A Distinct Lack of Lifts

Monday morning found me once again heading to the King's Cross-St Pancras area to catch a train.  (The two are purportedly distinct, though to my perception they kind of flowed together into one huge station.)  Though the UK's rail system is not exactly inexpensive, it still seems less expensive and is certainly more convenient than rail travel in the US.

When buying my ticket I used a machine, which gave me the option of selecting one for a high-speed train.  As this cost a few pounds more, I did not go with that option.  Then, ticket in hand, I looked at the trains in front of me, all of which had the words 'high-speed' emblazoned on them.  So over I went to the railroad employees, who I hope were getting time and a half for working on the holiday and who were all just as pleasant as they could be, and asked if I'd need the high-speed ticket.  I would, but it was no problem to simply pay for the surcharge without buying entirely new tickets.

The trip was uneventful as the train made its way eastward and somewhat north.  I kept thinking of the most recent Robin Hood film, because one of the train's stops was in Gravesend, and in the film the returning Crusaders pass through that area on their way back from France.  As I was preparing to alight at Rochester, the punk who'd been sitting in the same carriage woke up and asked, very politely, if we'd already passed one of the previous stations.  I felt bad that he'd missed his stop, but was pleased by his good manners, and by being proved wrong in my assumptions based on his style.

As the train approached Rochester I could see the tower of the castle, and grew dismayed as we kept

going.  Though the station did not appear as near as I'd hoped to the attractions I was visiting, they turned out to be not very far away at all, and easy to find.  I walked up a small hill and found myself on a bunting-canopied historic, and rather empty, street.  At first I was worried that everything was going to be shut up because it was a bank holiday, but then I considered that it was not yet 10 a.m., and that things would probably open later.  As it was, the only people I saw as I strolled were a group of voluble French students.

I soon gleaned that the bunting was decoration for the Dickens Festival, which would be happening at the following weekend.  Rochester was a favourite of Dickens, and he patterned many locations in his works after real buildings in the town; these are marked with plaques noting in which novels they appear and what they are called there.  There are also lots of shops whose names contain Dickensian references, like Pip's greengrocers and Sweet Expectations.

I was about halfway up the street when suddenly to my left there was an open area, rather than the row of shops that preceded and followed it, and the cathedral appeared.  A set of steps led up from street level into a little grassy courtyard with benches and a fountain in the middle; beyond that was a wrought-iron gate into the cathedral grounds, leading to the main entrance.  Directly opposite the west doors of the cathedral is the castle.  I don't believe two places I've been to visit have ever been so conveniently located before.

 

Founded in the 7th century, Rochester is the second-oldest cathedral in England, though the present building only dates from the 11th century.  If I remember correctly, it is also the shortest in length of all England's medieval cathedrals.  One of the things I liked best about it was the bathroom, because it was hidden behind a little door in a very medieval-looking corridor.  It was also impressive how modern and comfortable the bathroom was, given its location; it must have taken some work to plumb everything in.  Like St Albans, Rochester was also a pilgrimage site, and includes a set of steps that were used by penitent visitors as they made their way to the shrine behind the altar.  The stone steps have become so worn down and concave over the years that wooden steps have been built over them to make the ascent easier (and likely safer).  The cathedral's quire screen was especially nice, carved with saints and patrons of the church, but I also enjoyed seeing memorials to military service, including a regiment in Gibraltar, and the poppies arranged by the Great War memorial.

On the side closest to the cathedral is the castle's former moat, now grass-filled, which features a small plaque noting Dickens' desire to be buried there (they stuck him in Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey instead).  Beyond the moat is a wall enclosing the castle grounds, and within is a large grassy area with a few trees.  As this part is free to enter, it seemed as popular with the locals as with tourists; in the afternoon there were people picnicking and playing cricket there, and a group of teenagers had climbed onto the roof of the building that housed the toilets and were getting a talking-to from an employee as I used the facilities.  The 'castle' is really just the keep, a large rectangle rising up at one end of the grounds, and it is there that you must pay if you want to see any of what's inside.

