Enjoying retirement
In The Red Rose County
Manchester has always been my favourite city. Now I am not alone, it being picked by Time Out in 2021 as 'Third Coolest City In The World'. - We had a good start as our hotel - the Hyatt Regency proved a gem. The view from the window shows just 2 or 3 cranes. Last time we came there were dozens. Yes Manchester is getting finished! The hotel was next door to the Business School, so salubrious surroundings. Wherever we went, and we did an awful lot of walking again, the juxtaposition of old and new buildings gave enormous pleasure. And we always looked up....there was some fascinating architecture to see. Here the venerable Midland Hotel.........meeting place for Rolls and Royce....... The Free Trade Hall (now a hotel)...the acoustics were never very good for the Halle...... The Quays.... The Imperial War Museum, unfortunately closed... The Central Library with its famous reading room.... and impressive embellishments...here the entrance hall ceiling....we were inside to look at the Local History and Family section...it was great but overwhelming. St Anne's Church, refined and Georgian.... Hundreds of bars, pubs, restaurants, many now with outside seating and eating... a huge range of shops.... atmospheric by night... interesting statues old and new and interesting street furniture....the busy bee now very much Manchester's emblem..... The second day saw us at the Lowry to see a new Lowry exhibition (with paintings from private collections including interestingly several from the PFA), and an exhibition on Lockdown. I was expecting the latter to be tiresome...it turned out to be rather good. But the Lowreys were fascinating because they showed a whole range of subjects and techniques...here a self-portrait turned madman.. crowds of course, here on a platform... his mother's bedroom which whilst honouring her memory must surely have been based somewhat on Van Gogh's painting... Lowry painted a lot of seascapes and water landscapes..... this football match (obviously one of the PFA paintings)...... any of his erotic paintings were not on show but some of his landscape tended that way.... .......here one I particularly liked, The Lowry's newest acquisition, a very simple potrayal of David Lloyd-George's birthplace the most famous Welshman without a doubt born in Manchester.....really a painting stripped back to bare essentials.....full of character (to me).... as part of the permanent exhibition there are very interesting notes about people who influenced Lowry or whom he knew....here Ginner..... The Lowry is full of unusual aspects and it would be good to visit for a play sometime.... but lunch awaited us and we could see the bronze-roofed 'The Alchemist' calling..... a good if not great meal including cocktail set on fire...... more architectural interest on our way to the bus.... and I loved this (a pic taken from the bus)....a reminder of the huge industrial estate of Trafford Park (the first purpose build industrial park in the world) which is where my Dad and Mum worked and which I knew very well in the Sixties still then churning out industrial goods of all kinds....goods trains running though the streets, lorries everywhere, smoke and smells of all kinds...particularly powerful was a firm I remember nicknamed 'Rubbery Jim's' which processed rubber.. Now Trafford Park is still, apparently, one of the largest and most successful business parks in Europe....... On the third day we visited Mrs Gaskell's House. This road used to be lined with big villas like this. Now this house and the one next door are virtually all that remain of those days..... Best known for writing 'Cranford', 'North and South' and 'The Life of Charlotte Bronte' she was described on her death as 'one of the greatest female novelists of all time'. The house was a delight from start to finish. I enjoyed 'North and South' and must get onto the others. The guides were very very welcoming and full of knowledge and enthusiasm, and you were invited to touch everything and sit wherever you wanted. Whilst the house contents were dispersed on her daughter's death in 1913 (despite attempts to save them along with the house), the house today has been reconstituted as near to how it would have been as makes few odds. A great job by the Manchester Historic Buildings Trust, and others. Her passport was fascinating, made out for her, her daughters and maid to travel. Husband William preferred to stay at home and walk in the Lakes if possible (rather like me). I sat in her working chair....why not? and I was astounded to learn, something I certainly didn't appreciate, that to keep postal costs down it was common for Victorians to write cross hatch, first one way and then at right angles. You would swear it would be impossible to read, but not so. The chair and desk had a view over her much-loved garden (then more extensive). One of the most enjoyable of such visits we have had. As in Liverpool I lost a lot of pics so here borrow from the net. But I couldn't not mention our visit to the Crown and Kettle pub, a real highlight for me. As well as being a real ale pub of some provenance, it is a Grade 2 listed building, closed for a large number of years after a fire but re-opened thankfully in 2010. What a place. Absolutely amazing. Everyone should visit. Really. The last of our highlights was afternoon tea at Cloud 23. We knew as soon as we stepped out of the lift that we were in for a treat. and because our tea was not served straight away, we were offered complimentary champange or a cocktail. These Vimto-based cocktails proved absolutely amazing. The tea was probably in terms of its quality the best I have had. and then of course the views. It reminded me most of standing by a model railway layout with continual movement of trains, trams, cars and lorries. Quite exceiting really. I do hope the cladding on this building is in order. The toilets were both stylish and playful, not something you can say very often.
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