Margate gets its mojo back

This blog is about family travel around the world without leaving the UK. Impossible? No. Here are some thoughts on art, sand, chips and shells at Margate. This post is by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about books and blogs).  

Margate isn't the only seaside place to slip out of fashion.

Spain's Torremilinos was all the rage in the 1960s (Monty Python mocked it as the Costa del Sol's home of spam and chips); there was Paxos in Greece as the place for your bit of fun in the sun during the 1970s. Where did you go in the 1980s (Kenya?) or 1990s (if Thai backpacking try Alex Garland's The Beach) or 2000s (Croatia) - all subject to tourist trends.

But when the visitors move on towns - even countries - can suffer horribly too. That's what Margate was finding. With it's lovely sandy beach it had been the perfect Victorian resort. Plenty of East Enders - and other Londoners - were still happily visiting in the 1950s and enjoying the famous funfair, Dreamland (closed since 2003). But each year things seemed to go a little more downhill. In the 2001 census it was a place of high unemployment, and even now as you walk around it's very obvious the B&Bs are filled with social tenants, not holidaymakers.

Have you been?
But suddenly Margate's THE place to visit again. In 2012 the new Turner Contemporary exhibition was opened which offers a Tate-art experience (white walls, small labels, a caf downstairs), and expansive sea views out to the Isle of Thanet windfarm. The first exhibition is fabulous - as it should be for JMW Turner had strong links with Margate.

Tie that exhibition to a really friendly place, a super fast train across Kent to St Pancras and the knowledge that this is the town where Tracey Emin grew up and you have plenty of reasons for taking a trip.

Nell, 11, just wanted a day trip featuring ice cream and chips (both eaten on the beach). I also wanted a beach that allows dogs to tear around (until 1 May) and Pete suspected we'd all love Turner and the Shell grotto. Turned out he also found a pub to watch West Ham beat Bolton 4-0 too. What's not to love about a quickie to Margate?

Where in the world?
However, it turns out you can't be anywhere else when you're in Margate. I tried, but it is a uniquely British experience. However the Shell Grotto offers a fantastic puzzle - who could have built an underground temple decorated with 4 million shells without anyone noticing? Despite English Heritage listing it as a Grade 1 site, theories are varied. Although my instinct says this is obviously a Victorian fake (my dad didn't do end of pier exhibitions for nothing you know!) it's fun to hope that it is really a Phoenician temple built in the second half of the first century. These traders (busy trading tin from Cornwall and on to the Continent lived in an area roughly where the Lebanon is now.  For examination of the evidence see Patricia Jane Marsh's booklet The Enigma of the Margate Shell Grotto.

Over to you
What do you think is fun to do in Margate? Or which UK seaside towns offer a little taste of the places other travellers like to visit via planes?

A travel dilemma - can you help?

This blog is about family travel around the world without leaving the UK. Impossible? No. But what happens when your family say there's no option but to fly? This post is by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about books and blogs).   Pic - yes it is of ducks (now with us for 3 weeks). They need to grow their wings. We humans need wings too.

My daughter is presenting me with a lot of big world problems. She's been invited on a school trip to Spain (flying there and back). And now a friend has invited her to stay in their apartment in Spain, at a different time (but it involves two flights as well). If I decide not to think about the financial cost - and instead focus on the opportunity, then she's an amazingly lucky girl, with a good selection of friends and a forward thinking school.

But if I think about the carbon costs, I'm in an utter dilemma because she must not go, at least not by plane. Flying has to be kept to the minimum, and ideally not done. See why in this learned report on low carbon travel from Sustrans.

I have allowed myself to be talked into the school trip - it's all to do with learning the language. But I feel wretched about it.

Her age luckily saves me this year from being evil mum and saying no to the friend's invite (or good citizen and saying no, depending on how you look at it) because the airline doesn't allow unaccompanied minors (ie, under 14s) to fly with it. There's something to praise EasyJet for!

Over to you
What would you do in a situation like this? It seems so simple - say no. Actually I have looked up the London-Madrid rail cost to see if I could take a merry jaunt across Europe to pick her up, but it's very expensive without having pre-booked by two months or more. However if you are organised, or one day wish to be, and can imagine travelling cheaply across Europe by train then start getting to know the maninseat61 because it's FAQs are better than anyones.

Where's that bird from?

This blog is about family travel around the world without leaving the UK. Impossible? No. A half term visit to Wales introduced me to some south american locals.  This post is by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about books and blogs). 


We've had Chilean hens for some years. Now it turns out the two Muscovie ducklings I brought home from Wales also have a South American heritage (so they are not from Moscow as I'd always thought). See pic above of mummy Muscovie and Berry (mostly yellow) and Walden (the other one).


