Fat Rascals at Bettys
HARROGATE NOTE
Strolling Near the Baths
|
|
I really, really like it here! Perhaps you have traveled extensively in England, but this town is quite unlike any I have seen. I just went to the library (8 minutes, 3 more minutes and I could have been at Bettys) and put a book on hold for 50p. Then I started nosing around the bulletin boards and within minutes I found a note about a writing group that meets today (I plan to be there), a rambling (walking) group meeting on the weekend, a 12-week philosophy course at the Friends Hall, a meditation group again at the Friends Hall, and garden clubs, and music group after music group as well as concerts of all sorts. All this in a town of 70,000.
I suppose what makes Harrogate different is that it is very upper class and when the truth comes out, I could enjoy aspects of being a snob. Whoever started these spa towns in the 1890's must have stayed on and changed this town forever.
This morning was actually the first time I experienced anything which might have seemed less than upper class. I was doing a morning walk around our beautiful residential area and was smiling away because it all just seemed so beautiful. A gardener was walking toward me, nodded his head a bit, and said, "Morning, luv." I almost giggled.
As you might well guess the colonies have not come home to roost in Yorkshire to the extent they have in southern parts of the UK, notably the London area. I did see a few blacks in U.S. Army fatigues and come to find out there is a U.S. military intelligence base here called Menwith Hill. Some locals say it is tied to the CIA. Just what they are spying on I don't know, but from the look of the installation it clearly has to do with electronic communications. Immigrants from India and Pakistan are noticeable in some retail stores, especially super food markers, and one imagines that this is the beginning of a population shift.
The nearest city is Leeds about 15 miles to the south which is home to about 400,000 people. It is one of the three or four large cities in Yorkshire. Leeds is served by Leeds-Bradford airport with regular flights to London, other UK cities and the continent. Frequent trains connect Leeds and London via Kings Cross station. The University of Leeds is one of UK’s sought after institutions of higher education. Leeds likes to refer to itself as the London of the North.
Harrogate is famous for it’s International Toy and Christmas Fair held each January, a major event for wholesale and retain merchants. Home building is becoming a major industry in Harrogate as UK industry expands and relocates to Yorkshire. Recently, the Brits have taken to developing Model Home Villages, ala the United States. We visited a couple of these and found the term model to have at least two meanings. First, they are similar to the US in that they each contain several completed house of various sizes with landscaping side walks, and are completely furnished. Just like home. Then there is another definition of model, as in a “small scale reproduction.” The Brit models are similar to those in the US regarding the number of rooms and amenities but the scale is the most noticeable difference; rooms are much smaller. Single bedrooms smaller than 10 X 10 feet are not unusual, the kitchen are comparatively tiny and separate living and dining rooms remain the norm. The American “Great Room” has not caught on, but no doubt it will. The question is, How Great? We wondered if and when will new Mc Mansions appear.
View from the Gardens
|
|
One of the most attractive aspects of Harrogate is the combing of classical stone and mortar older shops with newly designed glass and metal buildings. Most of the down town streets offer this old world/new world landscape and the esthetic pleasure of both in juxtaposition. Because of the lack of total redevelopment, may streets remain narrow and curvy, which is pleasing to the eye but frustrating to drivers all sizes of vehicles. Even though shopping centers are being developed away from the town center, many people continue to shop in town. We had to look twice before realizing how this had been facilitated with out several story buildings. For example, a full Service Marks and Spencer department store is located between busy walk ways near the town center, as are other stores. The creative use of below ground level floors, creative lighting and effective use of escalators and people friendly signing avoid potential chaos. There is an avoidance of long, narrow boring streets by using varying city block sizes, benches carefully designed short “express” streets to move cars from section of the down town to another.
Sorry if this reads like a PR piece for Harrogate, but hopefully it conveys some of the reasons why we find the it such a delightful town/city.
.
|
