Munich



Town hall - Rathaus

Munich is one of the world's most desirable cities to live in according to some polls. It really shouldn't be allowed to have one of the best football teams as well, that is really unfair! It got fourth place in the Mercer livability rankings in 2011 and 2012. It was also ranked as the world's most livable city with the highest quality of life in the 'Monocle.' I had never heard of the Monocle, it sounds like a posh magazine for posh type people, you know the types that would have worn monocles if we lived in the 1930s. In fact it is a global affairs and lifestyle magazine, radio station, website and media brand. Well there you go.

I had the pleasure of landing at Munich Airport on the way to skiing in Austria, Munich being the cheapest way to get to the Zillertal ski region in comparison with Innsbruck or Salzburg. You can get the local train from the airport to the city Ostbahnhof, a fair old way and packed with commuters in the late afternoon as it trawled through the suburban hinterland of Munich. From the Ostbahnhof you can catch an ICE right up into the Tyrol. This means arriving in the Austrian Alps in serious style in a German high speed train smoothie.

I returned to Munich a week later with some of my ski pals and had the pleasure of strolling around the city centre for much of the day. I am jumping the gun a bit here, but you have to go to the Viktualmarkt, an elegant open space in the heart of the city surrounded by mature architecture and sporting quaint old refreshment kiosks, drinking areas and cafes with a distinct nineteenth century feel. Here three of us pushed our way through those thick sheets of plastic that act as 'doorways' into a sheltered rather glorified conservatory where you can eat a classic German lunch, exactly what we wanted to do before returning home, big succulent sausages, sauerkraut and potatoes washed down with a large beer. You have to do it!



Victualienmarkt - beer to your heart's content!

 

Munich Hauptbahnhof is a major hub on the very impressive German rail network and I had passed through just last summer early in the morning bound for Cologne and then home to Blighty. You can leave your luggage here for the day, nip into the tourist office just outside, grab a map and summary of the top ten sights, and then strike into the heart of the city. I noticed in the office that there were tours advertised to Dachau, the infamous Nazi concentration camp.

 



Hauptbahnhof - photo for rail geeks



 

It's a dead straight walk in to town from the station, down Shutzen strasse, crossing a major thoroughfare about half way along, then picking up Neuhauser. Then you enter the old city, walking down Neuhauser, and soon get to the cathedral, the Frauenkirche, or Church of our Lady, with its onion domed towers. We circled most of the building before finding the way in. It's only a short further walk to the centre of the action, Marienplatz.

 



Typically European, Munich old city has its share of fine walking streets which swathe through to the Marienplatz central square with its classic German 'Rathaus,' a medieval looking behemoth with intricate stonework and dinky theme clock (bells, figures and chimes). The great thing about Munich is that you can do the city centre in a day on foot. It's easy to get around and you can even wander off the beaten track to somewhere like the English Garden.

There are some pretty impressive palatial avenues slicing through the city centre and one such is Brennerstrasse, described in the city guide as 'Munich's first splendid boulevard.' It runs right into Konigsplatz Square with its classical buildings and museums, worth a jolly jaunt if you are striding through the city.

Konigsplatz - see what I mean!

There is a large palace area with gardens as well joined onto the city centre which you can promenade around in the late afternoon/early evening. This is the Royal Residence, the largest residential palace in Germany and the seat of the Bavarian rulers for 400 years. The Bavarian State Opera is next to the palace. I sort of dipped in and out of this area quickly as I had an appointment at the airport via an essential stop at Starbucks, but could see the appeal for a promenading couple, a promenading anything for that matter. Given some blazing summer evening it would be a great area to stroll absolutely aimlessly before sipping an outdoor coffee.

I also found myself wandering down to the English garden, which is rather more than a garden, more a gigantic slice of countryside plonked onto the edge of the city centre, Munich's own Hyde Park or Regents Park. It's 922 acres and one of the largest urban parks in the world. I thought it was rather more tidy than the Tiergarten in Berlin, a smooth shaven chin of a park as opposed to an untidy stubble of a park. And very pleasant it was as well, with streams and lakeland, dashes of woodland, extensive path network and wide green spaces.



