United Kingdom & Ireland Travel Articles

On the outskirts of Norwich, this is a small nature reserve on the flood plain of the River Yare and is an area of marsh, fen, dykes , scrub and wet woodland. There is a display board with information and a map at the entrance to the reserve. A well made surfaced footpath runs across the reserve, coming out onto Marston Lane which can then followed back to the entrance. Beginning on higher ground above the marsh, the footpath goes through trees to the River Bure. This is narrow and slow flowing here. Beyond is marshland. At a junction, the footpath turns right across the marsh to rejoin Marston Lane. (Taking the left fork at the junction takes you to the railway line and onto Church Lane into Easton village.) Cattle...

History and Background The Grand Western Canal was constructed in the early 1810s and served as a link between the English Channel and Bristol Channel, avoiding the long and perilous boat journey round the Cornish peninsula, where a lot of shipping was lost. Horse-Drawn Barges were one of the most economical and fastest means of commercial transport. This was one of the very early canals to be built. Work began in 1810 and navies completed the first 11.25 miles between Tiverton and Lowdwells in four years as it could be built without locks, tunnels or big embankments. It was dug to a depth of 5-6 feet and sealed with puddling clay to keep the water in. Building costs for the next section to Taunton escalated as it needed 2 locks...

An Overview At the junction of the Rivers Exe and Lowman on the eastern edge of Exmore, Tiverton is a busy market town serving mid Devon. It is remarkably unspoilt with many Georgian and Victorian buildings. Two walking trails explore the town. The Romans had an auxillary fort here and the Saxons settled in the C7th. The Normans arrived and stamped their authority over the area by replacing the wooden Saxon church by a stone church, and building a castle next to it. Tiverton’s wealth came from the wool trade, with wool being carried by a leat to the port at Topsham. This can still be seen running down the centre of Castle Street and at Coggan's Well, in Fore Street Wool money was used to rebuild St Peter’s Church...

Dunster is a pretty village on north east edge of Exmoor near the coast. The years have treated the village kindly and it is still unspoilt and possibly one of the best preserved medieval villages in England. William the Conqueror granted the area to William de Mohun who built a motte and bailey castle here and asked monks from Bath Abbey to establish a priory. Little now is left of the Priory apart from the Priory Church, now the parish church (#2), the monks’ lodging, now a private house attached to the church, and two of the medieval gateways into the village. Dunster’s wealth came from wool and the production of cloth. In the C12th, Dunster was on the coast at the mouth of the River Avill and was the main trading port for...

Minehead is overshadowed by the bulk of North Hill, the start of Exmoor, with its harbour nesting beneath it. In the Middle Ages, Minehead was major trading centre, particularly for the export of wool and cloth. The C15th Church of St Michael on North Hill had a beacon light for ships approaching the harbour. It is still a popular, although somewhat old fashioned sea side town and the terminus of the North Somerset Railway. It is the main town and shopping centre for the area with the wide tree lined Avenue. When sea side holidays became popular in the C19th, pleasure steamers also stopped here. The arrival of the railway in the late C19th brought even more visitors and a massive building programme. The impressive Town Hall...

Running between Minehead and Bishops Lydeard, three miles west of Taunton, this is Britains longest standard gauge heritage railway. The line was closed by British Rail in 1971 and was virtually derelict when taken over by a group of enthusiasts in 1976. The Bristol and Exeter Railway arrived in 1845, improving communication in the area. A network of connecting lines was soon proposed designed to provide an alternative for the long and dangerous trip around Land’s End by boat. The West Somerset Mineral Railway was opened in 1856 bringing from the iron mines in the Bredon Hills to Watchet, where it was taken by boat to iron furnaces in South Wales. Sir Peregrine Palmer Ackland of Stogursey who owned large areas of land in the...

Exmouth is a busy holiday resort at the mouth of the River Exe, with a long sandy beach and was always an important commercial port. This closed in the 1990s and is now a marina surrounded by upmarket modern housing. The entrance to the marina is now used by the Starcross ferry, a water taxi service and Stuart Cruises, who run several different cruises around the area. This describes the short 90 minute cruise which also included swinging along the sea front in Exmouth before heading back to the River Exe. There are views of the town, church tower and Victoria Jubilee clock tower. On the way back, there are views of Dawlish and down to Berry Head. Dawlish Warren is a massive sand spit stretching across the mouth of...