The word "Musk-ovie" - is possibly a reference to their smell (although good news birds, this goes when you're cooked!). An American website tells me that "in southern Europe and northern Africa they are called the Barbary duck. In Brazil, they are known as the Brazilian duck, in Spain the pato, and in the Guianas the Guinea or Turkish duck."


Just like the potato, I think of a Muscovy duck as a traditional local. When it's actually anything but...


Over to you
What's something you use or see or eat that blends in with the landscape to such an extent that you've just about forgotten its original home was far, far away?

World's best long distance walks

This blog is about family travel around the world without leaving the UK. Impossible? No. Here's how to use your walking shoes to take you over the horizon - and away to Rome and even Santiago de Compostela. This post is by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about books and blogs)   

My family is so very close to finishing the Capital Ring - a 70 mile (126km) route circling London. Sometimes I worry about finishing it - we'll end the joy of discovering new bits of London. Highlights include the Brent reservoir used for a long-ago Olympics, the art deco 1930s splendour of Eltham Palace, a peep into the grand schooling of Harrow School and the endless views of London from hills you didn't know existed. Honestly it's like tramping over the seven hills of Rome.

To compensate my loss there are some wonderful long-distance paths around the UK (and nearby) that could perhaps be revisited and allow me to dream up being in another place altogether.

Five best long-distance walks

• Camino de Santiago de Compostela - the route of St James (patron saint's day 25 July). I've met people who have walked this in the sharp winds of April with a baby on their back. I've seen the film with Martin Sheen and son, The Way, and long ago I stayed in the stunning parador (hotel) at Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain. Somewhere in the back of my mind I want to try this 780km journey too, but it's one that will have to wait for the children to leave school. Indeed if you go past the cathedral you can end at Finisterre, which Medievals thought was "the end of the world". More info at this website.
• Walk with the Romans along Hadrian's Wall. We've nearly managed the whole 135km, just a short two, maybe three, day section left between Newcastle and Hexham. The May half term is pencilled in, but we may have to give up on this idea as Nell, 10, is very wary of cows and they will certainly be out in the fields by then. Bulls and all. See a previous entry on this blog here about the moment we reached the end (before quite completing the beginning).
  
• West Highland Way - runs 152km from Glasgow to Fort William uphill. Well, as good as uphill. It's midge heaven and the few chunks I've tried out (along Loch Lomond for instance) are remarkably free of snack shops which makes walking more of a slog. Perhaps this is the one that best echoes Camino de Santiago de Compostela?
  
  
• Coast to Coast - success! Pete and I spent three years popping up and down to the Lake District in order to walk Alfred Wainwright's fabulous 190 mile path (sorry, it has to be miles in respect to AW's memory) from St Bees Head over to Robin Hood's Bay in Yorkshire (dreamt up in 1973, more info here). I'd never heard of Wainwright when Pete first suggested the idea. Now I am willing to watch reruns of his extremely slow TV programme, just to get back in the zen mood of walking through the Lake District with my eyes mostly on a compass rather than mountain tops...
  
  A tip from the cantankerous AW: "If you must take a companion, take one who is silent."
  
  I was quite upset when an energetic friend and her husband managed to cycle 225km on the C2C (a very similar route) in a weekend - the time it took my lumbering feet seemed to add to the magic of the journey. But if you are less hardy, but still speed-inclined try the 12-20 day holidays run by this group.
  
  
• Across India - isn't this what Gandhi did in some form of anti-British protest involving salt? Have you seen the size of India? 

Over to you
Where have you walked in the UK that makes you think you could be somewhere else in the world?

Using locals to speak a new language

This blog is about family travel around the world without leaving the UK. This post is by Nicola Baird 


What's the easiest way to learn a language? I reckon it's necessary to listen very hard to become fluent, and then to try the words and phrases, day after day. I think it is much easier if you can let your subconscious - that bit of your brain that demands habit (mine likes coffee when I wake up) -  kick in. But I don't find learning languages very easy.


"Quel'qu'n"  this may not be spelt right, but I distinctly remember learning the phrase "is anyone in there" after staying for a couple of nights in a Paris apartment with a French family. Because the apartment was crowded there was a serious danger of walking into someone using the bathroom, so the phrase took on ridiculous importance.


In the same way hearing "mira" being repeatedly said by a babysitter dandling my baby daughter helped me learn the Spanish word for look.


Now that my 13 year old has learnt a second language (due to travelling out of the UK all summer, shh not to mention much about this on this blog and besides it was a one-off, and it's Solomon Islands pijin which very few people speak in the UK) I'm trying to encourage her to use the same listen and try techniques to get herself a Spanish GCSE. She actually made the fluent breakthrough after six weeks in the Solomons, and then one rainy day spent making baskets and toys out of coconut leaves (see pic above). And if you ever want to visit that place (the largest uninhabited island in the Pacific), know as Tetepare, see the info here.


