London (in 48 hours)

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Craig's program this year is by research (no taught classes) so the typical schedule of terms and breaks doesn't really apply. Instead he has three major papers, then the dissertation, and our lives revolve around these due dates. Nov 13, Jan 22, Mar 19, Aug 8.

My plan was to take a trip after each of these papers and way to celebrate and get some adventure in. We managed to get in a quick November trip to London. (We'll see what we can do for the others--life is filling up fast though!)

The week before the trip was a tense week of paper writing, then I got sick right before the trip, then I don't really know where the days went after that, and I haven't posted on the blog, or exercised, or spent much time with friends since. So I'm grateful we got to sneak in 48 hours in London.

Here's what we did:

Neither of us had been before so we spent Thursday just wandering around seeing the big sights. What I've learned about myself though is that when I travel I really don't care about the history or architecture of the city--I just want to go somewhere with stunning natural beauty. Parks are greater than palaces.

Buckingham Palace 
St James Park

Westminster Abbey
Houses of Parliament
St James Park (again)
When it was time for dinner, I felt so sick I couldn't even eat anything, but I did manage to drink a Guinness and take a tiny bite of a halloumi fry (basically a mozzarella stick but better) and I felt a lot better after that, so those are my new go-to sick foods. See me looking revived at Platform 9 & 3/4.




All Craig wanted to do on this trip was see Abbey Road studios, so I found us a walking tour of Rock and Roll Music History in London. I make an exception in this case to my general rule about history/buildings. My all time favorite music is 60s rock and this was a fun way to explore the city. 

Legendary recording studio on the legendary Denmark street. The studio closed in the 80s and is now a guitar store.
https://www.regentsounds.com/pages/our-history
Location of Beatles' rooftop concert
Bag of Nails: when Jimi Hendrix performed here in 1966, basically all the great guitarists of the time where in the audience and they were like, "$h!t. What do we do now?"
http://bag-o-nails.com/club-heritage/

Abbey Road neighborhood
We spent the rest of the day wandering around Hyde Park as they opened for the first evening of their Christmas market, and venturing into the British Museum, which I mostly did because I felt like I had to, but I actually enjoyed it. Everything there is SO old its mind-boggling. Seeing items from ancient Christian history was a good reminder that Christianity has not always looked the way I know it to look--it has been practiced in many eras and in many cultures and it is big enough to reflect that. None of us get it 100% right, but there's something to learn from each era/culture. Both of those things are important to remember.


Albert Memorial? IDK it was pretty
Royal Albert Hall 
Hyde Park Christmas Market
British Museum

Rosetta Stone
Emperor Claudius and probably Julius Caesar
Icon of Peter
Anyway, the final day we went to Notting Hill to stroll the neighborhood, browse the markets, and have brunch. Then we sat on a train for 6 hours and Craig wrote a sermon for the next day.

If we get a chance to go back we'd like to see a show at Royal Albert Hall, spend more time exploring SoHo, eat at Duck & Waffle, and see more views of the city from up high.

My overall impression of London was that it felt SO BIG. I liked the idea of just kind of getting lost in the city and how there's so much to see and do, but it also felt pretty overwhelming. It was kind of like the first time we visited New York after living in DC. That trip made me realize what I loved about DC, even though I really grew to love New York. This trip made me appreciate Edinburgh for what it is--such a fun city to visit and explore and also very livable and lovely every day. Nowhere else I'd rather be right now.









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