Sidmouth is a lovely old fashioned sea side resort on the south Devon coast beneath red sandstone cliffs. It feels as if it has been passed by by modern life. Although it was mentioned in Domesday Book, it was little more than a village until C18th and never had a harbour. It became fashionable in Georgian and Victorian times and Queen Victoria was brought here for holidays when a child. The arrival of railway in 1870s led to development mass tourism. The front is lined with splendid terrace houses The compact town centre stretches up from the beach with a range of small shops, many still independently owned. Sidmouth is very compact and repays exploring on foot. Tourist Information on Ham Lane have free maps and trail...

Penrhyn Castle near Bangor is just off the North Wales Expressway (A55) and is a splendid neo-Norman castle overlooking the Menai Straits. The tall square keep dominates the castle with its round windows, arcading and chevrons. In the early C19th the land was inherited by George Hay Dawkins Pennant on the death of his second cousin, Robert Pennant, who had made his fortune from Jamaican sugar and the local slate quarries. George Hay Dawkins Pennant asked the famous architect, Thomas Hopper, to build him a Neo-Norman castle. Dawkins had visited Kilpeck Church in Hereford and decided this should be the inspiration for the carving and decoration of his new castle. The tall tower with the family rooms was constructed around the earlier...

This is a fascinating open air folk museum with over 35 buildings depicting rural life in the Highlands from the 1700s to the mid 1900s. Aultlaire Croft are the only original buildings here and date from the mid C19th. They rare shown representing a working 1930s farm. Buildings in the Middle Village have been brought and reassembled here and include workshops as well as a school, church and houses. The 1700s township is a reconstruction of the small settlement of Easter Raitts, which was on one of the old drove roads above the River Spey. It was used in filming scenes from the TV series Outlandewr. The large modern wooden buildings by the Aultlaire Croft contain the conservation laboratory as well as many other artefacts and...

I’ve been wanting to travel on this line for more years than I care to remember, so it had a lot to live up to! Often described as ‘the Line to the Isles’ it regularly features in the list of top Railway journeys in the world. It definitely lives up to this description. The railway from Glasgow to Fort William was completed in 1894. The extension to Mallaig was approved the following year and the line across some of the most challenging landscape in Britain was eventually opened in 1901. Built by Robert McAlpine, perhaps the most famous structure on the line is the Glenfinnan viaduct, one of the first rail viaducts to be built of concrete. The viaduct was built by manual labour with horses carrying materials . There is a...

An eighty mile trip from coast to coast Before the arrival of the railways, transport links in the north of Scotland were very poor and most relied on travel by sea. Inverness was the county town of Inverness-shire, which stretched from the east of Scotland across to Skye and parts of the Outer Hebrides. The quickest way between Inverness and those outlying parts of Inverness-shire, was by train to Glasgow and then by steamer to the isles. A railway line between Inverness and Dingwall was opened in 1862, and was extended to Wick and Thurso. In 1870, an extension was built from Dingwall to Stromeferry, where there was a ferry connection to Skye and the Isle of Lewis. The section between Stromeferry and Kyle of Lochalsh...

The Strathspey Railway is a preserved steam railway running through the Cairngorms National Park. The original line was built between Aviemore, Grantown on Spey and Forres. It provided a link between the line from Inverness and Aberdeen and the line from Inverness to Edinburgh. The line was closed in 1965 as part of the Beeching cuts. In 1971, the Strathspey Railway Company, a group of enthusiasts, was formed to buy, restore and run services along a section of the closed line. With the support of the Highlands and Islands Development Board, they purchased five miles of track between Aviemore and Boat of Garten and began running service in 1978. They have now bought a further eleven miles to Granntown on Spey. This has been opened as...

