To England: Liverpool is in my ears and in my eyes

The one big thing I'd do differently if I were to do this trip again (besides a second day at Wimbledon), is spend one less night each in Conwy and York and spend these two nights in Liverpool instead. I let people talk me out of Liverpool when they compared it to Pittsburgh, drowning out my inner voice telling me "yo Caroline you adore Pittsburgh, maybe you should stay there BECAUSE of that."

Besides, it was quite a pain in the butt getting to Liverpool which severely limited my time there. I tried to leave Conwy and all the trains were canceled. A nice Irishman helped me out by telling me how to take the bus to another train station nearby, Lladudno Junction. Just across the river from Conwy and much bigger. So I hopped on a train back to Chester, and then grabbed the same original train to Liverpool. HOWEVER halfway to Liverpool, they made us all get off at some rinky dinky station because the train was broken!

I feel like they were trying the "let's all get out and get back in again" plan but it didn't work. We got mixed messages: another train is coming in 5 minutes, no wait it's not, we'll send a bus, no wait, run back to the platform, there's the last train for awhile coming through now!

Made it to Liverpool but without time to do much of anything before my Beatles tour. Besides eat a street hot dog, which was both delicious and given to me by the most immediately talkative person I'd met randomly to this point in England.

The tour was a bit silly. I had just read a detailed book about the Beatles (seriously--it only went to 1964 and it was almost a thousand pages) so I recognized a ton of the things we talked about...but even so, mostly it was just driving past old churches and being like "the Beatles used to perform in this basement" or "Paul and George went to school here" and they'd point to a building across a field or halfway down the street.

I believe this was one of Ringo's homes.

This was quite close, another place Ringo lived.

This was definitely a George house. So skinny and tiny and blue collary, huh? People still live here so we had to be all hushed.

This was John's. (I only remember this because the blue plaque is reserved for Britons who have been dead so long).

Well this is clearly Paul's.

Penny Lane is one of my favorite songs because it's such a clear tribute to a city.

This was my favorite bit, because I didn't know it was real. The Shelter on the Roundabout referenced in Penny Lane. The guide said they are talking about tearing it down, but there's some interest in preservation. I hope someone steps up.

The Strawberry Fields gate.

It does remind me of home--its own unintelligable dialect, people who act like they've known you forever, city pride--not to mention the similar histories and subsequent changes. Parts of it are quite rundown, but it gets under your skin. The way the Beatles resisted moving to London for so long, trying to make it big from their rundown city. How when he comes to town, Paul supposedly still lives in the house he bought his dad in '64. And the way none of them have forgotten it, still lending names and money and attention to projects in town.

I want to go back. I'd take the tour which takes you in Paul and John's houses, and spend much more time in the museums along the pier, including the Tate Liverpool, some Beatles thing, and the local history museum.