To see what's weird about this "DANGER" sign you have to click on the image and read the full-scale version. Clearly they meant for people to lose any inclination to trespass. This was for a reservoir dam system. Our guide book, however, said to ignore the sign and go in. So we did and lived to tell about it.
In Danby Wiske we went next door to our B&B to eat at the White Swan, in fact the only place to eat in Danby Wiske. The proprietor (or "publican" or "gov'nor") didn't like what we ordered and said so. He said he wanted to cook something else for us if we'd let him. So Greg asked him what he wanted to cook for us. "Hold on," he said, "I'll bring it out." A minute later he slammed this plate down in front of us. What a card.
This sign is interesting mainly because it still exhibits the distances to places in miles and furlongs. A furlong, literally "furrow-length," is an eighth of a mile. Quaint.
This documentary photo demonstrates to the skeptic that some sheep kneel on their front legs to get their mouths closer to the grass. Lucile already knew this. Someone at the library please show her this picture. Susan promised her she'd look for this phenomenon.
Our coast-to-coast walk took us through all kinds of terrain, including pastures of working farms. The livestock are used to hikers and are very friendly. You cannot imagine how much saliva a cow can deposit on a rain jacket in no time at all.
Pretty crowded with tourists this day outside the Houses of Parliament. If you look close, or click for the larger view, you can find Susan.
Apparently people like to practice their rock-climbing chops on walls like this. Also apparently someone has come up with an ingenious way to foil them.
Harry Potter readers (or viewers) will be interested to know that this is the real "Diagon Alley." Its real name is Brydges Place, but it's located exactly where the books say it is. The other entry is a few feet wide, but by the time you get to where Susan is standing you wonder if you're going to have to turn sideways to get to the sidewalk. A freak of city non-planning.
You may or may not recognize this as the intersection on the "Abbey Road" Beatles album cover. Neither of us is in this picture, and here's why: In England, it's illegal, even unthinkable, for a motorist to challenge a pedestrian who is about to cross the street on one of these "zebra stripe" crossings. Taxi drivers lose their licenses for it, and so on. But everyone wanted to have their picture taken crossing this intersection. So a friend with a camera would cross to the triangular median patch about 30 feet to the right of where we stood to take this picture, and the pedestrian would wait for the traffic to go on by so the shot would be free of traffic. But the traffic, mostly taxis and buses, was not about to move with pedestrians standing there, which the tourists, mostly Americans probably, refused to understand. So the standoff continued with all kinds of slapstick starts and stops honking and yelling, "Go on" "No, you go on!" We refused to participate in this ridiculous charade. Instead we just took this picture from the side of the road.Here's a video that shows what we're talking about.
More soon. We're having a blast and we've managed to do almost everything on our wish list. We have the next week lined out pretty well to take care of most of the remainder and even to revisit a couple of favorites.
