THINGS THE BRITISH LOVE

As Americans we love football, cheeseburgers, apple pie, Thanksgiving, fireworks and showers that actually work. :-) 

Here are some things we noticed the Brits LOVE.

BEAUTIFUL HOMES AND GARDENS – Everywhere we went we saw exquisite homes and gardens, whether out in the countryside in a small village or in the middle of London.

SPORTS CARS – They were everywhere!  Mercedes, BMW, Porsche, Jaguars, Peugeot, even the everyday auto was much more likely to be sleek and sporty than in America. Here are two examples. Can you guess the brands?

HIGH FASHION – It was Fashion Week 2012 in London while we were there and the stores were bristling with shoppers. Many from Britain, a few from America, and hordes from France, Germany, Scandinavia and both the Middle East and Far East. Here are shoes we saw in a department store display and a dress by Alexander McQueen.

GOOD MUSIC – Whatever your preference, you’ll find it here. These pics are of a young woman singing opera in the square in Bath and an enthusiastic band at Portobello Road Market singing a Beatles cover.

GREAT FOOD – The belief that British food is terrible is a myth. We found the food to be uniformly terrific. We ate in numerous restaurants of great variety: Lebanese, French, Belgian, vegetarian, local pubs, a burger joint, even department store and museum restaurants. From highbrow to lowbrow and everything in between, the food was excellent. The pic below is of a street stall preparing paella.

THE ROYALS – Kate was coming off her topless photo revelation and all the papers were sympathetic and encouraging. Extensive coverage of their trip to the South Pacific was all over the news. They admire William. They adore Kate. And they’re amused by Harry. Here is Deb at Hamleys (reportedly the largest toy store in the world) posing with Lego representations of the three.

And here are Kate and Will immortalized at Madame Tussauds:

We loved the British culture and its people and can't wait to return.

IT WAS QUITE A DAY

Our most interesting day in London was Sunday, September 16. Being the Sabbath, we began by taking the tube to Covent Garden to attend worship at The Crown Court Church of Scotland.

We were received warmly by the congregation and loved the worship. Not a large church, but spirited in their singing - five hymns at full throat! And a terrific sermon.

Afterwards we went downstairs to the coffee hour and were invited for lunch, but this we declined as we had important errands to run. We were off to the local theater box offices to see what might be available for later in the week. We walked to the Lyric Theater and purchased tickets for Thriller Live. Then we went to the Cambridge Theater and were lucky to snag a couple of tickets to the hottest show in town - Matilda the Musical. We'll tell you about these in later posts.

Lee had always dreamed of going to the Royal Albert Hall, certainly the most famous music venue in England (perhaps in the world) and it happened that the RAH was very near our apartment. Here is the exquisite exterior and interior. The first is a stock photo, the second we took from our seats.

We checked the schedule to see "What's On?" and found one intriguing choice - The Sunflower Jam Superjam, a fundraiser to help therapists and spiritual healers to work on cancer wards in the British National Health Service, especially with children. Every year the Sunflower Jam brings together famous artists to contribute to this great cause. 

This year's concert was emceed by Jeremy Irons and included musicians from the classic British rock groups Queen, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple and Iron Maiden. 

Also, there were representatives from British musical theater. Notable among these was Alfie Boe, renowned for his role as Jean Valjean in Les Miserables at the Queen's Theater and voted this year Britain's favorite male vocalist.

This made for quite an eclectic and interesting evening. Here's a link to the playlist if you'd like to check it out. 

http://www.queenonline.com/en/news-archive/brians-sunflower-jams/

And if you're really intrigued just Google "Sunflower Jam 2012" and watch the many You Tube videos from the concert. Pretty amazing.

This choir of cancer survivors appeared and brought everyone to tears with their courage and unconquerable spirit.

Special guest for the evening was the one and only Alice Cooper. This thrilled Deb enormously as he's from her hometown of Detroit and, apparently, despite his well-cultured reputation, a very nice guy. Among his song choices for the evening was "Elected" in honor of the upcoming November election. It brought the house down. In fact, the house "came down" throughout the evening as song after song was played and in growing crescendo whipped the faithful into a continual frenzy. Yes, even we staid Presbyterians.

