Rocks, Slaves and Dinosaur Tales

Bristol, ENGLAND
Dec. 18-20, 2014

When you look at a map of the UK, on the lower west coast of England you see a prominent inlet of water poking into the coast, above the prominent bit of land jutting out [MAP - Leg 1].  Near the end of this prominent inlet lies the city of Bristol.  What is it famous for?  Well, Colin went to university here, to study rocks; the city played a lesser known but significant part in global history; and rock and fossils abound.

I never knew why geology seemed so popular in England (it is its own subject in grade school).  Now I understand: Britain has the rocks of ages from most geological periods easily available in its land mass.  Bristol also has a great gorge for rock climbers right within the city (where else can you study and recreate so easily at the same time?).  And an architecturally fine-looking university to boot:

Colin reminiscing of uni days from the coffee shop across the street

The city itself is architecturally quite pretty I discovered during our daily "forced marches" (best way to cope with 7 hours' jet lag...  just keep moving).  Decent way to spend a day, wandering, learning stuff, having coffee, food, wine, beer when you feel like it.

exhibition cider at the Coronation Tap - served by the half
pint only, due to its tremendous strength...

If you want to avoid educational tangents about the "learning stuff" - the text is in another colour and can be avoided if not in the mood.

Architectural History
Bristol's architectural finery, I learned from Colin, is owing to the slave trade.  Slave trade?  In England?  Bristol is a port city, and as such, contributed ships which transported a large proportion of the estimated 3 million slaves across the atlantic [1] as part of the 'trade triangle' (from Europe, rum and goods to Africa to be traded for slaves (who, if you've read "The Book of Negros", or "Someone Knows My Name" as published in the USA, were often rounded up by other Africans for selling to the Europeans); to the Caribbean Islands and Southern States, where the slaves were traded for sugar and tabaco from European- and American-owned plantations; and back to Europe where the Europeans thrived on the plangation products and profits.  And not just individually, but through patronage to the city's public places too [2]).

You know you are in Europe when each day provides a dose of ABC's - Another Bloody Castle, Another Bloody Church, Another Bloody Cathedral... (groooooan).  I love them, walking around inside and out, trying to understand the ideas that move people to such monumental undertakings...

Bristol Cathedral

Moving on from religion to evolution, dinosaurs really did exist.  There are some fantastic Ichthyosaur skeletons (a dinosaur fish I'd never heard of - more corretly, a "marine reptile") in the main university 'hall', which you can walk into and visit for free (as is the case with many British museums).  Dinosaur-fossil-hunting became a prominent sport in Britain during the early part of the 1800's, perhaps (my own opinion) because of the Enlightenment and its urge for people to start thinking about what they saw around them in the Here and Now, and not just study knowledge and things of the past.

Bringing us full circle back to the rocks, the abundant fossils can be seen in the stones of the buildings and in the climbing walls of the gorge.

Oh, and for the music people out there, Bristol is the source of the soothing beats of Massive Attack and Portishead (plus Bananarama and the Eagles too).

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/jan/12/bristols-streets-history-horror-slavery
[2] http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/immig_emig/england/bristol/article_1.shtml