Much as we loved both places, one thing we will not miss is the wifi connections we had in both our Edinburgh and Killin digs. The provider was British Telecom. It's a reasonable assumption that once you key in the password, you will have all-you-can-eat wifi. But not with BT. It takes you to a screen saying "You have chosen parental lock. Click here if you wish to remove parental lock". But then when you try to "click here", nothing happens. BT then demands that you provide your name, address, phone number, age etc etc. Long story short you couldn't access Twitter (a must for political junkies!) and numerous other sites using wifi. You had to switch to 4G which, presumably, any half-way smart 10-year-old would know. It was a pain in the proverbial. But wifi sanity has returned now we are in Derbyshire!
This is our digs - the Servants Quarters, 14 St James Terrace, Buxton. It was originally part of the estate of the fabulously (or obscenely) rich Dukes of Devonshire.
It's very comfortably appointed with two bedrooms and two bathrooms.
It also has a lot of stairs! You come in on the second level which has a bedroom and bathroom. Up 14 stairs there is another bedroom and bathroom. And down 14 stairs from the entry level is the kitchen/dining/living room.
There's a special spot to hit your head on a plaster protuberance about one-third of the way down.
Yep, just a dandelion but good grief they're big - even this one growing out of a crack in the pavement.
Haven't my pictures today been fascinating? A bit hard up for photos as our drive took six hours, and Mr Snorks did a top job.
Handing over to him shortly but I must briefly, yet again, refer to Newspoll - 51/49. What utter bullshirt. I'm certain they've again manipulated the algorithm like they did a year ago when polls were too heavily in Labor's favour. (It's a Murdoch poll after all.) It is impossible for it to be that close when the Lib primary vote is miserably low.
Over to Mr Tartan Pants.
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The drive was actually quite tolerable in the main, but a bit hair-raising when skirting around Manchester. I reckon there would have been a less congested route, but the SatNav chose the shortest one as the crow flies. Yes, yes I know you can tell it to choose an alternative, but I've only got a Bachelors in Car Navigation so far. I start my Masters next term.
We've already done a bit of a recce around our immediate surrounds. This seems to be the main shopping district. No cars allowed. The prominence of the Golden Retriever in the photo is of course purely coincidental.
Near here we passed the Buxton Bath House. Got a photo but I'm sure we'll get better ones tomorrow.
At one point I stood in the middle of a square and could easily see three pubs within about 50 yards. My kind of town.
Our digs also has its own private outdoor area, which we will happily use when the temperature rises by about 15 degrees. You access it by an unusual door from the kitchen, which Hortense promises will feature in tomorrow's edition.
Speaking of tomorrow ... it's Bank Holiday Monday. The poms do seem to get unaccountably excited about their Bank Holidays. I say unaccountably because they seem to have them every third weekend. Buxton's celebration of this one is called the Buxton Spring Fair, and we're told that it'll all be happening, so we're planning a day where we just stroll about town, orient ourselves with the main attractions, enjoy some pork pies and jellied eel at the Spring Fair and visit half a dozen pubs. We've already found one that advertises itself as England's oldest. We think that's the 57th we've seen so far that makes the claim.
Till tomorrow then!
.....Anne, you would have loved an interview with Paul Keating done by two right wing dicks after the ALP launched their election bid. He made them look like ignorant little kids as he ripped them, and the L/NC, a new one :)
ReplyDeleteWe saw it! Jane Norman's an idiot but I thought Andrew Probyn was okay. Pretty disrespectful of her to sit there banging away on her phone during the interview. Always a joy to see Paul Keating - loved his line about coal being the fuel of 250 years ago.
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