Back home

Both of us now safely home.  No diversions, no dramas, just jetlag, unpacking and washing.


Leaving LHR Wednesday evening.

Same view the next morning.

I still marvel that they stay up in the air for as long as they do.

Last day in London

Today (Wednesday) is my last day in London.  Mercifully it was cloudy so didn't seem so hot.  But the taxi on the way to Heathrow showed 37 degrees.  Fortunately it isn't particularly humid.  One lady at breakfast told me that her (long distance) train had gone slower than usual yesterday because of concerns about buckling rails.

Anyhow, got to the British Library - absolutely no queue.  Obviously not in the league of the British Museum.  Saw yet another exhibition on the Magna Carta and saw a second one.  Not in as good condition as the one at Salisbury.  I believe Br Library have two, and Lincoln Cathedral has a fourth.  Two Magna Cartas is plenty - no need to go looking at more.

Then saw the permanent display.  Original scores of music ,jottings from the Beatles,  letter from Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn to the pope (no prizes for guessing the subject matter), lots of Bibles, other sacred texts, including some in Chinese.  The old books are beautifully illustrated.  Also a Guthenburg Bible.  They were comparing how many scribes would be needed to publish what the press could churn out.  But even the ones off the press needed hand decoration.

And one item was given to the British Library in lieu of an unpaid tax bill.  Wonder what we have that would satisfy the ATO?

Pictures not allowed inside, so here is one outside:.

And this is the view of the walkway between Kings Cross and St Pancras Stations. Like a scifi set.  

Now at Heathrow waiting for flight to Singapore and home to Sydney on 3 July.  So the next post will be from Sydney.  Unless we have some other excitement on the way home!

Bits and pieces

It was hot today and forecast hotter tomorrow.  30 something today, but not too humid.

I leave London tomorrow, got my flight put forward, arriving home 3rd July.

And saw this today outside the hotel:

National Portrait Gallery

Then had a look at the National Portrait Gallery.  A couple of them below:

 

 

 And this fellow was Irish too!

 

Shopping

I thought I wouldn't have much to say about shopping, but a couple of interesting things happened.

The nice young man in impeccable dress and English accent at Fortnum & Mason was wrapping Kin Mun's fudge.  I asked if I could get VAT back, which lead to a discussion about taxation in general, including in Australia, and then to multinationals and their tax.  But he was more sympathetic to multinationals.  He pointed to the gadget in his right ear.  He said it was an Australian company that made his cochlear implant.  He was keen to visit Australia and to make contact with Cochlear and perhaps give a talk.  I was stunned - the implant certainly worked, he had absolutely no evidence of any impairment. He said he had a head injury when 3 years old.  So Australia certainly had made an impression on this young man, and you can think of him when you eat your fudge Kin Mun.

Then had a look at Liberty.  The young lady with Asian features was serving me and when she talked, she had a very Australian accent.  So I asked if she was from Australia - Oh, how did you know? said she.  I said I was from Australia, and glad to hear the accent.  She too was from Sydney, and has been in London 5 weeks, 2 weeks at Liberty.  I asked her how it was to work there.  She said it has a very different dynamic to stores in Australia, such as Myer.  Then she spontaneously added that the transport was much better in London!  Completely agree with her. 

And saw this too.  Very neat and very Japanese, along Piccadilly.

KM Home

Flew back from Singapore last night on the midnight flight that was delayed about an hour, first by late incoming aircraft then because a couple of passengers decided not to show and their luggage had to be taken off the plane that would not leave without their owners. Kay is still in London.

 

The A380 was half full, and there were two empty seats between me on one aisle seat and a lady on the other. After takeoff she immediately lay down with her head on the empty seat. If I were to do the same our heads would be inches apart. If I lay the other way, my smelly socks would be next to her nose. So I did the gentlemanly way of sitting up and tried to sleep. Fly business class next time.

 

Technology is marvellous. I had a new passport while in Singapore that did not match my Aussie visa, so SIA had to ring Canberra and had it sorted out in about five minutes. On arrival the electronic immigration recognised me as an owner of a valid visa and let me through.  I hope it was not just the word of the SIA counter officer in Singapore they were trusting on.

 

Captain said weather in Sydney was going to be fine, it wasn't when we landed but it did fine up to a lovely 13 C.  Either this or 33 C in Singapore, a change is always good. Got home, indeed the inside of the house was 13 C so I quickly switched on the heating. Yesterday it was air-conditioning to cool.

