7:30am Wednesday August 11, 2010

I am sitting in the courtyard of St Briavel’s castle where we spent the night last night. I t is cool but the sky is blue with wisps of white clouds; a nice change from the rain yesterday. The weather hasn’t been that warm since we got here and it has rained off an on each day. Evenings are usually the best.

St Briavel’s castle is a youth hostel. It was built in the 1200’s as a hunting lodge for King John. He was the one nobody liked because he wanted more power and money than his subjects wanted to give him. The Magna Carta was signed by him. His castle is in ruins now and the only areas still intact are the Royal apartments. We are staying in a room on the bottom floor of the east tower called the Oubliette. It is a hexagonal shaped room with a fire place and two charming recessed windows.

We arrived last night in time to join in the castle’s Medieval feast. Tom, Rhys and I dug up costumes from the chapel. Julia declined a costume. Almost everyone at the feast was dressed for the part. We were served gruel, (a pureed soup, thank goodness) sausages, roast beef, roast chicken and several interesting roasted veggies. For dessert we had a baked apple with custard sauce. We were the evening’s entertainment. Throughout the evening, two guests who sat at the head table would pull a number that corresponded to one at your place and you had to rise and entertain the group. This horrified Rhys and Julia. Julia managed to tell a riddle. I rescued Rhys as he looked like he was going to throw up if he had to stand. There were several families there and all in all it was a fun time.

After the meal, the kids ran off and the couple next to us told us about our room. Apparently, they had been staying in our room the night before and had moved. They story already sounds good, doesn’t it? You see, Oubliette means “Forgetting”. It turns out that under the carpet of our room (we haven’t checked yet) there is a trap door. After the Magna Carta the king could not indiscriminately kill people he didn’t like so he created a “forgetting” place. Under the trapdoor is a very deep cellar where the king would throw people away and “forget” them. Isn’t that lovely? They found out because there was a light left on and one of the kids noticed it. They knelt down to look and saw a foot! Apparently, there is a fake skeleton down there or so they were told when they politely inquired as to the contents of the room beneath the Oubliette. They asked to move as the kids couldn’t sleep after that. We decided NOT to tell the children until we were leaving. I slept rather lightly last night.

Salisbury

Old Sarem

Old Sarem was a big hill with castle ruins on them. It was a great place for a castle, because you could see for miles all alound you and your enimies were always exposed.

Different castle rooms.
The dungeon- The word Dungeon comes from the Latin word Donjon witch meant ‘Lords room’ the lords room was the safest room in the castle. Soon they put their prisoners in their and it turned in to the jail. They decided to change the name from ‘Lords room’, Donjon to ‘Jail’ Dungeon.
The bathroom- They did not have indoor pluming, so the king would sit on a hole and poo and pee would go I to a deep pit. When the king left leaving the toilet unused a peasant would be lowered in to the deep pit and clean it out.


Stonehenge

Theese stones were being but up around the same time the pyrimids of Egypt were being built. They were carried all they way from Ireland and the biggest one was 7 tons. The stones are called ‘Bluestone’ the reason they had to have those stones in because when you touch them they are warm. They were built in an intresting form. A circle, so that in July the sun shone through the 7th colom and so on and so forth.

Avebury

Avebury was a cool henge. It was a huge circle of stones. We didn’t even walk around the whole thing! This time you were aloud to touch the stones. They felt warm, they were supposed to.

Magna Carta

The magna carta was a law, written in Latin, saying that the king could not just do whatever he wants. What happened is the Barrones the made the Magna Carta met the king half way and showed the king their laws. The king approved. When the Barrons backed down the kind turned his back and went to the bishop to say ‘everything should be back in my power, their should be no Magna Carta!’ When the Barrons found out they were obviously outraged. That’s how the Civil War started.

In Bath, on the first day, we visited royal crescent, then split up and the girls looked at dresses or something, and we went to the museum of Bath works, then we got back together and looked at the roman baths. Royal crescent had all sorts of interesting things and ideas, like servants quarters and masters rooms with secret servant doors. It had all sorts of portraits of lots of people…. At the Bath works museum, there were lots of old machines J and metal gears and junk on shelves J and I thought of what I could make… with those… parts… … and then we went to the Roman Baths. At the baths, there were lots of different sections, the sacred pool, (scorching hot) the grand pool, (hot) the east baths, (really hot) and they had these hot floors (hot) that were hot enough to burn your feet without sandals. We couldn’t go into the pools because they were untreated, coated with lead, and 46º C. The Romans didn’t know that lead was poisonous around year 0. They threw curses etched into a piece of lead into the pool, mostly about stolen items. An example would be: Please have the person who stole my coat’s eyes poked out, and their arms ripped off and bleed eternally, unless they return it to your temple.

