LIFESTYLE the - NEWCASTLE WAY…

Tyne Bridge - Newcastle …

We have just retuned from a long weekend visit, to see our daughter who has relocated to Newcastle to study & work in this beautiful city. It was a relatively easy flight from Bristol airport approximately 40 minutes. However the journey this time was slightly marred by the feeling that I was sitting in a male public toilet! There were two very large parties of very drunken men who had clearly started the ‘stag party’, some hours earlier on the plane! The captain had been warned about the ‘excitable’ cargo & stated over the tannoy, that no alcohol was to be served on this flight & that because of the Covid virus, that only two people at any time could stand in a que for the toilet at either end of the plane. However once the seat belt light was extinguished, the ‘stag men’ immediately dashed up & down the isle, some holding onto their - ‘shall we say lower groin’, in anticipation of getting to the toilet. Within the first few minutes the entire isle in both directions was full of men bobbing from foot to foot; joking with each other & trying to cajole & coax their comrades to be quick. And so it went on all of the journey, a few of the men queuing for the second & third time!

Drunk men on mass can be very intimidating particularly if you are thousands of feet in the air in a tin can; but I can honestly tell you that all of them were of good nature & in good spirits [literally], despite the obvious strain on their nether regions. How they were likely to be later having access to more ‘booze’ was anyone’s guess?

I have been to an area of Newcastle before, when I was very young, my father’s relations - There are so many of us it would seem! This visit was to my ‘Great Aunt Grace’s’ home, she had two grown up, rather attractive as I recall twin daughters & we were to stay with them for the weekend. The best bit of this & of most interest to me was Gt. Aunt Grace’s upright piano in her ‘good room’ of the house, which she did not seem to mind me ‘enthusiastically’ playing on, which I did for hours on end, the noise was dreadful, even to my young ears, but I was of the opinion that if I continued to practice, that by the law of averages I would obviously improve. This drove my mother mad, she had been left in the house with me and Gt. Aunt Grace, whilst the others had gone out, someone apparently always had to keep an eye on Gt. Aunt Grace! To my delight Gt. Aunt Grace, kept telling my mother that I was fine - ‘Natalie is having fun’! So on I went with my relentless duty & practice, this time using my elbows, which did hurt a bit when I ran them from on end of the piano keys to the other, but I was resolute.

Finally I decided, that even my ears could not take any more, so I stopped pulled down the piano lid, got off the stool and looked out of the window. I watched Gt. Aunt Grace staggering down the garden path to the washing line with a large basket of washing, I assumed that she was staggering so much due to the weight of the laundry. I watched with interest as she glanced around at the house in a sort of furtive manner, clearly happy that she was on her own, she turned her attentions back to her washing. She bent down & pulled on the sheets in the the basket, it looked to me like she was untangling the sheets as she pulled & pushed at the basket, eventually she pulled the stubborn object free & out emerged a bottle, which she put to her mouth & took a huge swig, the effort of throwing her head back to drink, made her stagger from her position & almost fall over. Then one of her twin daughter’s, who had retuned expectantly ran down the garden & wrestled the bottle from her, I can tell you for what I considered an old lady, Gt. Aunt Grace could certainly put up a good fight.

Having logged this information, I decided that my next project would be to keep an eye on Gt. Aunt Grace as clearly there was something interesting going on! During my weekend of surveillance; I should tell you I am quite good at this, I have certain techniques that I had learned over my short years, for example I was not allowed into my brothers bedroom, however when he was away at school, naturally I used to sneak in to do a recce of what he might have in his cupboard or in his draws, however I had been caught a couple of times, so what I used to do, is check that no one was around, sneak into his room & remove the entire draw, take into my bedroom where I could riffle through it without anyone suspecting! Once I had gone through all the items, you would be surprised the information I gleaned, I would check no one was about & return the draw & bring another one to my room for inspection. Simple - But effective! So over the next few days my observations noted that Gt. Aunt Grace had a number of bottles stashed all over the house, under the sink behind all the cleaning products, in the bathroom hidden behind the sink pedestal, under the sofa, the favourite place seemed to be in the kitchen where there was a number of bottles hidden all over the place & she would take a long swigs, on one occasion she turned quickly & wink at me. The most ingenious hiding place of all was the bottles she kept in the piano! Gt. Aunt Grace like a drink or two … But she was very nice to me!

Looks like a set from Gotham…

This visit last week to Newcastle was to meet up with our daughter & her boyfriend, who had moved to this beautiful city as she is studying & working there. Tallulah had made forensic plans for us to see as much of Newcastle as we could fit in on our short visit. We travelled from Newcastle airport with her to the centre of town, via the Metro, still with the happy stag party in tow, still singing! It is a simple & easy journey of about 20 minutes. Our hotel was opposite the Metro - The County Hotel, we received a upgrade because we had booked directly with them as opposed to an on-line site. A perfectly good hotel in the centre of town. My one tip would be to order breakfast as opposed to eating from the bain-maries! Once we had off loaded the bags, we walked around the city and took in the sites as the early evening light drew in; there is something about cities at night the lighting makes certain buildings sparkle, walking up the road toward the Monument to Earl Grey, which stands high on a podium dominating the skyline, you can’t help but be ‘blown away’ by the Waterstones building that is lit up at night, having read all the Harry Potter books to my children, this building looks like it belongs in the story - just beautiful. Just close to Earl Grey Monument is the Botanist, a trendy eatery/bar with an equally amazing glass domed ceiling. Sipping our wine & cocktails in the early evening with our young companions, it struck me as the bar filled up, the diversity of the age ranges that were customers. This really is not something that you experience in the South, everyone was comfortable together, just getting on with their thing! I also noticed how well dressed people were, everyone had made an effort, in some ways - I guess it was a bit like the 1990’s, when clothes were king, I liked that, as I like clothes! Albeit I was very Southern dressed in jeans & t-shirt!

