The Great Escape

  June 21 - Lille As Lille is more known for its culture rather than for its tourist attractions we just thought we’d have a wander around the old town and see what’s around.   Our first stop was at the Basilica of Notre Dame de la Treille. Constructed between 1856 to 1999 this cathedral was built in a mix of styles, Neo Gothic & Contemporary, and, for my money, it just doesn’t work. Although we’ve seen other cathedrals with a blending of styles, Norman & Gothic, Renaissance & Baroque for example, these have all been sympathetic to each other, however, this one is strange! 😳 Just to add to this ‘weirdness’ effect, the whole church has been made in a light grey stone yet the bell tower, which had been forgotten in the original design, is made from brick.     Continuing on with our wandering around town we were a little unlucky as a couple of sites we’d earmarked were closed for visitors. Still, the weather was nice, the old town is lovely, and of cou...

  June 20 - London to Lille Travel day to Lille, France Off on to the Eurostar this morning with, what seems, the rest of the world!  It really was ‘chockers’!  That said it really is an easy and comfortable journey to France, only a 90 minute train ride ‘door to door’.   First impressions of Lille are that it’s a lovely place with some really nice buildings in the historic old town. I’m sure we’ll get to see more of these tomorrow when we’re out exploring.   This afternoon, when buying train tickets for our onward journey to Ypres (Ieper), Belgium, I’d forgotten how rural France really doesn’t do English.  When asking, in French, if the ticket seller spoke English we got a definitive “Non”! (I think we must have been spoilt in Norway recently😊), so then one had to delve deep for the schoolboy French learnt, and forgotten, so many years ago .  A lesson learned for our next trip over here, do some Duo-lingo homework!  Bon appétit, our first meal...

  June 19 - St Pancras, London Travel day Worthing to London After checking into our hotel at St Pancras we took off for a walk along Regents Canal towards Camden Lock. It was all very interesting along here seeing some of the old inner London industrial areas that have now been ‘gentrified’ and which are now really quite upmarket.  One particular area, previously a gasworks with 3 gasometers, has now been turned into ‘Gasholders Park’.  With apartments built within what were the gasometers the area looks terrific!    Walking along the canal it was a bit of fun watching some of the newbie longboat users trying to work out how the locks work! 😂  (Here’s a bit of a long-winded explanation ) On the way home we had a wander through nearby St Pancras railway station, a building just across the road from where we’re staying. Built in 1868 this stunningly ornate Victorian Gothic-style building, saved from destruction by the Poet Laureate John Betjeman in the 1...

  June 12 -18 Longyearbyen, Oslo and Worthing   Our flight from Longyearbyen to Oslo took us via Tromsø, a much larger city than I envisaged, I expected it to be tiny! It also made us think how far north we been as it took a 90 minute flight to reach somewhere so northerly (in Oslo I looked it up and it seems that Longyearbyen is much closer to the North Pole than it is Oslo and Reykjavik!).  Back in Worthing and the weather’s been just fantastic this week. We’ve not done a lot, walking, beach, parks etc but it’s been lovely and we’ve had a chance to do a little bit more booking for the weeks ahead.      I’d forgotten how nice the flowers were around this time of year.   F&C’s on the beach, lovely.  Tomorrow we’re off to London, the first day of our European jaunt, before getting the Eurostar train to Lille on Monday. 

  June 11 - Svalbard Well that was it, our last few hours on the Ultramarine, finishing off what was a great journey travelling around the island of Spitsbergen in Svalbard.  Its been a fantastic trip, we’ve seen some magnificent wildlife and scenery, we’ve learnt heaps, and in addition we’ve met some lovely people, we’ve had a ball.   Due to a bit of of a stuff up somewhere along the line, we, and along with a few ex passengers, had to spend an additional day and night in Longyearbyen. No complaints from us as additional tours and meals were all provided and it’s always interesting seeing somewhere new.  Interesting way to take the dogs for a walk! Longyearbyen itself, I have to say, is not the least ‘pictureskew!’, in fact it’s pretty ugly.  There’s no such thing as attractive housing and the whole place has a multi-coloured ‘army barracks’ feel about it. Considering it has 4 months of night-time as well, I don’t think I’ll be moving here quite yet! 😊   ...

