I'm sitting halfway back. There's a long central aisle that extends the length of the bus with two seats on each side. Knee room is fine.
Now, just so you know, I will be adding more pictures to this blog post tomorrow sometime. So you might want to check back later.
Blenheim Palace was first.
It's one of he only non-Royal castles in Britain. Actually, Winston Churchill was born here. He was two months premature - his mother was dancing at a ball and went into labor so fast they couldn't even get her upstairs - he was born in the cloakroom. Growing up, his cousin was the Duke, so he came often to spend the summer. He proposed to his wife here, and later married her.
Inside was super elaborate. Actually, it reminded me a lot of the Breakers house in Rhode Island. Interestingly enough, that house belonged to the Vanderbilts. One of the Vanderbilts, Consuela, married a Duke and came over here to live in this house. Sadly, the marriage didn't last, but she was highly regarded by her peers. It was interesting to hear the story from the British side.
This is the dining room. The roof goes up a whole story higher than my picture could include.
Look at that place setting! Where do you even start?
Then we came to my favorite room of all.
The library of course. It felt like the part in Beauty and the Beast. The room is huge, with bookshelves everywhere. And an organ on one wall. Don't ask why - I have no idea.
Now, the interesting thing about this property is that it is rented with a flag. Years ago, the ancestor of this family won the fight against the French. In geatitude, the house and land was given to him by the king, rented at a very cheap price. Every year, the Duke presents a "rent banner" to the queen. It's just a flag with embroidery on it, but that's his rent for the estate for the year. The queen hangs it in Windsor Palace, where we actually saw it when we went there.
When we went to see the gardens. We optimistically assumed we could see them in an hour.
Ha. Thanksgiving Point has nothing on this place for size. It's huge. They have a little train to take visitors to some of the further away gardens, but we didn't even make it to the station.
Then we saw this sign:
Well, why not? So we went in.
Of course, it then leaves you with the debate: if a secret garden has a sign, is it still a secret garden?
Anyway, we went back to the house. This is a picture from the garden side.
Now, it probably doesn't look familiar at all. But if you've seen the new Disney Cinderella, this estate served as the outside of the prince's castle. Of course they used their movie magic to sweeten it up a good deal, but this is it! I was thrilled.
I did not know this fact when the picture was taken though. That's why I only look a normal level of excitedness.
Anyway, after that we went to Oxford. It's one of the three or four oldest universities in the world, claiming all the way back to the 11th century.
If you go to Oxford, it won't look like much. Snaky little streets wind between really tall stone walls? You can see the occasional high tower, but if you try to get to it, they'll stop you at a gate and ask for admission.
This is why.
The whole place is made up of colleges. Each college is its own little building complex, shaped like a hollow square, or "quad." If you're familiar with the Joseph Fielding Smith Building on BYU campus, it's much the same. The architect deliberately tried to make it look and feel like a college quad.
Also, if you've seen Chariots of Fire, that's set in a similar setting, although it's filmed at Cambridge.
Each hollow square has a dining hall, student dormitories, a chapel, and classrooms. Students eat, sleep, study and worship with the same set of classmates through their entire university career.
This type of hollow square architecture jewels back to the Dark Ages, when monestaries were the haven for the continuation of knowledge. They were shaped the same way, with a dining hall, chapel, dormitories and schoolrooms. Early universities like Oxford based their architecture on that design.
According to our teacher, students never have to take regular classes, and they only have two tests, one halfway through their time there and the other at the end. If you fail either one, you're out. No second chances. The rest of the time you will work one-on-one with your mentor. He'll give essays and assign books to read, and the student will read the books and write the essays and discuss them with his teacher and then go back to re-write the essays or read more books.
Also, different teachers will give lectures. A teacher will post an announcement saying what the topic will be, how many lectures he'll hold, and where it'll be. Then he shows up and teaches whichever students chose to come.
Dr. Talbot had carefully given everyone a map and a list of the best sights to see, but when we got to Oxford, we were dropped off at a different location than where he'd thought. He announced over the speakers in the bus that he'd be willing to show the starting point on his map to any students who wanted. I think he was surprised when roughly thirty of the forty students followed him down the street. That's actually quite an accomplishment. It was very crowded for some reason, and we only found out later that it was graduation week, so everyone's parents were in town.
We followed him closely, and by the time we got to the first stop, Miriam had persuaded him to take us all through the tour instead of abandoning us.
Best choice ever.
Dr. Talbot is an Oxford enthusiast. He's actually lectured here before as a guest, and he knows all kinds of trivia!
The field here is where Lewis Carroll used to play with his friend's daughter. They'd go rowing in the river beyond the trees. Her name was Alice.
