Summer Holidays Coming to an End

So here we are closing in on the end of August. And I have been on vacation for 2 full months - the first real holiday I have taken in 4 years. I am still going to finish my stories of our English holiday in July, if only as a great way to edit and share our photos, with text to explain them. However, those and the other stories about what I did on my summer vacation may have to wait for the time I spend commuting to work. I start back on Wednesday, September 1. Tomorrow, Tuesday August 31, I have a lot going on. It is my mother's 97th birthday, but the annual family celebration was held yesterday and it was a blast. I have an appointment in the morning for a minor medical procedure which shouldn't take more than half an hour. Then I am going for a pedicure with Pam at Soleil Salon and Spa, a monthly treat. http://www.soleilsalonandspa.ca/contact.html
For the rest of the day, I will just enjoy my last day of freedom. There are cucumbers waiting on the garden wall for a deep watering promised for tomorrow morning. I'll get them in and maybe I'll have the energy to make a plum tart or peach pie - I was just too hot and breathless after today's harvest of tomatoes and beans, and after planting a few seeds for a fall crop of mesclen mix, carrots, radishes, and peas. As long as the weather stays this hot, the new seeds will need water every day. But that is a change. In spite of our long absences this summer, everything has remained green and the garden has yielded wonderful crops.
Well, I must to bed to be ready to leave the house by 8:30 tomorrow. I'm really not too nervous but the test on my thyroid involves an endocrinologist sticking needles into my neck. Fun, eh!? I'll let you know how it goes. 'Night now!

Taking the Train to Salisbury

Saturday, July 10
Day out of London

The highlight of our trip, in fact, my very reason for making the trip in the first place, was our visit to cousins Sheila Thompson, her brother Brian and his wife Brenda. Got up early, relatively speaking. I set the alarm for 7 and asked for a 7:10 wake-up call. Took me until around 1:00 am or a bit later to get to sleep. Might have been as late as 1:30. Well, we hadn't arrived back at the hotel until well after midnight after seeing Money, and I had to put my feet up for 30 minutes or so before I could sleep. I pulled a chair up beside the bed and rested my legs from the knees to feet elevated above my butt to simulate my recliner at home. Not the least bit elegant, but it did the trick. A bit of reading or TV distracted from leg, knee, and feet discomfort long enough for me to unwind and prepare to sleep. Jan didn't like the light or TV on as he was ready to sleep much sooner than I. On the other hand, he was up closing the windows and fiddling with the curtains at 6:15 in the morning. I sat up and checked the alarm clock then went back to sleep until the 7:10 wake-up call. The clock had stopped at 6:45! What gives!?! Anyway, we were showered, dressed, and finished breakfast by 8:00, out the hotel door and off to catch the tube to Waterloo station. We got there at 8:45, stood in line to get tickets combined with our Oyster cards (like TTC passes) and made the 9:15 to Salisbury - a lovely compfy fast ride with 4 seats to ourselves, facing pairs, with a table between. The porter brought a cart of refreshments - how civilized! I had a cappucino and a candy bar.

Sheila met us at the station and took us on a whirlwind tour of the old central part of Salisbury accompanied by all sorts of interesting bits of history and story. We walked through the marketplace that has held a charter for markets on Wednesdays and Saturdays for hundreds of years.
We took a picture at the butter cross ( or was it the cheese cross?), looked at the guild hall, the old china shop that is now a chain store,

and had a cup of coffee in the Red Lion pub which we entered through a beautiful old carriage driveway and a courtyard hung with vines and flowers. There was a typical British lion near the door enamelled Chinese red. Sheila proudly showed us a map and explained that the village had a grid of streets that created 6 square blocks, which were called checkers, and each one had a name.

Our walkabout was followed by another hair-raising trip down narrow roads, twisting and turning through the countryside until we came to the Black Horse country pub where we stopped for lunch.

This was a great old place, a couple of guys with their dog sitting outside, trees and fields falling away around it, and terrific food, of course: beer and cider for Jan and I, the prawns for Sheila and I, fish pie for Jan (potato and cheese topping rather than pastry), and sticky toffee pudding for dessert - mine with custard and Jan's with cream. Ah!

