UK

Anticipation ↑ Back to top

In 1979, as an innocent boy from a Queensland country town, with an air ticket for travelling once around the world and no money, I flew to Israel and 6 months later to England and then headed to Germany for 6 months, returning to England and then heading home to Australia. Along the way I encountered many 'characters' and those stories are for another book.

UK was chosen as a destination as my sister, Patricia, was living in Cambridge and on my second visit to England, I 'gave her away' on behalf of my father to an affable curate - Chris Butt. Chris is possibly the least stuffy Englishman I have ever met, and my sister had made such an impact in her work and church life that the church was packed for her wedding. Despite having been mugged the night before and sporting a 'shiner' (a black eye), I did not entirely embarrass my sister.

Many years later, with a 4-year-old Arien, and an 8-year-old Brooke, I visited England, this time taking in many of its glorious sites which I had been too poor and too immature to visit previously. This trip was a gift from my Aunt Helen who left a substantial amount in her will for me and I wish I could have recounted to her the joy we had in that visit.

Later still, we travelled to Italy as a family, minus Arien, who was commissioned to guard the house and complete study - one of which he fulfilled. Italy was such a revelation for a student of history. I came to terms with many elements of the ancient pax romana, including the slaves who lived underground, the moralising Romans who had overcome the progressive and delightful Etruscans, the wonders of engineering and the borrowing and appropriation of Greek culture. Meanwhile, the people everywhere we went were delightful and I resolved that, should I ever live somewhere else, it might be in Italy.

My experience of Germany was narrow indeed. Having worked 'black' and having no money to travel anywhere, Germany was the surrounds of a tiny village, Bookholzberg, and the inside of the Freizeitheim where I worked as a domestic. I experienced some of the culture courtesy of my employers. One of my workmates, a young local girl, declared me "dreckig' and 'faul' (dirty and lazy) which gave me not a moment of discomfort and, in terms of German directness, was probably akin to say she was in love with me.

This trip is a blend of joyful family reunion with my sister and nieces and a personal pilgrimage. I'm drawn to the places where the German figures who have so captivated me lived and created. My heart belongs to German composers, Bach above all. Even as a non-believer, I find the Luther Bible's German particularly compelling – so clear, plain, and direct. It's the unpretentious language Luther used, the language of the streets (Umgangssprache), that truly resonates for me.

For my wife, Robyn, Cornwall holds a special place, especially Rick Stein's hometown and restaurant. Cornwall was the 'corner' of England we did not visit, and we are keen to see what it will offer.

We hope you can join us as we travel. We will post daily updates and photos in various media, and I will write as meaningful reflections as I am capable of to accompany anecdotes from the trip.

It's a long way to ... ↑ Back to top

Australia is a country that may never be invaded, at least in the conventional understanding of invasion, simply because it's so damn far from anywhere. On a flight untroubled by turbulence or a sick child (Nicola was sick for the whole leg of our plane trip to Italy) there was plenty of time to reflect on just how far it is to the other side of the earth. The aircraft was travelling, for most part in excess of 800km/hr. To get a sense of this, an aircraft would go from a distant dot to roaring past you in under five seconds.

Yet, even at a speed that is almost beyond intuitive grasp, the first leg from Australia to Singapore takes nearly 8 hours. That's a whole day shift. Nearly half of that time you are flying over Australia. On the second leg, you are flying for nearly 13 hours. In our trip, that was flying over Asia for over two-thirds of the trip with the whole of western Europe just a small part at the end.

It's just a bloody long way.

We all yearn for the trip which is uneventful. We got it. Brisbane to Singapore was smooth as silk. Singapore to London had a few more bumps, but only a few. And the transit was rushed, but uneventful.

Speaking of a long way

Changi Airport is absurdly big. For a country where real estate is so scarce, the airport is huge. Travel between the 4 terminals is by light rail. Terminal 5 is being built is is set to dwarf all the current terminals. Really? Will you be required to take a domestic flight to get between terminals?

So many flights are coming in and out that the huge boards providing flight information must cycle through pages and pages. We gave up trying to read them. Faster to just Google the flight. Thankfully, as we were disembarking, I was logging into the Changi Wi-Fi while walking. Note to self - always get on to airport Wi-Fi in the first minute of disembarking. Heathrow is also huge, but seems to be somewhat more rationally organised.

