Walking
I lived several miles from the nearest bus stop until I was 4 -- so was used to long walks. I walked a mile or so to and from school when I moved to near Newport, aged 4.
I went on scout hikes, including an overnight trip in the Vale of Glamorgan to earn my First Class Badge.
Perhaps my longest walk was from Aldermaston to London (Trafalgar Square) as a CND protest (in 1962). Overnight accommodation (in school classrooms) was arranged and one's rucksack was transported by truck.
I was always aware of nearby hills and often walked to the top: Leith Hill (near Abinger); Twm Barlwm near Newport; the Garth near Cardiff.
Other than scrabbling around seaside cliffs, I had no experience of rock climbing. While at CERN, a Norwegian colleague asked me to join a group walking in the Alps. When we met up (myself, 2 Norwegians and Jack Steinberger), they had helmets while I had a handkerchief with corners tied British style. They had borrowed some crampons and an ice-axe for me. Our first steps were from the Aiguille du Midi along the crest (2 ft wide with a huge drop either side). We were roped in pairs - so I was to jump one way if Jack Steinberger fell the other.. The plan was to climb Dent du Requin but the weather degraded overnight, so we basically walked down the Vallée Blanche.
Hitch-hiking
In the early 1960's, hitch-hiking was relatively easy: truck drivers and sales reps were glad of company. I hitch-hiked to the Lake District and to North Wales several times. Later I went around Scandinavia and as far as Spain. I usually carried a small tent, so I could use it overnight if no youth hostel was nearby. I liked to offer the driver a cigarette (nearly everyone smoked in those times), but they would be unhappy if I did not smoke too. As my occasional smoking increased, I had to decide: informed by the recent death from lung cancer of an uncle, I have not smoked since.
Some anecdotes:
I got a lift in a truck in France going South down the
Rhône Valley. I asked the destination and understood him to say he was
driving until seven (sept). When seven o'clock passed, I was confused.
Much later when he drove into the port town of Sête, I understood.
When entering Spain from France, since I had heard
that hitch-hiking was not allowed in Franco's Spain, I walked through
the frontier post. The border guards asked where I was going: on being
told, they ordered the first British car with space to give me a lift.
On a trip to the Lake District with Peter Gamby, we
were picked up by a man who was planning to camp and hill walk and
asked if we would go with him for safety. We agreed and the next day
called at Cockley Beck Farm (which had a restaurant) in Wrynose Bottom
to report our plans and our intention to come back later. The owner
promised us a pie when we got back (from climbing Scafell Pike). She
also asked if we would take her helper (vacation student Angela) and a
friend to a dance in Millom that evening. And Peter is now married to
Angela.
On a trip around Scandinavia (with Peter Gamby) we
were in a remote part of Norway: every car that passed us (and there
were few) stopped to chat - even if they had no room for us. On one
occasion we were given a lift in the back of an open truck -- but could
not understand the destination. When we were up in the mountains, we
stopped at a corral where reindeer were being selected and butchered
-- which is what the truck would be transporting next.
Later on the same trip in a small town in Sweden, we
found the campsite and youth hostel both closed. We called at the police
station to ask for advice -- and they offered us a room for the night.
Travelling from Sweden to Norway (from Åre to
Trondheim), the road crossed the frontier and our driver swung across the
road at 50 mph and carried on. At that time (1961) Sweden drove on the
left and Norway on the right. Coming the other way there was a stop
sign for cars crossing, giving priority to our direction.
As well as hitchhiking by road, I have twice managed to "thumb a lift" by boat: once across Montauk harbour on Long Island and once along the Thames when I had walked from Abingdon to Oxford and wanted to come back with less effort.
Cycling
I learnt to ride a bike when about 5 on a "fairy cycle": a small wheeled bike.
When we moved to Whitchurch, I had a succession of regular bicycles and cycled a lot. These were not sporty bikes - just a road bike with 3-speed hub gears. I cycled to junior school, though not to secondary school since we lived so close to the school gate.
My mother had a bike (sit-up ladies type with a basket and fixed gear) and occasionally accompanied me on trips. Usually I explored with friends. I remember a few longer trips - a day trip to Barry and another to Newport.
I was not keen on writing thank-you letters and preferred to do a tour by bike of aunts, etc who lived in various parts of Cardiff to say thanks in person.
As a student at Oxford, I took my mother's bike. It was ideal - fast off the lights, had a basket for notes, was reliable and not attractive to thieves.
