Author Archives: Joy Hendrickson

An aristocratic and blue collar town, a tehnological and esotric site, it’s easy to get lost in its well-ordered boulevards that gently follow the Po river. You will find a warm and sweet shelter in its Art Nouveau cafes or … Continue reading →

Edinburgh is a mad god’s dream. ― Hugh MacDiarmid, Scottish poet (Above: Giant copper accelerating cavity from CERN) A universe of some 8,000 items, the National Museum is a large bite to take in in one swoop. Preferably several visits … Continue reading →

Half a capital and half a country town, the whole city leads a double existence; it has long trances of the one and flashes of the other; like the king of the Black Isles, it is half alive and half … Continue reading →

“Every surface in the chapel had been carved with symbols— Christian cruciforms, Jewish stars, Masonic seals, Templar crosses, cornucopias, pyramids, astrological signs, plants, vegetables, pentacles, and roses. The Knights Templar had been master stonemasons, erecting Templar churches all over Europe, … Continue reading →

On this my third visit to the Heath, I have decided to repurpose my first posting from 2017, as it still expresses the existential experiencce of it so well. The main difference is that it is harder to get lost … Continue reading →

Edinburgh slept on, as it had slept on for hundreds of years. There were ghosts in the cobbled alleys and on the twisting stairways of the Old Town tenements, but they were Enlightenment ghosts, articulate and deferential. ― Ian Rankin, … Continue reading →

This city whispers: come, look at me, listen to the beating of my heart. I am the place you have seen in dreams, I am a stage for you to play upon. I am Edinburgh. ― Alexander McCall Smith, Author … Continue reading →

Incredible railway inventions underpin our collection of over a million railway-related objects. Among them are the world’s fastest steam engine Mallard, the exquisitely streamlined Duchess of Hamilton, a replica of George Stephenson’s pioneering Rocket and the only bullet train to … Continue reading →

Guy Fawkes was born here, Dick Turpin was hung a few streets away, and Robinson Crusoe, that other great hero, is also a native of this city. Who is to say which of these is real and which a fiction? … Continue reading →

In the morning mist, hazy and amorous, London was delirious. London squinted as it floated along, milky pink, without caring where it was going. ― Yevgeny Zamyatin Many memories of many cities experienced on the upper deck of the tour … Continue reading →