We thought that Robyn's bionic metal knees might trigger alarms when boarding, which they did as we boarded for the second leg of our journey (pun intended). No need to show the doctor's report - they are going to make sure that those fake legs are not filled with explosives. And those two long scars aren't a dead give away?

It's quite an experience being translated from a country town where no-one speaks another language and brown and black people are rare enough to draw the eye, to a world in which you must strain to hear what language might be being spoken, even from English speakers. As I stood in line to purchase expensive and quite insipid coffee and pasties, a pair of stunning black girls who could have stepped directly out of any African country chatted away in the only language I know other than English - German. Forget the blond, blue-eyed Aryan stereotype which was never factual anyway. Everyone must now acknowledge that appearance gives no clues as to culture.

London

London was as I remembered it - big, bustling and scary. I had imagined that the rail system would have been hopeless. When I first went to England 45 years ago, Thatcher was busy selling British Rail to her millionaire mates. By my second trip 22 years ago, the rail system was a mess and frightfully expensive. But our trip across to my niece's place in central London was unremarkable except for the friendly and helpful conductors whose patience I surely tested with too many questions.

Those humans faces that still walk the platforms in their tidy uniforms are a comfort to someone who has no patience with electronic systems designed by information technology undergraduates who got an E for most of their assignments. As a part time web developer and programmer I realise the real reason that people hate technological developments that are supposed to improve service, is that it is actually stupid, confusing and ineffective.

We enjoyed a long languid evening with my niece in uncharacteristically warm weather. A tasting meal, casual chatting, catching up with cold drinks, clinking ice, entertained by two little girl engaged with everything - what more would you add? Or, as I quote to my children "I wonder how the rich people live?"

London living ↑ Back to top

We’ve encountered unusually warm weather — fresh, clear mornings giving way to languid afternoons in the low-20s. The sunshine has beckoned the opening of the concertina doors to the backyard of Hannah (my niece) and her husband Tom, where a paddling pool now sits inflated, and the BBQ sizzled on our first evening together — a scene more typical of Queensland than London.




The warmth also called for a stroll in the park with their two spirited daughters — bold, independent, and delightfully fearless. It was a joy to watch them climb, slide, roll and careen about, while nearby, more 'cautious' parents hovered nervously over their own children. Families were out in force, and the fairground and ice-cream vans were doing brisk business.

Like most English homes, Hannah and Tom’s house rises rather than spreads. Steep staircases connect rooms that look either onto the street or out over the garden.



Terraced houses dominate here, with detached homes mostly reserved for the countryside or more affluent suburbs. Recent design trends to open up the backs of homes feel especially welcome — creating flexible, sunlit spaces ideal for young families.

Interestingly, electric vehicle charging from power poles seems quite common — a practical solution in a city where driveways and garages are rare luxuries.

Birmingham ↑ Back to top

After a comfortable hour’s journey from Euston, we’re greeted by my sister Tricia and her husband Chris. Now settled in Birmingham, they’ve taken to the city’s vibe — far more welcoming than London and refreshingly less crowded. With a population similar to Brisbane’s, it seems every local is ready with a cheery smile and a burst of gloriously unintelligible English.

We’re also met by an enormous mechanical bull — a striking legacy of the Commonwealth Games. Unlike the cliché-ridden, winking Matilda the Kangaroo that made us cringe in Brisbane back in 1982, the Brummie Bull brims with meaning. Every component of its massive frame pays homage to Birmingham’s industrial past, a proud, gritty symbol of the city’s transformation (explored in a later story on The Black Country).



Riding the efficient public transport, we were treated to Tricia’s running commentary — albeit without the Brummie accent — as she pointed out landmarks of the city that, like so many in Britain, has grown in layered rings around its oldest centre. Brummie is the official term for the dialect and a demonym for people from the city. The term itself comes from "Brummagem," an older, local name for Birmingham.

Cars and cars

Once again, I was struck, when we arrived at Chris and Tricia's, by the presence of so many cars. (Wisely, they chose not to own a car). I remember 22 years ago being struck by how different the streets were from my visit 45 years ago, when few people seemed to own a car. Certainly, this photo from Birmingham in the sixties tells an interesting story.