As a post-doc at Rutherford Lab., I often had a lift in from Marilyn by car with my bike in the boot. Then the trip home by bike (to Didcot) was downhill, usually down wind, and getting wet was less of an issue.
When I left Rutherford, I offered my bike to my collaborator, Guru Vachan Dass. He tried it for a day or two but then declined: it was not good for his meditation.
Motorcycles
As discussed here, my first motor cycle was a Francis Barnett 250cc two-stroke.
Francis Barnett motorbike picture,
My parents considered a motor cycle to be dangerous and encouraged me to sell it. I bought a second hand Vespa instead. This, I took on holiday to France and used as a third year undergraduate in Oxford. I remember in the very snowy winter of 1963, slithering around on it as I travelled in and out from my digs.
Image: Austin A30 and Vespa scooter,
I took the motorcycle driving test on the Vespa in Newport so that I could take a passenger. This involved driving around a block while the examiner observed. You could anticipate when he was going to wave his notes in front of you to signal an emergency stop. Then around the other side of the block, you could relax since out of his sight. I duly passed.
Apart from some moped/scooter rentals on holiday islands, I have not ridden a motorbike since.
Cars
My parents only bought a car (a pre-war Vauxhall) when I was about 12 years old. My mother had had 8 lessons and passed the test. She could not really drive though and I remember the jubilation when she finally had the confidence to exceed 40 mph.
The Vauxhall had some curious features: the rear seat was inflatable and had a slow puncture so passengers in the back (me) had a sore behind. The battery was under the rear seat. It was hard to start and I remember sitting in the driver's seat working the choke and accelerator while my mother turned the handle.
In the Suez crisis (1956), petrol was rationed and big-engined cars were not popular. The local garage owner had a Ford Zephyr which he agreed to sell to my parents. My father was ignorant of mechanical matters, when asked if he had any queries about the car, he thought, then said "Does it have an ashtray?".
My mother taught my father to drive - which meant that I was able to observe what was needed - and see that my father was not very competent as a driver. He passed the test at the 4th attempt - one failure coming when the examiner pulled on the brake as he was about to cross a major road without slowing.
I learnt to drive (taught by my mother) and passed the test 4 weeks after my 17th birthday.
The Ford Zephyr was a joy for a boy to drive. It had a 2.6 litre engine driving the rear wheels and it could be induced to squeal on corners readily. Apart for sliding sideways into a kerb which did some damage to the steering, I managed to avoid any serious accident. It had the gear change on the steering column and a front bench seat: so the whole school chess team (6) could be transported.
Despite my reputation as a speedy driver, I actually won a safety rally. This involved driving correctly while being surreptitiously observed and also fixed challenges such as indicating when two posts were exactly 6 inches wider than the car then driving between them to check.
In my final undergraduate year at Oxford, a group of us decided to go by car to Greece and back in the Summer after the course had ended. As there were six of us, we initially looked at second hand ambulances, hearses,.. An advert in Exchange and Mart brought us to Bath to view a Humber Imperial which had three rows of seating. It was a Coupé de Ville with a glass partition between the chauffeur's area and the area behind and a fold-down roof at the rear for waving to the adoring masses. We were told that it had belonged to the Fry family and had transported royalty. We bought it for £25 and painted the roof light grey for hotter climes. It had coach work by Thrupp and Maberly and luxury features (cocktail cabinet, courtesy light under the bonnet, built in jacks under the rear wheels,..). The headlight dipping arrangement was that one headlight switched off and the other rotated electro-mechanically. This was not suitable for driving on the right, so we used the two fog lights as dipped lights. They were tinted yellow, lower down and closer together. So as we approached another car at night, we changed colour and got smaller and lower.
With a 4.5 litre engine, the Humber was heavy to start by handle. The steering was a bit vague at speed, but otherwise it coped well. We fitted it with new tyres - Land Rover tyres with a suitable tread for unmade roads. We got to Greece and back with only repairs to the exhaust pipe and to a rubber drive link.
In those days, Yugoslavia was socialist and had very few petrol stations with rather low grade petrol. We had a map of these stations and duly arrived at the marked spot with no sign of a petrol station. Then we saw a lady sitting under a tree with an oil drum and a ladle. This was what we needed.