Maybe these photos we took will give some sense of it all.

It was a wonderful evening and we're so glad we took the chance to buy tickets without really knowing what we were getting into.

Here's the serendipity. Upon returning home and going through our mail we discovered that Alfie Boe will be appearing in Pittsburgh on October 30 at the Byham. We immediately bought our tickets.

We're fairly certain he won't be singing Led Zeppelin as he did at the Sunflower Jam. More likely we'll hear "Bring Him Home" from Les Mis and "O Sole Mio," as he sang for the Queen's recent Diamond Jubilee Concert. Whatever, it'll be great.

All in all, it was quite the day. Thanks for staying tuned.

:-)

DIGS AND FORAYS

Deb had prevailed, with her better wisdom, to stay in apartments rather than hotels for the two weeks. This was wise. Not only did we have access to a kitchen and washer and dryer, it also gave us a better sense of having a "home" while away. 

Our apartments in both Bath and London were wonderful. Here's the photo off the web site of our London digs as well as a couple of shots we took of the exterior.

Upon our arrival we were delighted to discover how proximate we were to transportation. Since we didn't rent a car we were relying entirely upon foot power and public transit. The tube stop was literally right across the street. The ubiquitous London buses were half a block away. A nice department store (Marks and Spencer) and a Whole Foods were within a three minute walk.

This allowed us to "foray" around London with ease and confidence. Mostly, we relied upon the tube and buses. We found them to be easy, convenient, clean, reliable, safe and comfortable.

The second picture almost got us arrested. Lee didn't realize photos were prohibited in the underground so when he snapped this one the kind policeman who was nearby called him over, gave him a stiff talking to and threatened him with jail if he ever did it again. Chastened, we went along our way.

We took about every mode of transport imaginable:

     Autos - Ours to and from the airport, taxis, a chauffeured car 

     Mini bus - The Mad Max tour of Stonehenge and the Cotswolds               
     Trains - From Bath to London, on time and fast

     Boats - Cruising up the Thames

     Buses - Double-deckers all around town

     The Tube - As mentioned

     Airplanes - British Airways rules!

Tomorrow - Worship at the Crown Court Church of Scotland and a raucous rock concert at Royal Albert Hall - all in one brilliant day. 

COOKERY SCHOOL AND THE COTSWOLDS

On Wednesday evening of the first week in England we took a cooking class at The Vegetarian Cookery School in Bath. We wanted to do something fun and unusual and "untouristy." We also wanted to meet some folks from the area and interact in an informal and natural setting. The class succeeded on all fronts.

Taught by Rachel Demuth and Jo Ingleby, the "Fast and Delicious" menu included Mexican Sweetcorn Soup; Braised Greens with Griddled Polenta; Summer Vegetable Paella; and for "pudding" (English for "dessert") Roasted Figs with Mint, Rosewater, and Pistachios. From 6:30 until 9:00 that evening we met, learned, cooked, talked  and dined. Here's a photo of Rachel and Jo (the two on the right) and another member of the class listening as Jo teaches us how to make traditional Spanish paella.

And here's a picture of Deb with new friend Julia preparing the braised greens.  

We took a full day to take a "Mad Max" tour of the area around Bath. A mini-van load of folks were led on a jaunty ride through the countryside, courtesy of our entertaining guide, John. There were people along from Australia, California, Oregon, New Zealand and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania!

Our first stop was Stonehenge, the famous stone circle out on a barren, windswept plain in Southern England. It is one of the most well known prehistoric sites in the world and is a place of wonder and mystery.

The larger question is "why?" Why is this here? Who constructed it? For what  purpose? Is it for astronomy or religion or some other purpose entirely? Lots of conjecture but very little known for sure. Lots of whys. Just like life. :-)

Our next stop was Avebury, a Neolithic monument which contains the largest stone circle in Europe. It is both a tourist attraction and a place of religious importance to contemporary Pagans. We walked around, saw the beautiful village nearby, gazed at the monuments, walked through the fields and hastily exited when we noticed the multitudinous sheep droppings.

