This weekend I decided to go exploring outside of London. Another teacher friend (Georgie) and I embarked on an excursion to the town of Canterbury. We started off the day with a train ride through the city, which then turned into rural England with green fields, sheeps and horsee. We arrived at Canterbury to cloudy but dry weather, and strolled through the main street, lined with a mixture of ancient buildings that date back to medieval times to modern buildings. It was quite bizarre to see modern chain shops such as Starbucks in a building that was obviously quite ancient! Everywhere there were National Heritage Trust signs, detailing where Chaucer and the like lived. After a quick lunch we explored the Canterbury Cathedral which was quite amazing. High vaulted ceilings, beautiful stained glass windows and large echoing spaces all combined to make it a very humbling experience. We also explored the Crypt, which had an amazing sculpture made of nails (unfortunately we weren't allowed cameras in that part!).
After the Cathedral we went to the Canterbury Tales, which brought the famous writing to life. For once medieval English made sense to me! We then explored the various ruins left from the medieval times, including Britains oldest Franciscan building and the ruins of Norman Castle. After dinner we returned to the Cathedral for some night photography, and then did a ghost tour through the streets, learning about the gruesome stories of Canterbury's past. The leader was quite amusing, and regularly told amusing stories about the town. We made our way back to the train, and gladly collapsed into our seats. As we were flicking through our photos from the day, we realise that we hadn't taken one photo of ourselves during the day! We made sure we took a photo on the train, just so we could prove we had been there! After the long train journey home I was very glad to fall into bed after an exhausting day exploring.
Sunday was Chinese New Year, so a group of friends and I headed into Chinatown in London to partake in the celebrations. The streets were jam-packed with people, you could hardly move! We enjoyed a late lunch at one of the numerous Chinese restaurants, and after exploring the streets of Chinatown we made our way to Trafalgar Square for the fire works. Unfortunately I couldn't get close enough to a dragon to get a photo, but we could hear them and see the heads bobbing up and down over the crowds! It was a nice and interesting end to an interesting weekend!