Spanish is a fab language, I wish I spoke it. But my efforts over the years mostly in the UK - evening classes, tapes, plus short visits (pre-children & pre-blogging days) to Mexico and also Spain - have probably helped. But my know-how is very weak, so I cannot help my daughter build up her Spanish voccab, essential to get that GCSE which will give her a ticket to uni...


But there's a clever trick you can do too, whatever language you want to speak - use visitors to the UK.


Here in London there are loads of Spanish speakers so I've arranged for Lola to meet up with a Chilean family and help mum cook supper for the two boys one evening after school. 


Hopefully she'll hear phrases like "is anyone in the loo"  or "would you like some more" (all in Spanish!) that will never leave her brain. Actually I'd like to learn like this, but would prefer to go to a tapas bar, so somehow haven't got around to sorting out my language needs. 


If anyone's got any ideas about non-classroom ways of learning a language at home please share them here... Thanks.

Xmas mini breaks

This blog is about family travel without using carbon miles. It is by Nicola Baird.

There's an obscene pleasure in mentioning Christmas - or Christmas shopping - in September. I've been tidying up and happened to uncover a pile of 2007 Christmas cards which can be put to good re-use later this year.

But what really made me wonder about what I might do for December festivities 2011 was seeing an insert from guardianholidayoffers.co.uk/newmarket which cherry picks all the European places that are famously good at celebrating the run-up to Christmas.

BRUSSELS - has a famous market
BARCELONA - has a fabulous market
BOLZANO and MERANO - for the Italian Alpine markets in the Dolmites.
INNSBRUCK - for the alpine markets in the Austrian Tyrol.

The pictures on the brochure are all taken at night; the markets aglow with twinkly lights. But you can easily get the same atmosphere here in the UK, and thanks to my wedding anniversary being in December I've been to loads of Christmas markets.

Cheap tips
Of course every Christmas market is designed to make you part with cash from a cold looking person, despite their layers of coats and scarves, parked in a shed in a town square. Some of the sheds may even be covered in fake snow. Like many visitors (so-called shoppers) I have honed the art of feasting my eyes, which seems a bit mean for all those craft makers. However the food and hot mulled wine stalls still do well.

Even when it's rained, and every year it really has poured, the Christmas markets at Bath, Winchester and Cambridge have been lovely to wander around. There's many more I'd like to visit too, including York and Lincoln.

Given that the Guardian today warns that the average family income has to fall by 10 per cent - thanks to Osbourne and the Tory's absurd policies - maybe you can find a Christmas market a little closer to home for a seasonal treat?

Find a UK Xmas market
Have a look at this website for a huge list of the dates of all UK Christmas markets, they are everywhere from Tetbury to Skipton to Portsmouth...

Spanish gourmet

Pete, Nicola, Lola and Nell spent three months in 2007 travelling around the UK exploring the world. They are back now but still finding there's plenty to see, and lots of low carbon ways to see the world

Spain: there's so much I'd like to know about this country. And thanks to Nell's school organising a week of Spanish activities she at least is learning something. So far there's been flamenco dancing, paella making and a lot of foodie exploration. The eight and nine year old children were even given a jar of Mediterranean veg (aspargus!) to take home from a generous Spanish online gourmet shop, at http://www.ibericalondon.co.uk/.

The students were also asked to abandon their uniform so they could wear red and yellow clothes - which is a lovely way of remembering Spain's complicated flag. Although I'm sure that Spain's World Cup win (2010) means that every football fan knows exactly what it looks like anyway.

Extra tasty teaching
After classes on Wednesday the teachers laid out a table groaning with freshly-made fiesta food so every child could try something - even if it was just a grape or a bit of crusty bread.

Sadly Nell, 9, wasn't so keen on slithers of octopus, the dark, salty anchovies or the tasty gazpatcho. She's not allowed to eat nuts so that ruled out the almond-stuffed olives (I waffled these up) but she loved the tortilla. Phew.

Spanish fiesta

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 10, and Nell, 7, like travelling around Britain on public transport (don’t laugh). We spent three happy months exploring during summer of 2007 but now we’re home, you can still join us for the occasional sightseeing - plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola

Here’s Lola dressed up for her school’s Spanish fiesta in a dress that she reckoned she could swish her skirts, and stamp her feet. she even tried to look menacing as if she was dancing the flamenco.

Yet again this Spanish journey required no effort on our part – the kids get regular Spanish lessons at the school and as part of that the teachers decided to organise a bit of a party. Muy bien as the stickers on Nell's sweatshirt say on the days she's had her bit of Spanish.

Do you speak another language?

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 10, and Nell, 7, like travelling around Britain on public transport (don’t laugh). We spent three happy months exploring during summer of 2007 but now we’re home, you can still join us for the occasional sightseeing - plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola

At the school summer fair we had a storytelling tent for families to tell stories, or read stories or sing songs in their home language. A place to be proud of your mother tongue.

