Treasure islands
WE sometimes take our unique nation for granted. But there are so many different landscapes – and cultures – on these shores, it’s as if several countries have been squeezed into one.
Celtic fringe
It’s hard not to eavesdrop when you walk into a village shop and hear the locals speaking a language that you know is part of our heritage, but simply cannot understand.
WHERE: Welsh is most commonly spoken in the western and northern parts of the principality, and at events such as local fairs or livestock auctions – in Carmarthen on Wednesdays for example, when a lot of rural folk come to town. This language is in a fairly healthy state and the percentage of Welsh speakers in Wales is much higher than Gaelic speakers in Scotland – not least because there are 450 Welsh-medium schools. Meanwhile, Gaelic is most commonly spoken on the fringes of the western Highlands, particularly on the Outer Hebrides, although Gaelic speakers often tend to speak it at home, rather than in public. To get a real feel for the Gàidhealtachd (Gaelic-speaking region), stay in the immaculately-restored Corrodale Cottage on the island of Uist. To book, see uistholidaycottage.co.uk.
Ethnic hotspots
While our endemic languages tend to be on the fringes of the country, migrant languages and their communities are metropolitan, alongside the factories and transport systems that recruited them in the first place.
WHERE: Manchester’s Curry Mile, aka Wilmslow Road, was originally home to more than 50 curry houses. They were established in the he 1960s to serve the influx of migrants who ho came to work in the textile mills. The mills have ve since closed but with the university up the road, ad, the restaurants – which also now have Middle dle Eastern influences – have found a new audience. Meanwhile, London’s Brick Lane ne is the focus of the Bangladeshi community which originally came here to work in the rag trade. Its shops and restaurants – fragrant with spices and charcoal ovens – have a very diverse clientele today because the lane is also the heart of hipster area,
Shoreditch. For more insight, sign up for a local street art or food tour. See secretfoodtours.com.
Shingle spits
Most of the UK’S shoreline is a mix of cliff, ff, beach and rock, but there are several otherworldly shorescapes made up of billions of stones.
WHERE: The ‘Nesses’ of Orford (in Suffolk) and Dungeness (Kent) are a film m director’s dream. The former partly because of the decayed military buildings that dot the empty landscape, and the latter with its mix of fishermen’s huts dwarfed by the nuclear power station. Orford Ness is physically isolated from the mainland by the River Alde, and is run by the National Trust, which controls the number of visitors. But at Dungeness, it is easy enough to drive out to where the fishing boats are hauled up the shingle. Several of the former fishing huts are holiday lets. See beachlets.co.uk.
Level bests
The UK is primarily a patchwork of hills and dales, quilted with woodland and green fields. So pancake-flat landscapes can feel like a bit of a novelty.
WHERE: WHER
The fens of East Anglia are like an ex extension of the Netherlands. Dutch engineers ev even created the orderly system of canals and ditches that keep this very fertile land properly ir irrigated. Their influence can also be seen in to towns like Wisbech, with its Dutch architecture, o or in Wicken Fen, with its windmill. And while th there has been some man-made interference ov over in the Somerset Levels too, the mix of m marsh and meadow beyond Glastonbury is so cl close to sea level that it still gets regularly in inundated by great bedsheets of water during th the winter, which is why it is a wonderful place fo for migratory birds. Charismatic monastic vi villages such as Muchelney, with its abbey ruin, were built on little hillocks in the levels and become islands in winter. See more of the area by hiking the River Parrett Trail, and bedding down in the Langport Arms Hotel. See la langportarmshotel.co.uk.