CHINA TOWN - NEWCASTLE

China Town in Newcastle is just a road with the obligatory gate announcing its presence. Here there are many restaurants & a supermarket, which I unfortunately did not get the chance to visit - next time! Tallulah took a picture of us standing by the Gate, in the picture, I have a fluffy leather hat on, my husband & I looked like two escapees, just released from an asylum & having the good luck to find ourselves in China Town! Not a good look! However, we ate in a great Chinese restaurant the food was excellent … Really what is not to like about Newcastle & I had only been there a few hours!

In the day light, the city looks very different, it is clear that Newcastle is a party town, there was much revelling late into the night before, perhaps it was the stag party still revving up? They have a practice in place to clean up the streets, I’m told that there are a great deal of police support officers that roam the streets keeping things safe & I was advised by our daughter that I would see one of these ‘NEl’ officers as they are in abundance, I did not see one, whilst I was there nor did I see any trouble either - so all’s good! The shopping in Newcastle is brilliant - The usual multiples that you find in any of our towns or cities these days, but what really interested me is the many independents, Newcastle is awash with good shopping, there are many tailor shops too, I am guessing this is because the Newcastle people are a well dressed lot! I can’t think that I have seen a shop in a high street down south in a city centre that is devoted to tailoring these days? There is also a wonderful Fenwicks, just near the Waterstone building which has a food hall that is so up my street, it was a must to stop for a little glass of Prosecco…

Up the street you can walk through Grainger Market - were you can buy just about anything, although I have to admit I did spend most of my time ogling the cheese store & the fish market - I certainly had a bit of ‘food market envy’ - we again have nothing near me to compare with the extent of produce or the price point that could match what is on offer in Newcastle… Just fabulous food & bargains all around ….

Grainger Market - Part of the extensive fish stall …

Newcastle has an abundance of architecture crossing all century’s, styles & materials, most of it truly wonderful, I need another ‘few’ visits to take some shots of what I saw, we stopped off a the STACK, for a glass or two! This is an eating & drinking venue which is made up in the style of shipping containers that are ‘stacked’ together making a two story complex, in the centre is a music venue with a stage all in the open air surrounded by bars the tables have outside heating, upstairs there are further eateries & cafes - It is a buzzy place, again frequented by all age groups, which gives it a sort of festival vibe, but without the mud and hippies! I loved it! Later we walked down to the Quayside which has a market on Sunday’s, here there is an abundance of stylish cafes, bars & restaurants, none of which we had time to visit - next time! The bridges are built all around the River Tyne, the area takes on a Gotham city vibe but without batman & the baddies! It is all just stunning!

I loved Newcastle & I can’t wait to visit it again, obviously it was very different from my first visit as a child. I only ever meet Great Aunt Grace on that one occasion, however there is another tale about her some twenty-five years later. My fathers offices were in Brook Street, London opposite is the five star luxury world famous Claridge’s Hotel, which became an extension of my father’s office, in terms of his lunch & evening meals, in the years that he was at his Brook Street office he became well known to the staff. For some reason best know to Trevor, [my father’s name], he suddenly decided to rekindle his relationship with Great Aunt Grace & her cousin also called Grace. I think there was probably an element of wanting to show his distant aunts just how well he had done for himself - & why not? So he booked two first class seats on the train from Newcastle to London & sent them some money for their trip to come & see how well their nephew had done for himself.

On receipt of the money, Gt. Aunt Grace immediately converted some of the cash into a large bottle of whisky to keep them company on the long journey to London. Having quickly emptied the bottle of whisky the two Grace’s made ‘in roads’ into the train buffet alcohol supplies, with what was left of the cash. The result of this was when they arrived at Bond Street station they were well & truly ‘soused to the eyeballs’. Nevertheless, Trevor determined to continue with his plans took the two old ladies who were now not talking to each other to Claridge’s for afternoon tea. The next two hours were a debacle & that story deserves a post of its own - The two Grace’s bickered loudly between each other & complained bitterly to Trevor that the sherries that were brought to them were meagre proportions, Gt. Aunt Grace felt in some way that ‘this posh’ place served the alcohol in ‘too small glasses’, the only thing that Grace 2 agreed with & shouted loudly that the drink was most probably ‘watered down too!’ All very embarrassing for Trevor! Eventually this painful experience was over, Trevor paid the bill & made a hasty retreat hot footing it back across the street to his office.

Safely back at his desk, the receptionist called him on his office phone. ‘Trevor, Claridge’s on the phone.’ Trevor took the call from the manager of the hotel only to be asked if he wanted the cut glass ashtray & the silver salt & pepper pots taken by the two old ladies added to his next bill or did he want to pay for them now?’ …