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Published: October 6th 2008
Lindisfarne Priory
I told you it was a pretty day.Ok, this week has gone by really quickly, and I’m still behind. I’m going to do my best to catch up. I really want to document my first week in London, but I really need to finish up the tour now, don’t I? I’m feeling a bit removed from these stops at this point, but here we go.
Friday the 19th we went to Lindisfarne Priory in a city called Holy Island that can only be reached at low tide because the only way to access the almost-island is by one causeway that can become water-logged very easily. The Lindisfarne Gospels were written there and St. Cuthbert lived at the Priory making it famous, but that’s about all I can tell you about the gospels because that’s yet another thing being taught in the medieval literature course. I do know that it was a really pretty day and the almost-island was a great place to be on a nice day. While we were strolling around a small castle in Lindisfarne, Riley decided it would be a good idea to climb up close to a sheep that was on a small hill and mutter “here sheepy sheepy sheepy” in an attempt
The Cook Museum
She was knitting a stretchy rope. to pet it. While we watched, a lady standing close to us said to her son: “This man’s about to get beat up by a sheep, watch it!” After the Priory, we went to Bede’s World. Bede is a famous historian who mainly wrote about St. Cuthbert. Again, I don’t really know too much about him past that fact. Since the visit, Bede’s World has become the biggest joke of the trip. None of us were quite sure what we were supposed to get out of the visit to the “world” that included an odd farm, a dull museum that included a person-sized wire sculpture of Bede’s face, and the unimpressive ruins of a medieval wall in a nearby church, but we did appreciate a playground that we found on the way to the church. It was really entertaining to watch Ben push Riley down the child-sized slide and to wait for John of Tate and Andrew to jump off of the swings. After the interesting visit to Bede’s World, we made our way to Durham where we stayed for two nights. Upon arriving at St. Aiden’s College, one portion of the University of Durham where we were staying, we
The Cook Museum sailors
Check out that mustache... made the long trek into downtown Durham. While walking around and not finding a great deal of dinner options, we asked a police officer where we could find a grocery store that was still open so that we could find some lunch and snack foods. The cop told us to go back down the street we were on, take a right, and there was a grocery store open until 10 right past the WALKABOUT. Dinner problem solved. We’d found a Walkabout… we hadn’t even realized at the time that it was a chain, so there was joyous celebration. While we were having dinner, interest grew to watch Love, Actually. There was actually a lot more interest (especially among the males) than I would have expected. I realized that night that Love, Actually is my holy grail of films. I’m not sure what that says about me, but I cannot deny the fact as Alan Rickman, Emma Thompson, Liam Neeson, and Laura Linney are four of my absolute favorite actors. Throw in Hugh Grant, Colin Firth, and Bill Nighy on top of that and there is no denying that this is an all-star cast. Right near the end of watching the
High Cross!
This was outside St. Mary's Cathedral at the shore of Whitby. magical movie that makes me want Christmas to come tomorrow, there was a knock at the door. It was Margaret. She didn’t want to interrupt our film, so I stepped outside to find out what she’d wanted to tell me. She informed Elizabeth and me that there was a pub in our building where two bartenders were by themselves. They were students at the college, and one of them was a chemistry major, so she had to tell me about it. We were skeptical as we were right at the end of the movie, weren’t wearing shoes, and didn’t have any money to buy a drink. Margaret gave us money and made us go. The guys, Mike and George, were really nice. George was much more talkative than Mike, but Mike was the chem major. George divulged over the course of the conversation that his three favorite things about the States are double names (he was ecstatic when I told him my name was Mary Beth), red Solo cups (the clear cups of the UK are boring apparently), and ya’ll. He also told us that he had loved talking to Margaret, so the four of us talked about her for
Rose Window
In the York Minster. a while. A few other friends of theirs came in, and we didn’t want to outstay our welcome as the bar was supposed to close before we got there. We left the guys and thanked them for keeping it open for us.
On Saturday, we did a tour of the Durham University library. Durham is the third oldest university in England, so the library houses some very important collections and manuscripts. The most interesting aspect of the library to me is its continuing use as a resource: locals have come to see where exact property lines used to exist to see the origin of their land and important political figures have come to see the early maps of Sudan to know where it was divided. There were also many illuminated manuscripts. The most interesting part about those is how they were edited- early in their production if they made mistakes they would simply scrape the ink off of the parchment, and the same methods were used when Henry VIII (“may he rot in hell” followed his name when the curator of the library spoke it) forced all references to the pope out of such manuscripts. After the library, we
The Bishop's Trunk in York Minster
The Bishop used to have to travel with this huge trunk because his vestments could not be folded. Crazy. did a tour of the Durham Cathedral. This cathedral housed the tombs and monuments of St. Cuthbert and Bede, but my favorite aspect was probably the sandstone used to make the church. Because of the way sandstone forms in shifts in layers, the church had beautiful natural designs in the walls. Ironically, there are remains of the original plaster and paint that covered these beautiful walls that was a downright tacky beige covered with red rosettes and blue stripes.
