6/10 Headed Home!!

While I have enjoyed the six weeks I have been in the UK, I am really glad to be going home.  It has been hard to get work done because of uncomfortable hotels desks and desk chairs.  Sometimes, I even had to do work sitting on my bed, propped up with pillows, and that was really painful on my back. 

I am also glad to be getting back to my own home on wheels where I always have my own bathroom, my own comfortable bed, and my refrigerator and kitchen.  I also will be glad not to have to lug suitcases and my laptop backpack around. 

Some things I really enjoyed in the U.K. are:

• The excitement, shopping, and history of London.  Where else are their crowds on the streets late at night?  What city in the U.S. do you have to fight your way onto the underground at 11:00 p.m. on a weekday night? 
• Being able to see Hamilton, The Book of Mormon, Aladdin, and Kinky Boots live in the West End for a lot less money than I could have in NY. 
• Pret a Manger and all the other convenience stores that offered great take-out food.  The variety and quality of their sandwiches, salads, deserts, and other items are just not available in the U.S.
• The incredibly polite and trusting England and Scots. People don't worry about locking houses, at least in Scotland, and I had wonderful help finding information about my ancestors from perfect strangers. 
• The incredible age and history of ordinary things, such as farmhouses in the country, and homes in small towns. Because Great Britain was deforested a couple of thousand years ago, almost all buildings were made of stone and stone lasts. The two churches I got tours through where my great-great-grandparents were married and baptized in the 19th and even 18th centuries were a few hundred years old even when they attended these churches!   
• London cab drivers.  They are amazing at how they navigate narrow and back roads to get you to your destination. 

Some things I did NOT like in the U.K. are:

• The smokers.  They stopped people from smoking in public buildings a decade ago, but that has driven them out into the streets.  In cities like London, you have to do a lot of holding your breath and veering to avoid cigarette smoke. 
• The lack of ice.  The Brits STILL do not like ice in their drinks.  If you ask for a drink with ice, they will give you a bottle of something like Coke and two ice cubes in a very small glass.  When I could, I stopped into a McDonald's or Burger King and got a Coke with ice, but it was still hard to get enough ice.  The assumption is that all that every adult wants is a hot drink, so hotel rooms come thoroughly equipped with tea makers and cups.  No ice machines anywhere in hotels. 
• The lack of iced tea.  Most Brits cannot imagine why anyone would want their tea iced, so the only place you get a facsimile is in a Starbucks where they have a good mango black tea lemonade and will give you lots of ice.  
• Drivers in England who speed on very narrow roads.  I am talking about roads where there is only about a foot between cars as you pass, with stone walls or stone buildings on the edges of the road.  And roads where you have to pull over and stop to let someone go past.  Drivers in Scotland do not seem to drive as fast on these narrow roads, so it was an entirely different experience there.
• Stairs in the Underground stations.  Very few places in the U.K. are handicap accessible, so you see almost no handicapped people out in public.  One cause is that few Underground stations have elevators or escalators. If you have to lug a heavy suitcase or cannot climb stairs, you have to take a slower bus or a more expensive taxi or stay home.

Paddington Station looking at the Heathrow Express.  It costs about $30 but gets you to the airport from the center of London in 15 minutes.

 

There were problems with the return ticket I bought on arrival in Heathrow being good only for 30 days, except that I stayed for 42 days.  I had to buy a replacement one-way ticket, but the kind lady in the station bumped me up to the first-class carriage.  Nice ride, but very short.

6/9 Palace of Westminster and Parliament

Westminster is the home of Parliament.  A church existed here in the 8th century although nothing of it remains.  It became the Palace of Westminster and the royal home to many English kings, beginning with Edward the Confessor in 1042.  Henry III did some major construction on this site, but unfortunately, nearly all of the medieval monastery and palace was destroyed in the Great Fire of London. 

Because this is where the British Parliament meets, very little of the building is open to visitors except on Saturdays.  On Saturdays, you can enter parts of Westminster for a self-guided tour, or you can sign up in advance for a guided tour and get access to more parts of the building, including the rooms where the House of Lords and the House of Commons meet.  The rest of week, Parliament is in session, so almost everything is closed.  I bought tickets a month in advance so was able to get on a tour.  The bad news is that photos are not allowed in many parts of the building.  Here is what I did take of the outside and limited areas inside. 

If it looks like most of London is under construction, that's because it is.  

Underneath all of this scaffolding is what is often called "Big Ben," however, Big Ben is the name of the largest bell in this tower, which is really called the Elizabeth Tower.  Here is a site which shows what the side of Westminster and the Elizabeth Tower should look like when the scaffolding is removed in 2021:  https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/building/palace/big-ben/elizabeth-tower-and-big-ben-conservation-works-2017-/all-your-questions-about-the-works-answered/   

Got to admit that the scaffolding is pretty impressive, however.  

Fancy entrance. 

Westminster Hall is the oldest part of the building because it survived the Great Fire, but even it has got scaffolding because they are going to be replacing the roof soon.  

