London 2014

This is the moat of the Tower of London being filled with ceramic poppies to memorialize those killed in  WW I.  They are still being added.  Incredibly beautiful.

The first day after we arrived we went to the British Museum. We had tickets to a special Egyptian exhibit featuring video CT scan displays of six intact mummies. Very high tech, well done, interesting, as is the entire museum. I didn't take many pictures there but here is one not-so-good shot of the Rosetta Stone.

We took in two walking tours, Clerkenwell and Covent Garden.  Both were very good, all London Walks tours always are.  We had stayed near Covent Garden many times but we always see and learn a lot of new things on a guided tour.  The first pic below is Saint Paul's Church in Covent Garden, not to be confused with the much grander St. Paul's Cathedral.  The church and Covent Garden market were featured in "My Fair Lady."

The second pic below is Clay sitting with Oscar Wilde just outside another church, St. Martin's-in-the-Field, which features a lovely crypt converted into a coffee shop.

We saw four plays in London.  The first was a very funny transfer from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, still in previews, called "The Play That Goes Wrong." Next we saw another new play at The National Theatre, a historical drama: "James I."  It was very good and is part of a trilogy.  We will see "James III" on our one night back in London before we fly home.  The third show was a matinee at the Donmar, a small but excellent house that always does good theatre.  They were doing a revival of the early 90s play, "My Night with Reg."  Great to see, funny as fuck, but somewhat hard to watch.  Finally, last night we saw "Miss Saigon," which neither of us had ever seen.  Musical, great production, the same basic storyline as the opera "Madame Butterfly" but set at the end of the Vietnam War so there was no way that was going to have a happy ending.  The first pic below is of The National Theatre as we left. The second is a panorama pic taken as we walked across the Thames after seeing "James I."  The third is an evening view across the Thames taken before the play.

We stayed at the Park Lane Hilton adjacent to Hyde Park so I took a couple long walks around the park. It's a great space, lots of stuff to see, and here are just a few of the statues and memorials I encountered.

Above is a statue of Baden Powell, the founder of scouting, that I passed on the way to Hyde Park when returning from the Natural History museum.

When Albert died, Queen Victoria began to memorialize him in every way she could imagine, sort of like the Republicans and their St. Reagan.  This gaudy, god-awful, gargantuan statue sits in Hyde Park facing a much more useful and suitable memorial, Royal Albert Hall.

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There are many flowers and fountains in Hyde Park as well as statues.

I had read about a pet cemetery in Hyde Park and made a point of seeking it out although it's not really accessible or even very visible. Apparently it was started by one of the park's groundskeepers and later used by neighboring residents as well.  Most of the over 300 graves are dogs but cats, birds, and a pet monkey are buried here as well. My pics were taken through the fence, at ground level, under and through the bushes.

I couldn't even count or recount the number or names of all the pubs we visited.  There nothing quite like a pint of a good English bitter, but even the IPAs here aren't bad, not nearly as hoppy as back home.  We also have visited a Dutch pub and a Belgium one as well.  The weather has been beautiful, some cloud but not a drop of rain.

Today we are on a train headed to Edinburgh, Scotland.  They are having a national referendum on independence, splitting from the UK, on Thursday, which is also Clay's birthday.  It will be exciting to be there for what could be their Independence Day.  Everyone over 16 can vote and they don't seem have any good pollsters here.  The "no" vote appears to be leading slightly, but there is a significant percentage of undecideds still. The uncertainty caused a favorable (from our view) change in the exchange rate between the dollar and the pound.