Hangin' around Oxford

We are returning to our “established” routine now after having Ray, Linda, and Claire visiting us. They left on the bus for London Thursday morning—the rain let up long enough for them to get out of town. The trip to Blenheim on Wednesday was truly miserable—not the palace itself which was quite interesting, but the weather. We were in a deluge all day long. As veterans of the Seattle rains, we thought we would be ready for the British weather, but it is not so. Perhaps we lost our water wings after moving to Philadelphia. Maybe we will go back to see the gardens on a dry day.

Phil’s colleague from Haverford Naomi Koltun-Fromm has arrived in town for a summer program in Middle Eastern studies. (Naomi is a professor of religion whose specialty is ancient Judaism.) Her program is housed just north of town, so we met for a stroll and dinner on Thursday evening. We did not get a picture to prove that both she and we are here and working, but we will get one next time. It was good to see another familiar face. (We are beginning to recognize faces on the street now as people we have seen before, even if we don’t know who they are. And today, as we were walking around, we ran into our friend from Vienna Alexander who was a graduate student there and is doing research here now—we mentioned having tea with him in our blog on June 23. We don’t know that many people here, but we do seem to meet the ones we know.)

We spent today wandering around town exploring some more of the colleges. Phil’s academic visitor ID card has given him a sense of great authority. He shows it to the attendant at the closed gates, and they wave us through like we were important people. (Unfortunately, it does not seem to allow him to get into the lab building on the weekends, so he will have to confine himself to normal working hours.) There are 39 colleges in all, of which nine are only for graduate students and research. Of the remaining 30, we have seen probably a third, and toured even fewer than that. So we have a lot left to do.

The colleges are fairly well hidden, and it is very easy to pass one without realizing it is there. A typical situation has an arched wooden door in middle of a forbidding stone wall. On the other side of the door is a beautiful grassy quad with the buildings and cloisters of the college arranged around it. On one hand there is a similarity of style and architecture among the different colleges; on the other hand, each of them is distinctive. We continue to be amazed at the separation between the noisy, busy, grimy streets, and the seclusion of the college on the other side of the wall. The streets are far noisier and more crowded than we are used to even in American cities (let alone the suburbs where we live). And the colleges are much quieter and more private than any place around us in the US. They invite a life of quiet contemplation or, as we did today, getting a picnic lunch from a shop in the Covered Market and eating it in one of the quads of Brasenose College. Each college has a chapel—the one at Christ Church is a cathedral but none of them is very big—with architecture that is often amazing. The beauty is in the details.

Brasenose College Quad

After our quiet lunch of serious contemplation, we headed to Blackwell’s Books for some coffee and then on to some more shopping. We keep telling you how much we walk, but maybe this can convey it even better. Both of us have worn out a pair of shoes since we have been here and have had to buy new ones. Fortunately, Clarks’ shoes are the one thing we have found to be less expensive here than it is in the States, so we have not had to hobble around in our bare feet. Today was Phil’s turn to get some new ones, but Deb is hoping that the rains hold off for a few days because she is about to wear out her second pair. Oxford—the city of spires and shoes.

Blenheim Palace

Wednesday was our last day with the Tennessee Meneelys visiting , and unfortunately it was a soggy one. We had postponed our trip to Blenheim Palace from Sunday, hoping for better weather, but it was not to be. In fact, over 2" of rain fell that day-- more than Oxford usually gets for the entire month of July-- and we believe it!

Ray, Claire and Linda at Blenheim

Blenheim Palace is about 8 miles north of Oxford, the home of the 11th Duke of Marlborough. It was built in the first quarter of the 18th century, as a "thank you" gift to John Churchill (the 1st Duke of Marlborough) for a job well-done in the battle of Blenheim in Bavaria. In more recent years, its claim to fame is that it is the birthplace of Sir Winston Churchill and served as a location for scenes from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. (Not being Harry Potter fans, we are a little weary of Harry popping up everywhere in these regions.... but if you are a fan, Oxford is a treasure trove of Potterism).

We weren't allowed to take photos of the inside of the palace, but if you click on the link above, there are some pictures on wikipedia that will give you an idea of what it looks like. We ventured out in the rain to look at the gardens, but it was difficult to appreciate their beauty-- we'll have to go back when the sun returns. We did stop in the butterfly house and the Marlborough Maze-- a hedge maze. After getting fueled with hot coffee to warm up-- we headed home.




For one last meal together we chose Qumin, a Indian restaurant recommended by Philip's editor at Oxford University Press. It was a great way to end a week with family exploring southern England!

Bath-time

After spending Sunday locally in Oxford, Monday morning found us hitting the rails for Bath Spa.

We arrived there late morning, and headed straight for the ruins of the Roman Baths. Around 60 AD, the Romans built an impressive temple and bathing complex over natural geothermal hot springs... and it still works today just the way it did then. The ruins are extensive and very well preserved-- it kept the five of us fascinated for several hours.




When everyone had satisfied their curiosity about the ruins, we headed up the hill toward the Circus and the Royal Crescent. The Circus and Crescent are an amazing set of curved Georgian buildings designed by the architects John Wood (the elder) and his son John Wood (the younger) in the 1750's. If you click on the links, you can see some great photos-- it was difficult to get decent photos of the unique structures with our camera.

After a late lunch in a local pub, we wandered down to the Pulteney Bridge. This bridge is distinguished because it is one of four bridges in the world that has shops built along both sides of the street. In reality it was mildly disappointing, because as you walk down the street you can't even see or hear the river, so it might as well be a regular street. But the view of the span over the River Avon, is really nice from a vantage point further down Grand Parade street.




