22 June 2016 - Knight’s Folly Farm, Bitton, near Bristol, Gloucestershire

We were well organised this morning as we set off for the nearest Park & Ride at Breslington, the Bath Road P&R, lunch in the back pack with our Rough Guide, raincoats at hand in readiness for the rain forecasted later in the day. We arrived in the city before 9.30 am, down at the Centre, situated on a branch of the Floating Harbour.  I am sure I have said this before, that 9.30 am is not a good time to view a city for the first time. The shoppers, the tourists and the otherwise idle are still scarce on the ground, the cafes, bars and tourist attractions still to open their doors. On such a dull day, matters are even worse and we were not particularly impressed. As we wandered about, a little aimlessly in the first instance, without map or direction, we came across rubbish still strewn about from the activities of the night, vagrants huddled in corners muttering “Any small change, please?” 

We found ourselves in the St Nicholas Markets, housed in the Georgian Corn Market, a fantastically eclectric collection of stalls, reminding me of the Covent Market in London visited last year, before returning to the Centre. 

There we called into the Arnolfini, a contemporary art gallery housed in a refurbished Victorian warehouse. Here we found little to please us apart from a 1997 thirty minute film by Indian Amar Kanwar titled “A Season Outside”, his personal reflection on the effects of division and war. It caused me to reflect on the same issues.

We returned to the Floating Harbour, crossed over and wandered along the south side to see the old sailing ship sighted earlier. The Floating Harbour is an artificial dock  created by a lock-type arrangement. For centuries, ships relied on the tidal current of the River Avon to carry them to and from Bristol. By the late 1700s, the need to accommodate more ships in the harbour had become urgent. After forty years of discussion, a plan suggested by William Jessop was adopted; to dam the tidal river and create an artifical lake.  This lake, known as the “Floating Harbour”, opened in 1809. It was the largest artificially enclosed stretch of water in the world, preserving the commercial heart of Bristol and allowing continued expansion for the next one hundred and fifty years.

The ship, a conjectural reconstruction of “The Matthew”, spends most of its days tied to the dock offering tourists free boarding and no doubt a request for donations to cover overheads. Today, one of the volunteers was waiting for a busload of “ankle biters”, primary school children, who were to spend an hour or so on board, undertaking a short trip up and down the little harbour, adopting the costumes and spirit of pirates. Later when one lot neared the dock, we heard the great roars of six or seven year old pirates, who were enjoying every moment of the role playing.

The original “Matthew” was that which Giovanni Cabboto (John Cabot) sailed from Bristol in search of new lands in 1497; he is believed to have landed in Newfoundland and explored part of the coast of North America. He sailed off again the following year, but nothing more is known of his fate.

The Matthew off to do some pirating

This particular vessel was built in Bristol by traditional shipwrights brought together for the project and launched in 1996 at the International Festival of the Sea. In 1997 she sailed the Atlantic with a crew of eighteen to re-enact Cabot’s journey. Today the "Matthew" still voyages under sail around the United Kingdom and is an ambassador for her home port. It should be noted however, that for the purposes of mini-excursions like those today, three in all, the vessel motors without sail. I suspect the littlies did not even notice the anomoly. 

We were invited by one of the crew to return after 2 pm when the educational or dramatic part of their working day was ended, however at the time, we thought we would be elsewhere. As it turned out, we probably could have managed a return to inspect it for ourselves.

Instead we made our way to Shed M, a relatively new museum set up in one of the old dock sheds. The exhibits cover three floors and  concentrate on the last four or five hundred years of Bristol’s history. The curators should be given awards for their efforts and any tourist who fails to make this part of their exploration of the city should be penalised. We learned much here, although we had done our homework, so it wasn’t all totally new.

Although not proud if its role in the slave trade, Bristol has to give credit to this skeleton in the cupboard as being one of the most important factors for its economic rich history.  

There were 2,018 slaving voyages made out of this city during those dark years. The European transatlantic slave trade lasted for over four hundred years, bringing wealth to some and misery and death to millions. For Bristol, the transatlantic slave trade lasted only about one hundred years, enabling a wider network of trade in goods and raw commodities that depended on the trafficking of human beings.

Sugar was one of those important commodities; in 1760 Bristol had twenty sugar refineries. One of the industries that rose in Bristol, using sugar and other imported commodities, was Fry’s chocolate factory, operating from 1847 through to current times. In 1910 Fry’s was Bristol’s biggest employers with around 6,000 people working in their city centre factory.

A less savoury industry was tobacco production, the raw product imported through the same channels. Bristol was the largest centre for tobacco products in Britain for a century before 1980. The Wills family pioneered the manufacture and branding of machine-made cigarettes in the 1880s and their Woodbine brand became the best selling British cigarette. Unsurprisingly, tobacco production came to an end in 2009.