I have told several people this story before, and by George I will tell it again because it may be one of my favourite things that I have ever read about a castle.  When I was deciding where to go on the bank holiday Monday, I read a bit about Rochester and saw that it was fairly easily reached from London.  Knowing that I delved deeper, and came across the TripAdvisor page for the castle.  TripAdvisor lets users rate and review attractions, and among the many four- and five-star ratings I saw that the castle had three one-star, or Terrible, ratings.  I had to check these out; I can't think of a castle I've been to that I would rate so poorly, but perhaps these reviewers had experiences that I ought to know about before I decided to visit.

The first of the Terrible reviews was about the Christmas market, so I felt safe ignoring that one.  The next two left me flabbergasted.  Both were from Brits, and both said that they'd visited with people who had some kind of handicap.  And both reviewers were upset that there was no lift in the castle.  (That's an elevator, for all of our Spanish-speaking friends.)  Yes: not one but two people expected that the castle that was begun in the 12th century would have a lift inside.  I must admit that I was pleased to see that these reviewers were from the UK and not the States.

As it is just a tower, there's not a lot to see inside.  One room near the bottom has a display showing a diorama of the castle at its most complete, and includes a timeline of its history, but as the majority of the building is devoid of a roof or floors that aren't in the corridors, there is no furniture or decoration.  There are informational panels describing, in English and French, what the various rooms would have been, with illustrations showing them filled with people at work.  All the same, it didn't seem like it would have been a comfortable place to live; the squareness of it must have been somewhat monotonous for its inhabitants.  I was very slightly unsettled by Rochester Castle--not actively uncomfortable, but vaguely aware that something seemed off.  Eventually I realised that it was mainly because of the arches.  With possibly one or two exceptions, most of the arches are Norman (or Romanesque, if you're on the Continent).  This means that they are the rounded kind, rather than pointed Gothic ones.  For someone used to seeing mainly Gothic arches, their marked absence in Rochester was odd.

Before I left I decided that I ought to get fish and chips.  There was a chipper on the street near the cathedral entrance, and from there I ordered cod and chips.  What I got was the biggest piece of fish I've ever eaten.  It was easily nine inches long.  Of course it was good, crisp and hot and filling, and I ate it sitting on a bench near the cathedral.  Would that there were more meals in such locations in my life.

On the way back to London someone came round to check our tickets, and I presented both my original Rochester-St Pancras ticket and the one for the upgrade.  'And you've got the other bit as well, aren't you very good, my love,' said the conductor checking tickets.  Yes, I am, I thought, well pleased with myself and with having been in a cathedral and a castle and having eaten my fill of fish and chips in a pleasant town.

Sunday

Almost every place I visited on Sunday could fill its own post.  For the sake of brevity, though, it's all getting lumped together, as it was for me.

I woke in the morning and headed for the nearest Underground station, where classical music was playing, I supposed to placate people hungover from the night before.  An otherwise-empty carriage took me to Westminster.  When I emerged the sky was blue overhead with hardly a cloud to be seen.  There were barely any people queued up for the London Eye, and, since my parents had asked the day before if I'd been on it yet, I figured this was the best possible time for it.  So I took my place in the queue before the ticket office had even opened yet and bought a ticket, before standing in another short queue to get on the wheel.  (I recorded for posterity in my notes that I'd shared the gondola with American Eddie Redmayne, which is easy enough to explain and understand, and that in the queue I'd seen Foreign Cyberpunk Young Dudley Dursley, which is slightly more cryptic and bizarre.)  Had I had to wait any longer than I did, or had the weather not been as nice, or had I less time to kill before other things opened, I wouldn't have done it, but circumstances were aligned perfectly.  It is only under these conditions that I would recommend the Eye.  It was pretty neat to see the city slowly getting further away, and the movement of the wheel was almost imperceptible.