On Sunday morning, we drove to Whitby. Our first stop was the Captain Cook Memorial Museum, established to acknowledge the accomplishments and lifestyle of James Cook’s nautical voyages. The coolest aspect of the museum was that here were many people in period garb leading the informative facets of the museum. There were ladies downstairs that told of the activities that the ladies had to hold down the fort of the houses while their maritime husbands were at sea. Upstairs, there were many men in full uniforms to talk about the weaponry, food, and general life on the ships. I could have listened to these guys for even longer than I did, but one of the more interesting accounts was how
mead was originally made. When the ship ran out of fresh water, they would get water of an unsure cleanliness at another stop. To this they would add a sufficient amount of rum to “kill” all of the bacteria in the water. To avoid getting scurvy, they would add lemon or lime juice to the water and rum, and to offset this sour taste, they’d add a good deal of sugar. This concoction eventually became known as mead. After the museum, we had a good deal of time to wander around Whitby. Even though it was a relatively small town, I really liked this little city. There were many quaint antique shops, cafes, and book stores along to walk, and even a nice little open-air market. We went up to St. Mary’s cathedral and Whitby Abbey where the only thing I really remember is laughing at a very… interesting aspect of the audio guide for the abbey. On our way back to the bus through Whitby, we stopped for ice cream. It was soft serve, but it was called a whippy and had a good deal of whipped cream mixed in to the ice cream that made it really light
and delicious. After the drive to York, we settled in to our bed and breakfast and had an amazing three-course dinner provided for us by the hotel that was very welcomed after a week on the road.
On Monday morning we ventured to York Minster, the largest medieval gothic cathedral in Northern Europe. I think this cathedral/minster had the largest and most intricate stained glass windows that we saw on the tour. My favorite aspect of the church was six decorations in the South Transept of the church that had to be rebuilt after a fire about 20 years ago. The decorative aspects of the ceiling were chosen from many entries from young people who watched a children’s TV show that I forget the name of. There was a scuba diver and a whale, silver hands that held a small African child, a ship belonging to Henry VIII, a man on a crescent moon, an astronaut, and a rose to represent England. It was really cool to see these modern touches designed by children because they thought these were important images in history. There were also an inexplicable group of about 20 tall wooden statues of very melancholy looking
Another potential genius??
An apple from THE tree "fell" on my head... people that our tour guide had just arrived there that week and had no explanation for them. That afternoon I took a long, much-needed nap after the long, tiring tour thus far. After another amazing dinner, I played cards downstairs for a while (we taught Margaret and Dr. Barrington how to play BS) before retiring.
Tuesday we went to the National Coal Mining Museum for England. I wasn’t really looking forward to this visit, but it was actually very cool. We actually got to go down into a coal mine on a lift that was very similar to the original way the miners would get down. There were a lot of things to crawl through that simulated how the workers would spend their 10-hour days in the mines. It was absolutely miserable to imagine that kind of work, but they were presented as a very proud group of people despite the harsh conditions they worked in. In the museum, there were a lot of aspects of the community that coal miners created together outside of the mines from sports like bowling and soccer to bands that were put together. After our last dinner all together in the bed and
Newton Coat of Arms
Isaac got to create his own coat of arms when he was knighted Sir Isaac. Mine would have been much cooler given that opportunity. breakfast (that was another great aspect of the dinners… that we all got to eat together… it made me feel like we were a huge family), we went out to a quite typical pub to celebrate Meg’s birthday. Nothing too out of the ordinary occurred, so we decided to try to find some place to dance because that’s what Meg wanted to do on her birthday. We didn’t really find a dance club, but we did happen upon The 80’s Bar. This place was awesome. We didn’t stay for very long, but they played a few excellent 80’s tunes and had lots of kitschy 80’s garb for sale (I <3 80’s shirts, pointy Madonna-esque bras, neon sunglasses, etc). It was a very entertaining find on our last night in York.
