ENGLAND RE-VISITED BY MRS. D. CRANKO

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 11, 6 October 1937, Page 11

ENGLAND RE-VISITED BY MRS. D. CRANKO

"Dear old England appeared to me even more wonderful than it had in my rnemories," said Mrs. Donald Cranko, who recently returned to Hastings after a holiday spent in her homeland with her young son and daughter. "We were there in the spring time," continued Mrs. Cranko, "when the woods : were looking very marvellous with the

lovely beech trees and the ground carpeted with blue bells. In the Midlands we saw avenues of pink and white chestnut in full bloom, and when in Gloucestershire, which I thought the most attractive county, the trees met overhead the little lanes so typical of these parts." In Lincolnshire Mrs. Cranko visited the only thatched ehurch remaining in England, and this dates back to the Tudor Period. She also saw many old inns with their quaint names such as "The Drunken Ploughboy" and '/The Dun Cow." "London has altered very much during the last 12 years," said Mrs Cranko, "many of the shops in the West End having been rebuilt and made into the most palatial buildings. Liberty's shop in Regent street is such an artistie and glorious place that I was quito fascinated. Only one old flower seller was to be seen in Picadilly Circus, and this was rather disappointing because there were quito a number several years ago. "The underground train services have extended very much further into the suburbs, and the escalators are much easier to manage than previously when one had always to get off them sideways with the right foot first. "I thought that I would be nervous driving in the cities," continued Mrs. Carnlco, 'but I found that the traffic, in London particularly, was most effectively controlled with automatic lights, and it was much easier to drive there than in some of the smaller towns, and I though one gets completely surrounded with cars almost touching you, oue seems to be carried along. "Kensington Gardens and other parks have become even more marvellous now that the cities have grown so much, and the parks still seern to be in the heart of the country with their lovely fiowers and beautiful trees." Mrs. Cranko said that she found the roads in splendid condition, and that motoring was made very simple with the numerous Automobile Association sign-posts. She was particularly amused at the notices placed where . road work was being done. The first sign usually read "Caution, road work in process," and a little further along a second sign xead, "You have been warned. ' ' The travellers were also fortunate in being in England dnring the winter when the ground was covered with snow, and this appealed particularly to the children who had never before seen so much snow so close. To Mrs. Cranko, herself, the whole of England was wonderful, and she still considers it quite the best place in. all the : world.