This is the only funicular mountain railway in Britain, ascending the northern slopes of Cairn Gorm . The line ascends 453m (just under 1500’ ) in a distance of just under 2km, with a maximum gradient of 42.8%. The two metre gauge track is on stilts raised above the ground surface. The two cars are connected by a steel cable, with the weight of the descending car hauling up the lower car. A drive motor located in the top station controls the speed. There is one passing loop. Each car carries 100 passengers and the journey time is about 4 minutes. The line opened in 2001, replacing a ski lift which was often closed by high winds. It closed in 2018 due to structural as well as health and safety issues. The Scottish...

Salisbury is on the tourist radar as it is close to Stonehenge and runs a daily bus trip there. That is probably all most visitors see of Salisbury, although a few may get as far as the Cathedral, one of the best Early English Cathedrals in the country and with the tallest spire and a copy of Magna Carta. This is doing Salisbury a disservice as it is an attractive and prosperous market town with as good shopping area and plenty of old buildings. It repays a visit in its own right. At confluence rivers Avon, Nadder and Bourne on edge Salisbury Plain, the original settlement was Old Sarum, site of an iron age hill fort, built on a hill to the north of Salisbury. By the early C13th Old Sarum was considered was cramped and squalid...

The Celtic Saint, Brelade, founded a small community on a rocky ledge overlooking a sheltered bay in the C5th and there has been a church on this site from at least 1000AD. When Jersey was divided up into parishes in the C12th, this became the Parish Church of St Brelade. The church has one of the few surviving Medieval chapels, the Fisherman’s chapel next to it. St Brelade’s Church dates from the late C11th and has some of the earliest Norman work on the island. The chancel is the oldest part of the building. By the mid C12th most of the nave and saddleback tower had been built. Transepts and a north aisle were added during the C14th and the nave was extended. The small round tourelle by the south porch, contains a spiral...

St Matthew's Church was built in 1840 as a chapel of ease to save parishioners the long uphill walk to the parish church of St Lawrence ,well over a mile away. From the outside is is a rather uninspiring box like white church. It would still be an unremarkable church if it hadn’t been for Florence, Lady Trent, widow of Jesse Boot who had founded the Boots the Chemist shops. In 1934, she commissioned the French glass designer, Rene Lalique, to refurbish the church in memory of her husband. Not only is the glass work stunning, it is also unique as the moulds were destroyed and there is nowhere else like this. The first experience of Lalique's remarkable work is on the two glass panels of the main door, of an angel with crossed...

Built on the closest point to Mainland France, this is one of the finest examples of a medieval fortress on Jersey , surrounded by steep cliffs and the sea on three sides. The headland overlooking Gorey Bay has been settled since the Neolithic times and there was an Iron Age ditch and ramparts here. Originally referred to as Gorey or the King’s Castle, it seems to have been given the name Mont Orgueil Castle in the C15th. It was a the seat of Royal authority until the construction of Elizabeth castle. Jersey became part of the Duchy of Normandy in the C10th and became a possession of the English Crown when William, Duke of Normandy, was crowded William I of England in 1066. When King John lost Normandy to the French King in...

Tucked away in the fertile Les Vauxbelets Valley in the centre of Guernsy, the Little Chapel was a work of art and labour of love by Brother Déodat. His plan was to create a miniature version of the famous grotto and basilica at Lourdes in France, decorated with pieces of broken pottery, pebbles and shells. The version you see today is actually the third version. The first c hapel, measuring just 9 feet long by 4.5 feet wide, was criticised, so Brother Deodat spent the following night demolishing the building. He soon set to work again and, in July 1914, the grotto was completed and officially blessed. The portly Bishop of Portsmouth visited in 1923 and was unable to get through the door. A mortified Brother Deodat again...

Herm is the small island, three miles off the east coast of Guernsey. The southern end is flat with sandy beaches while the north end is high rugged cliffs. To the north is the even smaller island of Lihou. This is linked to Herm by a tidal causeway at spring tides. It is an important conservation area and the house is available for hire. Herm has been settled since Neolithic times and Robert’s Cross is the remains of a later neolithic burial chamber is on the north side of the Island between between Le Petit Monceau and Le Grand Monceau. In the C6th, Christian missionaries visited the island, including followers of St Tugual, a Celtic saint. A chapel was established to his memory and still in use today. From the middle...