Glasgow spring

We're in the full bloom of spring here in Glasgow. Finally.

Flowers have been popping up for a month, and now the trees have grudgingly begun to sprout leaves. Over the past several weeks we've been spending more time outdoors — it's getting progressively warmer, drier, and sunnier. Since our beloved dog, Mattie, passed away last autumn I haven't been out quite as much as I have been in the past.

Life without a dog has made me more sedentary, and that's something I've gotta correct. So I've been doing some wandering lately, occasionally capturing a few springtime photos.

A lovely footbridge over the River Clyde. Built in 1856, St. Andrew's Suspension Bridge replaced a busy ferry boat used by factory workers.

As I noted last year, springtime here

is a slow burn, teasing, tempting, flashing a smile and demurely lowering her eyes. Spring has been tantalizing us, seducing us, for weeks. Until the last few days, she's mostly been raising her petticoat and exposing her ankles. Now, it seems, she's ready for her miniskirt.

Amidst the gardens of Pollock House.

Jackson got his face painted at the vet school's annual "rodeo." It was supposed to be a dinosaur, but looks more like a crocodile.

A bit of fireman beefcake helping the wee ones spray the hoses at the rodeo. Water is Scotland's most abundant natural resource.

A few weeks ago I posted a picture of this building, the old Templeton Carpet Factory, and the trees were barren.

Adjacent to the Templeton Carpet Factory are these drying poles on the Glasgow Green. Going back to medieval times, the Freemen of Glasgow hold the right to dry clothing on the Green. These drying poles were installed in Victorian times, and used regularly into the 1970s.

The mute swans along our stretch of the Forth & Clyde canal are back to their egg laying. Hopefully, however, they'll have more success than last year.

Flowers bloom in front of the University of Glasgow's main campus.

After the long Scottish winter of rain and dark, spring can never come soon enough. Of course, as I write this it's currently hailing outside. And earlier this week, we actually had a short burst of snow.

Some of you gentle readers have been enjoying spring for months now. We're inching along, bloom by bloom.

The once and future cygnets

Last month, I wrote about the swans we encounter along the Forth & Clyde canal. One pair had produced a clutch of nine eggs. I expressed my misgivings about the safety of the young, whether as eggs or newborn cygnets.

When we got back from Paris, we found seven new cygnets with their mama and papa! Seven out of nine eggs was an excellent survival ratio. The wee ones stuck close to their parents while touring their section of the canal. All seemed well.

Mama and papa kept close watch over their new babies.

The cygnets followed mama as she looked for food.

They got noticeably bigger in just a few days.

And then they were gone.

All of them.

We've been told that year after year the cygnets along this stretch of the canal don't survive. But the ducklings on the same stretch of the canal do. No one knows why.

Although a few folks venture guesses like disease, my theory is predation. Whether those predators are land-based or waterborne, I have no idea. The sudden disappearance of all seven at the same time — with no trace of feathers, entrails, etc. — gives me pause. A dog or a fox or a snake might get a couple of cygnets at a time. All seven at once? Without a trace? I worry the predator is human.

The mama and papa carry on. They show no sign of fear, readily approaching for food.

The male approaches to see if food will be offered. Sorry, buddy. Just an unpaid photo shoot.

If the swans stay true to form, they'll have another clutch next year. And the cygnets will then disappear. I wonder if the Queen's royal Swan Marker has interest in her Scottish swans. We could use his expertise along the canal.

Coquettish spring

Spring has sprung, at last.

Although flowers have been blooming for more than a month, the trees are just now sprouting leaves. Temperatures during the day are warming into the upper 50s, which in Scotland means coats are off and some folks are even wearing shorts. Four of our last five days have had sunshine for most or all of the day — and daylight lasts more than 14 hours.

I shouldn't say spring has sprung. That implies it's suddenly springlike, which isn't right. Springtime here is a slow burn, teasing, tempting, flashing a smile and demurely lowering her eyes. Spring has been tantalizing us, seducing us, for weeks now. Until the last few days, she's mostly been raising her petticoat and exposing her ankles. Now, it seems, she's ready for her miniskirt.

Kelvingrove Museum on Monday.

Accordingly, we've been spending a lot more time outdoors. Long walks with the dog, multiple daily visits to playgrounds, kicking footballs {Ed.'s note: that's "soccer balls" to you 'Muricans}, in and out of the backyard twenty or thirty times per afternoon. Other folks are behaving similarly; parks and playgrounds are overrun.

Jack and I weren't the only ones who thought it would be a nice day to visit the park.

This past weekend we spent a couple of hours at the veterinary school's annual "rodeo," an event for the public to come onto its grounds for animal performances, charity tents, pony rides, animal rescue groups, petting zoos, and so on. Which animal did Jackson like best, the horses, dogs, ferrets, birds, rats, or alpacas? The guy in a horse costume, of course.

Not pleased by the crowd of onlookers.

Your favorite one? Really?

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about our local swans on the Forth & Clyde canal. Kate's excellent walk to work research reveals the momma swan has nine — nine! — eggs for this clutch.

That's a whole lotta eggs.

