Well I never, that’s where that town is!

[CormoranStrike]

I have spent fifty years - okay, cumulatively probably just fifty minutes - being utterly convinced Exeter was near Cambridge.

Today I had to check it in a map! Who knew? It’s kind of a Torquay/Plymouth way.

My world is tilting in its axel.

Anyone have other random finds like this?

Lympne is a fun one - just pronouncing it confuddles lots of people

Not read the full thread.

Have we had the 'nothing is where you think it is' from the West Wing?

Now do you know where places are on this map.....

It once took me over an hour to find my way out of Winchester by car in the days of yore pre Sat nav.

You think that's bad, try finding your way out of Redditch. At least Winchester has something attractive to look at whilst you are doing it

@ ListeningQuietly It’s obviously not
Limp-me as that’d be too easy

Lim

This is a fantastic thread!

Bangor on Dee/Bangor is-y-Coed (not sure if they're the same place or adjacent)

It is the same place - English name and Welsh name. It is indeed near Wrecsam/Wrexham!

I thought Thirsk was in Scotland until we drove through it in Yorkshire.

Truro is the one that always gets me. Even though I know it’s not, I’m still sure it is in Scotland, not Cornwall! No idea why, but I can’t get my head around it.

If you travel from Thurso to Truro via Thirsk, you'll have a mighty long (but wonderful) drive from the very top to the very bottom of Great Britain!

Gillingham - up north, maybe near Burnley or Blackburn or something.

Do you mean the one in Kent (pronounced Jillingham) or either of the ones in Dorset and Norfolk (both pronounced Gillingham)?!

I’m always amazed that when I’m in north Norfolk I’m further north than Leicester and Birmingham.

Never mind that - far more mind-blowing is that, if you travel from Leicester or Birmingham to Norwich, you've travelled to the other side (hemisphere) of the world!

West/ East Midlands always seemed an odd split. North/ South Midlands would just sit better.

The traditional dividing line is silly, as it's kind of diagonal rather than vertical. In fact, if you take account of the fact that Britain 'tilts' a lot more to the west at the top and the east at the bottom than most maps suggest, it's probably not that far off approaching horizontal! How can Rugby be in the West Midlands and Buxton be in the East Midlands?!

Slightly different but i thought that Magaluf was pronounced Malaguff.

'Malaguff' would be the second-best ever name for an authentic curry house, pipped only by 'Earth, Wind & Fire'

So Australia is actually in the Far East!?

It always amazes me to think of the north of Australia is not all that far from the Equator. I always think of it as right down in the bottom right corner!

I mentioned this on another recent thread, but it still blows my mind that this house is in Belgium AND The Netherlands. If you think that you get confused by where places are, spare a thought for the residents of Baarle-Hertog and Baarle-Nassau!

Yes to many of these

Also have always vaguely assumed that the Faroe Islands were somewhere near the Galapagos.

And that the Galápagos Islands were somewhere near Antarctica.

Anybody remember this from 2002?!

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2172858.stm

I still can’t get my head around West Ham and East Ham not being on different sides of London.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll
Anybody remember this from 2002?!
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2172858.stm

Not the same spelling but there was a Grenada/Granada story like that

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-24705723

(You’d think they might fleetingly wonder about the length of the flight...)

In my mind I always imagine New Zealand as being Northeast of Australia and I'm always surprised when I see its actually Southeast of it. I also always picture South America as being directly below North America, not way off to the East of it.

Never mind that - far more mind-blowing is that, if you travel from Leicester or Birmingham to Norwich, you've travelled to the other side (hemisphere) of the world!

Can't you do that in one step in Greenwich?

I must have ended up turning round in the hospital about three times. Eventually I tried turning right out of St George's Street into Jewry Street, then I was fine

far more mind-blowing is that, if you travel from Leicester or Birmingham to Norwich, you've travelled to the other side (hemisphere) of the world

My dh and ds cross from the Western hemisphere to the Eastern hemisphere a d back every day on the way to work as the Meridian Line is about 4 miles East of our house. I stay firmly in the West as I work in a different direction. I think.

I have worked in both the eastern and western hemisphere haulage yards along the A47.

Can't you do that in one step in Greenwich?

Indeed you can, actually Tourists probably do that there all the time, like they do at the Four Corners Monument in the US. Or like Homer Simpson did when marvelling at the concept of a light switch ("Light goes on, light goes off!")

Do you work near Guyhirn @DisgraceToTheYChromosome ?

I used to, both for Brett's and Ken Thomas.

Uttoxeter springs to mind, I imagined it somewhere like Wiltshire. It's in Staffordshire.

I only knew because when visiting a friend in staffordshire there was a sign for Uttoexeter - which of course I pronounced Uto - Exeter!

I thought of this thread whilst watching George Clark the other night. He was in Ormskirk which, to me, sounds like it should be in Scotland.

Quite apt that middle earth is near the centre of Britain

Do you mean England?

Centre of the British Isles, purplebunny

Dunsop Bridge is very near Hurst Green

my.viewranger.com/route/details/MjNfMjc2MQ==

Don’t ask me how they calculate it though