It was time then for Sheila to take us home to Firsdown where she shares a house with Brian and Brenda. Its back yard sloped up to a wonderful view over the top of a hill where far below we could just make out the cut of the old Roman Road. It was one of the few remaining chalk meadows in the area, covered with lichens and wildflowers and rabbit scrapes. Brian was having a rabbit fence installed - the same tough wire grid that surrounds our vegetable patch at home. We could see how hard it must have been to dig into the chalk and flints through such a thin covering of vegetation.

Sheila showed us around the house, the family memorabilia. We had a good visit with all three, and Jan gave them the USB drive full of old Thompson photos that he had assembled. Sheila had to leave early to meet the choir, so Brian made us tea - our first taste of scones,strawberry preserves, and clotted cream. Oh, my, god!!! Too good to begin to describe. Brian and Brenda were not going to the concert so a lovely friend of Sheila's picked us up for yet another white knuckle trip (we were beginning to get used to driving conditions) to the old red brick and stone country church, reportedly built under the direction of Christopher Wren. There was an old almshouse across the road. The choir of about 20 entertained the audience with a great selection of standards and show tunes, interspersed with solos by a guest soprano and the choir master himself. At intermission, refreshments were served on the lawn (I had expected tea and a plate of biscuits, but there was wine, and both sweet and savory snacks), door prizes were drawn, and Sheila introduced us as having interrupted our vacation to attend. No way!

Seeing her was the very reason I had wanted to make the trip in the first place. It was just great. We really enjoyed the day and the concert. Sheila got us back to the station in Salisbury on time to make our train. We got into London on time to catch the last subway to Earls Court. It was the best day.

Goin' to the Shunt Yard

Friday, July 9
London, Day 4
This may have been our longest day. We did a lot and loved every minute of it.
My first choice was a tour of Shakespeare's Globe Theatre.
Glenys, our petite guide was extremely knowledgeable about the theatre and its history. The backstage and upper reaches ended up off-limits due to an unexpected rehearsal to replace one of the actors. Not a problem - Glenys filled in the time quite nicely and led us into the seats to watch some of the rehearsal. I bought a few souvenirs in the shop before we left, very happy with the tour.

It was too hot a day to linger on the river bank,


so we hopped onto one of the fast river ferries for the trip down the river to the London Eye.












That was really fun, providing unexpected views of the city.













We grabbed a bite to eat at the (anything but) Zen cafe, a noisy and hectic tea room.

Refreshed, we managed the walk across the Milenium Bridge to Westminster Abby.






















At the far side of the bridge was a wonderful bronze of Boadicia in full war regalia. Got a few good shots of her.














Westminster Abbey was truly awesome in it's age and burden of history.























The building itself felt almost overpowering with footsteps echoing on the marble floor and arches towering above. After the opulence of St. Paul's it seemed austere but the grandeur of the burial sites and memorials was unmistakable. So many of the greatest of British figures were buried or commemorated there. We visited the graves of Queen Elizabeth and Mary, of all the many kings and nobles, of the great scientists like Darwin, of explorers and politicians, poets and authors. Too many to relate - it is something that must be experienced in the moment. Facinating to see and to read. Another thing that I loved is that momuments and death masks that survived the great fire in the 1660's were there to see in their scarred state. We stayed until visitors were ushered out for the start of a service. I should also mention that the docents at Westminster were particularly kind and accommodating, helping us to find Darwin, for instance, to make sure that we were able to visit him before that section closed. Lesson learned from previous sites that closed down by sections.
I had been in touch with a cousin, Yvonne Sell, who agreed to meet us at the end of her workday on Grosvener Street so we hopped on the tube and headed for Belgravia. Woo-whoo! Another amazing part of London! Wasn't I just keen on looking her up at the brilliant white building that we found at the end of our journey, and thinking how much fun it was going to be walking in all grubby at the end of a touristy day to an immaculate foyer and asking for her. Ack! As luck would have it a text arrived just as we mounted the stairs, instructing us on where to find her at a pub tucked away in a mews 2 blocks further along.

No mistaking Yvonne - we recognized each other immediately as Cadeaus (my mother's family) and got on like a house afire over a couple of ales for her and Jan and cider for me.