Nothing changed in the house except a framed picture fell off the wall, dislodged the wifi extender below and even knocked the power point crooked. Nothing broken, they still work.

 

The Epping Third Track works had made some progress. The concrete beams for railway bridge over the M2 was in place, the strip next to the track tidied up. The Cheltenham station exit to The Crescent changed once more, now it logically runs straight into the pedestrian crossing.

 

The deck looked good; Glenn cleaned it up and re-oiled while we were away, and the magnolias are coming into bloom. 

 

Who says nothing ever happens in Cheltenham?

Duxford

Today I caught the train to Cambridge and then a taxi to the Imperial War Museum at Duxford Airfield.  Being an airfield, it has planes, and more planes.

I later got to talk to the lady in green who was with her father in the wheelchair.  They were from WA, and her father was a pilot whose regret was that when he was old enough to join the Air Force, the war was over.  We all have our reasons for coming to Duxford.

Following are some photos, in no particular order.

Those of us old enough to have flown in a DC3 - this is the C47, the US wartime transport version of the same plane.

Some fabric off the Wright Bros plane.  Apparently, not just any old fabric.  It had to be thick enough that wind would not go through it.

 And a Concorde.  You could go inside....

 Flight deck.

And looking down the other way.  This was set up for research,so the passenger version would have a lower floor and wouldn't seem so small - or so they said. Some passenger seats were put in for display purposes towards the end. 

 View of Duxford - display sheds on the right, runway is off to the left (outside picture).

 Another one for those of us old enough to remember - a Vickers Viscount.

And a Supermarine Spitfire.  There were many versions of them apparently.  And they weren't the most used plane in the Battle of Britain - this honour fell to the Hurricane.  But the Spitfire has the fame.

And the aviation equivalent of a canoe.  A plane shorter than I am - would barely come up to my shoulders.  Apparently used for racing.

A warm and sunny day today.  Don't know where all this English rain is.  And Wimbledon is on during the daytime. 

Bits and pieces

One advantage of visiting London in summer is seeing the trees in full leaf.  This is Russell Square.

Lovely to walk through.  The downside is all the other people doing the same thing and who want to go to the same places as we do!

And saw this sign this morning.  Reassuring? 

British Museum

Today we walked to the British Museum - as they say in London, about a 15 minute walk. (Yesterday, one distance was said to be a 7 minute walk - not sure how they work all that out!).

There was a long queue - along the entrance block plus down the other side - but it moved at a reasonable pace - we queued for 20 minutes, so that wasn't too bad.

BL got an audio guide and checked out the Greek and other stuff.  I headed for the Australian Indigenous exhibition.

It was well done, and didn't dodge the role of the British colonisers in the story, and outlined the debates still occurring in Australia.

There were some videos of people in typical Aus settings, with sounds to match.  It was a fond reminder for me - a familiar landscape and sounds that are so different to where I have been for the past 2 weeks.

And I could hear English accents around me saying they wanted to visit Australia, and one (English) lady commented "It's an eye-opener isn't it".  

Then I went to another exhibition on mummies - some artificially embalmed, some naturally mummified in the desert.  And these people had names.   CT scanning revealed their physical state.  They all seemed to have bad teeth with abscesses, and the Egyptians were prone to atherosclerosis.

BL has left for the airport and tomorrow I make way to Duxford.  I expect Spitfires and Lancasters galore. 

Salisbury Cathedral & Magna Carta

Today was a visit to Salisbury Cathedral.  Built from 1220, and because it was built (comparatively) quickly over 38 years, it was all built in the one architectural style (Gothic) - in other words, not a mish-mash.  This means the building is higher, brighter and they managed to build all this with smaller columns than in the earlier churches.

There are pictures everywhere - but we took these.

The West door - the entrance.

It is the tallest spire in the UK.  The weight of the tower is so great that columns were buckling.  I think they have sorted out the problem by now (they called on Christopher Wren to fix it) but the buckled pillars remain.

Salisbury Cathedral houses one (and the best) copy of the Magna Carta.  Only 4 remain.  You cannot take photographs, but it was very clear, almost HD, despite being in small print.  It was in Latin, so could not vouch for the translations.  Quite amazing that people came up with concepts such as fairness in those medieval days.  Of course, fairness didn't apply to you and me, just the barons and the church, but the right-wingers today assure us about a trickle-down effect, in economics anyway.

