered in the attic of Newton Abbot workhouse in 1896. Over the centuries the many feoffees included Parliamentarian General Sir William Waller and the diver John Lethbridge.

Feoffee chest, Newton Abbot Musuem

After the museum, we had intended to explore Newton Abbott on foot, but the weather had other ideas, so we drove south to Compton Castle.

Compton Castle

Getting There

Newton Abbot to Compton is 4 mile down the A380 to the delightfully named village of Ipplepen, then left toward Paignton (silent ‘g’) along the less charmingly monikered Gropers Lane.

Ipplepen Info claims the name has Celtic origins and has been variously spelled over the years (where hasn’t?) The more authoritative Nottingham University Key to English Place Names says it is Old English, and it was here Ipela penned his animals. But for the village, Ipela would have been as forgotten as the unfortunately named Snot who donated his name to Nottingham (I jest not).

I have found no information about Gropers Lane, but such names and more vulgar variations (sniff the smelling salts, Fanny, before looking at Wikipedia) were common in medieval cities and denoted a street of brothels. Sensibilities change and so do names, over time many morphed into Grove Lane or Grape Lane. But this was an urban phenomenon, and every one of the 1,945 metres (streetlist.co.uk) of Gropers Lane is relentlessly rural.

The Gilbert’s Castle

Compton Castle, now owned by the National Trust, is more of a fortified manor house than a castle, but it is a magnificent fortified manor.

Compton Castle

Sir Maurice de la Pole had a castellated house here in the reign of King Henry II (1154–1189). Later, the manor passed into the hands of the Compton family who built an undefended manor house in the mid-14th century. The Comptons gave way to the Gilberts who added the fortress-like front in the 1520s.

Through the forbidding gatehouse with double portcullises…

Gatehouse, Compton Castle

…is a quadrangle with a chapel on the right...

Courtyard, Compton Castle

...which appears to still be in use.

Chapel, Compton Castle

Sir Humphrey Gilbert

Best known of the Gilberts was Sir Humphrey Gilbert (1539–1583). He and his half-brother Sir Walter Raleigh are alleged to have shared the first pipe of tobacco smoked in England at Compton.

Sir Humphrey was a complex character. His brutality in Ireland where he was involved in putting down the First Desmond Rebellion (1569-73) was extreme even by the standards of the time, while in the mid-1570s he devoted himself to writing and promoting education and the arts. Thereafter he turned to exploration and adventuring, applying himself with more enthusiasm than skill.

In 1583 he led a small fleet to Newfoundland in HMS Squirrel, a ship that had featured in some of his earlier adventures. The way the story is spun one might assume he discovered Newfoundland though John Cabot had been there 90 years earlier and St John’s was a well-established port occupied, if only seasonally, by fishermen.

Gilbert arrived, claimed Newfoundland and all surrounding land for Queen Elizabeth, accepted the gift of a dog from the locals and then he set off home. HMS Squirrel foundered in a storm off the Azores and Gilbert drowned. In his memory, squirrel motifs abound at Compton Castle.

A Squirrel on one of the chapel pews

And in memory of all the Tudor adventurers and legitimised pirates there is usually a volunteer somewhere on the premises in Tudor costume.

There is still at least one Tudor at Compton Castle

After the Tudors

The Gilberts sold the estate in 1785. The need for fortified manors had passed, the castle was allowed to deteriorate and eventually the Great Hall roof fell in. Walter Raleigh Gilbert, a young naval officer and a Gilbert descendant bought the ruin in 1931. In 1951, after much rebuilding and restoration, he donated Compton to the National Trust on the condition that members of the family should continue to occupy the castle. They still do, administering it for the Trust.

The Rest of the Castle

The chapel and Great Hall form opposite sides of a quadrangle. The Great Hall with Sub Solar and Solar behind are open to the public. The private residence is in a large wing forming the end of the quadrangle and continuing behind, leaving the rest of the enclosed space as a garden.

Walled Garden, Compton Castle

Sadly, no photographs were allowed inside. The Great Hall, filled with Gilbert memorabilia, has the feel of a medieval hall, despite the new roof. With modern furniture the Sub Solar has a veneer of modern comfort, while the Solar, reached by a vertiginous 15th century spiral staircase, feels more spartan. There is a small ‘snug’ beyond, but the vast fireplace and modern heating equipment are a reminder of how difficult it is to heat a building of this age to modern standards.

The kitchen is at the end of the main wing. A warm if rather smoky place, it was once a separate building so any inadvertent fire could be easily contained. The trade-off was that, in winter at least, the castle’s inhabitants would never get a hot a meal.

Kitchen, Compton Castle

The Last Evening and Beyond

Hilary had cooked two splendid dinners during our stay so on the last evening she deserved a rest. We ventured out on foot to a harbour side bar for a drink. Despite the ecologically indefensible space heaters on the terrace, the nippy breeze made inside the only sensible choice.

Afterwards we walked round to the Junjaow Thai restaurant. Between the four of us we ate prawn and chicken pad thais, a green curry and two red curries. It is few years since we have been to Thailand and the flavours were authentic enough to bring back pleasant memories.

The next morning, we took our leave. Despite the uncooperative weather, we had spent a very pleasant and convivial few days with Brian and Hilary, eaten and drunk well and visited some interesting places. Thanks to both for their hospitality, and particularly to Hilary for all the hard work in the kitchen and the excellent dinners that work produced.