So much fun to meet Tim's little sister, youngest of the Sell brood and another strong independent female member of my extended family. She is a management consultant by trade and a rock climber for fun. Neato! We kept it brief as she had to pack for a weekend of climbing and we were due at the Shunt Yard by 9.
Jamie worked the box office for the Shunt Theatre and had invited us to see their play Money, highly recommended by Erin. So off we went on the tube again to Tower Bridge station. We had to walk a number of blocks through questionable underpasses beneath the tracks. But the twilight and the lighting kept us feeling safe and comfortable. We arrived in time but with no time to eat so we grabbed seats at a atable inside and waited for the show to begin. What a show it was! A contemporary piece of collaborative experimental theatre, Money challenged audience members to go along for the ride, to trust and cooperate through scenes of repetitious und loud machine sound, darkness, characters whose lines and actions were not entirely obvious, but were intriguing nonetheless. The main theme was one of greed, the recurring question "what do you want?", and while the answer appeared to be "money" there were suggestions re love, belonging, family as well as references or swipes at corporate corruption, Nazism, and indidelity. And probably much else that I can't recall at the moment. Great fun! Thoughtful, clever, provocative and along with the astonishing machanistic tri-level performance space and set,completely brilliant. We were exhillerated and exhausted by the time we emerged at the end. Too tired and too late to buy Jamie a drink. So we said thank you and good night and headed backl to the Ibis. With the trip to Salisbury demanding early rising the next day, we were anxious to turn in and get a good night's sleep.

Finding Harry at the National Museum

Thursday, July 8
London, Day 3

Well, memory of exactly what we did every day is becoming a blur, but our photos tell me that on Thursday we went to the National Museum. We took it easy that morning, ate late, and returned to our room to call Sheila in Salisbury to confirm arrangements regarding visit there on the 10th. She seemed thrilled about it and agreed to meet our morning train and get us back to the station in time for the last one that night. On our way for the rest of the day, we stopped for lunch at the local pub and chatted with the Australian waitress a bit. We have noticed that most people who serve us at the hotel and restaurants are from elsewhere. She followed a boyfriend home to Engand and he is in school.
After checking the tube map we set out for the museum. Ooooh and aaaahhh!!! Free. Accessible. Remarkable artifacts and splendid exhibits.
We concentrated on the ancient Sumarian,
Greek, and Roman pieces on the first floor,









saw the Rosetta Stone,














and marvelled at the age, beauty and detail of the art.
However, I got a bit sad after awhile about something to do with the distruction that preceded these exhibits.

Many of the sculptures were torn from ancient ruins, or had been vandalized on site. Some important bits and pieces were missing from their body parts.
Still, a wonder.
After a tea break we went up to the rooms of ancient British finds. The Time Team had been busy!
One neat thing was the tile floor from one of the turrets we had visited at the Tower of London.















Another was that among some ivory carvings, I found Harry, the Viking mascot for Wexford Collegiate Scool for the Arts, which is where I work.
We ended our visit in the reading room, which was air conditioned and a blessed relief. It was really a very hot day!
I convinced Jan that the bus would be faster, but this time I was proved wrong. Just because a bus was at a street corner did not mean we could board it. So we gave chase and probably got half way to Piccadilly before we finally got on.

Jamie was waiting for us there and we walked to China Town to eat dinner - excellent food! - and had a great visit with him. He is working temp jobs and volunteering at the Shunt Yard theatre box office so he was able to plan to do the festivals for the summer, working or volunteering at many of them. Hope he has a blast! After dinner we walked back to Trafalgar Square to check out the Sadlers Wells installation called Slow Dance.
I knew there would be projected images because we had seen the technicians setting up three big screens on our first visit. However, I was hoping that there would be actual dancers as well. No such luck. Three synchronized films were being projected, each a single image of a dancer performing jumps and turns in various genres of dance, like ballet, modern and hip hop. After awhile one of the images would fade out to be replaced by different dancer and style. We could only watch for so long, but two things happened before we finally turned away. I offered my cane to a one-legged man in a wheelchair to assist him in standing at the rail above the square to watch the films. Also a young boy down in the square began to imitate some of the movement in the films. When we were done, we said goodnight to Jamie and headed for the hotel. We stopped back in at the neighborhood pub for one drink just before last call. Had to laugh. One tourist couple didn't take them seriously and ended up finishing their bottle of wine and beer out on the sidewalk. When they say 'closed' here, they mean it!