One escapade occurred at a camp-site in Yugoslavia. A German was taken ill and his wife asked if we would use the Humber as an ambulance to take him to the frontier with Italy (since he had medical insurance valid in Italy). We agreed and showed up at the frontier post in the middle of the night. Explaining that we did not want to cross but just export an ill German to be met by an ambulance was tricky. The lady kept wailing "mein mann ist kranke" and we had no command of Croat. "Croce Rosso" was having some impact but we were not getting the message across. The breakthrough came when we discovered that one of the border officials understood French. After exporting the invalid, we were invited to a glass of slivovic by the guards.
The Humber became increasingly hard to start (most probably caused by low quality Yugoslav petrol) and we sold it for £5 soon after returning.
As a postgraduate student at Oxford, after selling the shared Humber, I decided to buy a car myself. This was an Austin A30 costing £125. It had had the engine overhauled and was quite reliable. At some point the battery terminal became erratic and, if the car stalled, you had to open the bonnet, hit the terminal with a hammer, then start up.
I lived in Woodstock, so went to the Theoretical Physics department (12 Parks Road) by car. I remember that there was space for three cars in the drive: usually Prof. Peierls's MG sedan, Prof. Dalitz' Ford Thunderbird and my little A30.
Image: Austin A30 and Vespa scooter,
While a post-doc at Rutherford, living in Didcot, I swapped the A30 for a larger car. This was a Vauxhall Victor. The owner was very proud of it and informed me that he had never let children travel in it! I was buying it because I had two small children, but I kept quiet about that. I inspected the car at night and agreed to buy it. I thought it was beige, but by daylight it appeared to be a pinkish colour. I recall Roger Phillips (head of Rutherford Lab theory group) consoling me that it was most probably a colour called "bruise", a more masculine name than "pink".
We stayed in Madison Wisconsin for 6 months in 1969. Rather than rent, I bought a second hand car there: a 1963 Chevy II - a US compact car with 3 litre 6 cylinder engine. Since the UK driving licence had no photograph, I took the precaution of obtaining an international driving licence which was better recognised in the US. This had a photo - but no serial number on it. To pay by check (cheque) in the US at that time, a driving licence was essential and the licence number had to be entered by the check-out person. To solve this dilemma, I used an IBM golf-ball typewriter to type a serial number (actually my passport number) on the front cover of the international driving licence. This was duly copied down at every purchase and everyone was happy.
The Chevy II had a serious oil consumption - needing filling with oil in between filling with gas (petrol) if driven fairly fast. In those days oil was very cheap in the US. We drove from Wisconsin to Colorado (Aspen) and back to Chicago in the car.
When I took up a fellowship at CERN, the Vauxhall Victor was the car I went in. To have Swiss plates, I needed to have the speedometer marked in km/h - and I found a man who could do this. Unfortunately, he put the ignition and brake warning light connectors back interchanged - which caused much confusion later.
Since my CERN position allowed to buy a tax-free car, I decided to buy a new car. I drove the Vauxhall back to London to pick up the new Ford Cortina estate (mark II) I had ordered. I needed to sell the Vauxhall so went to Warren Street (near the BT Tower) where car dealers stalked the pavement. One offered me £25 which, to his surprise, I accepted. As I then unscrewed the Swiss plates, he complained that he had only bought it for the plates. I gave him the UK plates that originally went with it, so he was mollified.
In 1972, we spent a few months in California (Cal Tech, Pasadena). Again I decided to buy a car. As I went out to look at possible choices, Marilyn asked me to get a modest sized car. I came back with a Ford Thunderbird Estate - quite a lot of car. It had power steering and power brakes, so did not need strength to drive, just a lot of road. The children loved it since they had so much room. We did a trip to Death Valley, Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon in it, as well as a trip down the coast of Mexico. To keep the cost of insurance low, I decided to get a US driving licence. I went along to the test center to get the relevant papers - they said I could do the test there and then. Not like the UK! I did the multiple choice test first (typical question: if you have consumed a lot of alcohol- do you (i) drive home quickly (ii) drive home slowly (iii) not drive). An examiner then sat with me while I drove around - after a few minutes he said all was OK - so I got my license straight away.
Ford Thunderbird in Death Valley picture.
Cars owned since: Mini van, Mini saloon, Ford Cortina Estate (mark
III), Ford Cortina Estate (mark IV), Chrysler Alpine, Ford Fiesta,
Citroen BX, Honda Concerto, VW Passat, Skoda Octavia. Marilyn: Peugeot
205XS, Ford KA, Skoda Fabias.