By this time it was late in the day and time to return home. (We didn't have any Jane Austen fans in the group, so we skipped the museum dedicated to her.) All in all, we decided that Bath was a pretty impressive place that had exceeded our expectations.
--Deb

Sunday rains

The notorious English rains have descended on us . We had been expecting it since we arrived, but the rain has only come in the past few days. It has been a hard, soaking rain accompanied by strong winds, and it has affected our plans a bit. Sunday we postponed a trip to Blenheim Palace and Gardens (hoping for more sun later in the week) and instead walked to Iffley to show them the locks, the village, and the Norman church. (This was the topic of a previous blog.)

Humorous sign we saw in Iffley... worthy of a blog photo
"These horses have been castrated"

The rain cleared enough to make it a pleasant walk along the Thames, with Phil being fascinated by the many different species of colorful snails along the way. He was all set to explain the genetics of shell coiling (clockwise or counterclockwise, which actually does have an important role in the history of genetic thought) but no one else was particularly interested so he will inflict it on his students some day. On our walk back to Oxford, we stopped at the Isis Tavern, which can only be reached by those walking or boating on the Thames. The food was great, the atmosphere is nice, and the prices were (for Oxford at least) reasonable. (And our barista turned out to be a psychology professor on sabbatical.) Since it is only a pleasant 30 minute walk from our flat, we may do that more often.

Back in town, we went to Christ Church and toured inside the Cathedral, dining hall, and so on. It is considered one of the most impressive of the colleges—it certainly impressed us—and was used as the setting for Harry Potter movies.

Christ Church Dining Room

It also has a stained glass window with Alice in Wonderland characters, and a friendly guide was pointing out many things that served as inspirations for Alice. By the time we left and began our walk back home, the rains returned again.

Wales, Relics, and a Birthday

We have been so busy the past few days with Linda, Ray, and Claire that we have barely had time to blog. We will try to catch up on a few quick items. On Saturday we took a tour bus to Wales—the same tour guide that we used to go to Cambridge two weeks ago. Wales is the one part of the United Kingdom that we had not visited before and we had very little prior knowledge of it. If you look on a map, it is on the westernmost side of the island of Britain and has been part of Great Britain since the time of Henry IV (or maybe the Henry V—anyway, a long time.) Long enough that the oldest son of the king or queen is known as the Prince of Wales—but you knew that from Charles and Diana. It is separated from England by the River Severn, one of widest rivers in Great Britain. (It is our impression that many rivers in England would be called “creeks” in some parts of Pennsylvania but that just goes to show what good public relations and a few hundred years of additional history will do for you. The Severn is in fact a river.)

Our first stop in Wales was at Tintern Abbey, ruins of an old abbey from the early part of the 12th century. The buildings and cathedral are remarkably well-preserved and make an impressive array of towering stone walls and open courtyards. This was one of the most important abbeys in Wales, dominating the Wye River valley for hundreds of years. In the 1530s, when Henry VIII separated the Church of England from the Catholic Church, he disbanded all of the abbeys and monasteries and seized their property. So the abbey was abandoned in 1536 and fell into ruins.

Tintern Abbey

The ruins were “rediscovered” in the 19th century as a rural and romantic get-away, and have been a popular destination ever since. Wordsworth wrote a poem about them even. We spent a very pleasant hour wandering through the ruins, and took many pictures.

Then we were back on the bus for a trip to Cardiff, the capital of Wales. In the 19th and early 20th century, Wales was the mining capital of Great Britain and the coal capital of Europe. (They would say the world but Pennsylvania would dispute that.) Cardiff was the busiest coal port in the world until the end of World War I, and shows many signs of its heritage. It is considered one of the most ethnically diverse cities in Europe since so many different nationalities came to Wales for mining, and had some extremely wealthy people living there—as well as many who were extremely poor miners. It is still an important shopping destination, and even with our American eyes, we were amazing at the sizes of some of the stores and shopping area. We had lunch in a pub and wandered around town in the rain before ending up the National Museum. They have a small but interesting collection of French impressionists painters, and a very nice collection of Welsh landscape artists. We had never heard of most of these painters but we did like their paintings.

One highlight of the bus trip was the birthday balloons. Linda brought along a pack of balloons and would occasionally blow one up and toss it over the seat on top of the Birthday Girl. (The Birthday Girl will not be named but it was not Linda or Claire and it was someone in our party.) The luggage rack above our seats was filled with balloons. When we returned to Oxford, we celebrated the big event with fish and chips at the Eagle and Child, right next door to our bus stop. Not everyone can say that they got Wales for their birthday.
-Philip

Pitt, Posies, and Punting

We're a little behind on our blogging, each day had been packed full of activity-- there's no time to report on it! Friday-- on America's Independence Day, we celebrated by touring the Pitt Rivers Museum, the Oxford Botanical Gardens, and punting!

The Pitt Rivers Museum is best described as a giant Ye Old Curiosity Shop-- full of masks, body ornamentations, totems, musical instruments, weapons, masks, textiles, jewelery, canoes, ceremonial cloaks, shrunken heads--you name it. It truly is something to behold. You couldn't ever possibly see all that they have-- you could wander around for days in there. If you want to check out a virtual tour of this amazing place, here's the link: Pitt Rivers Virtual Tour

Next we headed for the Botanical Gardens-- this picture tells it all... gorgeous! But then doesn't everybody's garden look like that?




After that, Claire, Linda and Deb all decided they were up for a little punting on the River Cherwell... with Philip and Ray serving as riverside photographers. Claire was our punter and she did a fantastic job-- especially manuevering past boats full of less than apt oarsmen. Deb and Linda enjoyed the leisurely trip downstream and back-- a great way to celebrate the 4th of July--British style.

Claire, Deb and Linda punting