The English Garden - more like a fully fledged shire

 

 

Cyclists plied up and down the paths by the bucketload (I guess you wouldn't see many Germans going off the paths), and even a few horse-riders. I passed a crowd of English who had perhaps come over for the Manchester United match. I did a massive circle of the park, running out of time to visit some sort of classical folly on a hill, and headed back to the centre. It was only when I returned to the UK that an article almost immediately appeared in the Daily Telegraph on German nudism. The English Garden in Munich is a prime spot for displaying your nakedness to the world, at least when the weather is on your side. I spotted no such thing when I was there! But it had been drizzling for most of the day.





 

Liverpool

 

 

Adelphi Hotel, Liverpool city centre

Liverpool is a fantastic city break and one of my favourite places, and I recently combined a family christening with a foray into more of the city's attractions, Speke Hall and Goodison Park, the home of Everton Football Club.

Liverpool has not always had a good press, as the second seaport of these islands it had a lofty and prestigious history, but has suffered in the post war years from economic stagnation, urban blight and maladministration. However, it has managed to pull itself up by its bootstraps on the back of European city of culture 2008 to become a very worthwhile destination.

Liverpool city centre has as impressive a collection of classic buildings as you'll find anywhere in the country, from the massive civic pile of St George's Hall opposite Lime Street Station to the Walker Art Gallery round the corner and the full set of iconic waterfront buildings centred on the Liver Building and flanking the Pier Head. Major new development Liverpool One has been welded onto the old city centre, sandwiched between the bus station, docks and original shopping streets, and has the usual mix of brand name chain stores, cafes and restaurants juggling for space on different levels with flagship stores like John Lewis.

St Georges Hall itself is worth a look inside, very much a part of Liverpool history. It has a large hall inside with an impressive mosaic floor, and was also a seat of judgment for the city. The old criminal court can still be visited and downstairs are the cells for internment of prisoners.

Just over the road from Liverpool One is the Albert Dock where you can wander around the old basin and enjoy the warehouse architecture now converted into a major 'centre of town' hangout, complete with The Beatles Story and Merseyside Maritime Museum attractions. Nearby is the modern Echo arena for major events.

If you take a trip over the Mersey to Birkenhead either by underground or ferry you can visit Hamilton Square, a vast old square in the centre of town, and visit the old U boat that is still perched on the edge of the Mersey and a reminder of the pivotal role that Liverpool had in the Battle of the Atlantic in the Second World War.

The family christening took place at the Anglican Cathedral because of family connections with the cathedral itself, an impressive building designed by Gilbert Scott, the same person who designed the red phone box. It is the largest cathedral in the UK and the fifth largest in the world and was finished in 1978. The cathedral sits on a mound above the city centre and overlooking the River Mersey surrounded by elegant new architecture and some newly cleaned up smart and classic streets to the north of the cathedral precincts. the cathedral bulk from the outside is quite dark and forbidding, but inside has a much lighter and pleasant ambience. The tower is well worth ascending for great views of the city and its surroundings. It's a good place to spot Anfield from the top! There is a protective fence surrounding the tower to prevent any more unfortunate incidents after a local professional threw himself off the top some years ago.

 

Liverpool cathedral

For an alternative experience you can visit the Catholic Cathedral, a wedding cake of a church built in a big circle, altogether more unconventional and locally known as the Mersey Funnel (as opposed to tunnel).

To help get your way round the city, there's nothing like practicing the Liverpool, or scouse, accent, and if you can say 'chicken and chips' with the distinctive 'ch' sound then you are well on the way. Also don't forget to drop the 't' at the end of some words, 'What's tha?' as you scrutinise a chip buttie and mushie peas.

Liverpool has great parks and green spaces, that something you appreciate once you've made a few visits. I am more familiar with South Liverpool and Sefton Park, Calderstones Park and Otterspool Park which hold childhood memories. However I visited Stanley Park for the first time recently when parking up to visit Goodison for the Everton match, and was pleasantly impressed to find not a recession hit piece of waste ground between the two great football grounds but a fully fledged traditional British Park with all the trimmings such as bandstand and lake.