The Ford KA, we bought new from a German dealer (since prices were
lower there). He agreed to deliver it and his son would drive it to our
house. His son went into a pub in Greasby with a piece of paper with our
phone number on it - and they called me so I could come and guide him
to our house. He spoke no English and had never driven on the left
before. As agreed, we gave him overnight accommodation and arranged his
flight back. Marilyn took the KA (now with no plates) to Chester to be
registered. Surprisingly, nobody stopped her while driving without plates.
Flying
I first flew on a student flight in a DC6 from Gatwick to Copenhagen. The plane was elderly and leaking oil from the engines.
As a researcher, I flew quite often - typically 6 trips a year - so I have been to a lot of different airports and on a lot of different airlines in my time. See list of places visited for Physics
Some anecdotes: flying Aeroflot internal flights, foreigners were
seated first by Intourist. My allocated seat was not by a window so I
moved. The Russians came aboard and fitted in around me - and I ended
up next to a very disgruntled Russian who complained about life in the
USSR. The stewardesses on Aeroflot at that time resembled shot-putters
in physique. In flight service was a plastic cup of water and 1
boiled sweet.
On one trip in 1975, I ended up in Simferopol (Crimea) airport and
had to wait for a car to meet me. I went into the post office and asked
for a stamp to send a postcard to England. Why?, they asked - I said I was
English. You are a capitalist (Vi kapitalist!) they said, and shook my
hand - and, as I agreed, I realised that irony was alive in the USSR,
and that change might happen sometime later.
On the return trip, I had several hours to wait in Kiev airport and looked at
the airport bookstall. This had little choice - several Marxist-Leninist
tracts, and Landau and Lifshitz "Non-relativistic quantum mechanics". I
could see why these items had not sold out.
I first flew to Japan in 1978. Before the Soviet Union demised, flights went west-about up over Northern Greenland to a stop at Anchorage, Alaska before proceeding on across the dateline to Tokyo. Because it flies with the sun, this 19 hour journey was at a local time of about 3pm most of the time. So we had lunch lots of times....
When we visited Fiji in 2003, we took a feeder flight from the main airport (Nadi on Viti Levu) to Matei on Taveuni. This was a small propellor plane and we were seated aboard rapidly. En route we stopped at Savusavu (on Vanua Levu) where we were informed that toilet facilities were available [so a comfort stop for us]. Matei itself had about one flight a day at that time with a gravel strip.
Luckily, I have never been involved in any serious airplane incident, although I have been delayed by as much as 24 hours on occasions. When we were leaving Champaign from the University of Illinois Willard airport there, the small plane taking us to St. Louis made several attempts to get airborne, but aborted each time halfway along the runway. A different plane was brought thereafter.
I took an introductory flying lesson in the USA (Madison Wisconsin) in 1969 but did not have the time to take it further.
At Les Arcs I went up a chair lift with a young woman who extolled the experience of taking a "para-pente" down. This was a large parachute with attachments for two people - the expert plus one passenger. So I asked if this was available - oui! - and I was soon skiing off the cliff edge and flying. The landing was smooth and job done.
I have only once been in a helicopter - Rescue 122 from RAF Valley - and, regretably, was not in good shape to enjoy the ride.
Public transport
I am old enough to remember the trams in Cardiff (pre 1950). The tramlines survived longer and could be a hazard when cycling. Cardiff had a trolley bus service until 1970. I often took the trolleybus to Roath Park to visit my grandparents. Riding was very smooth and I enjoyed using the trolleybuses as a windbreak when cycling. The conductor sometimes had to get out the long pole to set the two wheels back correctly against the overhead wires.
When we lived in Whitchurch, I often took the bus to/from Cardiff: Cardiff bus 23 or 24 or "Valley" Western Welsh bus (from some exotic destination such as "Ferndale"). Some of the "Valley" buses were low-height double deckers with a narrow passageway to the right upstairs and seats for 4 with sitting headroom -- not very convenient for the leftmost passenger to get in and out.
Otherwise I went by train from Llandaff for Whitchurch station. The next stop for the train was Cardiff Queen's Street so it was a quick journey. The GWR local steam trains were not a great experience - soot in the eye was likely.
One spectacular piece of public transport is Newport Transporter Bridge. I have even walked over the top of this -- I believe that option is now closed because of safety concerns.