Wednesday we made a trek to our next to last city before London, Lincoln. None of us were very excited about another cathedral, but I really, really liked the Lincoln Cathedral. They had the most amazing wooden Stations of the Cross. I spent most of the time we were there just taking them in. They were beautifully crafted from many different types of wood that included many different colors
I love this quote
Isaac Newton. Smart guy. of dark and light woods. Some of the images were very literal while others were very symbolic, but they were all very spiritually designed. After leaving the cathedral, we walked around Lincoln for a while. Lincoln seemed to have enough tea rooms for an entire country, let alone one small town. Seriously, for every pub in Dublin there is at least one tea room in Lincoln. Who drinks that much tea?!? What a bunch of weirdoes… We also went to a place called the Bishop’s Palace which is actually outdoor ruins. The best aspects of the Bishop’s Palace were Riley startling Margaret (again) by jumping from around a corner of a dark room in the ruins, Andrew startling Dr. Barrington in a similar fashion (after Dr. Barrington let out a gasp of surprise, his explanation to Andrew was “Oh, I’m sorry Andrew… I wasn’t reacting to you physically… I like you… I just didn’t expect you to be there…”), and a group of people throwing dirt clods and small rocks at Chad because he was “besieging the castle.” After the Palace we made our way to the hotel and went to dinner at one of the two places across from
The prisms!!!
I told you I had fun. it… our only options. Someone had purchased the internet and movie package at the hotel, so that night we got to watch Iron Man. I’d already seen it, but it seemed more ridiculous the second time around. I still loved Robert Downey Jr., though. After the movie, there was a suggestion to watch Forgetting Sarah Marshall followed by a resounding agreement. Megan made a point that she loves the people on the trip as a whole because they either really like books, movies, or both, so there was always something to do or discuss. I completely agree. Within the group I hang out with, conversations frequently turn to film. I have missed following what’s coming out in the states as closely as I usually do. I’ve been listening to the Filmspotting podcast and checking Rotten Tomatoes, but it’s just not the same when they are discussing movies that haven’t even been released here yet. Anyway, I’ve wanted to see Forgetting Sarah Marshall since the Filmspotting guys put some of the actors from it on their top 5 performances of the year so far list this summer. Oh my gosh. How did I miss this film? How did no one tell
The couch dress
I told you I wasn't kidding me to go see this? I think this Judd Apatow comedy deserves twice the hype that Knocked Up and Superbad have received and would actually live up to said hype unlike the others (in my opinion). There were the expected great performances from Jason Segel, Paul Rudd, Jonah Hill, and Bill Hader, but there were also some performances of actors that are about to blow up. Mila Kunis is of these to watch. You know her as Jackie on That 70’s Show and Meg’s voice on Family Guy, but she didn’t make me hate all young female actresses as female actresses sometimes do, and the guys enjoyed watching her just not necessarily for her acting ability. Jack McBrayer and Russell Brand are HISTERICAL in this film. You may know McBrayer from his role as Kenneth the page on 30 Rock… and if you don’t… what’s wrong with you? Start watching that show! Russell Brand hosted this year’s VMAs… he’s a very popular stand-up comedian in the UK. We all left the room still laughing after recounting some of the funniest quotes and moments from the film.
Thursday morning I got to go back to my scientific roots for the
An assembly room
I think this was a the tea room. first time on the trip at Woolsthorpe, Isaac Newton’s birthplace and childhood home. The coolest part about the site is that the apple tree that Newton sat under when the apple fell to earth (supposedly inspiring his revelation on gravity) is still present… or at least some ancestor of the original tree in the same spot. I ate about half of an apple that had fallen from the tree. The tour guide said they were cooking apples, so I didn’t expect it to taste that great. It wasn’t bad at all, and who can say they ate an apple that fell from Newton’s tree? We also got to see the room where he made most of his discoveries involving light employing light from the window and carefully situated prisms. There was also a science museum that house many science experiments displaying laws that Newton had established. It was basically every physics lab you have to complete in an intro course. The best part was a set of prisms that I played with for a while. After the stop, we had a four hour bus ride to Bath. Margaret decided that this seemed like the perfect time to watch Slings and
Roman Baths
The water's such a lovely shade, yes? Arrows with her. We watched the first four episodes of the third and final season. Slings and Arrows is a Canadian TV show all about a Shakespeare festival in Canada. The main character’s name is Geoffrey Tennant, and he’s just so crafty and talented that I’m convinced that all of the women who watch the show want him and all of the men want to be him. While I am not sure if folks who don’t have a love of theatre or maybe just literature in general would enjoy it as much as we do, if you belong to either category you’d probably quickly be hooked. There is so much that the show says about doing theatre in a world where it is so hard to put butts in seats that the theatre often becomes commercialized. Each season’s main focus is on a different Shakespeare tragedy, and there are usually plot points among the actors that loosely shadow the play. It’s a show that anyone who enjoys making theatre needs to experience (a few other people on the trip have been borrowing Margaret’s seasons. I will spread the word on this underrated series.) After the lengthy bus ride passed quickly
with the aid of S&A, we got to Bath, had dinner in a pub called the Rat and Parrot, watched The Prestige, and called it a night.
