England Day Two - Getting Reaquainted

If you know anything about England you know that the hills and dales of this lovely country are green green green.  And you also know that those hills and dales don't get that green because the sun is always shining in England.

You also know that the temperatures in May are not in the 70s and often not even in the 60s.

As fate would have it, along with that book I left on my bedroom floor, were my warm sweaters.  So Day Two consisted of a little shopping.

Sound fishy?  Hmmm...

A trip to Tunbridge Wells, the "town" of "down the town", is a necessary for me.  For one thing: they have a Starbucks.  And for another, they also have one of my favorite bookshops: Hall's.

Hall's is situated on a corner, down a hill, in, what appears to me, to be the older part of TW.  It is the English second-hand bookshop personified.  Lots of musty old books shoved into musty old shelves in musty cramped quarters.

I have no idea where they get their stock or if they've even added anything new this century, but I always manage to find something that I absolutely need.  This trip I found an old book on butterflies including wonderful colored plates.  I also found an old German book on Alpine Flowes with glorious color pictures.

Be prepared when you go to England that your American dollar is worth less than half of the British Pound.  In other words, £10 is not $10.  But hey, this is vacation and you're allowed to spend 20 bucks on a tattered old book if you want to.

Our stately home visit for Day Two was Penshurst Place. 

Again, a private home though this one had public rooms to tour (but no picture-taking in this house even thought it isn't National Trust).  Also, lovely grounds and a nice gift shop so you can spend twice as much as anything's worth and come away with a smile on your face.

The day was very overcast, and the sky, though ominous looking, made for some terrific photos,  You can take photos of the grounds.  Or maybe you can't but you don't have the 150 yr old smiling granny following you around as you do in the house.  I snapped to my heart's content.

Penshurst also has a tea room.  Not in the style of the beloved Cherry Trees it offered, forgive me for being such an elitist when it comes to cream teas, a kind of cheesey version of a cream tea that comes with a little vacuum-packed plastic tub of clotted cream.  Which positively strips the "quaint" from a cream tea lickety-split.

I can't remember what I had to eat at Penshurst but I assure you it wasn't a "cream" tea that comes with a little vacuum-packed plastic tub of clotted "cream".  I am quite adamant in wanting my cream tea to come with the clotted cream in a little glass bowl.  I don't care if the clotted cream in that little glass bowl was actually scooped out of a vacuum-packed plastic tub.  The presentation is part of the allure and makes it a bona fide cream tea as far as I'm concerned.

Of the evening the Drawbridge's wanted to take us to an American-style restaurant.  Something & Benny's (can't remember what the "Something" was).  Not sure if there are any in the States as I'd not heard of this restaurant before but I gave it two thumbs up for having wonderful service and piping hot food.  Certainly, that's what Americans have come to expect whenever they're dining out, eh?  And completely ignored the fact that our TGI Friday's-style meal cost about $40 per person including the totally unnecessary tip.

A word about tipping and how favorably Americans are viewed by restaurant servers across England.  Tipping is not necessary, not expected and always enthusiastically accepted with an "Are you sure?".  Even if it's just £1 ($2).  Can you imagine an American server asking you if you're sure you want to leave them 2 bucks on a $38 meal?

Anyway, in England, Americans are known to be good tippers.  It's so nice to be regarded highly by somebody for something when you're on foreign soil.  Even if you have to pay for it.

As we ate dinner we talked of what would be on the next day's itinerary and also had an indepth conversation on gypsies.  It just so happened that a caravan of gypsies were camping out in the parking lot of the restaurant and we felt obliged to discuss that over our meal.  Apparently, gypsies are allowed to camp out in parking lots or the like for 24- or 48-hours before they're shooed along by the local constabulary.

But such is a nomad's life.  And we all agreed that gypsies must be doing pretty well for themselves as they all seemed to be driving Jeep Grand Cherokees and pulling nice mobile homes.

Peter also shared a compelling story of a little dog kidnapped by a band of gypsies which was utimately returned to his rightful owners after a bit of gyspy-style bartering.  It was all quite moving and, thankfully, had a happy ending.

In the end, when all was said and done, we concluded another good day.  I had already acclimated myself to the cloudy and cold English weather, learned a lot about gypsies and had a couple of new sweaters to keep me warm and a couple of smelly old books to add to my library.  I went to bed with a smile on my face and looking forward to...

Day Three, please stay tuned...

Comments

[Teresa L. Kaiser]

I've got to see England. Wait, I don't need to see England. You've described and photographed your experience so well, I feel like I'm in England.

[Draw]

Frankie and Benny's was teh American style restuarant. It's what I imagined America to be before I came to America and found out it was exactly like that, just more so.
About the cream teas... I've had more cream teas in the past 3 years than in the previous 30. It says a lot about Cherry trees when you consider that we've had cream teas in various parts of the country and even in the home of cream teas and still nothing comes close to the first one we experienced together. I still remember the slight look of doubt on your face as you smothered what you thought was a biscuit with jam and then this gloopy boiled cream that seemed to have dried bits on it. But after the first bite, I think you were hooked.