We stopped for lunch at The George Inn, a traditional English Pub. Then we toured the small towns of Lacock and Castle Combe, gorgeous Medieval villages used in the shooting of "War Horse" and "Harry Potter." Here are a number of pictures that give you a sense of these wonderful places.

It was a magical day. Tomorrow we'll tell about our fabulous London digs and how Lee almost got arrested and thrown into the slammer. Stay tuned.

OUR ENGLAND ADVENTURE

We returned on Saturday from two weeks in England, a bit staggered, but very happy. We’re still trying to figure out our days and nights and get to some semblance of order. Deb’s first day back to work is today.

It was a wonderful trip! Over the next few days we’ll record some of our adventures on the blog. We hope not to bore you by going on and on, but we do want to share our experience. If you find it interesting, follow along! If you don’t, use the delete button. We’ll try to give it to you in small pieces and have lots of photos so you can visualize all that we experienced.

We followed Rick Steeves’ advice by landing at Heathrow in London and going immediately to the city of Bath, about two hours away, to get over the jet lag and have a quieter place to get oriented to new surroundings. Rick says, Bath is a joy to visit. We found that to be understated to the max.

Bath existed long before the Romans ruled Britain. It was built around natural warm springs that were renowned for their healing. It has survived Celtic clans, Saxons, Romans, and even hordes of tourists like us. Here are some photos of this beautiful place. They are, in order, The Bath Abbey, The ancient Roman baths, the Royal Circle (one of the earliest of condominiums), the River Avon in the heart of the city, the Pulteney Bridge and a typical street scene.

We'll tell you later about the day trip we took to Stonehenge and the Cotswolds as well as our cooking class. Additionally, while in Bath, we visited museums and galleries, did a little shopping, ate some terrific food, went to see Anna Karenina, and took the obligatory bus tour of the town and environs. We found it to be exquisitely beautiful. 

A FUN FAMILY LABOR DAY WEEKEND

As part of the sabbatical, we spent Labor Day weekend with children and grandchildren. Our generous friends offered the use of their condo in Hidden Valley and so we were able to be together Friday evening through Monday noon. For folks scattered geographically and tugged every which way by family and job responsibilities this time together was a rare and precious treat. The group included Lee and Deb; Jason, Lisa, Leah and Caitlyn, from New Wilmington, PA; and Rob, Alexa and Connor from St. Louis. Here’s an overview.

On Saturday we enjoyed Idlewild and SoakZone. Idlewild is billed as the best kids’ amusement park in the country and we had fun riding all the great rides. Here’s a pic of Caitlyn on the Merry Go Round and Deb and Caitlyn at Mac 2 on the Scrambler with Rob and Lisa in the background. Heretofore Caitlyn has been a little skeptical of amusement park rides, but no longer!  She wanted to do even the scary ones again and again.

We had a picnic lunch then part of our group went to SoakZone and the others stayed riding the rides at Idlewild.

Sunday was a rainy day so we played games, read, talked, got into the hot tub between the raindrops, watched movies and enjoyed a mystifying magic show by Leah that evening. Left to right in the hot tub pic are Connor, Leah, Lisa and Lee. Caitlyn and Alexa are in the second pic watching safely from the side.

Monday we went to Caddie Shak and rode the go carts, shot paintball, tried our hand at the batting cage, played in the arcade, got soaked on the bumper boats and finished up with a great game of putt putt golf. Fun was had by all! Here’s a pic of Lisa and Connor and one of Rob and Connor playing a game back at home base.

We ate in every night and that was part of the fun, with everyone pitching in. It was wonderful to be together and great to experience the wilderness beauty of Western Pennsylvania.

Monday after returning from Caddie Shak we cleaned the condo, packed up and everyone headed home, greatly fulfilled and more than a little tired. What fun!