Corinne CrawfordI took the train from Manchester to Leeds on Thursday with plans to meet up with a girl I met when I was in Portugal last year. We were going to have dinner and drinks on Friday night. After a short 10 minute walk from the train station to my budget hotel, I tried to settle in for the afternoon and evening. The room was a micro budget room with literally no room for a suitcase except under the bed so it was a puzzle game anytime I needed anything out of my luggage. There were several reasons I wanted to go to Leeds. I was looking forward to meeting up with Jaz and it was just a two hour train ride to Prudhoe Castle. I have wanted to visit Prudhoe Castle since I missed it on my first trip to the UK quite a few years back. It was on my list of places to visit because according to some family research one of my Dad’s relatives did, I am a descendant of the family that built the castle when they came to England with William the Conquerer back in 1066. So basically, this was my castle.
There is something very special about having a connection to a historical place. Again, this was not actually not a castle like a Disney castle but it had the walls, mostly intact from the original build and the keep, remnants of the great hall that used to be there along with a brewery and then there was the Georgian house that was built later when the castle was in the hands of another family. It had the distinction of being the only castle in that area that withheld the Scots. When I arrived, there was only a few other people visiting the grounds and only one person working the desk for admission. Because she was not busy, I got to chatting with her and the fact that I may have family ties to the castle and the DeUmfrevilles that built it, she pulled out a family tree that was in a folder under her desk and we compared notes and it seems as if the family history I had relied on proved to match the records they had on the family. Although we lost it in the 1600’s because it mainly followed the name and not the daughters who married into other families and therefore had different last names. The last named DeUmfreville in my family tree was Joane DeUmfreville born in 1383, daughter of Thomas DeUmfreville. She married Thomas Lambert and of course the rest of my ancestors carried names other than DeUmfreville. I enjoyed wandering around the small castle grounds and Georgian manor and took a walk around the entire castle along the dry moat. It was a beautiful area.
I had a mediocre lunch at a pub near the train station and then headed back to Leeds to shower and change for my dinner out with Jaz. We decided to meet up at a bar that overlooked the dock area, which was about a 20 minute walk from my hotel and I got to see a good portion of the city. We had a drink there then headed to a wonderful Thai restaurant closer to my hotel. After a good dinner, we had one more drink at a pub. It had started to rain so Jaz took an Uber home and I walked the 5 minutes back to my hotel. It was very nice to catch up with her and I love making friends from around the world and making an effort to visit them when I end up in their neck of the woods.
The following day I just went to the library and caught up on some work as I did not end up working any on Friday between the castle visit and dinner with Jaz. I then wandered through the huge market both indoors and outdoors before going back to that same Thai restaurant to order the exact same thing for an early dinner, my first meal of the day.
I really liked Leeds. It was modern and well laid out which a huge part of the central area of the city for pedestrians only. Lots of shopping (not my thing) and it appeared to have a vibrant nightlife with lots of options for food and drink.
I went to bed early as I had a long day of travel the following day as I would get my first glimpse of Scotland.