Friday morning we went to the Assembly Rooms discussed in many Jane Austen novels (we had to read Northanger Abbey for our history course) and a Fashion Museum that they housed. I really liked the museum… my only criticism is that it wasn’t arranged chronologically. They chose to organize it by type of garb instead of period, so it was hard to put all of the pieces together as there wasn’t any way to see all of the pieces from certain periods at once. There was, however, a special exhibit at the time on Georgian, Regency, and Victorian dress that was much more helpful in this regard. It was much easier to see the changes in dress between these three adjacent periods when the dresses were grouped together. There was a Georgian dress that seriously looked like a couch. I’m not kidding. Size, shape, fabric. It was a couch. After the museum, we ventured to the namesake of Bath, the Roman baths. The baths are created from a natural hot spring and
some of the remains of the original baths are still around today over a thousand years later. One thing that I saw in the museum was a small collection of gemstones from rings that had all been excavated from the same location. They suspect that was where a drain was located at some point because all of the gems had fallen out of the rings while the wearers were bathing. After the baths, we all bought a pasty for lunch. Pasties are basically Hot Pockets except with actual food in the filling. They are sooooo good. The chicken ones are a lot like chicken pot pie folded into a flaky pocket. Yum. Dr. Barrington told me they are called Cornish pasties because the Cornish coal miners used to take them to eat in the mines. After lunch we wandered around Bath for a while. I really like Bath. I think I was one of my favorite places on the tour. It was a very cool mix of old buildings with modern flairs and had a lot of nice squares to sit in without feeling too big-city crowded. It’s hard to describe, but I got a cool vibe from Bath that
Stonehenge 3
This was Alabama Saturday. I wish there had been a cannon around... maybe the outcome would have been different. I didn’t really expect. That night we celebrated the last night of the tour at the hotel by watching Russell Brand Live… the stand-up comedian from Forgetting Sarah Marshall. His act was really funny (especially a bit about how his subconscious reminds him of the stupidest things he has said in life right before he goes to sleep), but he referenced a good deal of famous British folk that none of us had ever heard of.
On a very misty, chilly Saturday, we set off from Bath headed for London. But before we got very far, we got to stop at Stonehenge. It was absolutely breathtaking to walk through the end of the small tunnel that leads to the site and just see this formation that I’ve seen in pictures for so many years. The weather that day only added to the atmosphere and mystique of one of the most puzzling historical sites in the world. I took so many pictures. I just couldn’t get enough of the image that was right in front of me. Before we left Stonehenge, Margaret concocted a plan to get back at Riley for the many times that he’d scared her since the
Dr. Barrington in the bushes
He even had on a green jacket. What an expert. beginning of the tour. Elizabeth stayed in the gift shop while all of the rest of us were on the bus, so Dr. Barrington asked Riley to run and get her. While he was gone, Seamus moved the bus around the corner so Riley couldn’t see it, and Dr. Barrington hid in some bushes at the corner to document their elaborate plan. I knew that they weren’t going to be very successful as there wasn’t a sufficient amount of time to actually create panic for Riley, but it was really amusing to hear the plan formed and see it carried out. Elizabeth actually had to mutter to Riley when Dr. Barrington jumped out from the bushes that it was a joke because he didn’t really know what was going on. It was so funny to watch from the bus. After a stop at Winchester Cathedral, home and site of Jane Austen’s grave, we finally made it to London. Margaret and I watched the last two episodes of Slings and Arrows between Winchester and London (both of us cried, and she had already seen it once), so by the time we finished I looked out the window to find London looking
back at me. It took us a good 20 or 30 minutes to actually make our way to the hotel because we couldn’t find the proper street to get to it, so I knew that couldn’t be a good sign for me to be able to find things once I wasn’t on a bus anymore.
Alright, this is like a teaser trailer, but again, I’m spent. More on London in a few days… I promise.
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Mary Jean Thomas
non-member comment
England
Loved your comments. Having been to Bath and Stonehenge I can appreciate the awe. After talking to your Mom last night a reference was made in the TV show Cold Case to a guy who had gotten two tickets to Wicked. If I hadn't talked with her it wouldn't have meant as much. Take care, Love You, Grandma