Our upcoming docket is getting crowded. If the weather stays nice and we've got energy, we plan to take a day trip this Friday to the nearby Isle of Bute. Two weeks from today, my parents will arrive for a three week visit, during which time we'll all make a trip to Paris. And a few weeks after they leave one of Kate's sisters, Rachel, and her family will arrive for a visit.

Our chilly spring probably seems amusing to those of you in warmer climes. I've been hearing about temperatures on the East Coast of the States this week in the 80s Fahrenheit. It's all about your perspective. Here's Jackson yesterday evening, with the temperature in the upper 40s:

Spring construction has begun.

Your spring, apparently, is a harlot. Ours, a coquette.

Seigneur of the Swans

Unless it has been marked for private ownership, any "mute swan" in the United Kingdom residing in open water belongs to the Queen.

I'm not sure this guy agrees:

A male "mute swan" monitors passersby on his stretch of the Forth & Clyde canal.

The Crown has claimed ownership of the "mute swans" since at least the 12th century. As a practical matter, the monarchy only exercises this ownership over swans on parts of the River Thames and some of its tributaries. Every July, in a ceremony called Swan Upping, a team of royal swan wranglers — the Queen's Swan Marker, the Royal Swan Uppers, and the Swan Uppers of the Vintners' and Dyers' livery companies — row skiffs up the River Thames for five days. Rather than capturing the swans for dinner as in olden days, they now take measurements and put rings on the legs of all the swans who have cygnets (i.e., baby swans) that they find during those five days.

Nowadays, the information they gather is used for conservation, including tracking by the British Trust for Ornithology. Essentially, the Swan Upping is a swan census.

When the swan ranglers sight a brood of cygnets, they cry out "All up!" to signal that their boats should get in position. As they pass Windsor Castle (one of the monarchy's homes), the rowers stand at attention, raise their oars, and cry out "Her Majesty the Queen, Seigneur of the Swans!"

Truly.

{Ed.'s note: The Crown also possesses ownership of the "Fishes Royal." According to a still-valid 1324 statute passed during the reign of Edward II, the monarch "shall have . . . whales and sturgeons taken in the sea or elsewhere within the realm." Today, any whales, dolphins, porpoises, or sturgeons captured within three miles of shore (or which wash up on a beach) can be claimed by the Queen.}

A "mute swan" is the general white swan of the United Kingdom, as well as many parts of Europe and Asia. The swan's plumage is all white. Its beak is orange, bordered by black, with a black knob on the bill. Having been introduced in the United States in the 19th century, it's now deemed an invasive species. The bird is called "mute" not because it's quiet, but because it is not as loud as some other swan species.

All white plumage, except for dirt.

We encounter mute swans all the time in Glasgow. Several breeding pairs live on our nearby stretch of the Forth & Clyde canal. A singleton lives at Lock 27, across from a pub of the same name. Kate crosses the canal every day for work. Jackson, Mattie, and I cross or follow the canal several times a week on walks.

On a winter stroll along the canal.

We're moving in to spring now. Our temperatures have increased from average highs of 40s Fahrenheit to highs of 50s Fahrenheit. Daylight lasts for 13 hours. We have more sun and less rain. Flowers peek up out of the ground.

Flowers like these are erupting around Glasgow.

As we move into spring, the paired swans are starting to lay eggs. On Kate's walk to work yesterday, she found six eggs in a swan nest. Today, she noted that someone had helpfully provided bread crumbs for the incubating mother.

Both males and females attend to the nest.

We have many foxes in the area, so the incubating pair needs to stay on or near the eggs at all times.

If she's done laying eggs — they typically lay one a day — then it'll be another six weeks or so before they hatch. I'm a little fearful for the clutch. Besides danger from a large number of foxes, the nest rests on the shore of the canal quite close to a sidewalk where many people and dogs pass by daily. The potential for disruption or confrontation, either before or after the eggs hatch, looms ominously.

Perhaps I'm needlessly worried. All the swans on the canal are quite comfortable with humans and dogs passing by. They'll readily approach for food, of course. But even if no food is offered, many stand their ground without concern. These royal birds do seem to rule the roost along the canal.

Unperturbed by toddler or large unleashed dog.

Wells — Bishop's Palace, Vicars' Close, and the Crown

In both its geographic size and its population, Wells is the second smallest city in England. Only the City of London is smaller. {Ed.'s note: The "City of London" is the 1.12 square mile city within the metropolis of London; it has its own mayor (i.e., the "Lord Mayor of the City of London"), and is the base of most of the financial services industry in metropolitan London.} The denomination "city" in the U.K. is obviously not based on an urban area's size, but instead is a political designation provided first by kings and later by Parliament. In medieval times, being a city came with advantageous privileges and exemptions.

Wells was designated a city in 1205. But settlements go back at least to Roman times, which centered around — no surprise here — water wells.

Downtown in Wells.

Bishop's Palace

With tourism its main industry, Wells relies not only on its beautiful cathedral but also the Bishop's Palace and Vicars' Close. Most of the Bishop's Palace was created around 1230, but it has had numerous additions. A bishop in the mid-1300s felt the need to add walls and a moat to protect himself, since he raised taxes on the citizens of the city. Now, the palace is guarded by a wall, a moat, and a small army of ducks and swans.