 

Stanley Park

One of my favourite areas of Liverpool is Sefton Park and surroundings, as classical an old Victorian park as you will find anywhere in the country. It's the nearest thing Liverpool has to Hyde Park in London. I have great memories of visiting this park as a little kid when we used to visit my grandma and associated relatives in Aigburth. This vast space with its lakes, shrubbery, Palm House and Peter Pan statue surrounded by a ring road of massive (and I mean massive) Victorian mansions must have been as exclusive as you could get back in the nineteenth century. Even now the faded grandeur is in evidence all around. Rafa Benitez used to live in a block on the perimeter road which bristled with TV aerials so he could catch all the football channels. I wasn't Rafa's greatest fan because I found him a bit on the defensive side as a manager but he was still good!

Big green spaces in Liverpool go well also with lots of leafy dual carriageways swathing the city in all directions bordered by salubrious interwar residential property. This is the side of Liverpool you don't read about in the press, lots of attractive suburban areas where I would be quite proud to own a house.

Speke Hall  is as good a National Trust property as you could visit anywhere in the UK, a large Tudor property simply bursting with black and white splendour. I remember visiting it years ago when I was a kid, now I could appreciate it much more as an adult. It provides a stark contrast to some of the signs of industrial decline on Merseyside. It is surrounded by extensive green spaces, just off the main road into Liverpool from Runcorn and Widnes. It sits in a tree filled depression separating it from the River Mersey. A path circles the property along the top of this depression giving wide vistas of the Mersey as well as tempting glimpses of the house itself. The path takes you right up to the edge of Liverpool Airport where you can sit and watch activity on the main runway.

Speke Hall entrance

Speke Hall - round the back

 

A jolly scouse lady dressed in Victorian finery takes you round the property in a private guided tour if you want, relating the usual anecdotes, such as the last lady of the house who used to dress in black and smoke a pipe. Ah, what's happened to the great British eccentric? Speke Hall of course was a Catholic stronghold and it has its own priest hole which the priest could escape to when the King or Queen's men came hunting for heretics.

Liverpool Airport nudging Speke Hall

From Speke I drove to Everton for the footie. A very nice assistant at Speke hall advised getting the football bus from Lime Street Station to the ground. Sounded like a good idea, but when I got to the city centre I thought I would be too up close and personal with a busful of Everton supporters which could prove embarrassing for a Liverpool supporter like me, so I thought I would drive straight to the ground.

Incidentally I parked nearer Anfield than Goodison Park in a bid to find a free parking space. I avoided the car parks asking for £10 to park for the match and found a spot in a quiet side street. Only thing was there were spaces because the houses were abandoned and boarded up, further up in the inhabited part of the street there were plenty of parked cars. After parking up I noticed the posters on the lampposts 'Car Crime Hotspot!' That's all I needed, but hey it was a beautiful day, no sign of degenerate looking locals, and there was nothing to steal in the car, so I took the chance.

The walk to the ground was very bearable on such a lovely day and not really that far. I arrived with plenty of time to spare, collected my ticket and then promptly went looking for a cash machine. In the end I just had enough cash left to buy myself a healthy snack, sausage and chips, that grand staple of any self respecting football fan.

Everton v West Ham

Goodison Park

Suitable attired in blue (not planned) with a red shirt lurking underneath, I made my way back to the ground and spent an enjoyable afternoon watching Everton beat West Ham 1-0. Later I returned to Liverpool city centre to catch Liverpool playing Southampton in Southampton on any available TV including the end of the first half in John Lewis. Later I watched the second half in the pub.

Washington Common, West Sussex

 

Looking east to Chanctonbury Ring

 

Path along the south side

That are lots of little nooks and crannies hidden away in our localities that we often never ever discover until we step out of our normal routine and take a different path. Washington Common is one such place that I only stumbled across recently, and yet I've been passing it on the A24 for years! It occupies the areas to the north west of the Washington roundabout just a few miles north of Worthing on the A24. If you take a left turn off the roundabout west towards Storrington along the A283, then take a right turn off the main road just a few hundred yards ahead at Clayton Farm, you hit an untarmaced lane that creeps up the hill. No boy racers allowed! You have to take it easy on a badly pock-marked route which takes you up to a National Trust car park. From where radiates a network of paths over Washington Common, a cosy little area of hillside, heath and woodland. Ideal for walking the dog or just yourself for that matter!