They're changing the guard at Buckingham Palace. Christopher Robin went down with Alice. (A. A. Milne)

Wednesday, July 7
London, Day 2
We were picked up at 7:30 am by Evan Evans Essential London half-day tour.
We went first to a large bus depot where passengers dispersed to their various tour buses. The last 2 collecting buses came in late, so we were delayed a bit. Our driver was Charlie and our guide was Richard. He was very clearly spoken and well-informed, full of all sorts of stories and history that makes such tours worth the time. This sightseeing tour included major sites in the West End and Westminster (which means "the monastery west of London"). We saw the Albert Memorial & the Royal Albert Hall,

the Houses of Parliament & Westminster Abbey,
and then the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace,

and ended up at Trafalgar Square, which like Piccadilly Circus we seem to keep coming back to - truly the heart of London.
We had booked a tour of the Tower of London on-line to dodge lineups. But decided that we had time to see St. Paul's Cathedral on the way. However, we had to eat first and a window of pastries caught my eye so we stopped long enough to indulge in plates of strawberry short cake with loads of whipped cream. Then we descended into at Charring Cross station, directly in front of the route 15 bus stop. I had pointed out that the bus was direct to both St. Paul's and the Tower, but Jan thought that the underground would be faster: the Northern line to one stop and the Central line to the Cathedral. Hah! I say, Hah!
Well, it was worth the trip. St. Paul's was magnificent and from certain vantage points the intersecting curving lines of the upper architecture were simply quite dizzying. Then there was the opulent iconography, and the carved and gilted woodwork and pillars, the wrought iron gateways, the marble statuary, and the memorials that stretch back beyond the great fire of 1666. Not only were nobles buried there, but also many of the great heroes and thinkers of various times. And a few of their wives. Funny how there are always so few women considered worthy of these memorials. But there were some and I intend to look them up in the book I bought there. After wandering awestruck by the intricacies of the mosaics arching high above us, I sat in the crypt at St. Paul's Cathedral waiting for Jan to come back from climbing the 257 stairs to the whisper gallery

and worrying a little bit that we would not have time for our tour of the Tower of London as planned. Tickets bought online were good for a week, so we could always go the next day. The tower closed at 5:30 and it was already after 3:00. Oh, well. I enjoyed the rest in that the tube had led us through several long walks underground on our route to get here.
When Jan came back, it turned out he had climbed all the way up to the top of the dome, outside!
We jumped into a London cab for the first time to get to the Tower of London too late for the last tour guided by a yeoman. I couldn't have kept up anyway. We quickly found ourselves in the audience for a simulation of soldiers practising with siege weapons prior to a battle with the Scots.
There was an enormous crossbow like weapon
and a thing that looked something like a catapult but was in fact a perrier. Men and women competed on teams to try to fling a (water)bomb the furthest by pulling on a rope and sitting down rapidly. I would have volunteered but they would have had a hell of a time getting me back up off my butt. Lots of fun to watch anyway.
Then up to the top of the walls we went, and into several towers where there were terrific signed and projected explanations and descriptions of the use and history of each space. We looked down into the rookery - amazing birds - and then visited the white tower to see an incredible exhibition of armour. That's where we found the staff starting to shut the place down, which caused us a bit of panic to get to the crown jewels. Wow! Totally did not expect the size of the glittering display of gem-encrusted crowns, septres, gold church and banquet pieces. Worth the visit for that alone.
But I was pooped by the time they were backing us out the gates. We walked along the river to Tower Bridge, up and this time onto the bus to Covent Garden.
Now I knew I was in a theatre district, with restaurants offering pre-theatre specials. I stepped into one to ask if they could manage a special before our 8 o'clock curtain for Oliver. "I thought that was at 7:30," she said. More panic as we raced around the corner to find that she was correct and that Jan did not know where he had put our tickets. Fortunately, once again we found that the staff at the box office were terrific in trying to trace our Leiscester Square discount tickets (which were back at the hotel buried in our pile of receipts). Just before curtain they seated us for what was a wonderful remount of the original musical.
The cast was excellent down to the smallest waif on the huge stage, and the production itself moved along seamlessly. Had a ball, and I am still singing and humming the songs. However, our 1988 high school Fagan, Gord Rand, would have given them a run for their money.

