UK (Cambridgeshire and Inverness) Trip advice needed

[Steelsun]

In a little over a week I am leaving for about 2 weeks in the UK.

Week one will be in England with a home base in Ely, which is near Cambridge.
I'll have about 5 days of 'free time' there for exploration and photography.
I've been there before, so I'll be looking to day trip (train) from Ely/Cambs to see new stuff.
Places I plan to spend the day:

York - 2 hours to get to - been there before & loved it, so it's covered for what I want to see/re-see.

Norwich - about an hour by train - Never Been - any must sees?

Lincoln - 2 hours by train - Never Been - any must sees?

Nottingham - Never Been but might pop into - is it worth the 2 1/2 hour train trip?

Cambridge - I may spend a day here - any places to definitly see?


Then we are going to Inverness Scotland where we will have 3 days to play (and have cars)
One day will be totally spent taking a bus to John O'Groats and the Orkneys.
We'll have time to explore the Inverness area (Urquart, LochNess, BlackIsle, etc)
For the other two days:

Explore Westward towards Skye - 2 must sees we have are Eileen o Dulan (sp?) castle and the rail viaduct from Harry Potter. ANy other places to check between Skye & Inverness?

Explore Eastward to the coast - plan to see some distilleries and whatnot. Any secret places we should check out?

Our last day will be driving to Glasgow from Inverness to catch a flight back the next morning, but we have plenty of play time for the trip.
Any must sees along that route?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

[Big Dog]

I lean toward the old architecture when I think of Britain. In Cambridge, find the colleges and go behind them - across the River Cam - and shoot from the "backs". Particularly, find King's College and go into the chapel if it's open.

Ely, Norwich and Lincoln all have old cathedrals and York has it's Minster. York Minster is the largest Gothic building in Britain IIRC.

The Harry Potter sites are fun. While in London this past December, we visited Platform 9 3/4 at King's Cross, and at Oxford we accidentely found the stairway filmed as the entrance to the Great Hall at Hogwarts.

Have fun and post pictures.

[Steelsun]

Thanks David - I'll go to the backs for sure!
I too am a big fan of old architecture. I've compiled thousands of detail shots of British & Irish churches, castles, etc. Also UK graveyards.

I spent a week in York about 10 years ago, in my "pre-photo" days. Thus why I am willing to sit in a train for 2 hours to go back and see the Monster and the ruined abbey.

[futurshox]

If you're in Ely during the weekend of July 7th/8th, you'll be right close to Duxford and that weekend is the Flying Legends air show, one of the best warbird shows anywhere. The P-38 'Glacier Girl' is currently en-route from California to display there. http://www.fighter-collection.com for more info.

Norwich is a lovely city, it has great shopping and a lot of the shops are in smaller alleyways. Find your way through these up the hill to the castle. Or stay in the shopping area and find some cool modern architecture in the Forum, which is the city library amongst other things.

Cambridge is good for the colleges as others have noted. The place is populated by more foreigners than natives during the summer, it will be very busy.

If you look on the news at the moment, you will see that a lot of the central and northern parts of England have been subject to severe flooding this week. (not just Texas!) so if you're planning on heading to those parts, they may or may not have cleared up by then, and trains could well be disrupted. I'd hazard that Norwich would be better than Lincoln in regards of this but things might have improved by then.

Lincoln is meant to be lovely, I've not been but always meant to go.

You might consider a train ride straight up north of Ely to Kings Lynn, it's on the coast and is generally pleasant. Or a day out in Bury St Edmunds, my old home town, is always nice - it has old ruins of one of the largest abbeys in medieval England and the current cathedral is very nice, with a tower spire completed only two years ago on a 14-th century building. In fact most of the town centre grid is 14th C with some parts dating back to the 11th C so if old architecture's your thing, there's plenty there.

Here's a rail map of the UK which will show you where you can get to.

Hope this helps!

Jo

[Steelsun]

Thanks Jo, lots of good advice there.

I got to visit King's Lynn & Bury St Edmunds a few years sgo, albeit only quickly. My wife is a change bell ringer (there are actually 3 towers in Houston, one in Dallas, and one in I think Abiline or Amarillo) and she was on a ringing tour or the northern Fens: about a dozen towers in 2 days. I went along as the unoffocial photographer - awesome time.

The airshow is tempting - one of our group is going and I might as well (don't know yet my full plans for that weekend - I know on the 7th the wife is ringing 4 towers in London though).

[Steelsun]

Attempted Car Bombings in London Yesterday (where we'll be flying into next friday and staying until Saturday night)

Car bombing at Glasgow airport today (where we'll be taking a train to in about 12 days to rent a car, the flying out of in about 2 1/2 weeks)

Weather being extra wet and colder than normal through England & Scotland.

What next?

Something in conspiring to make the trip less than ideal.