 

Chanctonbury Ring in the distance

 

Route back to the carpark

 

 The path winding up from the car park along the south side of the hill gives great views of the South Downs and Chanctonbury Ring. Just do a circular tour along this stretch, then strike north through the trees, up over the top, down through the woodland, and then head back towards the car park by a different route. When I was about there was so much water that it was like a mini Everglades with vegetation sprouting out of pools of water saturating the woodland. It's a wonder I didn't bump into Noah, well it is early 2014! Near the common and at the western end towards Storrington is a very pleasant area of rather opulent residential settlement struggled out along the little lanes such as Vera's Walk.

Looking westwards to South Downs

 

On the heath

 

 

Drenched woodland

 

Vera"s Walk in fact is named after the pioneer of a community that was set up here in the 1920s. Vera Pragnell was the daughter of a wealthy textiles industrialist and as a young 25 year old used her legacy to set up a Utopian community in this area in the 1920s called 'The Sanctuary.' Sounded like some glorious open air version of Cold Comfort Farm. What is it about Sussex that attracts these bohemian havens? Not far away to the east of Lewes is Charleston Farmhouse where the assorted progressive intellectuals, writers and artists of the Bloomsbury group strutted their stuff back in the pre-war years. I think they would have been at home in 2014 Britain! Anyway, Vera Pragnell invited people to join her in a back to nature  'Sermon on the Mount' type endeavour. They were a rum bunch, including mystical Christians, nudists (not sure how that relates to the Sermon on the Mount!), alchemists and actors, but eventually as time went on the relatives sold off the land and now it is a pretty prosperous slice of Sussex real estate hidden down leafy lanes.

By the carpark

 

The Sanctuary hut

 

Heart of the old sanctuary community

You can now explore said leafy lanes which pan out and prod through the surrounding farmland and woodland, sometimes ending up back on a main road into or out of Storrington. One things for sure, the folk living in these very comfortable looking dwellings won't be short of a bob or two. This is leafy, prosperous Sussex at its Garden of England best.

If you want a bit of industrial grit mixed up with our Sussex idyll there is a quarry a little further to the south west and bordering the A283, that's if you're into dumper tracks and suchlike negotiating mud and puddles.

This area is not really for the ten miler hiker type person, more the Sunday afternoon stroll merchant, perhaps with a dog or family in tow. Toasting muffins round a log fire after a bracing circuit of this little corner of Sussex would be a cool way to round off a crisp, cold winter's afternoon. If you fancy something a bit more commercial, then head for Squires Garden Centre, a very respectable joint with quite a large modern café where you can grab a baked potato for lunch or maybe a cream tea. I would recommend it and you can find it a few stallion paces north of the Washington roundabout on the left of the main road, but don't wander into 'Kates Cakes,' the local cake factory, by mistake.

The Ridgeway

This is a great long distance (87 miles) footpath that cuts across the north of the London basin through the lovely Chiltern Hills which cosy right up to the edge of London and cosset the Thames Valley. London is blessed with some great surrounding countryside. The Chiltern Hills are wonderful country for walkers and cyclists. and are the spiritual home of Midsomer Murders if you are into that sort of thing, you know dreamy English villages, duckponds and the rest.


You can get to the Chiltern Hills from London by getting a train north west from Marylebone Station, one of the smallest and most compact London railway termini. You can take your bike with you on the train if you want to mix it with the cycling and walking. There are a couple of routes you can take from Marylebone station to end up on the Ridgeway. You can aim for Princes Risborough, a tidy little town on the edge of the Vale of Aylesbury, or Wendover, another well heeled little town just a few miles to the east on a different line.

