Horrible jet-lag, Canterbury, and a little bit besides

---

Apologies for this being so late - the hostel in Canterbury didn't have a working internet, and so for my last entry I very quickly borrowed someone's laptop. Also, I'm typing on a UK keyboard, and nothing is where it should be - so bear with me if there is @ symbols in the wrong place, or suddenly a # sign is a £.

Three days ago, you would have gotten a page and a half rant about 10 hour straight through flights, overnight, and how absolutely atrocious they are. Today, I just don't care. That said, we arrived in Heathrow just 5 minutes behind schedule, both very tired, because neither of us slept much on the plane (but I got very much more sleep than Alex...mostly due to a 1mL shot of melatonin. He refused. We left London right away (but first got to take the tube to our London-Victoria, the train stop. It moves about as fast as the skytrain, but is WAY more space efficient). The train to Canterbury was nice, even though we both fell asleep almost right away. Getting to Canterbury was a breeze, and our hostel (Kipps) was only a 5 minute walk away. We got our rooms, skipped dinner because we were exhausted, and struggled to stay awake until about 7pm, when we both gave up.

Due to jet-lag, neither of us could sleep by about 3am (also because neither of us gets to sleep longer than 6-7 hours ever anyways!)...I managed to fall asleep again, but it made for a long day the next day.

The next day: We got to see Canterbury! Canterbury is an adorable little town...I could definitely live there, I think. The Canterbury Cathedral was amazing - by far the largest building I have EVER seen, and I took lots of photos. Parts of the cathedral are as old as 500A.D. - and we got to see the spot where Thomas a Becket was murdered (he was an archbishop of Canterbury sometime in the distant past...pre-1500s for sure, but I forget) and when he was murdered, he was practically martyred, leaving him as an icon for pilgrams to travel to. That's where the Canterbury Tales by Chaucer came from - a collection of stories of pilgrams making the pilgramage to Canterbury. I find history really interesting - Alex was a little more interested in the stain-glass windows and the reverence of the place...and I took an awful lots of photos of architecture. I can't believe how they managed to make all those little spired things without breaking them. I just can't.

In the crypt, we weren't allowed to take photos, but it contained some of the original art of the building (still there, on the walls, from the 1200's - it was nuts) and some of the original posts from the beginning of construction (it took over 1000 years to contruct what sits there today)

We both really loved it - we're having a blast over here. Alex is happy to not be working (and I was supposed to pass that information onwards). The rest of Canterbury is really neat too. After the Cathedral, we went for lunch at the Thomas Becket Pub - and I discovered, much to my dismay, that British pubs serve WARM beer. I won't be ordering any more beer, I think. We both tried british food for the first time (or at least I did...I don't think Alex has before...actually, now I'm not sure) they like to deepfry things. (example: I had deep fried brie tonight. It was delicious. Weird, but delicious)

Next, we went to see an 1800's gaol along the westgate (an ancient wall - composed of chert, I am in geology after all - surrounds the city, and there were gates placed at the four quadrants, plus 4 inbetween) - and we got to see all the original handcuffs, and the cells they used to hold prisoners in, etc. They had a story there of one man named Thomas, who could actually break through his iron manacles, and did so on several occasions. It never mentioned how he died, though.

This morning, we left Canterbury, and hopped on a train to Chichester. There is a roman palace there that we wanted to see, but when we got to Chichester and asked more about it at a tourist info kiosk, we discovered it was really just a palace with old stuff in it on display, and it cost a fair amount. I'm not much for art galleries, and neither is Alex. So instead, we wandered around the town for a few hours, and hopped back on the train to Salisbury, which is where we are right now.

Due to technical difficulties, you aren't getting any photos in this entry either. We'll make a photo entry when the stupid thing starts working.

In the meantime, we have a bus to catch. Today, we go to Stonehenge.

---