We were starving by the time the curtain came down, but it was still early enough to walk into Covent Garden Market and have a delicious late dinner at Fuel al fresco. The waitress warned me not to hang my bag on the back of my chair when Jan went off to a nearby ATM. Said that there were thieves around there. Jan saw a drunk pissing in a doorway, but otherwise all we saw were lots of people of every age and description eating and drinking and having a great time together. As we did.
Piccadilly Line, change at Earl's Court
(where Jan took pics of the complex wiring and connections that had me expecting undercover to leap out of the woodwork at any moment), and home to the Ibis and to bed. Well, hold on - we might have stopped at the pub. We did stop one night when they were projecting a game between the Netherlands and Spain. But that was another night, I think.

London, Day 1

Tuesday, July 6
Finding Apple to no avail
Breakfast at the Ibis was served until 10 am on weekdays, a civilized hour that nonetheless got us up and out before the day was half gone. Simple but good food, and enough variety to keep it tolerable for the week. We spent the rest of the morning on wifi (£5/2 hrs) trying to get into UK apps store so we could download GPS for England onto this iPad. Jan went out and found a shop that sold time for the cell phone. We also booked the half day bus tour that is part of our package for Wednesday morning, July 7. I called and left a message for Jamie but of course couldn't remember our cell phone #! Hoped he would text back or that I would reach him later. Jamie is a close friend of Erin's and we are going to meet him on the 8th &/or 9th, and we will see the play Money on the 9th at the Shunt theatre where he works.
We finally set off on the tube to Leiscester Square where we got discount tix for 39 Steps for that night at Piccadilly Circus and for Oliver the next night at Covent Garden. Erin recommended the first, and I had to see a West End Musical. Oliver was the first musical I had produced for the arts school in Niagara in 1988, so I chose it. We walked around the square and stopped for lunch at the Moon Under Water pub, sitting at an outdoor table across from the green. I had a pint of cider and Melton Mowbray pie. Jan had a pint of ale with cheese and onion tart. Delish!

After lunch we walked up through Soho - shocking! (ha,ha) - and Carnaby Street and were surprised at how many London streets are malled off. We were in and out of stores a bit, but for the most part we were window shopping, people watching, and gaping at the beauty of the old architecture and streetscapes.




We did visit Liberty to look around, browse through the Hermes scarves in search of a non-existent bargain for my mom, and giggle at stumbling over the champagne and oyster bar in the basement level.

More photos of its amazing exterior.







At last we reached the Apple Store, where Igor was utterly delightful in his efforts to assist (note to self: contact the store and tell them how great he was). We discovered that I could not change location to buy UK apps because I had a balance of $5.32 with the Canadian itunes store. He tried to arrange a new account for me in the UK but I had to have a UK credit card and address other than one week in a hotel. Canadian address and card would not do. Steve Jobs, what is the deal here? We just wanted a UK GPS system. Ah! As Igor so kindly pointed out, the OS GB 250k map of Great Britain functioned with satellite GPS anyway and found us easily so I had the capability to navigate our entire trip. Whew!! Okay, let's get on with it!




Well, we wandered back down toward Piccadilly along Saville Row (oh, the clothes!) and past the Royal Academy of the Arts where we only had time to stick our heads in the door long enough to find out that the Haunch of Venison sign indicated the presence of a large gallery.

Title of photo below: Cath, A Broad :)



By that time we had just enough day left to grab a bite to eat in a convenient Pret A Manger (what a brilliant concept these ubiquitous self serve restaurants are) and get back to Piccidilly in time for 39 Steps. This hilarious play takes one of Hitchcock's early films and with four players on stage, 3 men & 1 woman, presents it as a farce that I think Hitch would have loved. Killed ourselves laughing, and the more you knew his films the funnier the play was as it referenced a lot of them throughout. Brilliant!!!


[Photo: the lift at the Earl's Court Tube Station]
When we got back to the hotel, we just had time to get into its pub, the George & Dragon I think it was, before last call. Now some friends had expressed concern about what I would find to drink over the pond, and I have already mentioned that I tried the cider, which I quite liked. But didn't I find the tube walls plastered with stories of Jack Daniels and how he made his Tennessee whiskey (please note that JD is not Bourbon which is Kentucky whiskey). So I was happy to find it available in every establishment that we visited. A little nightcap and off to sleep.