The building on the left is the college that J.R.R. Tolkien used to work at. The tower on the right belongs to the college where C.S. Lewis taught.
The two were friends and used to walk through the fields at lunchtime, discussing myths and Christianity. C.S. Lewis thought Christianity was merely a collection of myths as well, but Tolkein disagreed. He believed that Christianity consisted of true myths, unlike all the other stories. Eventually Lewis realized Tolkien was right, and it was here that he finally knelt and prayed. He later described himself as initially being the most reluctant Christian of them all.
This is a kissing gate. It's a metal gate that swings back and forth inside a very narrow U-shaped passageway. Only one person can go through at a time. Dr. Talbot ran ahead and shut himself in it. He then proceeded to lecture us from inside the gate, cheerfully dismissing the fact that he was blocking pedestrian traffic from both directions. Someone made a joke about it being a kissing gate, and he promptly tried to talk his wife into kissing him through the bars.
It didn't work, but it was very funny.
It also took forever for all thirty of us to get through one at a time, though we moved as quick as we could. It's amazing how well people can work together when they're desperately trying to keep up with our springy-stepping teacher.
We walked between some of the colleges, and Dr. Talbot quite blatantly pointed out two students walking by in their official garb. I'm pretty sure he only did it to embarrass us, because he'd just given a lecture on trying to be inconspicuous as possible. The Oxford students thought we were weird.
Dr. Talbot is the kind of man who tries to sneak into educational places without paying. Because he looks every inch the absent minded professor, I imagine he can usually succeed. But not with thirty students trailing at his heels. He did sneak us in a couple of doorways though, when the guard wasn't looking, and we stood just at the entrance and took pictures.
This is the Bodlian library.
Every book published in English speaking countries sends a copy to the Bodlian library. The place is staggeringly enormous, spreading underground in all directions.
Then there was the best part. Seriously, the very best part. We walked around a big building called the Camera, (no, that is not an autocorrect) and there was a sidewalk with a lamp post in the middle.
This is the original lamp post - the one that C.S. Lewis walked by every day, and the one he wrote into the book The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe! In fact, when the makers of the film were researching, they came and made their lamp post look exactly like this one - only this one doesn't have visible roots.
We all sort of stood in awe, and then Dr. Talbot broke the mood. "James," he called. James is his son and is the only boy in the study abroad. "James, come and take off your shirt and play Mr. Tummus."
Of course James was nowhere to be found. Then off bounded our teacher, and the rest of us worked frantically in relays to get pictures with the lamp post so we could catch up.
The Camera:
Our tour finally ended in the open air covered market, where we dispersed.
These are cakes.
Miriam and I split a sandwich and headed to the local bookstore.
It was wonderful.
The only thing that could've made it better was if it had used books. Folks, it had all the children's books I love! Lots of them I didn't even know we're still in print! Andrew Lang's fairy tales, Howard Pyle's King Arthur, Kipling's Kim, The Lost Prince by France's Hodgson Burnette, a whole series by Enid Blyton, The Swish of the Curtain by Pamela Brown (so excited to see that one!), and the entire Swallows and Amazons series by Arthir Ransome!
It was like a dream come true.
The only sad thing was that they didn't quite have the entire Swallows and Amazons series. I almost worked myself up to buy my favorite of the lot, just to realize it was the only one missing from the shelf. I guess I'm not the only one who loves that particular book.
Right before leaving, we trotted off to see the "Eagle and Child," the pub where Lewis and Tolkein used to sit and bounce story ideas off each other and read each other's manuscripts. Very cool.
After we got home, we all said goodbye to Keith, our driver. He's a very stereotypical kind of guy - short, round, red faced, smokes, bad teeth, jolly person. I'm not sure what he's a stereotype of, but that's him. He's a funny sort. Earlier in the day we'd had to drive through a narrow gate. He got on the microphone. "Will everybody please press in. Press in, or we shan't get through."
There was a moment of confusion as we tried to figure out what he meant, and then laughter when we realized he was asking us to make ourselves as skinny as possible so the bus could fit through the gate.
We made it with inches to spare.
After making ourselves sandwiches, Miriam and I set out on one of our last walks. It's a walk along the other side of the Thames. It used to be a really creepy, seedy part of town.
You ever heard of a prison referred to as a "clink?" That refers to the old Clink Prison that used to be here. Now though, it's quite nice, especially along the riverfront. There's a nice wide walk, well lit, and you can see the whole city on the other side.
We walked two miles, all the way from the Tower of London, past St. Paul's, and down almost even with Westminster. They were all on the other side of the river from us, so we had a really good view. Towards the end it was dusk, and really pretty. And at the end, we walked back across the bridge and went home.
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