1969 European Holiday: Last Days
Aug. 18th, 2019 09:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ashetlandpony15-18 August 1969
We spent our last days in Skipton basically just relaxing and saying goodbyes to our friends there.
Then, finally, on the 17th, it was time to bid farewell to Florence at the Skipton rail station. Both Mom and I cried. I loved Florence, and it really hurt to leave her. But we promised to write often, and that helped ease the pain of parting, at least a little.
Not much to do on the train to Kings Cross, except to gaze wistfully out the window at the countryside whizzing by, and listen to the wheels going clak-clak on the rails as we got closer and closer to the end of our time in the UK.
Didn't see much of London on our short cab ride from Kings Cross to Victoria Station, except for a political demonstration, of which I don't have any visual recollection at all.
Our hotel in Crowley near Gatwick was ultra-modern and quite well appointed. For the first time, we actually had a television in our own bedroom! No mood to watch it, though, although I vaguely remember watching the late news to have one final look at the BBC.
Anyway, earlier that evening, we had our last social call of our trip: Mother's first cousin Winnifred (Smithy's and Mary's sister) and her husband, Les Wellbelove. They were thoughtful enough to bring some coins to gift me, but only minutes after I took them in hand, I mislaid them in the hotel lounge, where I guess someone saw them and lifted them. I felt terrible about that. How could I be so negligent to lose a gift that someone had just given me? Extraordinarily, though, the Wellbeloves said that meant we would have to go with them all the way back to their home in Woking 40 miles away and get me some more coins! What an unbelievably kind and generous gesture. I made sure I didn't lose those, too!
This was the last photo I took during our trip: the view from our hotel room at a roundabout in or near Crawley. No roundabouts at all in our country yet, so I wanted a picture of one to remember them by.
The last thing I remember from our UK visit was the long, incredibly boring delay at Gatwick. In later years, I would endure much longer airport delays than that, but none quite so melancholy as that long sad day pacing the terminal at LGW.
Then we finally boarded our plane, lifted off at 9:34PM, and that, as they say, was that. My trip of a lifetime was over, at long last.
We spent our last days in Skipton basically just relaxing and saying goodbyes to our friends there.
Then, finally, on the 17th, it was time to bid farewell to Florence at the Skipton rail station. Both Mom and I cried. I loved Florence, and it really hurt to leave her. But we promised to write often, and that helped ease the pain of parting, at least a little.
Not much to do on the train to Kings Cross, except to gaze wistfully out the window at the countryside whizzing by, and listen to the wheels going clak-clak on the rails as we got closer and closer to the end of our time in the UK.
Didn't see much of London on our short cab ride from Kings Cross to Victoria Station, except for a political demonstration, of which I don't have any visual recollection at all.
Our hotel in Crowley near Gatwick was ultra-modern and quite well appointed. For the first time, we actually had a television in our own bedroom! No mood to watch it, though, although I vaguely remember watching the late news to have one final look at the BBC.
Anyway, earlier that evening, we had our last social call of our trip: Mother's first cousin Winnifred (Smithy's and Mary's sister) and her husband, Les Wellbelove. They were thoughtful enough to bring some coins to gift me, but only minutes after I took them in hand, I mislaid them in the hotel lounge, where I guess someone saw them and lifted them. I felt terrible about that. How could I be so negligent to lose a gift that someone had just given me? Extraordinarily, though, the Wellbeloves said that meant we would have to go with them all the way back to their home in Woking 40 miles away and get me some more coins! What an unbelievably kind and generous gesture. I made sure I didn't lose those, too!
This was the last photo I took during our trip: the view from our hotel room at a roundabout in or near Crawley. No roundabouts at all in our country yet, so I wanted a picture of one to remember them by.
The last thing I remember from our UK visit was the long, incredibly boring delay at Gatwick. In later years, I would endure much longer airport delays than that, but none quite so melancholy as that long sad day pacing the terminal at LGW.
Then we finally boarded our plane, lifted off at 9:34PM, and that, as they say, was that. My trip of a lifetime was over, at long last.
