Saying Goodbye to Britain—Part III

I wasn't expecting this to be a three-parter, but I guess I have a lot to say about Britain. After all, it was my home for three years. It might seem like a brief span of time, but it was crammed full of so many experiences, both good and bad, that it seems like a lifetime. I was grateful for the few days Chris and I had together to revisit the south of England, as it brought back so many of those good memories for us.

Chris' Backyard

The coast of Cornwall is a special place for me. Back in 2008, Chris and I had explored different places along the western coast. Though the seaside villages were quaint and cozy, it was the old stuff which appealed to me the most. When you come from the American Midwest, where the oldest building in your town is 150 years old, the age of ruins in Europe can boggle the mind. To my utter delight, on that trip in 2008, I found out that Cornwall is steeped in Arthurian legend. I've never been particularly big on the whole King Arthur legend, but the mystery surrounding it has always intrigued me. Though it's widely known that such a person didn't exist, there are elements of truth to the legend. No doubt there were real people and events which inspired the story of Arthur, Lancelot, and Guinevere. As so much information was lost in the Dark Ages (the early Medieval Period when few written records were kept), we will never really know the true story of Camelot. Still, visiting places like Tintagel Castle on a high cliff above the sea, it's easy to envision it as the residence of a powerful king and his sorcerer. Tintagel is hands down one of my favorite places in Britain. It ticks all the boxes for me with its rambling mix of Roman and medieval ruins and cliffside/island location. Tintagel also comes with a cave, named Merlin's Cave, underneath the castle. There's a narrow cave corridor you can walk through to get to the pounding sea. There is also a nearby church on the cliff with a graveyard which sports weathered Celtic stone crosses. There was something about that humble stone church that spoke to me back then, and I went in to kneel before the candle-lit altar. I had been the only one in the church at the time; Chris had stayed outside. I could hear the pounding of the surf against the cliffs, as well as the howling wind. I didn't utter a prayer in that church, rather I soaked in the feel of the place. There is no doubt that Tintagel resonated with something inside of me, and its one of the most inspiring places I've been to. There's a story inside of me I still need to write about what may have happened in this dramatic setting.

So why I am bringing this up, seen as how Tintagel wasn't on our itinerary this time around? I suppose it's to evoke an air of mystery and wonder when describing Cornwall. It really is a magical place. Though my husband grew up in Cornwall, he fails to appreciate the history of his home county. Chris is more of modern history enthusiast—anything after the French Revolution. Kings, castles, standing stones—bah! Ancient history. I suppose when you grow up surrounded by ancient ruins, you might have a blasé attitude about the age of things.

After spending the night in Newquay, we headed back through the interior of Cornwall. Inevitably, we ended up in Liskeard, Chris' hometown. We stopped at Moorison's to buy some lunch, then we drove through Chris' old neighborhood. He paused the car outside of his mother's house. She may have been in there. We played around with the idea of paying her a visit. After all, I have never met the woman. The less said about that situation the better, as I respect Chris' privacy concerning his family. However, I think it's safe to say that if I didn't meet my mother-in-law then, I will never meet her.

We kept driving and ended up at a park at the end of the street. We sat on the swings and ate our lunch. After that, Chris drove us to the Minions, a wonderfully named village on the outskirts of Liskeard. I wasn't sure what there was there to see, as we started walking across what seemed like a barren moor. There was the chimney from an old tin mine in the distance, serving as a reminder of Cornwall's industrial past. However, as we continued on, we came to a standing stone ring. The Hurlers, Chris told me. Stone circles can be found all over Britain, though none quite as impressive as Stonehenge. Stonehenge is the only one you have to pay to see, and is protected behind a fence (thanks to the hippies who kept trespassing on private land). It's quite fascinating to come across these rings in the middle of a field with no fence and nobody around. You can touch the stones and lean against them and do whatever you want, though I think it's safe to say you can't dig them up.

According to Wikipedia, the Hurlers are actually three separate stone rings. There isn't a ton of information on them, other than they seem to be aligned with the sun. I circled them several times, touching them (I've read books on ley lines across Britain, and though I can't fully subscribe to the idea, it still doesn't hurt to think these stones have special powers), before we continued on towards a pile of rocks. The pile of rocks turned out to be quite a massive assemblage of rocks called The Cheesewring. I suppose this geologic wonder is named this because some of the rock stacks look like cheese presses (though I've never seen a cheese press so I couldn't tell you how accurate this is). Now that I'm studying geology, I can tell you how cool these formations are. Essentially they're slabs of granite that have been weathered, resting on top of each other like a stack of plates. I wish I had had some knowledge of geology back then to really appreciate them. To have a rock formation in the middle of a field is quite remarkable. There must have been some heavy-duty weathering going on to smooth the granite into layered slabs. Sedimentary rock, yes I can see. But granite? I can only imagine that this part of Britain had been underwater at one time. Maybe I'll go back there someday and study them closer.

As it turns out, there is a lot of granite to be found in Bodmin Moor, the area outside of Minions. We followed a path that led us to a series of rock quarries. One of the quarries had been filled with water. Chris said that he used to swim there when he was a kid. In fact, this whole area had been his playground as a kid. This was unbelievable to me that this was the first time I had heard about stone rings and piles of rocks in his backyard. What did I say about blasé?

Now the only thing I have left to see in Cornwall is Brown Willy. That'll be on our next trip through.