BTW, fairness was to be judged by a group of your peers - still persists today with the jury system.

The Barons forced all this on King John who knew he had to put on his seal or else.  Like all politicians, he attempted to renege on his promises.  But subsequent kings were simply handed another Charter to sign.

This is the 800th year after the signing of MC.  There are displays and pictures all over Salisbury, as well as competitions to colour in the best baron. Here are a couple:

And the rest is history!

We finally struck Tube congestion on the way home.  However, even tonight,  we have rarely had to wait more than a minute for a train - quite amazing service.  BL leaves tomorrow, so we are looking for a tube-free outing - ie close to the hotel.  British Museum is high on the list.  I see there is a display about Australia's indigenous peoples, as well as new stuff on mummies, including XRays etc.

One last bit of Ireland - the Queen of England and her Guinness.

But no froth on those royal lips.

The Queen's visit to Ireland in 2011 was hugely significant.  Saw this postcard today - the meeting of two great symbols.

New airport?

Westminister Abbey and War Rooms and shopping

This morning we joined London Walks for a Westminster Abbey tour.  No photography permitted inside the Abbey, so today's piccies are limited to the cloisters.  It is 18 years since I have been inside and I had forgotten just how big it is.  The guide was good, again lots of history stuff and she was quite humourous.

 Westminster Abbey through the cloister windows.

Then we went off in different directions.  BL went down to the river and shopping, and I went to the Cabinet War Rooms.

One of the bedrooms in the underground bunker.  It wasn't Churchill's but a man called Norman Brooks.  Churchill's was a bit larger than this, and had a proper quilt and better chairs.

I found a lot of the history familiar to me, so skipped the audio guide and spent the time reading the boards and looking around at the environment.  It wasn't impregnable - a direct hit would have been a big problem - it is said Churchill knew this but his staff didn't. Fortunately there was no direct hit.

Weather is hotter today - especially noticeable in the train.  Oh for some rain!!  But be careful what you wish for I suppose.

Tomorrow is Salisbury.

Shopping and Westminister

Today was shopping.  Not many pictures on that!  Had an italian lunch, then made our way to Westminister Tube Station to meet up with Richard III of London Walks (he is the third of six Richards who have worked for the company).  It was a big group - I didn't count but must be close to 30.  This was the slowest of the London Walks I have been on - a wise move given the numbers in our group and the traffic/crowds around.  It worked well.

It was really a history lecture, illustrated by the relevant buildings around.  Westminster Abbey first built by Edward the Confessor (the last of the Saxon (ie English) kings), and the first to be crowned was William the Conqueror, a Plantagenet (ie French).

More pictures from the tour:

 Houses of Parliament - Lords side.

 Guess this one.

Another picture - 3 in one - Westminster Abbey, Houses of Parliament, and I thought I knew the building on the right - ?St James something?  Google isn't helping either.

Then back to Oxford Street for shopping, Chinatown again for dinner (better tonight) and Back to hotel.

Again, the weather has been good to us - no rain.  But getting warm during the day.

Oxford and the Cotswolds

Today was an early morning.  We went on a tour of Oxford and the Cotswolds with London Walks.  This was one of their "day trips" from London, and in keeping with their usual professionalism despite a casual arrangement where you just turn up at the appointed time and place.  In this case, 9:15am at Paddington Station.

We caught the train to Oxford, then a bus to the Cotswolds.  We walked in a village called Minster Lovell with the usual gorgeous Cotswold stone cottages and thatched roofs. Summer is even better to see these cottages.

Then a walk beyond the village.

Then to lunch in another village, Burford.  Saw a shop there stocking these brands!

Then to Oxford.  On the way, passed some typical Cotswolds vistas - a bit hard from the bus, but you get some idea.

Then to Oxford.  Began to take photos.  This is the Sheldonian, designed by the up and coming Christopher Wren

 

Then Divinity College/Bodleian Library

Brasenose College.

And a bridge over a street reminiscent of the Bridge of Sighs in Venice.

After a while, I just gave up taking photos.  There are just so many ancient and beautiful buildings wherever you look.  A city of dreaming spires indeed.  It was the beginning of summer holidays, and something else happening - there were graduates and undergraduates in gowns.

Then we found Chinatown for dinner.  Roast pork, roast duck and buk choy with garlic.  Not brilliant chinese food, but a very welcome change of flavour.

As for tomorrow -  sleep in and SHOPPING !!!