Travels with my brother

Julian with a new mate in Edinburgh

I managed to get on the same flight back to the UK as my brother which made life a lot easier - even though Singapore airlines refused to upgrade him (shame on you Singapore air). Julian coped really well with his first long-haul flight since he was 9 years old, and was treated nicely by the airline and airport staff.

When we got to my place in Tunbridge Wells it became evident that there was no way he would be able to hang out there on his own as the stairs were just too tricky for him to manage on his own. That was a total bummer and meant we had to re-jig some of his holiday, but fortunately he was able to stay longer in Dundee with his friend Eileen, who's place is all one level.


Once we'd both recovered from jet-lag, we threw ourselves into a sightseeing frenzy, so that Julian could tick off everything on his list. He did a hell of a lot, and quite a bit on his own (including going to Ireland, and finding his way around London). Travelling is hard enough when you are able-bodied, and Julian took it all in his stride. Good on ya bro! He was lucky enough to be around for the Last Night of the Proms in Hyde Park, and we also went to the Tower of London, the Dungeon, Madam Tussauds, the Natural History Museum, and to Legoland (where I enjoyed myself immensely, I must confess) amongst other things. Julian fulfilled his wish of having a beer in a pub in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales and is now a cider aficianado.

No trip to the UK is complete without a visit to Primark!

Julian went off to Cardiff and then to Dundee, Stirling, St Andrews and Edinburgh, before returning to my place to go to the yearly reenactment of the Battle of Hastings. The battle was great fun, and was basically full of people who haven't grown up yet putting on costumes and playing at pretend. Why I haven't taken up this sort of thing years ago, I don't know, as clearly it is a hobby that I would be well suited to. It was all quite professional; there was a market where you could buy food and anything remotely related to medieval life. Families were everywhere - what kid wouldn't love this day out? - and you had to get in early to nab a good position to watch the battle. There was an official commentator, and he got the crowd into the spirit of things, as we hoorayed Harold and booed William; then the charging of horses, and clashing of swords got underway and the Bayeaux tapestry came to life. Predictably the outcome was William 1, Harold 0.

This appeared over the field, just before the battle. A good omen for William?...

The next day Julian and I headed off to Llangollen (pronounced Clan-goth-in, if you're interested) as Julian wanted to visit the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. Llangollen is very cute and quaint, and most of the locals speak Welsh. We stayed at Riverside Mews, which as it suggests is alongside the River Dee. We walked practically every inch of Llangollen, and went to visit Plas Nywydd, a gloriously gothic house. We sampled welsh fudge (which tasted suspiciously like NZ fudge...), welsh oggies, welsh cheese, welsh beer, welsh cider, but I think we were most taken with the only establishment that was open on a Monday night - the chinese restaurant, where we were given a choice of rice or chips with our meal!

Autumn hits Llangollen

Plas Nywydd

From Wales, Julian went on to Dublin, thus fulfilling another life-long ambition to visit the Guinness factory. He now has enough Guinness-related paraphenalia to furnish an Irish pub. he also went out to County Wicklow to see where we Emmetts came from long, long ago.


Anyway, despite a few hiccups - especially with transport, Julian had a good holiday and I had a fun time hanging out with him and showing him around. Ooh, and big-ups to Madam Tussauds who let disabled people in for free!