Sheila (Keith's mum) made it on time to London on Christmas morning (despite our worries about delays due to the snow). After some waiting her luggage decided to join us on Boxing Day evening (it had decided to take a little vacation from us in Detroit). We had a nice day of opening presents on Christmas day and spent Boxing Day at the sales in Uxbridge, while Keith wisely opted out to relax at home with his new books. We are off to Yorkshire this afternoon for a few days to visit Keith and Sheila's family.
Before it gets too late I thought I should post a few pictures of our travels from last week when Keith and I were on holiday. We mana
ged to get downtown three times, around last minute Christmas shopping and my homework. The first trip was to Camden Town which I already covered in an earlier post. Later that week we went to Westminster Abbey which we had not actually gone into yet! It is a fabulous place to visit. It seems like every famous person in Britain is buried and/or memorialized there. We found two pieces of Canadiana - one was General Wolfe's large memorial (although I think he is actually buried elsewhere) complete with a carving of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham. The second was a memorial to John Franklin, the Arctic explorer who died with his crew trying to map the Northwest Passage. We also enjoyed seeing all of the memorials to composers - Handel, Purcell, John Blow, Vaughan Williams, Elgar... also Poet's Corner, Mary Queen of Scots' crypt, the burials of so many other ancient Kings and Queens... What an amazing place. I have been reading a funny and pithy history of Britain and so I was very pleased to be able to actually place many of the famous people whose memorials I was seeing (and in some cases, standing on).
The second jaunt we took the day before Christmas Eve was to the Museum of London near Barbican station. From the station there is an above-street-level walkway that leads you directly to the museum without having to deal with any traffic. Along the way we discovered these remains of a tree, and as I always stop to read the placque (just in case) found that it was dedicated to Mendelssohn as he used to spend time in the area (when it was less cit-y and more park-y I sup
pose) to get inspiration for his music, including A Midsummer Night's Dream. The Museum of London is dedicated to London's history. Actually the Museum in Docklands which we visited earlier is the other half of the Museum of London. There are lots of interesting things to see, such as a reconstruction of Roman-era Londinium, Oliver Cromwell's death mask, a display on London's Great Fire of 1666 and a recreation of a Victorian shopping area (which didn't have the lifelike smell of the Sailortown in the Museum in Docklands, but we managed to make do). The museum was also quite empty as I imagine most people in the city who were on holiday already were still shopping. A great day out, as they like to say here.
Before it gets too late I thought I should post a few pictures of our travels from last week when Keith and I were on holiday. We mana
ged to get downtown three times, around last minute Christmas shopping and my homework. The first trip was to Camden Town which I already covered in an earlier post. Later that week we went to Westminster Abbey which we had not actually gone into yet! It is a fabulous place to visit. It seems like every famous person in Britain is buried and/or memorialized there. We found two pieces of Canadiana - one was General Wolfe's large memorial (although I think he is actually buried elsewhere) complete with a carving of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham. The second was a memorial to John Franklin, the Arctic explorer who died with his crew trying to map the Northwest Passage. We also enjoyed seeing all of the memorials to composers - Handel, Purcell, John Blow, Vaughan Williams, Elgar... also Poet's Corner, Mary Queen of Scots' crypt, the burials of so many other ancient Kings and Queens... What an amazing place. I have been reading a funny and pithy history of Britain and so I was very pleased to be able to actually place many of the famous people whose memorials I was seeing (and in some cases, standing on).The second jaunt we took the day before Christmas Eve was to the Museum of London near Barbican station. From the station there is an above-street-level walkway that leads you directly to the museum without having to deal with any traffic. Along the way we discovered these remains of a tree, and as I always stop to read the placque (just in case) found that it was dedicated to Mendelssohn as he used to spend time in the area (when it was less cit-y and more park-y I sup
pose) to get inspiration for his music, including A Midsummer Night's Dream. The Museum of London is dedicated to London's history. Actually the Museum in Docklands which we visited earlier is the other half of the Museum of London. There are lots of interesting things to see, such as a reconstruction of Roman-era Londinium, Oliver Cromwell's death mask, a display on London's Great Fire of 1666 and a recreation of a Victorian shopping area (which didn't have the lifelike smell of the Sailortown in the Museum in Docklands, but we managed to make do). The museum was also quite empty as I imagine most people in the city who were on holiday already were still shopping. A great day out, as they like to say here. Well, Sheila and Keith should be home soon and then we are going to open our new-found presents. I'll update the blog when we are back from Yorkshire later in the week!
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