Duck flotilla approaches to meet us.

Then the swans arrive.

In a practice going back centuries, at least a few of the swans are trained to beg for food by pulling on strings attached to bells. They are not shy. Fortunately, we had a couple of bagels from Jack's bag to share with the swans and ducks.

These young grey cygnets will turn white as they mature.

Once you cross the drawbridge over the moat, the Bishop's Palace and its gardens are open for exploring.

The current bishop lives in a portion of the palace.

Interior of the walls that guard the palace and its grounds.

Back side of the palace.

The interior of the Bishop's Palace is pleasant, but nothing special. It looks like a lot of other European palaces that were somewhat frozen in time a couple of centuries ago.

A great hall inside the Bishop's Palace.

The acoustics of this room are not good for the piano. I tried it.

I did enjoy decorative touches like this dragon on the staircase banister.

The Bishop's Palace has a little taste of the jumbled stained glass from the cathedral, as described here.

The best reason to visit the Bishop's Palace is for its 14 acres of gardens. There are both traditional, orderly English gardens, as well as wilder flowers and shrubbery.

Controlled, orderly, organized.

Straight-line plantings, tidy borders.

The formal gardens were enlivened by some modern sculpture, like this one of Adam and Eve.

The star of the show is the outer gardens. You cross a bridge enveloped by a weeping willow and venture out to a stream and wilder shrubbery.

The willow branches part for the bridge.

A glimpse of the cathedral's Lady Chapel.

Benches and paths give you beautiful viewpoints of the east side of the cathedral.

Eastern exterior of Wells Cathedral from the Bishop's Palace grounds.

A cat in the gardens tried to adopt us. He purred, rubbed, and meowed for attention. Then he followed us on our meandering tour of the gardens, making sure we were always aware of his presence. Jackson was delighted, of course. Ultimately, we asked the staff at the gardens if they knew the cat, and they said he was new but not unique as a feline interloper in the gardens.

The cat makes his introduction.

The cat followed us across the bridge and into the formal gardens. We eluded adoption only because we went into the palace.

Vicar's Close

The Vicars' Close lies on the opposite side of the cathedral from the Bishop's Palace. It is a picturesque straight line of houses, supposedly Europe's oldest purely residential street with all of the original buildings surviving intact. The houses were completed in 1412, about 50 years after construction began. Originally, the houses were approximately 520 square feet, but additions have been added to the rear and some of the houses have been combined inside.

Southern entrance into the Vicars' Close.

Obviously, many updates have been made over the centuries, but the street front remains uniform in style.

Looking north into the Vicars' Close. The close (i.e., an old term for cul-de-sac or alley) is ten feet narrower at the northern end than the southern end, making the street look longer.

As an American, this street looks quintessentially English to me, from the stone to the chimneys to the front gardens.

The front gardens were not part of the original plan; they were added in the 1400s.

At the northern end the close was capped by a chapel and library. It is now used by the cathedral school.

A narrow alley on the right side of the chapel/library allows egress to the north.

Beautiful sunflowers in one of the gardens.

I was quite fond of the sunflowers.

Since the southern end is wider than the northern end, the close looks shorter when viewed from the north.

Looking south down the Vicars' Close.

Wells Cathedral rises beyond the Vicars' Close. The southern end of the Close is plugged by a storeroom and barrel-vaulted hall.

The houses in the Vicars' Close are still occupied by church officials. But if you reserve far in advance, one of the homes can be rented out for weeklong vacations for about 500 pounds.

We came across another very friendly cat in the close:

She had an appropriately serene demeanor.

The Crown at Wells

Wells is sometimes a location for television and movie productions, such as in Doctor Who episodes and Elizabeth: The Golden Age (with Cate Blanchett). I thought the town looked familiar to me when we visited, but didn't know why. Then we stopped in at The Crown at Wells, a pub and hotel established around 1450.

The Crown at Wells has been serving pub grub about twice as long as the U.S. has been in existence.

Ready to start dinner.

When I looked around at the various photos on the wall, I came across this one showing actors Nick Frost and Simon Pegg:

Simon Pegg and Nick Frost behind the bar.

The Crown at Wells, and the entire city of Wells, were locations for Pegg's and Frost's movie Hot Fuzz, a comedy that followed their hit Shaun of the Dead. Kate and I had watched Hot Fuzz on DVD when we were living in Raleigh, perhaps a year before we visited Wells. Wells is the stand-in for the film's fictional town of Sandford. The pub is seen in the film.

Jackson got in the spirit of goofy comedy while we were eating dinner. His exuberance carried through to our stroll after dinner.

Post-dinner antics.

Stomping sideways down the street. "Mommy, you do it, too!"

Wells Cathedral, Bishop's Palace, and Vicars' Close were highlights of our trip to southwestern England. We saw them all within a five to six hour period, including feeding ducks/swans, a stop for dinner, some shopping, and a stroll.

Hard to get a better afternoon as a tourist than that.

For more about Wells Cathedral, the first wholly Gothic cathedral in England, see here: http://www.coloringwithoutborders.com/2013/10/wells-cathedral.html