Liverpool - Beatles country

So yesterday was easily one of the best days I've been here so far. A few of us, me, Sarah, Paul and Ken, went up to Liverpool to check out the Beatles landmarks. We left on the train at about 10 am, it was my first long-distance train ride so it was pretty cool. I liked being able to see the countryside as we went by, as opposed to flying over everything on a plane. And the train was very comfortable, much more than the plane.

We got there and found the Beatles Store, which was on the street of the Cavern Club, the place where the Beatles played hundreds of shows, and a pub that they frequented. We went to this pub, where there was a photograph of the band taken, and we re-enacted the photograph in the same exact seats that the Beatles had been in when it was taken, the photos are at the start of this blog. The wallpaper is different, they had preserved a strip of it, but you can't see it in our picture. So that was really cool.

Then after consulting the bartenders, they called a taxi for us, and we were off to find Strawberry Field. The driver, however, had no clue where it was. But he was a very cool guy, he knew he had no excuse for not knowing where it, or any other Beatle landmark was, and he made lots of calls to try and find out. We eventually had the best luck stopping and asking a policeman who knew exactly where everything was, even the bus stop where Paul's mom was killed (we decided not to take a picture there).

So we drove around and found Penny Lane, Strawberry Field, John Lennon's childhood home, the church where John & Paul first met, and the grave of Eleanor Rigby, it was really cool. The driver told great stories, and didn't charge us too much...which was very relieving, we were driving around for 45 minutes, and he got out and took pictures for us and everything.

Then we went back to the Cavern club, which is the re-built place where the Beatles played hundreds of shows...a guy was on the stage playing Beatles covers...very surreal.




(John Lennon's house, above)




Very cool day. I felt like I was in the presence of greatness.