London - August 6th

August 6, 2010

St. Paul’s Cathedral, “The Holy Stairmaster”.

St. Paul’s Cathedral is a very finely designed and important church to the city of London. The decorations on the inside are very intricate and ornate. The basement crypt has Lord Nelson and others but not the same history as Westminster Abbey.

We climbed all the way to the disappointing whispering dome. The ambient noise from the “other tourists” made it hard to hear, although the view of the church was impressive. We continued up to the top of the dome, a fascinating look at the inner structure of St. Paul’s, and made it to the top lookout, passing many winded sightseers, to the highest point they let the public at. A tight space wrapped around the top spire. It is a fabulous view of all London.

British Museum.

We got there a little late, around 3:30 but it is open late Today (Friday). There is too much to see and you are quickly overwhelmed by history. In one hour I have seen the real Rosetta stone, several mummies, a bust of Ramesses II, Some plaster figures that are 9000 years old, Roman mosaics and much more. I have barely scratched the surface. I think setting aside a whole day when we return to London is what we have planned. You need to be fresh and prepared.

Fish and chips.

A quick dinner tonight since we leave London Saturday morning for Bath. I will be driving. I have very good insurance. I finally have some decent fish and chips in London. The quality of fish and chips seems to be inversely proportional to the price. For 3.80 pounds I have the best fish compared to 12 pounds at the pub that was only OK.

Blog Notes

Uncle Steve has alerted us that the comment feature no longer works. We will try to fix this soon. I just thought nobody cared J

August 5th

August 5

Churchill War Museum

If you don’t think Churchill was a great man, just go to his war museum. It is located in the war rooms in London during the Second World War. It is the actual location with most of the original objects. Apparently after the war they just left and closed the door. It wasn’t really opened up again until the 1970s. It puts you back into the 1940s convincingly. The most powerful thing is the footage of his state funeral.

Kensington gardens

We were going to go to tea here but decided that $100 CDN was just too steep even though it was supposedly the least expensive good tea in London. They had a nice pond with plenty of birds to see, geese, swans and other fowl. Sitting in a chair cost four pounds. We didn’t pay it. Good God, re-reading this, we are cheap Canadians.

Mousetrap (Agatha Christie play)

Holly saw this the last time she was in London. We have just seen the 24,039^th performance of this show’s run. It was a good show even from our 15 pound nosebleed seats. I never would have guessed the killer is …. I promised not to tell.

London August 4th

August 4

Tower of London

Tower of London is a fine looking place for such gruesome royal deeds to have taken place. When you stand at the spot of the beheading of Anne Boleyn and the 16 year old Lady Jane Grey it quite disturbs the peaceful setting. So we are off to the bloody tower, er, Bloody Tower. Several Kings, Queens and traitors “in the King’s view”, were held there as prisoners and later executed. It is interesting to see their lodgings. Everything looks great from the outside but 15^th century castle living seems a bit like camping to me. Peasants must have really lived like rats.

Tate modern

In sharp contrast to the Tower of London, the Tate Modern is, well, modern. Holly discovers she doesn’t care for much the art here. I am more in the middle. There is plenty of crap on the walls but there are also some very interesting things. Big names are aplenty, Salvador Dali, Picasso and Jackson Pollock to name a few. I found at least 25 pieces I could stare at.

When we left we went over the millennium foot bridge.

Nose crusties

We all get them people. On occasion we all must clear our nostrils, some more than others. We all choose our own cleaning method as well. Having cleared that up (heh, heh), I was alarmed this morning when I was delicately clearing my nostrils to see BLACK crusties. Black? Two options immediately sprung to mind. One: I have contracted the Bubonic Plague. I have heard this is not uncoimmon in London. Two: The air here is disgusting. I am hoping for option two. I have noticed a small red spot on my face but until it becomes more boil-like I shall treat it as a common pimple and assume the air in London is foul. It doesn't look foul but many more people are smokers here than at home. Could it really have had that much of an effect on my sweet little nose crusties?