Day 15: Mind the Gap!

This is one of a series of entries from my travel journal chronicling my recent trip to Europe. You can click here for the archived entries.

Day 14 | Day 15

England photo gallery here.

14 Alma Place, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, UK 19/06/08

I got a little bit distracted yesterday evening as my bus pulled into the last stop in Oxford, Gloucester Green, to be greeted by Jeff. We headed out with his friends and colleagues to O'Neill's and Far from the Maddening Crowd (Thomas Hardy, for you non-literary types. Admittedly I didn't know this myself until one of the girls mentioned it, but it was a bit of a coincidence because a few hours earlier I had walked upon Hardy's flagstone at Westminster Abbey.)

Back to recapping yesterday in London. In addition to the memorials on the ground floor of the Abbey - intricate, mammoth structures of marble, gilt, wood, etc., both Nelson and Wellington had huge ornate memorial chambers in the crypt below. The crypt was fascinating - actually felt very modern and well-maintained (as it should be for £10 a pop admission fees). Unfortunately we couldn't enter Wellington's crypt because they were doing restoration work, but you could look in and see an enormous pink marble sarcophagus in a large chamber. The goal of the restoration was to make the Duke's chamber as glorious as the admittedly superior Nelson's chamber. Among other important figures buried in the crypt were Sir Christopher Wren and Sir Henry Wellcome, an American industrialist and pharmaceutical maker, who established the eponymous trust which funds medical research of various types, including Jeff's field of bioinformatics. Understandably, one of Jeff's favorite spots to point out his customized tour of St. Paul's. There was a great deal to be made of Britain's military heroes, with memorials to those who died in specific conflicts (the Great War, WWII, the Falkland Islands) as well as countless individual graves of distinguished officers. The crypt also had a display of the history of the royalty at St. Paul's as well as the somewhat morbid-sounding Crypt Café (didn't eat there).

After St. Paul's we walked across the Millenial Bridge to the south side of the Thames. We walked past the Tate Modern art museum, the reconstructed Globe Theatre, past London Bridge (which boasted of the new "London Bridge Experience. It's bloody scary!" Some kind of horror show with flashing lights and a myriad of ghouls. Perhaps they take lunch at the Crypt Café?) We came up to the Tower Bridge and crossed that, having passed the impressive HMS Belfast moored in the middle of the Thames, decked out in WWII-era ocean camouflage. We passed by the Tower of London - actually rather a squat fortress with four towers, although Jeff observed that when it was first built it quite literally must have towered over the rest of the town; now dwarfed by modern office buildings. We had limited time because I definitely wanted to spend some time in Westminster Abbey and I had made plans to meet up with relatives living in London for dinner, so I couldn't go inside the Tower. We hopped on the tube (the London subway, or Underground) and headed to the Embankment stop. This allowed us to walk through Trafalgar Square and see Lord Nelson's column - an impressive tribute to the martial glory of the old British Empire. The square itself was very busy with people and traffic, bordered on one side by the National Gallery and by several nations' embassies - flags were flying from Canada, Zimbabwe (outside of which there had been recent protests, my uncle later mentioned), South Africa, and many more. We walked over to see Buckingham Palace, which was in an impressive plaza with many a Union Jack flying, gated entrances, statues on columns, beautiful rows of flower beds, brilliant green lanws, gilded wrought iron, and all the trappings of an anachronistic constitutional monarchy. I was a bit surprised that the literal facade of the palace was unadorned with any finery or ostentation, however. It looked like a standard government building or museum rather than a palace. But I suppose it works for the ridiculous display that constitutes the British monarchy.

We walked down the Princess Diana Memorial Walk toward Westminster and its eponymous abbey, passing by a bunch of giant white marble and granite government buildings as we did so. Here Jeff and I parted ways - he had work to do in Oxford and I wanted to see the Abbey and meet up with my relatives later on.

As impressed as I was with St. Paul's I was equally or perhaps moreso with Westminster (Abbey, not to be confused with Westminster itself where Parliament sits. This is the building to which Big Ben is attached, and of course I had to get the obligatory pic of me standing in front of it before Jeff left). It's simply a huge monument paying tribute to the royalty, nobility, majesty, and achievement of Great Britain since it was built in the 10th century. Here lie all the kings and queens, lords and ladies of the Realm. In one sense it feels very crowded - the place is packed with statues on top of one another. Evidently there was some confusion as to whether the remains are in the appropriate places, because when Oliver Cromwell instituted the Commonwealth he dug up the remains of all the royalty. With the Restoration these were returned to their rightful spots but there the inevitable mix-up when you're dealing with hundreds of musty old skeletons. I noticed a small flagstone in one of the chapels commemorating Cromwell, which I found a bit surprising. Is he actually buried there? Would seem rather a forgiving act on the part of the Brits.

My favorite part of the Abbey was the Poets' Corner, where tribute is paid to Britain's famous writers, including a giant memorial to Shakespeare, as well as a nice bust of Longfellow, "From British admirers of the American poet." The floor in this section was covered with the flagstones of famous writers - the aforementioned Hardy, D.H. Lawrence, Henry James, George Eliot, et al. Also impressive at one end of the Abbey is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and a tribute to FDR.

After Westminster Abbey I met up with my relatives for dinner at Gourmet Burger Kitchen, where I had a mammoth avocado and bacon burger, great chips and a delicious sweet hard cider from South Africa. From there I hopped on the Oxford Tube and returned to Oxford to hit the pubs for the going-away do for one of Jeff's colleagues. All in all a great day. But there is so much to see in London - I may return on Friday (only £15 round trip!) to spend the day while Jeff defends his thesis.