That unexpected thing achieved I took public transportation to north London.  This included transferring from the Underground to a bus.  At first I felt a bit lazy doing that, since I only took the bus a stop or two, but when I saw the steepness of the hill I felt better about my decision.  To reach Highgate Cemetery I walked through Waterlow Park, which abuts the eastern section of the cemetery.  I knew that I wanted to visit at least one cemetery on my trip, and based on photographs I'd seen online Highgate seemed the obvious choice.  It's one of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries built in London in the Victorian era, and is separated into an eastern and western section.  After paying the entrance fee you can wander Highgate East at will, but it's necessary to take a tour to see Highgate West; however, the ticket for the West side tour includes entrance to the East side.  I feel it's worth the £12 combined ticket.  Tours leave every half-hour or so, and though I bought my ticket in time for the 11:30 tour all of the tours until 1:00 were already full, so I went through the East first.

One could easily live undetected back in the far reaches of Highgate East.  That's actually my new life plan.  Despite the fact that the cemetery seems to be jam-packed, there is still apparently room to be buried there, if you can afford it.  I must say, though, I'm not sure what constitutes a burial plot there, because there is hardly any room to spare that's not already occupied or used for a path.  Douglas Adams is buried there, as is Karl Marx, whose stone includes a large pedestal topped with a huge head staring down at everyone--the stone reads 'Workers of all lands unite,' and Marx's glower seems to add 'Or else.'  There are headstones there of every shape and size, ones made of the usual stones but some made of slate or even wood, and many of them covered in ivy or tilted precariously.  It's terribly picturesque. 

More money has gone into the restoration of Highgate West, so it's less ramshackle.  It is, I believe, a bit smaller than East--or at least it seems so, as you're not free to walk around it on your own it certainly seems smaller; it's definitely hillier.  The West also features more mausoleums, some of which were planned around a theme.  The two big ones are the Egyptian Avenue and the Circle of Lebanon (right).  The crypts in the centre of the Circle form a huge pot that holds a cedar of Lebanon, which has grown usually large because of its sheltered location.  We were able to enter a large crypt where some of the vaults had not been sealed, and saw rather old caskets that were still mostly intact.  That was a little odd and creepy.  I was also surprised to see among the old graves that of Alexander Litvinenko, the former KGB agent and defector who was poisoned in 2006.  One of the best things about the tour of the West was that our guide, Angie, clearly loves the cemetery and loves sharing it with visitors.  Her enthusiasm heightened my appreciation for it.

Upon leaving Highgate I made my way to Camden Town, just a few Tube stops south.  I wanted to see the canal lock, and the area was supposed to have cool markets and things.  What I found was that everyone in London was there.  It was awful.  I should have anticipated this, as it was Sunday afternoon and a long weekend to boot, but for some reason I didn't expect it.  A lot of the stands set up seemed to be selling tacky, generic souvenirs, and while some of the food stalls smelled appetising, there were so many people crammed into the area that it wasn't worth trying to get a closer look.  I did manage to cross a bridge over the canal when a boat was preparing to go through the lock; getting to see that was the only thing that redeemed this part of the day.  The boat sailed into the lock, the man climbed out and swung the gates shut behind it, and the water level sank until it was the same as the lower part of the canal, at which point the woman opened the gates and then embarked again before they left.  During this time there was a horde of young women outside one of the canalside restaurants, shrieking for some celebrity, but I never did figure out who.

After fleeing Camden Town I was more determined than ever to ride a boat to Greenwich.  It took a while to get there; the Tube station I'd come to was exit-only during certain hours, and the next-closest one was so full that there was a crowd of people waiting outside to get in.  I chose to keep walking rather than wait for a train there, figuring that I'd happen upon another station eventually.  Along the way I paused to buy and eat a snack, and eventually made my way back to Westminster.  The queues for the Eye were long and the sky was overcast, making me even gladder I'd gone up when I did.  I got a water bus ticket right by the Eye and hopped on, sitting at the stern.  The ride really was refreshing and passed lots of great edifices, including the Tower and Tower Bridge.  If, however, you want more leisure to see the sights along the way, there's a slower tourist water bus that would probably be worthwhile to take.