The Black Country ↑ Back to top

We visited The Black Country Living Museum. Not so much 'living' as 'immersive'. At least in 3 dimensions and the artefacts from each era. Obviously, due to modern sensitivities, the smell of the slaughterhouse, the ubiquitous dust and perhaps the smell of human waste not treated to the extent we might in modern days are missing. Evoking the sensory and material world of industrial Britain without necessarily replicating every discomfort is a choice highlighting the fine line between authenticity and visitor experience.

The museum curates different eras like time capsules — some homes lit by gas, others by early electricity, showing the incremental changes in domestic life. A recreated schoolroom and sweet shop stir up nostalgia - for me, Stringer's shop at the gate of the primary school I attended.

We did not quite have time to experience the harsh instructional tone of the schoolteacher but the actor in the sweet shop did give us a live demonstration of the process of sweet making and, naturally, only being human, we were tempted to purchase some sweets. The interaction in the sweet shop collapsed time for a moment - letting me feel the tug of my own childhood. Sadly, the era was hard lollies only. My favourite was bananas.

I did enter the hardware store where I asked for 3 nails. The actor rightly pointed out that I could buy anything. I can just remember as a child when our town's hardware store (I believe run by Mr Barret) had each item in tiny boxes on shelves and nails were measured out, not self-served in a plastic packet from a hook, underscoring how much the rhythm of daily life has changed — not just in what we buy, but how we buy it.

There’s something about asking for three nails - somewhat cheeky in a modern context but really a modest, practical request in essence, and it captures the spirit of a time when people bought only what they needed, when they needed it. Of course, my three-nail request was tongue in cheek, but a reminder of the market dynamics of previous eras. We boast today of 'just in time' manufacture, yet what I observed was the epitome of this kind of production - the order made there and then 'before your eyes'. Our current "just-in-time" systems pride themselves on efficiency, yet in those earlier times it was human effort that fulfilled that role in real time, with no algorithm or global logistics chain - just muscle, sweat, and skill.

I was happy that the grimy nail maker was a live demonstration accompanied by a commentary. A further reflection on market dynamics where, even though demand was high for nails for ship building and other industries, the sheer abundance of labour meant wages were driven down to inhuman levels and skullduggery rampant. Since labour regulations were still in their infancy, exploitation of the young was widespread. I did reflect on the 'dainty' ways of the school kids who were visiting and how we have lost, perhaps, some of the grit that keeps economies going.

The demonstration was a reminder of the class system - labourers crushed under demand and low pay, the sobering penalty for industrialisation. The clink of hammer on iron becomes a kind of echo of forgotten lives of men (and boys) who were both indispensable and disposable.

Watching the school children gave rise to a reflection on how clean and safe they were, interacting with a sanitised past. Have we traded resilience for comfort? Lost a kind of toughness that, while bred in hardship, also gave rise to endurance and ingenuity? Yet, one could also argue that the grit now takes new forms — digital dexterity, emotional intelligence, environmental awareness. Maybe we’re not softer, just differently forged.

I did notice, in an earlier visit to a park in London with my niece and her children a tendency for parents to 'hover' and offer assistance in every way. I believe this has developmental penalties, as it is through the 'rough and tumble' that children develop coordination and motor skills necessary to navigate the world. However, there is nothing to recommend the kind of repetitive strains that child labour would have imposed. I am grateful for the advances on all fronts, technological and industrial, as they provide opportunities for people to be productive beyond the demands of grinding poverty.

There’s no romanticising the ugly, body-breaking conditions that were once the norm. The story of progress is, in many ways, the story of expanding what kind of life is possible — not just for the elite, but for the masses. The museum’s power lies in showing how recent that struggle really is, and how much it still echoes in the texture of cities like Birmingham.

The tension between past and present became more poignant with a visit to the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. I was disappointed by how little space and resources were apportioned to Birmingham's role in the slave trade. While slaves were not brought to Birmingham (so far as I can tell), the armaments for which Birmingham was famous were taken in ships to the west coast of Africa to trade with local warlords for slaves.

