The last the day in Edinburgh was spent walking around the New City. It was going to be heading out to see Rosalyn Chapel, made famous by Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, but after finding out that the bus takes an hour to get out there and another back (and I only had until 4pm before my train to Inverness), I gave it a miss. The New City, on the opposite side of Princes Street Gardens, was the city built when the Old City was too full and disease ridden to live in in any numbers any more. They did a good job with it though. The streets are spaced around parkland and all the ones that run down to the gardens have monuments in the centre islands. This side of the city has become ... read more

Not The Only Reason To Go To Liverpool… But A Good One None The Less. Arriving in Liverpool with a minimum of fuss, I took a walk through the city to familiarise myself with the layout. It’s a city with some character that’s for sure!! Down the main street there is some classic architecture around such as St George Hall and the museum just behind it, all over shadowed by another monument to Nelson. A little around the corner and you hit Mathew Street (if you haven’t heard of the street then surely you’ve heard of the places on it), where you find the Cavern Club and all the Beatles memorabilia you can handle. The club is not the original unfortunately as that was closed down in the 70’s and was demolished shortly after, but ... read more

…And Exchanging Them For Castles Instead From Gloucester it’s only a short trip to Wales and it’s capital, Cardiff. Made famous for it’s port facilities back in the 19th Century when most of the world was using Welsh coal, the majority of the city was then owned by the Bute family, who were the largest miners and exporters of coal in the area. Because they owned the docks, the castle and most of the town, they set about making Cardiff one of the more appealing places to live. Cardiff Castle dates back a lot further then the Bute family though. Originally thought to be a Norman castle with walls and battlements and a keep, during excavations of the site in the 1900’s it was discovered that the Norman walls were built on top of existing walls ... read more

And Loving Every Minute!!! After a much more comfortable train ride to Salisbury I head for the main attraction of the town... Salisbury Cathedral. With Britain's tallest spire at over 120m, it was built in the 13th Century and miraculously survived the bombings of WWII unscathed. Later on, after talking to German pilots, it was revealed that they were under strict orders not to touch the Cathedral, as they used the spire as a landmark to guide themselves to other towns after flying over the Channel. What makes this particular Cathedral important though is it houses the best preserved of the four remaining copies of the Magna Carta, the document that almost all democratic constitutions in the world are based on. It dealt with things such as freedom for the church, trial by jury and issues ... read more

Heading South I hadn't decided whether I was going to spend the night in Canterbury or in Dover when I left the hostel for Victoria Station. What I had decided was that I was taking the bus instead of the train as not only did I get to see some of the winding roads through the countryside, I also picked the ticket up for about half the price of a train fare. Arriving in Canterbury after a couple of hours on the National Express, my main reason for the stop was to see the Canterbury Cathedral which is the base for the Church of England. Towering out of the city centre, the cathedral was originally founded by St Augustine in the 6th Century but was rebuilt in the 11th. Over the next 400 years is was ... read more