By the time I got to Greenwich some attractions were beginning to close.  This wasn't awful, as I wasn't especially invested in visiting any of the museums.  Being greeted a statue of Sir Walter Raleigh was gratifying, and upon reflection it would have been interesting to see what the museum had related to his life and voyages.  I would have liked to have seen the chapel, but a wedding was in progress and thus it was closed to visitors.  Luckily the Painted Hall at the Royal College was still open.  The Hall is insanely ostentatious, very Rococo, but quite well executed, as one might expect.  The trompe l'oeil work on the columns would indeed fool a casual observer, and I appreciated the mirrors provided to study the ceiling without doing damage to one's neck.  After wandering around the college for a while I ended up at the bottom of the hill on which the observatory stands, looking up at it and thinking, 'I'm going to have to go up there.'  And so, fuelled by spite more than anything else, I lumbered my way up the hill.  It wasn't as long a climb as I'd expected, but it was steep; I took a break or two under the guise of taking some pictures.  At the top I was rewarded with a view of London that I must admit was worth it: the college buildings at the foot of the hill, London in the near distance to the left, a building I think is the O2 Area to the right.  I'd thought that there was a place at the observatory where you could stand in both hemispheres at once; the only thing I saw like that was a line on a wall that was in a sort of alley, with a crowd of people waiting to have their pictures made there.  I decided I wasn't going to try to mush in there, so I descended the hill.

Then I had to figure out how to get back to central London.  I thought about getting the water taxi back, but a single ticket was nearly £8, which seemed a bit steep.  I knew that there was some kind of rail somewhere in the area, so I wandered around for a bit trying to find a place to get on, to no avail.  There was, however, this strange cylindrical brick building with a domed top that looked very clearly like some kind of small public building, a restroom if nothing else.  When I entered there were stairs going up and a very large lift that descended some distance; at the bottom I walked through a white-tile-lined tunnel that sloped gently downward for the first half and gently upward for the second half.  At its end I reached another lift that led to another cylindrical building.  And that's how I crossed the Thames underwater.

I'd say that all of the things I did and saw on Sunday had things to recommend them, and I wouldn't entirely discount any of them under the right circumstances.  My problem was that I ended up doing too much in one day, and wasn't able to enjoy all of it because I got too worn out.  If I had the day to do over again I would probably skip Camden Town altogether; that would have given me more time in Greenwich, and I might have been able to take the slower boat.  As it is, I'm glad I saw the thing most important to me near the beginning of the day, when I had the energy to really appreciate it.

St Albans

...I Ioon Maundeuyle kniȝt, if al it be þat Y be not worþi, þat was ybore in Engelond in þe toun of seynt Albanes...

St Albans is the dream.  That's what I kept repeating to myself as I walked its streets, and that remains my best description of it, though I have a hard time articulating what exactly I mean by it.

St Albans is like Sandford, Gloucerstershire, but (one assumes) without all of the murder.  It's likewhat you'd imagine if someone told you to envision the prototypical small English city.  Half-timbered buildings, houses with roses climbing up the front, a busy market on the high street on Saturday morning, an Oxfam book shop, Roman ruins in a large, beautiful park, and a cathedral rising above the trees.  It's the dream.

The city is less than an hour north of London, making it a perfect day trip.  That was something that recommended it, to be sure, but the real reason I went was because of John Mandeville.  Whether or not he truly existed, the medieval explorer claimed St Albans as his home.  I'd seen things related to Marco Polo in Venice; now I had the opportunity to give Mandeville his fair share.

(Walking through St Pancras on the way to my train I heard a little girl say, "Mind the gap, Mummy.")

I found my way from the St Albans City station to one of its main streets, at one end of which was St Peter's Church.  The church is set in a large churchyard that includes gravestones, gardens, and wild-growing plants.  It was on the walls of St Peter's that I first encountered walls made with irregular flint.  Inside the church is not terribly remarkable, but in its children's area it had a banner that I want to recreate, because it pays tribute to Queen Elizabeth II with Her Majesty's silhouette, a large crown, and Union Jack hearts.  It was the most English thing and I love it.