Morally, I don't think you get to highlight the skill of the gun makers, with a complete mini workshop with marionettes, but leave out how these armaments were integral to the enslavement of people. Arguably, African warlords would have had far less means to enslave their own people had this trade not existed. The slavery 'triangle' - armaments to Africa, slaves to Americas, cotton, sugar, tobacco, tea to Britain, should be integral to the proper re-telling of this history.

The lack of attention to the slave trade points to a recurring issue in how industrial heritage is often curated — as though skill, ingenuity, and economic impact can be celebrated in isolation from the moral cost that underwrote them. Birmingham may not have been a port city dealing directly in human cargo, but its industries — particularly gun-making and metal goods — were essential cogs in the machinery of transatlantic slavery.

To feature the craftsmanship of the gun makers without confronting what those guns were used for — especially in a museum committed to telling the history of Birmingham and context — risks creating a dangerously incomplete narrative, ending up aestheticising cruelty. The museum missed a critical opportunity to show how industrial success and imperial violence were linked.

Certain narratives have been so deeply woven into the cultural fabric that anything which threatens to unravel them is quietly deferred, diluted, or — like that nod to a "future expansion" proposed for this section — postponed indefinitely. A placeholder for conscience.

Historians often work within institutional and political frameworks, and public museums walk a tightrope between education, tourism, and national identity. Telling the full story of Britain's industrial triumphs inevitably means confronting uncomfortable truths about how that prosperity was funded — not just in terms of slavery, but in colonial extraction more broadly. That’s a hard story to tell in a celebratory space but the test of a curator is in the material they exhibit or choose not to exhibit.

The fact that Birmingham helped fuel the slave trade through arms and iron, even without docking a single slave ship, is precisely the kind of complicating detail that should enrich our understanding, not be seen as inconvenient. Sanitised heritage doesn’t honour the past — it embalms it.

The Canals ↑ Back to top

Birmingham is often called the “City of Canals,” boasting a network said to be more extensive than Venice’s. These canals played a vital role during the Industrial Revolution — from the late 18th to early 19th centuries — transporting raw materials such as coal and iron, as well as finished goods. At the time, factories and warehouses crowded the canal edges, and boats were originally towed by horse from only one side, which inevitably led to conflicts among passing vessels. The eventual introduction of two-sided towing helped resolve these disputes.

According to Scott, our Brummie canal tour guide (who claimed to be speaking “his best English” for our benefit), the canals were dug by hand — often by children, since adult men were needed in the coal mines. Early canals followed the natural contours of the land to avoid cutting through hills, but later ones were straighter and wider, made possible by the use of gelignite.

Ironically, the very features that made canals practical to build — wide, flat areas for hauling away overburden by horse and cart — also made them ideal for the railways that eventually replaced them. As steam locomotion took over, trains offered faster, more flexible transport, and the canal system fell into decline.

With railways allowing factories and warehouses to be built almost anywhere, the once-bustling canal network slowly slid into disrepair, its industrial heyday fading into history. The canals were saved by restoration efforts by a dedicated group of enthusiasts. Now, it was become part of the fashionable hub in the centre of the city. Many towpaths have been restored, making them popular for joggers and cyclists.




The Gas Street Basin is a historic hub where canals meet, now a lively area with bars and restaurants. We stopped at the Canalside cafe (also an award-winning restaurant) where I was able to make a fool of myself in stumbling Italian.







Modern buildings for both business and apartments now line the canals, some erected on locations once used for human waste disposal derisively labelled "Lego Houses" by Scott and some looking much like they were abandoned halfway through construction.

Some forgotten corner ↑ Back to top

Bath is an eminently walkable city, with most of its highlights clustered within a short distance. We chose to stay outside the city and, when we drove in, found inexpensive parking at a local museum. From there, we strolled downhill, past striking examples of Georgian extravagance.

In its heyday, Bath was a playground for the wealthy. Now, its stern, towering Georgian buildings proclaim imperial might and exploitation on a grand scale. This was wealth extracted from slave colonies. Wealth seized through the pillage of India. Pax Britannica ingloriana.



I find it hard to reconcile my feelings about this era — and this place. Morality, I’ve come to believe, is not merely a matter of private virtue or righteousness. It is the sediment of systemic injustice, layered over time, that immiserates the weak. It is not about bad people. It is about bad systems. So why do humans persist in building monuments to their own cruelty?