Bristol was a trading hub from its beginnings in about AD 1000. The position of its port, in a protected river but with easy access to the sea and to the inland river transport, gave it advantages over other ports in the region. By about 1250, it was the second most important port in the country after London, trading locally, nationally and internationally.

For about four hundred years, from the 1330s to the 1700s, Bristol was the second city in England after London, thanks to the size of the port and the volume of trade. Bristol lost that positon from about 1750, as other ports, in particular Liverpool, developed. They had the advantage of being close to the expanding industrial markets in the north, providing both goods for export and a market for imports with low transport costs.

Today Bristol, with an estimated population of 442,500, is England’s sixth and the United Kingdom’s eighth most populous city, and the most populous city in Southern England after London.

As we had entered the city this morning by bus, both Chris and I had been rather unimpressed, the buildings shabby, in disrepair, and often empty and neglected. In fairness, when later we found ourselves in a newly developed part of the port, we did change our minds. Bristol had a hard time during the last war, it being a natural target for the German bombing raids because of its importance as a port and manufacturing centre. 

The first of six major air raids took place on 24 November 1940 and  lasted for six hours. Thousands of incendiary and oil bombs as well as high explosives were dropped, which destroyed homes, historic buildings, churches and much of Bristol’s main shopping area. Two hundred and seven people were killed with a further one hundred and eighty seven seriously injured. But let us remember that this was seventy six years ago; how much time does it take to make a city shiney and new again? Today we did see a lot of scaffolding up suggesting that there is some restoration going on, and perhaps we should return in another five years before further critisism.

When we found ourselves down in the newly developed area, graced with sculptures and decorative water installations, we wondered where all the people were. It was as if this had been done for a future generation rather than those here now.

Banksy's "Paint Pot Angel"

This lovely new open area runs down to the harbourside,  west of where we had found "The Matthew", and is indeed shiney and new. We found ourselves in conversation with a narrowboat owner who had spent the last four months travelling down through the network of canals with his wife. After wishing him a long healthy life to carry on his pursuit, we climbed up Brandon Hill, through lanes and paths, emerging from the untamed gardens near Cabot Tower, which we elected not to climb. We had walked beyond the access point for the Museum, a fact that did not delight my husband much, however it was all downhill after that.

We were not particularly interested in the museum part of the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, having had our fill at Shed M, but did enjoy the two floors of the permanent art collection, including a piece by the famous Banksy; “Paint Pot Angel”, an altered statue of an angel with a pot of paint upside down on its head.  This was originally displayed amongst the museum collections during the 2009 exhibition “Banksy versus Bristol Museum”. Banksy was reputedly born in Bristol in 1974, although his identity is very much a mystery.

Bristol Cathedral and Rajah

The afternoon was again slipping away as it always does when we are having fun, so we decided to head on to the bottom of the hill back to the bustop, but were distracted by the lovely College Green, gardens separating the cresent shaped Council House or Town Hall and Bristol Cathedral. The Town Hall is quite an impressive structure, size wise if nothing else. Interestlingly it was opened in 1938, and I did wonder what damage it had undergone during the blitz. It is currently being upgraded and not obviously open to the tourist public. Instead we made our way into the Cathedral and were duly impressed with this structure, also massive.

Curiously the statue standing outside the Cathedral is of Rajah Rammohun Roy, born 1772 in Radhanagar, Bengall, died 1833 in Bristol, a philosopher, reformer, patriot, scholar, a founding father of Indian Renaissance. He was obviously a fine human being but I am still baffled as to why he, rather than some other, is glorified here.

Once an abbey, founded in about 1140, the Cathedral attained its elevated status in 1542. It has the appearance of having been constructed in one swoop, however it has evolved in the same manner as most others, combining radical medieval techniques with sympathetic Victorian additions. I was greatly impressed and pleased we had made the detour.

Bristol's Council House

Finally we reached the bus stop, just in time to catch the Park & Ride bus, and in turn head home. We had avoided any further rain all day, however there were spots as we entered our little house. As I prepared a welcome cup of coffee, a steam train passed close by, great clouds of smokey steam puffing high above the trees across the road; all very English story book. All we needed were some red robins and grey squirrels and we had seen plenty of those today on Brandon Hill.

 Tonight we are listening to the last televison debates concerning the Remain or Stay in the EU referendum, the last ditch arguments before D-Day. We have our own views, but of course have no right to vote. The polls will close late tomorrow and we will sit up late to learn the outcome. The battle has become very ferocious, the outcome could go either way. Even the murder of the female MP this last week has been dragged into the theatre, although this was obviously a nut case on the rampage with little to do with politics. Interesting times, for sure!