Rob and I just got back from England! It was my first trip to Europe (Rob’s second), so it was a really big deal and very exciting!
We were in London for three days and out in the countryside the rest of the time. In London, we stayed near Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. The park and gardens were so big, we only saw tiny parts of them. And we learned just a little bit about their long history: In 1536 Henry VIII seized the land that is now Hyde Park from the Westminster Abbey monks for use as a private hunting ground (it was forest then, perfect for deer and boar hunting), and it wasn’t until 1637 that Charles I opened the park to the public. I’ll tell you just a few of the things we saw in the park and gardens: ornate Victorian fountains in the Italian Gardens; rows and rows of London planetrees (sycamores) along the Broad Walk; and, near the Queen’s Gate, the Prince Albert Memorial (a gilded pavilion containing a golden statue of the prince). White swans sailed about on the Round Pond, and there were pigeons perched on the heads of all the statues.
We spent our first morning in London running around in the freezing cold, taking pictures of stone dolphins and goddesses in Kensington Gardens. We oohed and ah-ed over the beautiful Victorian buildings in the surrounding neighborhoods–including the cathedral-like Natural History Museum, and Royal Albert Hall with its magnificent dome and friezes.
We kept having the same dumb conversation over and over again:
Leslie: “Oh, look, isn’t that neat?”
Rob: “Oh yeah, that is neat.”
The things we were seeing were so famous and so awesome, we didn’t know quite how to talk about them. As Rob put it, “When you’re looking at all this great stuff, you feel like everything you say is completely inadequate and totally stupid.”
Around mid-morning we had a weird breakfast at Pret a Manger. Rob got a “cheese toastie” (grilled cheese sandwich), and I had some icy veggie sushi. (A traveling vegan always has a tough time of it.)
Later we took a tour bus to Trafalgar Square, where all the fountains were blowing in the cold wind, splashing the stone paving of the plaza. It was about 3:00 and nearly dark. We walked around in the freezing gloom and fountain mist and admired the huge but gentle-looking bronze lions at the base of Nelson’s Column; we later learned that the reason the lions look so tame is that the sculptor used his dogs as models.
We spent some time in the National Gallery, where we got to see the Leonardo Cartoon, a beautiful unfinished drawing by Leonardo da Vinci; it shows Mary and the baby Jesus with St. Anne.
After that we went on a freezing ghost tour of old London, strolling through dark tunnels and dimly lit alleys, under shadowy gargoyles, and past the scary dragon statue in front of the Royal Courts of Justice. Our guide, Phil, was a real card. He turned all his ghost stories into jokes. For example, he led us to an old stone building, once the studio of a Victorian portrait painter, and he told us the place was said to be haunted. It was haunted, he explained, by the ghost of one of the painter’s nude models. Then he added with a sly grin, “The ghost of a naked lady. So what, should we wait here for the next 40 minutes and see if she appears?” Then he laughed in a devilish sort of way, did a gleeful little jig, and skipped off into the darkness ahead of us; he was on to the next stop!
