Enjoying retirement
In The Red Rose County
We wanted to see the brand new park in the centre of Manchester, not far from Piccadilly Station, which opened last week. Very impressive it was too. Lovely soft planting, very nice hard elements, a cleaned up River Medlock (jet black in my youth like all Manchester rivers), and a good playpark. Terrific job, Manchester. We then headed for the Vimto Park. After Primary School I would often sit on the Vimto factory wall and look wonderingly inside the factory. First however we saw Archimedes. This statue sits under the railway arches on Altrincham Street and depicts a larger than life-size Archimedes, leaping out from a bath during his famous 'Eureka! ' moment and is sculpted in stone by Thompson Dagnall. It was unveiled in 1990. The Godlee Observatory which we could see above the Uni's Sackville Street building just by the side of Vimto Park was bequeathed to the people of Manchester by businessman and philanthropist Francis Godlee in 1903. The observatory features a spiral staircase, trap door, and dome made from papier-mâché! It has been a feature of the city’s skyline for well over a century – and even played a part in putting man on the Moon. I did enjoy seeing at last this monument to a Manchester drink. This is on the spot where the drink was invented by a Manchester herbalist. We then made our way towards the Art Gallery, passing the old London Road fire station. In addition to a fire station, the building housed a police station, an ambulance station, a bank, a coroner's court, and a gas-meter testing station. The fire station operated for eighty years, housing the firemen, their families, and the horse-drawn appliances that were replaced by motorised vehicles a few years after its opening in 1906. It is currently, after years of neglect, being renovated for multi-use. We passed other grand Edwardian buildings from Manchester's heydey. Here a building now occupied by the Uni. here the old Tootal's warehouse and showroom...... here just one of the many grandiose warehouses on Portland Street where I used to catch my bus home after spending Saturday morning in Sherratt and Hughes, the bookshop. Pevsner described it and its companion, No. 86, Manchester House, as "quite splendid ... good examples of the warehouse type designed for multiple occupation by shipping merchants". Now flats. With a totally different look, the former Lloyds Bank at 53 King Street in white stone , also splendid Edwardian....... Anyhow, we eventually arrived at Manchester City Art Gallery where we went on an hour's tour with one of the curators. We've always found this a great thing to do and very instructive, and often amusing. So it proved. We first learned about Stubb's Cheetah and Stag with Two Indians when a cheetah brought to England from India was pitched against a stag in a hunting demonstration at Windsor. The outcome was not as expected.....the cheetah hid behind a tree when released and the stag chased him away! It rather looked as if Stubbs (famous of course for his horses) had just put a stag's head on a horse's body. Interesting. We then learned about Etty's mammoth and voluptuous The Sirens and Ulysses. "Dramatic depiction of the Sirens, three nude voluptuous females on a small island, their hands raised in gesture, one playing a lyre, all of them singing. Around them are strewn the decaying remains of dead sailors. In the background to the right is Ulysses' ship, Ulysses bound struggling to the mast, surrounded by his men, struggling with the sails of the boat. Dark clouded sky and sea." The bodies resulted from Etty's trips to morgues. Perhaps the Victorians found this all too much as Etty could't sell this picture. We were also surprised by how much Turner had taken from his hero Claude. This is Claude's Adoration of the Golden Calf ........... and here Turner's 'Thomson's Aeolian Harp'..... We had a brief look at the Lowry room which had his paintings alongside his teacher Valette's. But we were hungry and so hurried along to Rudy's our new and very very good pizza place. The pizza is only in the oven for a minute so service was exceptionally quick. And they did one pizza between us - more than enough. On our way to our concert we were taken by the reflections of the grandiose Midland Hotel in a modern building opposite. The Bridgewater Hall bar overlooks this sculptured scene...... We were at the BBC's Young Musician of the Year and excellent in all aspects it was too. And a stalls seat for £10....you couldn't grumble.
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August 2023
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