As I headed toward the cathedral I passed an Oxfam book shop and stopped in.  This proved to be an advantageous decision, as they had boxes and boxes full of old postcards, separated by English county, other country, and subject.  I picked a few of the ones I liked best, including one of Southwark Cathedral, one of Harlech Castle, and one of the Book of Kells.

Market stalls were set up along both sides of the street down to the clock tower, selling everything from fresh produce to lengths of fabric.  The clock tower was built in the early 15th century; once again I chose not to go up in it, at least not before I'd been into the cathedral itself, my main objective.  But I didn't go straight to the cathedral, instead choosing to see the Roman ruins first.  This led me down roads where toadflax grew from walls studded with white seashells, and terraced houses with colourful doors.  It was delightful.

Though now named after England's first martyr, St Albans was called Verulamium by the Romans, who left bits scattered around the city.  I went out to the site of the ancient theatre, but chose not to pay the fee to go in and see what was undoubtedly a series of small walls.  I was charmed by the gatehouse, with wisteria a contrast to the light-colored stone, and the fields beyond it.  Nearby is Verulamium Park, one hundred acres of land that contains playing fields, a lake with a small island, a section of Roman city wall, and the remains of a hypocaust with a mosaic floor.  The mosaic is a decently sized chunk, which makes it all the more impressive that it's survived.  Now, of course, a building has been erected over it to protect it from the elements, along with walkways that allow visitors to view it from a few feet above.  Nearer the city in the park is the section of wall, now surrounded by a low fence to keep people from climbing on it.  I didn't linger long there, because that was when it started raining--just enough to require getting out my umbrella and making my way toward the cathedral.

As I skirted around the lake I saw a couple walking their dog, and had to ask them if I could take a picture, because he was the first and only bull terrier I saw while I was there.  He was a nice brown brindle who sat still enough for me to snap a picture to send to Dad, and then I chatted with his owners for a bit, explaining that my dad had asked every time we'd talked whether or not I'd seen a bull terrier yet.  The dog, for his part, was more interested in exploring his surroundings than talking to me.

I passed Ye Olde Fighting Cocks, named by Guinness World Records as Britain's oldest pub.  The main building was formerly used as a pigeon house and is octagonal.  I pressed on to the cathedral, passing through the gate that used to be the entrance to the monastic complex but now belongs to the school.  The Cathedral and Abbey Church of St Albans was founded near the site of the martyrdom of St Alban, and his shrine has been a pilgrimage site since his beheading.  In addition, the monastery was home to one of the most well-known monks in English history, Matthew Paris, an author and illuminator.  And, much to my joy, one of the columns on the west end bears a painted inscription about John Mandeville. 

I arrived at the cathedral in time to join a free tour.  As we gathered at the west end and our guide began giving us information, there was a wedding going on in the Lady Chapel, and we could hear faintly the ceremony going on.  At one point the congregation sang "Jerusalem" and it was perfect.

Like all medieval cathedrals, St Albans has not remained static, in its original form.  The earliest architecture is Norman and makes use of rounded arches.  Some of these still bear their medieval decoration, and the faded red stripes on the rounded arches reminded me of the Mezquita in Cordoba, which was an unexpected comparison to be able to draw.  A number of columns are painted with saints who have been there since the 13th century.  The western end of the cathedral was built when the Gothic had become popular, and the two architectural styles meet without finesse.  Adding to the somewhat unsophisticated appearance is the fact that two of the Norman arches on the north side collapsed and were repaired with Gothic arches, meaning that the aisle is asymmetrical.  Still, despite the fact that it seems like three or more different buildings shoved together, the cathedral is beautiful.

The Alban shrine is at the back, between the altar and the Lady Chapel.  The pilgrims came up the south aisle, and in order to keep an eye on them monks were stationed in a wooden viewing stand.  It was not dissimilar, in purpose if not in appearance, to a deer stand.  At the end of the tour I asked the guide something about the tiling on the floor, and then she offered to show me some of the brasses still in the floor.  These were covered by mats so that they wouldn't be damaged by people's walking on them.  Like bells and other metal decorations, many medieval brasses did not survive because they could be melted down and used for other purposes.  The young man to the left was some noble lady's brother, though I can't remember who.