  June 10 - Svalbard   Up for the final day. We are at Recherchefjorden which is a fjord just below our final destination and disembarkation tomorrow. The morning trip was out to look at the glacier which was different again and just as beautiful. This one ran down to a pool of water, possibly an inlet, but almost a lake. To me it looked like two glaciers had formed this plain which we walked across, but I am not a geologist - maybe U3A could offer a short course? Anyway there was a large plain leading to the inlet of water which was full of sea ice and then behind was the remaining glacier. There was a bit of mud around but nowhere near like the other day but a warning sign left by a previous group methinks - two boots and a marker board sticking out. Once again the wildflower, Saxifraga, everywhere. We saw lots of birds again, guillemots, purple sandpipers, kittiwakes, and Eider ducks flying. We also saw fox tracks and a few Reindeer up on the slopes, and then some dropped ...

  June 09 - Svalbard   This mornings activity took us to visit a colony of Little Auks, which, according to JEM, are “the cutest bird up here” (I think she might have forgotten about Puffins though!). Nesting in cracks in the rocks there were just thousands of them, about 60,000 according to our resident ornithologist, although I don’t how you’d go about counting them!  It was great to see huge groups of take off from their nests, fly around in a giant circle, and then return to their nests, it was almost like synchronised swimming.   We’re seeing Reindeer more frequently now than we did earlier on this trip, and we’re also seeing them in larger numbers. I know Reindeer happen to be all over Svalbard but I wonder if the greater numbers are due to the warmer temperature down south? (+2°C instead of -2°C 🥶 ) I’ll have to find out.   This afternoon we cruised round to Burgerbukta, an area on the west coast not too far below Longyearbyen, and said to be ‘Spitsber...

  June 08 - Svalbard   Unfortunately the sea swell from yesterday continued on this morning so consequently this meant no beach landings only zodiac rides.  Expectations were high though as, once out on the water, a Polar Beer was spotted almost immediately out on the ice. It soon took off though and unfortunately that was last we saw of it.  However, we did keep looking and, although unsuccessful, we did ride through some beautiful seascape.  Once back on board another Polar Bear was spotted. It was a fair way away, but still easily seen with binoculars. It was interesting to note that it was a lot darker in colour than those we’d previously seen and it almost looked dirty. Strange!  Due to the sea we were still unable to make land this afternoon so off out again on the zodiacs.  Some guides on this trip are really passionate about their subject of expertise and our one today, a geologist, is one of them, he’s really good.  As such we were gi...

June 07 - Svalbard   Arrived in Kapp Lee Bay overnight to 100% visibility, yay! 😀 In contrast to yesterday what a great morning it turned out to be.  Zodiacs to the beach and, although a little wet and choppy, off for a hike over the hills.  We hadn’t walked far before coming across our first of four groups of reindeer.  We approached slowly, trying not to startle them, and, as they didn’t seem too perturbed, we managed to get reasonably close, which was fantastic. These were the first we’d seen with a decent set of antlers, making them look much more like I imagined them to be (still the wrong colour though! 😂 )   There was some beautiful scenery and even more wildlife further into our hike, more Reindeer, Snow Buntings, Purple Sandpiper, Ptarmigans (the Svalbard chicken), an Arctic Fox, Brent Geese, and Walruses. Even though we didn’t manage get photos of all it was the best morning so far (even for those of us that had a bit of ‘fun’ in the mud!)   ...

  June 06 - Svalbard   After travelling south overnight we woke up to what what we used to call in London, a “peasouper”.  “Fog as far as the eye can see” was basically the forecast for today and so consequently all excursions were called off. It’s not surprising really when considering all around here is Polar Bear country!  The view from our balcony  this morning  As there were no excursions today a number of lectures took place instead. Covering subjects such as geology, ornithology, pinnipeds (seals), and the history and challenge of reaching the North Pole, they were all very interesting and presented by the guides who also happen to be subject gurus. Lots of great information and a whole host of stuff to add to my list of things I didn’t know! I missed the scenario below but this photo was taken from the bridge today. It’s called a ‘fogbow’ and is formed in a similar way to a rainbow with light refraction through the mist.