Walk from Princes Risborough to Wendover (great day walk)

It's a bit of a distance from the rail station to the town centre and a bike came in really useful.
Princes Risborough dates possibly back to Roman times, and the 'Black Prince,' Edward, had his palace here in the 14th century, which is where the town's name came from. You can take lunch at a little café in the centre of Princes Risborough as I did, then climb the hill to link in with the nearest section of the Ridgeway which is signposted along its length. From the top of the scarp slop you can appreciate wide vistas across the lower belly of England, the expansive Vale of Aylesbury stretching far into the distance. Here you find yourself in Whiteleaf Nature Reserve which is known for its butterflies and wildflowers. Then off you go striding east along the top of the scarp slope through wide stretches of beech woods and sunny glades, interspersed with wide horizons when the woodland fades out.

A highlight of this particular stretch is that the Ridgeway goes through the grounds of Chequers, the British Prime Minister's country residence dating from the sixteenth century. I was fortunate enough to do this walk on a lovely sunny January day making the views crystal clear with the blue sky accentuating the greens and browns of these gentle hills. You walk down one side of the estate with the old mansion clearly in view, then cross the front of the estate near the main gate, taking care not to scrutinise the security cameras too much! Then the path takes you up and out of the valley floor into the extensive beech woods which take you up to Coombe Hill and fantastic views again across the Vale of Aylesbury. Here there is also a monument to Buckinghamshire men killed in the Boar War.

Coombe Hill monument

From here you can work your way down into Wendover. The only problem you might have in this situation is if it is late, or if you don't want to walk back a fair old way, there's no direct public transport the other way. But you can take the train from Wendover up to Aylesbury, which I did, then get a train down to Princes Risborough. Whilst loitering in Aylesbury I wandered into Asda and bought a DVD. On my return to Risborough I bought fish and chips in the town centre which I was able to finish off on the train home.

PM's home there in the background!

Wendover to Ivinghoe Beacon

Wendover is a well heeled type of town mentioned in the Domesday Book, and is part of London commuter land on the main  route from London to Aylesbury.

This is another belter of a walk. Catch a train again from Mary's bones (my cockney rhyming slang!) and alight in the town centre. If you wish you can grab supplies from that posh supermarket of Budgens, again the supermarket has appeared in a beige handbag area! I started off by walking through the church yard of St Mary the Virgin. Built in the 14th century, it was used as a camp for Oliver Cromwells' troops in the Civil War. Moving on, you follow the path and pick up the Ridgeway which then heads west along the ridge through the lovely Hales Wood with the Vale of Aylesbury on the left as usual. After the settlement of Hastoe, you pass through Tring Park, with its manor house and fallow deer. The large town of Tring is nearby but  slightly off the Ridgeway. It has lots of facilities if that's what you're looking for.

Ivinghoe Beacon!

You always come across the odd gem on these travels, and I could not resist taking a photo of a country gate with the unbeatable notice, 'Jesus loves you, but I'm his favourite.' Not what you'd expect in rural Buckinghamshire.





After Wigginton you pass over the A41 dual carriageway and the Grand Union Canal.

Once you pass over the main rail line from London Euston to the north you have more open downland interspersed with woodland to pick up the remainder of the Ridgeway to Ivinghoe Beacon. You can take a diversion to the classic English village of Aldbury if you want. It's so postcard yummy that it has been used in films like The Avengers, Inspector Morse (I thought he was based in Oxford!) and The Dirty Dozen. Back to the Ridgeway, the path winds along the contours through a straggle of woodland before reaching the open downland. From there on it's wide vistas, endless skies and a sniff of the destination after a few valleys and field crossings. Once out of the woods I realised that my £100 plus sunglasses were no longer hanging snug at the top of my tee-shirt. The dilemma was, do I go back to find them or carry on to the destination before dusk? I had a pretty good idea of how I'd lost them, taking a leak off the main  track, but decided to look for them later after reaching my destination first, so onward I strode. I think I may have spotted one of our esteemed Conservative MPs striding topless (it was a he and it had been quite warm!) with a lady-friend on the same path. They shall remain nameless! I was tempted to say hello but held back. The destination seemed to keep disappearing over the horizon as if a giant invisible hand was continually moving it out of my reach, but eventually I got there just as the day was beginning to slip away. Here I admired the 360 degree view back towards London over the Chiltern hills and north over the plain. There is an information board and trig point.