We made the long trip back to Salisbury, driving by Stonehenge but not stopping (we have seen it up close and personal twice, plus you can see if from the motorway). We opted for a night of reliable comfort at the Premier Inn. We have stayed in countless Premier Inns on roadtrips across Britain, and they have never failed to provide a comfy bed with the best duvets and pillows around. Also, Chris and I are suckers for the Harvester, the chain restaurant which comes attached to just about ever Premier Inn. A family-style carvery, it's not the most elegant of places, but when you're on the road, it's just what the doctor ordered. This was to be our last night together in travel-mode for a very long time.

One Last Goodbye

We rose early in the morning, before the sun, to return the car to Heathrow. From the airport, we entered the world of mass transport, the thing that has always turned me off about London. The Tube—I hate it. It's convenient enough (especially after living in Manchester where the trains run every hour, which means if you miss one, you have a long wait until the next one), but it's the maze of the underground and the heaving mass of humanity which makes me uncomfortable and out of my element. I found it daunting the first time I was in London; I found that if you pause for just a second, you risk getting mowed over. Chris loves it. London is the whore he constantly longs for. He's an absolute natural in the city, blending into crowds with ease, whereas I'm claustrophobic and anxious about flowing with the human traffic. I will never get used to it. Needless to say, I was relieved when we ascended from the rat hole of the Tube and passed through wide green openness of St. James Park to Buckingham Palace. We had some time to kill before catching our bus to Manchester, and the Queen's residence is close to Victoria Station. We joined the crowd of tourists at the gates and watched a guard do his pointless paces. It was the first time I had seen this exercise. It looked utterly ridiculous to me. Funny how tourists see this and somehow think this encapsulates British culture.

Chris was happy to revisit Victoria Station as it brought back so many happy memories for him (not so for me), and we found our bus to Manchester. We could have taken the train; it would have been quicker. But we were looking to save money, so it was one last bus journey for us. We had done this bus trip before, against our will, when we had flown back from Greece and had been redirected due to Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland erupting. Instead of Manchester, we had landed in Gatwick and been put on a bus to Manchester. It had been a long ride then. After all our bus journeys through Asia, this one should have been a piece of cake. But, for some reason, the last leg of a journey is always the longest.

It was bittersweet when the Pennines came into view. We were back in the North, the cold, hard, gritty North. Yes, I suppose that the North is harsh when compared to the green, gently rolling hills of the South. I suppose I always picture it sunny in the South, though this is just a dream scenario in my head. When I think of the North, I think of rain, red brick, and abandoned mills. Of course, the North is so much more than that. Manchester is a cultural hub, particularly with its music scene. Who doesn't know about Madchester—Manchester's cultural heyday? Well, I suppose I didn't know much about it while living in Northern Illinois, but boy did I learn about it after living in Greater Manchester. Manchester taught me so much about music; I came to appreciate music I hadn't listened to before: The Stone Roses, The Verve, Happy Mondays, Joy Division, New Order, James, The Smiths... well, I suppose I knew some Smiths' songs before leaping across the pond, but I never knew they were from Manchester, nor did I care. But now when I hear these bands, I hear Manchester. I hear the grit, the industrial grind and the red brick. And I love it. I fucking love it. If nothing else, Manchester opened the door to different types of music for me, and offered a new catalog of bands which I had been secretly craving (and no, I'm not including Oasis in there—pretentious wankers).

As the bus followed the spine of the Pennines, I felt a draw to the landscape and also sense of dread. My time in the North had been tainted from the start with psychological trauma (and a serious physical injury). I remember returning to Manchester in 2009 after spending a month in the States. As we drove through the wet, dark streets of Ashton-Under-Lyne, a severe depression descended, and an immense feeling of dread. This had to do with where we were staying at the time, in Dukinfield, which was Ground Zero for my trauma. I felt a prisoner to northern England and to all the bad memories. Thankfully things got much better after moving to Mossley, my real home-sweet-home in Britain, that quaint storybook village on the edge of the Pennines. Just getting away from red brick made a huge difference to my sanity.

It would be interesting to see what kind of effect the North would have on me after all this time. I have a different perspective on things, and Alaska has pretty much restored any sanity I might have lost. I also have my faith in humanity restored. For a long time, I felt as if the North had chipped away at me, much like the weathered granite in Bodmin Moor. I was hardened and roughed up. Perhaps I still have an edge of hardness, as it's something I will always carry with me as a souvenir. But being toughed up is a good thing as well; I don't go prancing through life like I once did, thinking that the world was all rainbows and butterflies. Of course, living in Alaska, some of those butterflies and rainbows have returned, so I have a bit of both sides now, which is a balanced way to be.

I can't say how Chris and I spent our final moments together. We stayed a few nights with his sister, Danielle, in Ashton-Under-Lyne. Her little rugrats kept us entertained and exhausted at the same time. Chris had an interview in Manchester and I went for one last visit to Mossley, climbing that impossibly steep hill in order to visit people and places I had come to love.

It was one more goodbye at the airport, as Chris came to see me off. In a history of airport goodbyes, this one was significant, as we didn't know when we would next see each other. I felt confident that we would play our roles successfully, and Chris would receive his Green Card in due time. There was a long journey still ahead of me, and for Chris, who would be navigating the maze of American bureaucracy. But there was a long journey behind us as well. Not just our world travels, but the time we had spent together in Britain. The pubs we had sat in, the drinks we had shared while engaging in hours-long conversations, the nights out in Manchester with friends, the music festivals, the spontaneous vacations in Europe, the road trips, the countless miles traveled together...

We had come so far. And still had so far to go.