Yet here I am, in awe of the sheer scale and beauty of this avenue. Shouldn’t I be scrawling prophecies on the sallow stone walls, calling for rebellion? I am safe. I am not hungry. I do not labour from dawn to dusk.



Thankfully, the Roman Baths revived my sensibilities. The exhibit combines Georgian hubris with Roman spectacle, all overlaid by dazzling technical effects and sharp historical commentary. The curators, unlike their counterparts in Birmingham, did not flinch from critique. They openly questioned the hedonism of the Romans and mocked the British Empire’s absurd imitation of Rome, complete with statues of handpicked emperors. With suitable contempt, I looked up the skirt of one such emperor, confirming the nakedness beneath.



I left with a strange conviction: the Romans were clever—albeit inhumanly cruel. The Georgians? Merely pompous. The Romans remind us there is nothing new under the sun. The Georgians remind us that Trumpian hubris has a long lineage.



As we were in Cinque Terra, the long line of tiny villages with impassable streets drew us back into past where pirates haunted coves and little boats sailed on impossible seas to feed their populations. There's nothing easy about getting in or around these villages and this has been their saving grace, although we did notice that development was forging a new character to the old buildings.



We stayed at Padstow, a wise choice by Robyn, which balances a pratical seaside settlement with a quaint village on the water, but also the restaurants of the famous Rick Stein. The pick of the villages was Mousehole, pronounced Mowzell (with ow as in cow). My sister had read us the children's story of a cat whose human had gone out in rough seas to fish to save the village from starvation. The extensive walls - two walls across the mouth of the cove, one with a narrow opening and the second with a lock - suggested violent Atlantic storms, but on the day we were there the water was glassy and it was hard to visualise anything other than the serene seascape before us.



Some little villages, like St. Ives, were crowded with tourists despite it not yet being holiday season. But this did not hold us back from venturing onto the short stretch of white beach that makes a contrast from the rocky cliffs. The attraction to tourists is obvious, but I can imagine that in summer this is 'standing room only'.

We made the mistake of putting our faith in Google Maps (naively entering the village name) when entering Port Isaac, where the series Doc Martin was filmed. There the streets were narrow even for a Fiat 500 and clearly vehicles are not welcome in the foreshore area. We weaved our way out of trouble but not before we had weathered disapproving glances and frequent pauses for delivery trucks and prams. The steep streets provided both an immersive experience of the series and reminders of the villages of Cinqua Terra which perch precariously on the Mediterrnean coastline of Italy.

In Megavissey I suggested to some fishermen sitting about that no work would be done if they sat drinking coffee. They gave as good as they got, countering that "that was the point". Our conversation led them to ask the inevitable question as to where I was from, one 'old codger' quipping "Which part of Cornwall are you from?", knowing full well that I was an Australian. I was able to assure him that it was somewhere south beyond Lands End and also reveal my Cornwall connections in the relatives on my mother's side - the Lanyons. The abundant shocks of red hair in the local population seemed to reflect my mother's genetic heritage.

We were amused by the public toilets which opened only at odd hours. Clearly, the calls of nature should be confined to office hours. Fortunately, some establishments have toilets which can be accessed if one purchases a coffee or a pastie or such. In one moment of great distress, I made the mistake of walking to the nearest WC led by Google Maps which turned out to be across on Michael's Mount. On arrival, a worker was closing the gate and announced he was unable to unlock the toilet for me because it was closed. When my agitation turned to anger he scurried off and was surprised that I followed, giving him unsolicited feedback on his attitude, complete with expletives. I reminded him of what human compassion meant and that he seemed sorely lacking in this area.

When his boss arrived in a vehicle, I was also generous with my reflections on how miserable the service was, especially when he denied any connection with the island's management with the name of the organisation emblazened on the vehicle. Needless to say neither encounter solved the problem.

Despite this unseemly blot, our experience of Cornwall was overwhelmingly positive, even when we were temporarily lost on a walk. Follow the acorn signs, they said. That is indeed good advice until one encounters a fork in the path with no acorn symbol.

From Birmingham to Bath to Cornwall, Britain has treated us to a feast of contradictions and pleasantries, and we are glad we came. Now, to Germany.