I Could Have Spent a Week Here!

Anyone out there recognize this place?

This is one of my favorite places in all of London, The British Museum.  By happenstance, the flat we rented was a 5 minute walk from the British Museum!

The British Museum, in London, is widely considered to be one of the world's greatest museums of human history and culture. Its permanent collection, numbering some eight million works, is amongst the finest, most comprehensive, and largest in existence and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present.

Room after room of history from around the world.

They've got an amazing collection of Egyptian artifacts.

They've got pieces from the Parthenon in Greece.  Like this one:

The Rosetta Stone.  

And so much more.  

We visited there last year and found out about this book - A History of the World in 100 Objects, written by Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum.  The book began with a BBC Radio 4 program that described 100 striking objects housed in the British Museum in London.  You can download the original podcasts of the radio program for free here.

We listened  to all of the podcasts and purchased the book.  And when we went to the museum, we found all of the 100 objects (well, the ones that were on display anyway, about 82 of them) and photographed them.

That was a great way to see just about the entire museum.

After a day on our feet...

... some of us needed a rest.  

We love the British Museum - I would definitely recommend a visit.  And even if you are not visiting, "A History of the World in 100 Objects" is well worth the time.

If the BBC series sounded interesting, you might be interested in "Shakespeare's Restless World" - a new series from BBC Radio 4. Twenty programmes will explore the world of Shakespeare and his audience through objects from that turbulent period, all available to download here.

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London's Olympic Venues

London has been getting ready for 2012 for over four years, and they've done a great job of cleaning up the city for the games.  We were able to visit a number of the different venues - we're looking forward to watching the games to see where we were!

These are the sites we saw:

Hyde Park - where they will hold the triathlon and marathon swimming.  Those birds may want to take a bit of a holiday during the games!

The North Greenwich Area (commonly known as The O2) will host artistic gymnastics, trampoline, basketball and wheelchair basketball.

Bit of a funny story - when we were taking these pictures, we were confronted by the O2 security wanting to make sure that we were not professional photographers out to take publicity shots of the O2.  We explained what we were doing and finished our amateur photo shoot, but under pretty close scrutiny.

Greenwich Park will host equestrian events (dressage, jumping and eventing), paralympic equestiran and modern pentathalon.

Hampton Court Palace will host the road cycling time trials.

The Mall (recognizable for many from last year's Royal Wedding) will host athletics (marathon and race walk), paralympic athletics (marathon), and road cycling (road race).

The Horse Guards Parade Grounds will host beach volleyball.

Eton Dorney will host rowing, paralympic rowing and canoe sprint.

Wimbledon will host (can you guess?) tennis.

You may be able to tell that, for this former tennis player, our tour of Wimbledon was a real highlight!  I even got to sit in the spot where the winners (and losers) do their post-game interviews.  Our tour guide told me to think what it would be like to have just beaten Serina Williams for the championship, and I answered "She would have had to have been asleep!"

And finally, the Olympic Stadium itself - where most of the events will be held.  This is the best view we could get.  My father-in-law was very concerned about the purpose of the structure just in front of the stadium - do you have any ideas?

Looking forward to watching the games from this side of the pond - I can't imagine the traffic and crowds that will overtake London this summer.  I wouldn't want to be there for the main event, but it sure was fun seeing where it would take place!

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Leeds Castle, Dover and Canterbury Cathedral

We spent a day touring Southeast England.  One of the places we went was Leeds Castle.

Leeds Castle was built in 1119, and was used as a residence for royalty for hundreds of years.  They used it as kind of a hunting lodge.  Anyone have a hunting lodge like this?

The royal family sold it and it was purchased in the 1930s by American heiress Lady Olive Baillie, who restored it.

Black swans are the symbol of Leeds Castle, and  many swim in the lake there.

We went on a day with miserable weather, so our pictures are somewhat grey, but here's a shot of it (from the Wikipedia Commons) that was taken when the sky was blue:

Next we went to Dover for lunch, and to see the famed white cliffs.

I mentioned that we had terrible weather.  It hadn't improved by the time we got to Dover, and the white cliffs were only just visible through the downpour.

Can you see?

Wikipedia Commons to the rescue again:

Our next stop was Canterbury Cathedral. Canterbury Cathedral in Canterbury, Kent, is one of the oldest and most famous Christian structures in England and forms part of a World Heritage Site. It is the cathedral of the Archbishop of Canterbury, leader of the Church of England and symbolic leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion. Its formal title is the Cathedral and Metropolitical Church of Christ at Canterbury. 

Founded in 597, the cathedral was completely rebuilt 1070-77. The east end was greatly enlarged at the beginning of the twelfth century, and largely rebuilt in the Gothic style following a fire in 1174. The Norman nave and transepts survived until the late fourteenth century, when they were demolished to make way for the present structures.

Not a great photo of me, but it was raining, windy and cold after all.

I am always amazed at how these massive cathedrals could have been built without modern tools and machinery.  These ceilings are incredible.

A pivotal moment in the history of Canterbury Cathedral was the murder of Thomas Becket in the north-west transept (also known as the Martydom) on Tuesday 29 December 1170 by knights of King Henry II. The king had frequent conflicts with the strong-willed Becket and is said to have exclaimed in frustration, "Who will rid me of this turbulent priest?" The knights took it literally and murdered Becket in his own cathedral. Becket was the second of four Archbishops of Canterbury who were murdered, but the only one to have been murdered in the cathedral itself.

King Henry the VIII began the Reformation in the 16th century, during which, many images and art in churches were destroyed.

I love to look at the ceilings in these cathedrals as well as the floors.  Both were fantastic here.

I love how this photo gives you a sense of the scale of the inside of the cathedral - this is looking down one of the halls that run on either side of the cathedral.

So much history to be seen - really just fantastic to this American's eyes.

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