Thursday, September 13, 2012

and London again

Wend. marked our last morning in Bath, wh. we spent having a pleasant walkaround, first along the Avon on a shady bike path (passing some honeysuckle along the way), then along the Crescent again (where to my surprise we saw a magnolia tree --thought I'd seen three poss. ones before, but this one in bloom and close up confirmed it), then the Circus w. its five great old trees, and finally a sit down for a cup of tea at 'Boston Tea Party' before heading back to grab our bags and check out. To the station, and back to London.

After returning to Celtic House, we went and did laundry, during wh. Janice (bless her) sent me off to Skoobs Book store while the washers washed. Found four books there: one by Christopher Tolkien (a collaboration w. Nevill Coghill I've been looking for for a long time), one by Joseph Wright, a Flann O'Brian, and a Wodehouse (the book I've been trying to read on Kindle proving discouragingly skewed).

That night was a Jack thr Ripper walking tour, wh. was interesting but during wh. we got soaked in a sudden downpour



And today was a trip down to Highclere House, home of Lord Carnarvon, patron of Howard Carter's King Tut excavations. Everyone talks about how sad it was that he died just after his years of trying finally paid off: think how sad if he'd died the year before, rather than the year after!

John R.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Magnolias in bloom! Ours bloom in early spring here in Vermont. The season in England must be very different or is it a different type of Magnolia that grows in the states? I know I was amazed when I first saw the hardy varieties that we can grow this far north and I had to have one.

John D. Rateliff said...

They were the southern Magnolias we have in Arkansas, the same kind as grow (with care) in the Seattle area. We saw one in bloom today at Windsor castle -- only a single remaining blossom, but it's v. late in the year for that back home. Nice to see, though.
--JDR