Chronicle-1961

Lettersfrom England Following is part of one of the many letters written by Mr. G. M.ORAM: "Well now,all this is probably beyond the point as far as you are concerned, for you will be expecting to read something of our Continental trip. We had a most wonderful time—27 days ofcoach travelling in seven different countries. We went from London to Dover in an East Kent coach specially hired and then crossed to Ostend where we picked up the coach that was to take us through Europe. Fiat by make, and smooth and comfortable as you could wish, by nature. We drove straight to Brussels and there we occupied an alarmingly luxurious hotel for the night. The standard of accommodation was not quite maintained subsequently,except for three nights in Rome and another at Ancona on the Adriatic coast of Italy, but nevertheless the rest of the hotels were ex cellent,and the bedrooms we occupied usually had their own toilet and sometimes bathroom as well. Something depended on the luck of the draw on arrival when our courier handed out the cards for the rooms. Anyway, we were well satished with what we got, and we ate well and slept well wherever we went. "We unfortunately missed tulip time in Holland for it had been an early season and the flowers were over by the time we arrived. I was quite amazed at the amount of building going on in Rotterdam and Amsterdam—vastschemes covering not only war damage hut involving complete new districts as well. This is a phenomenon that seems to be characteristic of most other countries too, including England of course. Tremendous blocks of flats are going up everywhere, and I was told in several places that there has been, and there still is, a great shortage of accommodation. Rome is the outstanding example of this sort of thing—its population now numbers nearly three million (a million increase since the end of the War)and it is astonishing to see the great new suburbs that extend north and south of the Tiber. Our luxury hotel was in a new district housing over 80,000 people in magnificent blocks of flats whose elevation was a delight to the eye because of their graceful flower-bedecked balconies and generally pleasing design. "The rebuilding of war damaged areas seems to be now almost completed, and it is astonishing what has been done. When we were in Nuremberg nine years ago, it was largely rubble, but the old town is now back again, largely as it was before, since nearly all the principal buildings have been completely rebuilt in the old style. Too amazing for words. Even France seems largely to have completed its restorations. On our homeward trip to Paris we had morning coffee in a trim little town,all neat and new,that we had seen completely devastated when we passed through it in 1952. Many other places showed a similar revival also. "Our trip took us over 3,600 miles,so we have been through many dilferent types of landscape. The first half of it was over the autobahns of Belgium, Holland and Germany, and here perhaps the traffic was more interesting than the scenery. The roads were alive with vehicles of all sorts—a large proportion of them great tankers and commercial wagons with trailers attached. It gave us an impression of great commercial prosperity. The Rhine too, was alive with barges. Then came the wonderful scenery of the Dolomites and later the whole length of the Riviera, or most of it, at any rate. Going from Nice up through the south of France to Switzerland was also most spectacular, and of course I need say nothing of Switzerland itself. "We ended up in Paris with a fine round of entertainment at the Follies and another theatre. They showed us the human form, male and female, to great advantage, and they also clad it in robes of great splendour at times! ■Yes, we've certainly seen things! London seems somewhat dull and tame on a wet day like this one!" 180

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