Onward to Ivinghoe!

Retracing my steps, eventually I reached the woods again just as there was a little too much dark creeping in. I foraged around off track in three or four spots, praying I would get back my superposy cool guy sunglasses. I was just about to give up when one last investigation yielded success, there they were nestled in the undergrowth. 'Seek and ye shall find,' and I have serious form here. I have found sunglasses three times after losing them in the countryside.

When I got back to Tring, I found the town could not give me a bus ride back to Wendover on a Saturday night. Thinking of a taxi ride, I stopped at a bus stop and engaged this woman with a people carrier plus child about local buses. It was a case of 'we don't do buses on a Saturday evening.' Amazingly, she offered to take me back to Wendover herself. Ah, irresistible charm unlocks a thousand doors! She told her son in  front of me that this course of action was not normally advisable! a woman taking a complete stranger of the opposite sex for a lift in your vehicle for several miles. But she merrily returned me to Wendover for a few coins pocket money for her son. I was very grateful as she dropped me off within the comforting sight of Budgens, that great servant of mankind.

The Seven Sisters

For another super duper helter skelter, big time up and down sort of walk get yourself out to the Seven Sisters Country Park just a few miles west of Beachy Head and give your boots another workout. The Seven Sisters has been voted the UK's best walk by none other than Walking Magazine, that stalwart of the rambling fraternity that regularly appears in W.H. Smiths and supermarkets up and down the land. It should know a thing or two about walking, as the magazine is a feast of fine photos of gorgeous scenery the length and breadth of the UK and how to negotiate it on two feet.

Looking east from Cuckmere

Western end of Seven Sisters

The Seven Sisters is larger than life white cliff scenery on a magnificent scale that brings to mind that 'sceptred isle set in a silver sea' scenario, as well as invoking 'white cliffs of Dover' type feelings of how these extremities of our doughty island were there ready to protect us against the Nazi hordes.

Looking west towards Brighton

How do you get to this great spot for a serious hike. Take the coast road either east from Brighton or west from Eastbourne and you get to the Cuckmere Valley that cuts through the adjoining South Downs National Park via cute and cosy tea shop laden Alfriston to the English Channel. Park up at the National Trust Car Park at Cuckmere (conveniently providing spaces on both sides of the main road) and then take the very well laid tarmacked path towards the sea, tracing the winding ox bow type Cuckmere River as it prepares to disgorge itself into the ocean. You can be a little more adventurous and go off the main path as there are alternative routes, but still the same destination, the expansive pebbled beach that lies at the western end of the Seven Sisters. Where the river cuts into the sea is a narrow channel which prevents you from crossing over to the western end of the same beach. It's worth walking along the bottom of the cliffs from the beach for a while to admire the scale of this natural wonder.

The Stately Sisters looking east

Otherwise you can ascend the first cliff for an exhilarating switchback journey to Birling Gap, the next clear break in the cliffs a few miles to the east, and a restful interlude before the massiveness of Beachy Head beyond. Once you get to the top of the first cliff, you can begin to admire the sheer scale of this natural phenomenon, miles of undulating coastal cliff that lies along the English Channel like a giant anaconda that is just absorbing its prey along its pulsating length. The paths are well worn and plentiful where thousands of feet have pummelled the grass down every slope and up over every lip, or stood in groups to have their photos taken against the backdrop of the sea pounding the cliffs far below. But don't get too near the edge. These are cliffs on a grand scale with an eye-wateringly huge descent to the rocks below.

Up and down along the cliff tops

Big views is what this area is all about, so a camera is a must, and surely it is difficult to beat a real blue sky day to get the very best out of the far flung sea and landscapes which provide such a feast to the eye.

When you return after  a few hours yomping along the edge of southern Britain, you can partake of refreshments at the café in the gaggle of buildings alongside the car park, knowing a great day's walking work has been done.