Monthly Archives: August 2016

Britain: Leaving

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1/3/2016

You have one day in London. What do you do? For us, it was simple – we hadn’t had a chance to see Buckingham Palace or the British Museum. Alex was more interested in Buckingham Palace, while I was more interested in the British Museum.

Tiny hotel room

Tiny hotel room

I think this may have been the smallest hotel room I’ve stayed in – basically a bed and a tiny bathroom. But it was cheap, and the location was reasonable.

The palace guard raincoats are pretty badass

The palace guard raincoats are pretty badass

I enjoyed the palace and grounds more than I expected. It was threatening rain the whole time, but the ground were verdant, populated with diverse waterfowl. There were cool statues, the guards, and the roads were walkable. Alex mentioned a rumor that the Queen (a former ambulance driver in WWII!) wasn’t allowed to drive in England, but was permitted to on the grounds of Buckingham Palace. I could easily imagine her careening around corners and zooming between ancient trees, trying to avoid mowing down tourists.

This statue is pretty badass, too

This statue is pretty badass, too

The area near Buckingham Palace has lots of government buildings, and we nearly visited the Churchill bunker. Maybe next time. We got another good audio tour courtesy of Rick Steves. We detoured a little to see Denmark Street, another famous musical location (Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Sex Pistols, Elton John), before arriving at the British Museum.

Denmark Street, rain

Denmark Street, rain


I knew little about the museum, beyond the fact that they had mummies. So it certainly exceeded expectations. You walk in (no admission!), turn a corner, and BAM – Rosetta Stone. Since it was a rainy Sunday, it was more like BAM – crowds – BAM – Rosetta Stone. But still, pretty cool.

Crowds around the Rosetta Stone

Crowds around the Rosetta Stone

For me the highlight of the museum were the Assyrian reliefs, including an extensive set of panels from Ninevah. I’ve always felt Assyria and Sumeria are underappreciated and under-represented. Egypt gets all the glory. But I enjoy Assyrian artwork more, and it feels like a much more dynamic area with more diverse cultures.

Elgin Marbles, crowds

Elgin Marbles, crowds

Objectively speaking, however, I think the highlight of the museum is the Elgin Marbles, basically the reliefs from around the top of the Parthenon. They probably shouldn’t be in Britain, but we took advantage of it while we were there. All in all, I think the British Museum compares favorably to the Met in NYC – at least, in terms of what I’m interested in seeing (more historic than artistic stuff).

We have to LEAVE?

We have to LEAVE?

Leaving the museum, we only had a limited amount of time until we caught our flight. We picked up various gifts, cramming them into our bags, and were soon on our way back to the airport – and then a return to NYC.

Britain: Edinburgh & a Return to London

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1/1/2016-1/3/2016

Long before we arrived in England, we discussed how to get from Edinburgh to London. There were two reasonable options, train and plane. Roughly the same cost, but the plane is a shorter trip. But – we opted for train – thinking that travel to/from an airport, going through security, and waiting at the gates wouldn’t be worth it. Soon, we’d find out whether we made the right choice.

We had one day in Edinburgh after the New Year’s Eve extravaganza (we slept in). So far, we hadn’t visited the castle that dominates the city (a more prominent landmark than anything I’ve seen in other cities). That was certainly on the list – beyond that, we hoped for a quiet day of scotch and seeing the town.

View of the main NYE pavilions and fair

View of the main NYE pavilions and fair

The castle really is incredible. Not only is it your traditional medieval-style castle, but it also has really jaw-dropping views of the city, to boot.

American flag, left, carved into prison door at Edinburgh castle

American flag, left, carved into prison door at Edinburgh castle

Additionally, there were two other museums inside the castle. First, after the time period when it could be a functional castle, it served as a prison. Some of the people held there were American sailors captured during the War of 1812, which was interesting – you tend to think of Americans and British as such allies – and even during the Revolution and Warof 1812, it always felt like “the British come to America,” so you don’t think that some Americans ended up in Great Britain.

In a Scottish close off the Royal Mile

In a Scottish close off the Royal Mile

We also listened to some Rick Steves – for all the hokeyness of Rick, I think his tour guides and advice for Europe is pretty solid. He offers high quality free walking tours – including this tour of the Royal Mile. It was a good thing we did the tour, which zig-zagged across the street, because it led us to some little off-the-beaten-path courtyards, called ‘closes’ in Scotland. For example, one showed the former home of Robert Louis Stevenson. Others were simply scenic.

Early the next morning it was time to check out and head back to London. We’d find out whether the train was a wise choice. It was a different tradeoff than I expected.

As I mentioned in earlier posts, there was intense flooding across Britain while we were there, and that caused some delays of the train – I think a tree had blown down across the main tracks south of Edinburgh. So we waited in the station for two hours (sitting on the train). It actually wasn’t bad, the train is far more comfortable than waiting on the runway in a plane. When we did set off, it was much slower than usual.

I think we were delayed about two hours, which was a shame, since it meant we got into London in late afternoon instead of midday. On the other hand, the trains in the UK have a policy that delays more than some amount of time (perhaps an hour), mean you can get a full refund. So in the end, our trip from Edinburgh to London was free – we just had to mail in a check.

When we got into London it was raining (surprise!) and from the beautiful St Pancras station, we stopped by at the British Library. I was continually impressed with the government buildings in London. Museums and the library were free – the library had a huge exhibit with historic books and manuscripts, including an ancient bible, a Gutenberg bible, letters from Queen Elizabeth, da Vinci notebooks, Bach musical compositions, the Magna Carta, and notes from when The Beatles composed songs.

The London Eye, from below

The London Eye, from below

Of these, seeing letters from Queen Elizabeth and the Magna Carta were coolest. We’d seen another copy of the Magna Carta in DC, and that was a big deal, lots of security and precautions – here it was just sitting there in a glass case. Very accessible.

Skating near the Thames

Skating near the Thames

Beyond that, we simply did some wandering around the town – we flew out the next day and knew we wouldn’t get a good chance to revisit some parts of the city, so this was an early goodbye.