It would have been a runaway success if it had been too hot or too wet.

As it was the tent was host to nine different languages – Arabic, French, Hebrew, Nigerian (Hausa and Yaruba), Solomon Islands Pijin , Spanish (Castilian and Latin American) and Turkish - all enjoyed by children who wanted to chill out or simply listen. Watching the faces of the children hearing a home language in a public place was amazing. One little girl's grin was wider than the Cheshire cat's.

This pic is of our Yaruba reader sharing Heads, shoulders, knees and toes with her audience.

Story food

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 9, and Nell, 6, spent three happy months during summer of 2007 traveling around Britain. Now we’re home, but the travel bug is still there. Join us for the occasional sightseeing plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola

It’s cheating to just go to a restaurant and pretend you are somewhere else. But when the rain is beating down on a winter mini-break it’s a pleasure to do just that. This weekend Pete and I managed to enjoy noodles in a satay sauce and green curry at a Thai restaurant in Bath, earwigging conversations about cricket and art, and then the following night go to Spain.

Visiting La Flamenca is an atmospheric, quick, carbon-light way to get to Spain. It is built into vaults, giving a cave like feeling. I was soon talking about paradors (those glorious Spanish state run posh hotels) and festas, a theme that was easy to maintain seeing as everyone was eating tapas and downing Sangria. Pete saw his opportunity and as a result I now also know a lot about Real Madrid. He of course maintains that he didn’t talk to me about football at all…

Beach life, almost Ibiza

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood whatever the weather. This post is from Nicola

Our friends Debbie & Adam, plus their children, are complete beach babies so it was a pleasure to find ourselves on a beach in Devon with them claiming this was as good as Spain (albeit admitting that in Ibiza the sun is hotter, the sea bluer and the water seems safer and warmer). Adam took it one step further saying he thought “this was the best beach he’d been to in Devon”, which is quite an accolade for someone raised near Dartington.

Arymer Cove – the nearest walkable beach – is gorgeous: a large shingle spot reached by public footpaths along the cliffs or through a very lush green valley. It feels like a smugglers’ spot and they’re aren’t ever more than a couple of other people there – very different from the tented out bits of sand at Bigbury on Sea. Debbie & Adam were ending a camping trip with a beach picnic to enable both sets of kids to have a very long play before they took off for London. After a picnic of Devon apple juice, local cheeses etc the girls dared the waves, Ethan networked, Adam explored the iron pyrite rocks that were glistening in such a way that maybe they should be rechristened idiot’s silver (rather than fool’s gold) and Debbie and I lay chatting as we sunned. It was one of our most relaxed days on this trip.

Spanish madness

Nicola, Pete, Lola and Nell want to travel the world with a difference. We hope to get a taste of many countries without adding to climate change (with needless emissions from aeroplanes) or having to waste hours of holiday time in airport terminals. We hope our adventures inspire you to take a Grand Tour of your neighbourhood. This post is from Nicola (look to the far left of the pic to enjoy the crazy window designs on the Scottish Parliament. Pete is looking longingly towards Arthur's Seat)

Scotland's new parliament building opposite Holyrood Palace may not have many signs up, but it doesn't need them thanks to the crazy, hot, eccentric design provided by a Spanish architect.

Pacing around its fluid roofs, or even driving past in a tour bus or taxi, you know you are in the presence of a building with immense character. It's architecture, but not as most of us know it. An unmissable experience.

The building - housing the 129 SMPs (Scottish members of parliament) was hugely controversial, not least because it cost #414 million pounds, approx 400 million over budget.

Perhaps worse was its late opening (2004 instead of 2001) and the architect, Spaniard Enric Miralles dying early on in the job (July 2001) taking many secrets to the grave despite the project being taken over by his widow Benedetta Tagliabue (EMBT/RMJM Ltd).

It won the Stirling Prize for Architecture - nothing else stood a chance really. This is what the judges said about the building: "[it] manifests itself as an attempt at an organic transition between the city and the drama of the Scottish countryside surrounding it" - an effect helped by its landscaping. The ability of both the design and construction teams to realise a building of this complexity is truly remarkable."

We've only seen it from the outside as I wasn't sure that Nell could cope with another shush and listen hour (ie, a tour), but it must be even more stunning inside. She loved slithering down the railed steps at the back of the SMPs' private offices though, and later on clambering up and down the wild flower garden/park linking back to front. And after we'd climbed nearby Arthur's Seat all of us enjoyed reading Scottish truisms and mottos carved into granite on the Royal Mile side as if the building was a book, to be judged by it's cover.

So I did, and this was my favourite (from Gerard Manley Hopkins):

"What would the world be once bereft of wet and wildness?

Let them be left.

Oh let them be left.

Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.