Travelling with Nick: Sculpture

Bermuda

Our main vacation this year consisted of a four night stay in Bermuda and a sixteen day tour of the Southern Atlantic coast region of Florida, starting in Miami Beach.

As most people know Bermuda still has the status of a 'British Overseas Territory'. In fact it is the oldest self - governed such territory and has the third oldest continuous parliament in the world.
The islands have been connected to Britain since 1609 but they were first discovered in 1505 by Juan de Bermudez, a Spanish navigator. The islands were named after him and apart from a short time when they were called the 'Somers Islands' they have retained the Anglicised version of his name ever since.

The 'Somers Islands' were named after Sir George Somers a member of the Virginia Company who's ship 'The Sea Venture' floundered on the Islands' Eastern reef in 1609 on its way to the nascent English Colony of Jamestown, in Virginia.

Enough of the history although it is one of Bermuda's many delights, what is the place like now? Pristine, is one word that comes to mind, especially after looking at the photos on our return home. Everywhere is clean and well cared for. In four days it is impossible to see everything the islands have got to offer, we naturally concentrated on the things that interested us most; this involved visiting a large number of historical sites, as you will see from the photos. Hamilton is a vibrant, bustling and apparently thriving capital city. We liked it very much. It has the air of a British provincial market town with the emphasis on British. I hope that it doesn't offend any one but we liked that aspect of it very much.

One cannot escape the fact that there are a large number of commercial offices on the north side of Hamilton, including Bacardi's World Headquarters. The greater part of Bermuda's GNP is generated by 'offshore' financial businesses particular in the area of 'reinsurance' .
I will not pretend to know anything about this type of business but I do know that Bermuda has been very successful in attracting such enterprises to its shores and it shows! It is also clear that there are a significant number of 'high net worth' individuals with residences on the Islands but particularly in the district of Hamilton.

I am interested in politics but even if I wasn't it would not be difficult to identify the tension that exists between the PLP (Progressive Labour Party) and the OBA (One Bermuda Alliance). This was brought home to me by the two well informed and charismatic taxis drivers who drove us to and from our hotel. The consensus appears to be that recent Governments have taken their eyes off the tourism jewel in favour of the the finance industry jewel.
Even based upon our short visit I would tend to sympathise with that view. I know that late November and early December cannot be considered to be prime dates in the tourist calendar, nevertheless one would have expected to see more tourists than we did see in
St. George and 'The Dockyard' area. They were virtual 'ghost towns'. Both deserve better.

So what conclusion do I come to? On our first walk into Hamilton from our hotel - Royal Palms (highly recommended and very convenient) we fell in love with it. For us it was the best of English with the added benefit of warm sunshine. We started (unrealistically) dreaming of buying a holiday home there. By the end of the four days the dream had faded mainly due to us but also I had let the politics get to me. Most people would not let themselves be so troubled.
It is a beautiful tranquil location with the required amount of tropical weather even at the end of the year. As I said earlier the hotel we stayed at could not have been better, old world charm efficiently applied.

Here are some photos; no white sandy beaches edged by a turquoise sea and with beautiful people languishing on them, I am sorry to say, perhaps next time.

Hamilton's Administration and Historic buildings/monuments

Hamilton's Commercial District

Natural Beauty in Hamilton

Typical Hamilton Colonial Architecture

A Cruise Ship in Hamilton harbour - another important source of income for Bermuda

Dockyards - An important site for British and Bermudian history combined with modern commercial enterprise.

Commissioners House - National Museum of Bermuda

St. George's - Kings Square

A Replica of the Deliverance one of the two ships constructed after the wreck of the Sea Venture so that the original journey to Jamestown Va. could be completed in 1610.

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So that is a small glimpse of historic Bermuda. There is so much more to see and enjoy but we only had four days. Perhaps there will be a 'next time'.

Southern Florida

If you would like to read about the Southern Florida part of this trip you can find it here -

http://travelling-with-nick.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/southern-floridas-atlantic-coast.html

If you want to learn more about Bermuda, particularly its rich history, then I recommend you to this website -

http://www.bermuda-online.org/

To view my other 'Travelling with Nick' blog posts go to the Index -
http://travelling-with-nick.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/traveling-with-nick-index.html

If you are interested in motor cars you can see all types, in abundance, here -
http://twincam-serendipity.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/index-page.html

It has been said that 'everyone should visit Rome at least once in a life time'. I was of that mind myself and I decided that it was now time for my wife and I to pay that visit, before we got too old and decrepit.
We made the trip in the middle of May 2013. It certainly was one of my better decisions and I would add my voice the quote referred to above.
I am going to give a plug to the hotel we stayed in, Best Western Hotel Piccadilly, purely because it turned out to be ideal for our stay. It is about four hundred metres from the San Giovanni Basilica which was our starting place for touring the famous buildings and monuments of Rome. The Colosseum is less than a two kilometer easy walk to the East of San Giovanni. Alternatively you could take the Metro (underground tube train) at the San Giovanni station. I would certainly recommend taking the Metro to see the other sites/sights especially if travelling to San Pietro and the Vatican.

Having said that, the one abiding impression I have, of the historic heart of Rome, is, that if you are reasonably fit, all the famous buildings and monuments are within reasonable walking distance of each other. That is certainly what we did, over a period of four days. We had a couple of small maps given to us by the hotel which, like most other tourists, we used to navigate ourselves from one site to the other. It wasn't always easy purely because we tended to over estimate distances. We often over shot the location/road (Via) we were looking for and sign posts to the buildings/monuments are few and far between.

The Rome tourist board could certainly do better in this regard but it may take the view that too many direction signs would detract from the historic appearance of the city. I must say that I could expand on my view of the overall presentation of 'Historic Rome' and the appearance of Rome in general. I am afraid it would be somewhat negative so I am not going to indulge myself. I don't want to take anything away from what was a very enjoyable trip or the undoubted magnificence and richness that is Rome.

The other thing I want to say about my impression of 'discovering' Rome, is, that once you have found a hotel that is reasonably close to the historic centre, then you don't really need a map. One could just keep walking with eyes wide open and you will be overwhelmed by what you see with every single step; whether this be first century or seventeenth century architecture or sculpture. There is nowhere on Earth that has so much to offer in this regard, in such a relatively compact space.

I am not going to say any more. If you, as I hope you do, want to find out more about any of the buildings featured in the following photographs then you will be spoiled for choice for sources of that knowledge on the internet.

Arrivederci,

Nick
ps There are more photos on this Youtube clip accompanied by some light music -

http://youtu.be/9nKvHFxn6Jc