This impressive roof was commissioned in 1393 by Richard II and is the largest roof of its kind in northern Europe. Click this link for more information on this roof:  https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/building/palace/westminsterhall/architecture/the-hammer-beam-roof-/https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/building/palace/westminsterhall/architecture/the-hammer-beam-roof-/

One of the few rooms we were able to photograph.  This hall connects the two parts of Parliament. 

This small plaque indicates where Scottish hero William Wallace, Braveheart, was tried and found guilty as a traitor the king in 1305.  He was hung and drawn and quartered.  His head was placed on London Bridge and his arms and legs displayed in various English cities. 

For a more accurate history of Wallace, you can read this: https://owlcation.com/humanities/williamwallacebraveheart 

I wish I could show you photos of the two chambers of government, but I can tell you they are very small with chairs only and no desks.  Members have offices elsewhere, and since there are not enough seats for everyone, it is hoped that not everyone shows up!   

  

6/8 Museums of London

I had been to the Museum of London before and really enjoyed it, so I decided to go again.  While the British Museum focuses on all of Great Britain, the Museum of London is smaller and focuses just on London.  There are exhibits on prehistoric London, Roman London, medieval London, and modern London.  

Did you know that London (aka Londinium) was founded by the Romans in 43 AD at a convenient crossing of the Thames River?  In fact the first London Bridge was built by the Romans.  If you can find the boundaries of what is still called "The City" you can find bits of old Roman wall.  "The City" is the ancient one square mile that was the original Roman City of London.  Click here for some information on Londinium. 

Tucked under this pedestrian walkway near the Museum of London is a piece of that old wall--probably a gate into the city. It is a contrast to the modern office buildings in this part of London.

There are actually two Museums of London.  This one is the original museum located not too far from St. Paul's Cathedral.  The other is the Museum of London Docklands, and I went there as well.  I was happy to find a Pret a Manger right next door, so stopped for a lunch chicken salad.  

One of the newest exhibits is on the Whitechapel "fatberg" that weighed 130 tons and 800' long and was blocking part of the sewers in London.  It took men in special suits using high pressure hoses and jackhammers two weeks to remove it.  They saved a few chunks to be exhibited, and two of them ended up in the Museum of London.  There is a video showing what it looked like and how it formed.   More information can be found in this BBC article:  https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-41238272https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-41238272.

So the point of exhibiting a fatberg is to show us what we should NOT put down the drain!  Here is one chunk of the fatberg. 

Here is one of the sewer workers who had to remove the beast.  Not a fun job, I suspect. 

 One to more pleasant things.  This is the entrance to the Roman Gallery.

This is how they suspect the Thames may have looked like in Roman times.  There is evidence of docks and shipping buildings. 

Some Roman artifacts found in London. 

And a depiction of what part of the Roman city looked like.  And by the way, early Roman maps show the city of London laid out in nice squares with long straight roads.  That lasted only until they left and the native Brits took over and created their incredibly complex road structure existing today, where the average street is only two blocks long and nothing in straight!

There is evidence of Roman baths in London.  But, if you want to see Roman baths that are still observable, you need to go to the city of Bath where baths were built over natural hot springs. 

I posted photos of an exhibit of the remains of Roman shoes when I visited Hadrian's Wall.  They were leather with leather soles, but to make them last longer, they had hobnails in the soles, as shown in this exhibit.  There are some ancient shoes in the lower left corner.

Not all Roman buildings were made of stone, as in Rome.  Some were wood, with wattle and daub, or sticks and mud, as shown here.

This is a reconstruction of the home of a wealthy Roman with an actual tile mosaic floor that was discovered and preserved. 

And Roman coins found in London.

This is the second Museum of London in the Docklands.  The docklands is where British ships brought cargo from all parts of the world, and these are some of the original warehouses.  

Now, however, this once poor and industrial part of London has become an area full of high-rise office buildings and expensive apartment homes.  The area is also known for nightlife and restaurants.  They do still have the remnants of docks, but they are more likely to be filled with private boats than commercial shipping. 

The cranes here are for show only. 

 

6/7 London Again

Back in London for just three nights before heading off to home.  I have seen most of the regular tourist attractions in past years, so I decided to just do some shopping and visit some of my favorite places.  One place I hadn't been to in a while was St. Paul's Cathedral. It is the primary cathedral in London and where Princess Diana and Prince Charles were married because it is larger than Westminster Abbey.  The original St Paul's was burned during the Great Fire of London and then rebuilt according to the design of Sir Christopher Wren.

A big problem with this church is trying to take a photo of the large dome. There are too many building close by to get a good photo. 

Here is Queen VIctoria.

 I wondered what this crane was up to and then discovered it was lowering a bell from one of the tower.  I later found out that both towers have bells and the bells on the other tower had been removed in January for cleaning and refurbishing.

 

Note that each bell has an inscription telling who paid for and cast the bell.

Aha!  Got it!

I don't know what this entrance way is, but will look it up. 

 

 A double-decker bike rack.  M&S is Marks and Spencer.  While it is also a major department store, it also has quite a few grocery shops around. 

This interesting building is St. Pancras Hotel, a very famous VIctorial landmark. 

Kind of looks like a college building, doesn't it? 

 

And just a few more photos of exciting Oxford Street.  What is interesting about London and most UK cities is that you find the old and ornate next to the new and modern.