Then, on my way back to the train, I ate a pasty.

I really enjoyed St Albans and highly recommend it, at the very least as a day trip from London.

Around London

After our morning session on the UCL campus on Thursday we went to the London Metropolitan Archives.  Not content to be home to the National Archives, London also has its own local archives of the city's long history.  There we got to see a selection of records related to burials, the commitment of lunatics to asylums, and maps of the areas most bombed during World War II.

Below are some pictures taken on the way to and from the Metropolitan Archives.

 

On Friday we visited the IdeaStore Whitechapel.  The IdeaStore concept expands the notion of a library to include more community activities--things that many libraries offer anyway, but IdeaStores set aside spaces for them.  So while story time was going on when we visited, we also passed through the cafe, and saw a presentation in the dance studio.

The Whitechapel location is not far from Brick Lane, famous for its Indian restaurants, so of course I had to have dinner there.  I enjoyed the British national dish, though I didn't so much enjoy having to sit right in the front window of the restaurant; if I'm dining alone, I'd prefer to do it without so much notice being called to the fact.

As it was still early I decided to visit one of the places I'd come across in my research.  I took the Tube to the Tower Hill station, and upon emerging was a little surprised to see the Tower right across the street.  It was like when I was surprised that the Coliseum was directly opposite the Colosseo station in Rome; I don't know why I don't believe metro station names.  There's a naval memorial on the same side of the street as the station, so I looked at that before crossing to get a better view of the Tower.  Though I wouldn't have minded going in, it was a little too late in the day to try, what with the queues and all. 

Instead I headed for somewhere a little off the beaten path.  London has a number of public gardens and parks, and while some, like Hyde Park, are well-known, others are just small green spaces that offer much needed oxygenation and a place to sit.  One of these is the garden of St Dunstan in the East.

As the name suggests, the garden has ecclesiastical connections.  A church stood on the site from at least the Middle Ages; the building that was there in 1666 was damaged by the Great Fire, and Christopher Wren helped to restore it, adding a tower.  During the Blitz the church was all but destroyed, though Wren's tower was later repaired.  The remaining construction was made into a garden.  A fountain now stands in what would have been the middle of the nave, and vines grow around empty Gothic windows.  Though it's near a busy business district and is apparently a popular place for an al fresco lunch, it was quiet and serene when I visited.  I wish I had been there earlier for better light for taking pictures, or had had my tripod, but it was beautiful beyond the ability of my camera and keyboard to represent.

Cambridge

Wednesday morning found us boarding a coach (driven by a gentleman whose first language sounded like Polish or Russian) for a trip to Cambridge.  It doesn't take long at all to pass from London centre--depending on traffic, of course--into the surrounding neighbourhoods, and from there into the countryside.  The trip is around two hours, but the time went by fairly quickly.

Cambridge is a little like Santa Barbara: they're both college towns, and so beautiful that it's a wonder students ever go to class.  In the case of the former, though, the college buildings themselves are a major part of the grandeur.

After a stop at a campus cafe to get a drink and use the loos we visited the English faculty library.  In part because of the university's organization, wherein there are a number of separate colleges to which students and faculty can belong, there are departmental libraries whose resources can usually be used by anyone, regardless of college affiliation.  The English faculty library has its own room devoted to Shakespeare and works related to him; it's smaller than you might expect, but then, the library itself, while modern, is on the snug side.  It also features stress-reducing services like a graffiti wall (which, according to the staff, was adorned with many Terry Pratchett quotes and pictures of daffodils this spring) and Tea at Three, where the head librarian makes tea and supplies cake for students.

Next we went to the Judge Business School, where we heard a presentation on user experience.  The important thing about the Judge is that the interior looks like a shopping mall designed by set decorators for "Doctor Who."

