A couple of trips to Scotland (with a day in London between)

Ramesses the Great.

About a week ago, at the invitation of Gresham College, Sue and I traveled to London so I could deliver a lecture, The Rise and Fall of Sourdough: 6,000 Years of Bread.  For the truly intrepid you can watch a video of the lecture or read a transcript at the link.

Much to my surprise a lot of people turned out.  Who knew there were so many bread-heads in London?

Before my talk we had a couple of hours in the British Museum.  Within minutes we saw the Rosetta Stone, the Elgin Marbles taken from Athens' Acropolis, Assyrian reliefs of a kingly lion hunt that were ready to jump from the stone, and some of the best and largest Egyptian stoneworks in the world.

London bobbies offering an assist to Chinese tourists.

A detail from the Assyrian reliefs.  The foot is about 18 inches long. Look at the detail in the fringe.

Inch-high hieroglyphs covering an 8-foot sarchophogus.

From the Parthenon.  This is the head of one of the horses that drew the chariot of the moon goddess Selene across the night sky. Note the fatigue.

Being muggles we had to take the normal train from London.

After the lecture at Gresham we took the train to Edinburgh, Scotland.  Just six days earlier we were in Edinburgh for the day to see tourist sites.  This time we went so I could take a weekend course on sourdough baking at Bread Matters.  Our first trip to Edinburgh was like this.

And this.

But we did see this.

Edinburgh Castle.

After London, while I was indoors baking, Sue was outside enjoying cloudless skies and temperatures in the 60s.

How I spent my weekend.

 


Some of Sue's discoveries.

Finally, a photo of not a sheep.

Our lodging.

The view toward our cottage from across the valley.

Astute observers among you will notice that in all the photos we have sent from the UK the landscape is beautiful and austere.  There are no trees.  Sue discovered that what the British refer to as a forest is nothing more than a dense plantation of conifers to be mowed down like silage corn.

Finally, can you look at this delicious pub food, called Bangers and Mash, and not giggle?

Cheers.

The next three weeks are chock-a-block full.  Sue's brother Marty joins us for the first two.  We'll tour the Yorkshire Dales with friend Amanda and my colleague Beth for a few days.  Then Beth and I have a conference to attend in Manchester.  At the end of week 1, Marty, Sue, and I head to Paris where Sue and I have to work.  I'm teaching a five day class called A World Food and Agriculture.  Sue will be at her computer.  Sue and I get back to England the same day my niece and me Mum arrive for week three. Phew.

Hiking in the Lake District

The view from our B&B in Keswick.  We climbed the tall peak in the back center of the photo.

Lancaster is right on the edge of Lake District National Park. We went for a weekend and after visiting William Wordsworth's Dove Cottage (a lot more interesting than I anticipated) we hiked and hiked. Click on any photo to open it up to full screen.)

Among the ferns on the way up.  They have not started regrowing this year.

Nearly there.

A 1000 feet or so above Derwentwater.

Sue has set a goal of taking a photo of every sheep in the UK and I am doing the same for every stonewall.

 

To get to the other side, of course.

Lake Buttermere.

My version of a sheep. (It's actually a breed of Scottish Highland Cow.)

Baaaaaaaa.

Eric and his sheep searching for something worth eating.

Views form other hikes in the Lake District.

A glacial valley.

Lake Buttermere waiting to be circumnavigated.

Another henge.

Making Bread

Here are three adventures related to bread.

The rooster at the watermill.

Sue and I took a field trip to the Little Salkeld Watermill in the Eden Valley of Cumbria.

One of two waterwheels.  The mill dates from the 17th century and might be 200 years older than that.  The owners aren't certain.

The water turns all kinds of gears and is used to power all kinds of devices like hoisting heavy bags of grain to the third floor where it can be poured into a hopper for the millstones.

The stoneground flour was soft as baby powder (I purchased wholemeal, rye, spelt, and malted wheat) and the millers were amiable and highly informative.

Freshly milled wheat flour.

The millers that operate a 300-year-old grain mill.

A mile away in the middle of a farm is one of the many henges in the Lake District and one of those British cars that just about makes you hear the background music for a BBC special.

Back home in Lancaster we had sourdough pizza night with a penguin and learned to make pizza Florentine from John and Nicky and the penguin.

Nicki making sourdough bread.  She's a natural!

Sue assembling pizzas; John checking for doneness.

Dexter with his creation.

Pizza Florentine.

I also took a trip to the National Collection for Yeast Cultures where my sourdough starters are now being analyzed for their biodiversity of yeasts and bacteria.

The liquid nitrogen bath holding more than 4,000 species of yeast.

Where my sourdoughs will now be stored.

From the street in Lancaster and the train.