Day 6: Monday 26th September

Finally, it was time to visit Durham. I’d been meaning to go there since I first read Bill Bryson’s Notes From A Small Island:

if you have never been to Durham, go at once. Take my car. It’s wonderful.

Of course I should really have gone to their applicants’ day but I was disinclined since I already had an unconditional offer from Cambridge, and (perhaps because they knew I’d applied to Cambridge) they’d transferred my application to a college that was distinctly not the one to which I’d applied. Anyway, it had been preying on my mind for years that, perhaps, I’d made the wrong choice. I can state now that I’m now convinced I didn’t. I didn’t feel Bryson’s fervour for the place , but I did find Durham very agreeable. (Indeed the fact that this is true despite it being a dull day suggests that had it been sunny I might have liked it very well).

We spent most of our time in the cathedral, which I insisted on browsing properly with the aid of a guide-pamphlet. Grandma seemed pleased at this, since her visits are usually more of the in-and-out variety, for carol services and graduations. In this way we passed a pleasant hour or so even without paying for entry to any of the extra exhibitions. I didn’t feel I possessed the religious fervour necessary to tour a separate museum dedicated to one saint, particularly as the very idea brought to mind Father Ted. Having made a circuit of the cathedral, we stopped off at the café in the undercroft. According to a newspaper review on the door, it was ‘everything a cathedral café should be’. Whether by this they intended ‘frighteningly priced and full of mildly-disapproving-looking old people’ I’m not sure, but it was pleasant enough nonetheless, in that delightful small-pleasures way.

Outside, we wandered the old streets, and I wondered quietly (and perhaps with some little unfair derision) whether they tiny townhouses we passed that proclaimed themselves “University of Durham: Department of x” really did contain the entire department of x. Presently we came to a bridge on the river, and I watched the students going by, wondering whether term had started so soon. It was all familiar yet different: plenty of stash in evidence and a couple of oh-so-public-school types in college scarves and blazers. From what I’ve heard of such universities (Bristol and Exeter included), I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find people in Durham who out-‘Oxbridged’ Oxbridge.

Other lessons of the day: Grandma found my driving acceptable, and made it clear that although for religious reasons she won’t swear herself, it’s quite alright if I do in her presence. Anyone who’s driven with me will understand that this is important. Hehe.

Something I discovered on this trip is that Britain remains a big, diverse place, with a great deal to see. Given that Britain’s a tiny country, the world really must be huge. And yet it’s just a small planet orbiting a small star in an average galaxy… etc. Crazy, really.

The rest of the day passed easily enough, watching Corrie (which, more so than other soaps, I could see myself getting into if I really became a couch potato – think I’ll stick to The Archers though; and why isn’t there an Archers facebook group?!) and driving D and Uncle A to the pub.

There, that wasn’t too much to read was it?

[Posted 16:24 on November 7th]