Our last visit before lunch and free time was to the Wren Library at Trinity College.  Getting there meant wandering among the back streets, and then behind the college.  The area where some of the colleges border the River Cam is called the Backs; Trinity's backyard includes a well-tended lawn.  Though we weren't able to walk around the college grounds, we did see the quad, which was surrounded by columned walkways and filled with immaculate grass in the middle.  As the name implies, the Wren Library was designed by Christopher Wren.  The library is beautiful, with a black-and-white checkerboard floor and dark wood shelves decorated with crests carved in lighter wood.  It also includes covered display cases that house things like Newton's first copy of the Principia and a manuscript of Winnie-the-Pooh.   Before we went in we were asked to be especially quiet, as there were two students taking exams in the library.  It struck me as not an ideal environment for exams, in part because of the distraction of visitors coming in and out, and in part because the grand surroundings must have been intimidating.  Perhaps the students become inured to such things over time.

Lunch was at a pub, of course, where I had shepherd's pie and a pint of cider.  I must admit that I'm not used to midday drinking.  That did not stop me from trying to adjust, though.
After lunch we had a bit of free time before meeting our coach and returning to London.  Whilst walking we'd passed by a few churches that I wanted to return to.  The first, very near the pub, was St Bene't's.  (According to the church's website, the wonky spelling is because the name is a contraction of Benedict.)  It's not only the oldest church in the city but the oldest building in the whole county.  Therefore, as you might imagine, it's on the small side, with thick walls.  Though there are plenty of later touches--most of the arches are Gothic, as are the present windows--there is one stained glass window high in the west wall that I assume is original to the Saxon architecture, mostly because of its location, which would have been more protected than the lower windows.  The interior is whitewashed, with dark roof timbers and painted angels supporting them; it also features modern suspended light fixtures that would be much more at home in the 1960s than the 1100s.

Next I visited the Church of St Mary the Great, otherwise known as Great St Mary's.  Nearly opposite King's College, its tower is touted as one of the best places to look over Cambridge.  I glanced briefly at the stairs before deciding against ascending, though it likely would have been worth the exertion and fee.  The present building dates from the 1400s and is the University's church; it was built to accommodate greater numbers than the other churches I visited in the city, and has a second storey of pews for seating.  Great St Mary's has plenty of stained glass windows, and figural finials, including a unicorn, on the ends of some of the pews.

I was most excited to visit King's College Chapel.  Despite the name, the chapel is large; it appears to be even bigger than Great St Mary's, or longer, at the very least, since its profile is long and tall.  It's supposed to have some of the best medieval stained glass and vaulting in England.  I walked up to the college gates, excited to see all of this, and asked the porters if this was the entrance to visit the chapel.  You can well imagine my dismay when I heard that the chapel had closed to visitors some fifteen or twenty minutes earlier.  I was told I could come back for evensong, though I couldn't, as our coach was leaving before then.  Not being able to see the chapel was perhaps the greatest disappointment of the entire trip.

After choosing some postcards from a nearby shop I started wandering back toward the coach pick-up point.  As I went I passed a plaque that marked the former location of the White Horse Inn, where Luther's Reformation ideas were debated.  I also stopped in St Botolph's, another of Cambridge's many churches.  The church's website says that it was near the south gate in the city's walls, the one that led to London, and was the first church encountered by visitors crossing the Cam from the west; given that, it's no wonder the church was named for a patron saint of travellers.  Like St Bene't's, St Botolph's is old and smallish and somewhat plain, though it does have a carved screen before the altar that was installed in 1460 (though the paintings on it are from the 19th century).  I think the pendant lights in St Botolph's are even worse than those in St Bene't's; St Botolph's are just big frosted globes that look utterly out of place.  I understand that wiring and lighting a mostly-medieval church must be a challenge, but surely something can be done that's less jarring.

I've no idea which college this is; it's just a typical Cambridge view

As I walked back to the park where we were to meet our coach I passed a horde of schoolchildren, possibly high schoolers, speaking Czech, and wondered if they'd come by coach all the way--some of the EGT kids did, in my first year.  You could not pay me enough to sit on a coach with a bunch of students all the way from Central Europe to the UK.  I was glad to get back on ours and watch the pretty countryside pass by until we reached London again.