Had an amazing couple of days. I love London.
Went to Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament. They’re doing restoration so it wasn’t nearly as impressive as what it was last time I saw it- but nevertheless, it was stunning. Got some amazing photos of the Thames – London is such a photogenic city.
Yesterday and today I bought breakfast and had it in St. James’ Park – one of the Royal Gardens of London, directly in front of Buckingham Palace, home to hundreds of animals. An amazing place, they’re such beautiful gardens. Yesterday I was sitting on the grass and a little squirrel came and sat beside me, so I shared my baguette with him. They are so used to humans; he was sitting right next to me and let me pat his head. They’re so adorable.
Both days, unfortunately, I arrived at Buckingham Palace right at 11.30 so the Changing of the Guard was just starting. I decided not to stay as it seemed every tourist within 100 square miles had come to watch the changing of the guard and I was far to late to get a good place. It is absolutely chaotic when the guards change, you’ve got to get in hours early to find a good place. I think I’ll go watch it when I’m back in London in a few weeks.
I’ve been up to Trafalgar Square as well, sat by the fountains and watched all the tourists. We’re such funny people… I went to the National Gallery yesterday - such an amazing place. The art spans almost 700 years, from the 13th- to 15th- century. There’s entire rooms full of Raphael; the incredible Entombment, the elusive and most superb of the unfinished Michelangelo’s; da Vinci sketches; Venus and Mars, Botticelli’s finest work; and Monet and van Dyck and Gossaert and Van Gogh, and so many other magnificent works. I think I might have to go there again, there’s so much there I’m sure I missed something. But oh, it was fabulous.
I then attempted to find the Photographer’s Gallery but I, er, got lost. So I wandered down Charing Cross Road and Tottenham Court Road, and went shopping on Oxford Street (as you do) then wandered down a side street and got lost again. Walked around in circles until I got to the British Museum, which is quite potentially the most amazing building I’ve ever been to. I did one of the audio tours, which was great – the museum has far, far too much there to be able to go through it all in one day, and there are so many incredible artefacts. An audio tour as really necessary at times because there is a lot of things that at first sight are seemingly insignificant but really have shaped the history of the world. For example, this one beautifully crafted knife that is maybe as big as my hand – exquisite craftsmanship aside, rather unimpressive – but it was found in Tanzania and is almost 2 million years old, and it basically confirmed that the human race originated in Africa.
The Museum has some astonishing things; the Flood tablet, which could potentially be the origin of Noah’s Ark; the Mummy of Katebet, one of the most studied of the Egyptian mummies (they were so small!); the Aztec turquoise double headed serpent, statues from Easter Island, sculptures looted from the Parthenon in Greece; Assyrian Lion Hunt relics; a colossal 7 tonne bust of Ramses the Great, taken from a temple near Luxor; a Sloane astrolabe, remanent from the Age of Enlightenment; and – oh my gosh I was so excited when I saw it – the Rosetta Stone, discovered by Napoleon’s armies, the stone that deciphered the hieroglyphs for the first time. It’s astounding. The sheer importance of the stone is hard to grasp. Being able to read hieroglyphs advanced the study of ancient Egypt by enormous proportions. Its actually quite interesting how they did it; the inscriptions on the stone are divided into three very distinctly separate pieces – the top is hieroglyphs, the second in the common tongue used in the Pharoic era, and the third in Ancient Greek. Therein lies the key to reading the hieroglyphs: each of the sections reads the exact same text, so as scholars could read the Ancient Greek they could logically decipher the hieroglyphs. They can confirm that it’s correct as certain symbols and symbol collections were known to represent the names of Pharaohs as they had been found in throne rooms and on personal belongings. The sheer impressiveness of that one item makes the museum worth going to, even for ten minutes (hey, its free)
It’s absolutely amazing; I still can’t get my head around how many important things are in that museum. Their Egypt collections are of astronomical proportions; I have a feeling it may be among the best in the world – including the collections at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. (I’ll let you know!)
Got onto Anne yesterday – she was in Florence at the time but came back Sunday night so I stayed at her place. Met Ben, he’s lovely. Going to spend a week or so with her again later on; she’s left for Dubai today so I’m here by myself at the moment, heading up north to Newcastle tomorrow to visit Alison. I think I’ll stay there for ten days, then go over to visit Jenny at her uni in Lancaster, then come back down to London. Am considering going via Oxford and Cainbridge and maybe go to Cornwall for a day. Definitely have to get to Stonehenge at some point, maybe spend a day in Bath too.
Oh, decisions….
