Windsor Castle

After leaving Bath on June 20^th, we drove to Windsor so we could visit Windsor Castle. Check out the rest of the Bath posts: Salisbury Cathedral, Stonehenge, Roman Baths. 

We were both very tired and got a bit lost but we made it in the end. It turns out the “rest stops” in the UK are quite different than the picnic table and public bathroom style rest stop you see in the states. We found ourselves at what amounted to a mall when we stopped looking for a WC and a place to stretch. They had WiFi (you had to set up an account though) a Burger King, a M&S (like a 7/11) a couple of little cafes, and a free car park. Take another spoke off the round about and you’ll find yourself at the petrol station and a third spike is for caravans only (campers). Whew!

The town of Windsor was, in every way, quaint. Just about the only thing it has going for it is the castle though I think my mom and Mark’s mom would have loved to have a walk through the little shops and the market. We only had eyes for the Castle though so we headed up to pay our money.

The Castle is not a ruin but a constantly changing piece of architecture, though of course every effort is made to maintain the original character and restore as much as possible as repairs are made. The Castle is one of the Royal Residences so it is kept in pristine condition, and indeed the gardens and grounds were immaculate. We stopped to watch the castle band perform a little and noted that unlike American bands, the band had an oboe and was playing with a brass tuba, not the American-invented sousaphone. The band was still very cool and we enjoyed it for a few minutes before moving on.

link to video of band here... 

embedded video coming as soon as I can find better WiFi. 

Throughout the castle and actually throughout much of England we found hidden touches of the crown. It has started to become almost a game, like finding the hidden Mickeys at Disneyland. Here is one perched innocently on top of a lamppost.

The highlight of the Castle for me was seeing Queen Mary’s Dollhouse. Unfortunately this was a no camera exhibit. For those of you who don’t know, I played with dolls of all sorts all through my childhood and my allowances always went to dolls or doll clothes or accessories. The dollhouse was spectacular. It was several stories tall and each room was filled with tiny details, down to the wallpaper, tiny stoves and fireplaces, beds with hand quilted bedspreads, and dolls. There was a garden with model trees and rose bushes and car park with model cars! Each room was labeled but I am quite sure those labels were added for tourists. I wish they hadn’t been added, as a little girl would not want such labels because sometimes rooms change.           

As part of the dollhouse exhibit, we got to see some of the large dolls that the queen was given as a little girl as a gift from several dignitaries from other countries. These dolls were about three feet tall (the doll house dolls were more Barbie sized or smaller) and their dresses were the most fashionable items of the time. I wondered if the Queen was ever allowed to really play with those clothes and dolls. They looked too beautiful to ever be truly played with or loved like dolls should be.

After the dollhouse we were lead to an area full of genuine suits of armor. We also got to see antique guns, swords, shields, and other elements of battle. In addition, a lot of the plunder from wars past was on display, such as decorative knives and swords and shields from enemies past and decorative military uniforms from defeated foes. Today an officer just needs to look on twitter to confirm if a soldier is telling the truth or not, but back in the day a soldier needed to bring back something from the battlefield to prove that he did indeed do as he said.

We explored the castle grounds some more and watched the planes coming in and out of London Heathrow make an interesting juxtaposition against the turrets of the castle. Finally, when we felt we could see no more without collapsing, we left and continued our drive to the tiny town of Cheshunt where we stayed the night before continuing on to Cambridge in the morning. 

And so after many years of playing the princess, I saw a real genuine castle, an actual royal residence, where royal people occasionally live and do royal things. I decided that while I may act the princess or queen, I much prefer the life of well loved cabbage patch dolls and sitting criss cross on the floor playing cars with my brothers. I wouldn't say no to a mansion though... 

Bath: The Roman Baths and the rest of our weekend

Don’t forget to read up on the first parts of our weekend, Salisbury Cathedral and Stonehenge.

We woke ourselves up early on Sunday morning (June 20^th) so that we could see more of Bath and visit the Roman Baths. Both of us were still suffering from pretty severe jet lag, though we’re still not sure if it was actually jet lag or just lingering exhaustion from the years long haul of graduate school culminating in a Tasmanian Devil style weekend of commencement and defense.

The city of Bath served its purpose as an “entry level” sight seeing city very well. We followed Rick Steves’ advice to spend our first weekend there in order to shake off the jet lag and also to let the whole “ZOMG WE’RE IN EUROPE” thing sink in. And although we scoffed at the notion, in retrospect we needed such a weekend on both accounts.

We found that Bath reminded us a little bit of Las Vegas. Everything was overpriced, had an aura of attempting to be extremely clean despite hooligans constantly messing it up, and there were people dressed up in crazy costumes having stag and hen parties all over the place. (Stag=bachelor and Hen=bachelorette, and I promise the parties are even more raucous than in the states!)

Since we left much of our Bath touring to Sunday, the Bath Abbey was closed to tourists but the Roman Baths gladly took our money. An interesting note of history is that the Bath Abbey is right next door to the Roman Baths. At some point in history the same people responsible for building the Abbey were responsible for destroying much of the Roman Baths, as the Baths were religious grounds for the Romans.

The Bath tour was not cheap, but it did include a fantastic audio guide. These audio guides are very cool as you just dial in what exhibit you’re standing by and it will give you a little speech about it. I was particularly excited by the children’s tour as it had fun characters and more succinct information. They have audio guides at all the major sites we’ve been to, though many cost extra and none of the others have had a children’s tour.

Much of the Roman Baths have been restored to their original state, or at least as close as historians and archeologists can guess. They have excavated and found original paths and floors and pipes and evidence of superb engineering. We found the underground heating system remarkable and imagined what it must have been like to visit in the freezing winter and walk around barefoot on a warmed stone floor. Mark and I were both pleasantly surprised to find that we found the Roman Baths fascinating and remarkable. It is one thing to read about history, hear about it from someone, to watch a movie about it, or even have a lively debate about it. It’s another to put your hands on a lead pipe that once transferred water to a bath full of Romans two millennia ago or walk down a path made of stone bricks formed by a mason in the first century.

After leaving the Roman Baths, we stopped at the Royal Crescent which are some amazing old flats for the very rich. Even the rich live compactly in Europe! Finally it was time for us to wave goodbye to Bath and drive through the country to Windsor. The country drive was beautiful and much of it reminded us of San Luis Obispo county.

Bath: Road trip to Stonehenge

If you missed my recap of the Salisbury Cathedral, check it out here. This story continues from there, as after checking out the cathedral we drove on to see Stonehenge on June 19, 2010.

Seeing stone circles of Stonehenge has long been on my bucket list, ever since I could fully comprehend how many different stories there are explaining how they came to be. Unlike many people who visit the circle, I am not necessarily as fascinated by their wonder or mystery, but by the actual fascination of them itself. I am amazed at how many different kinds of people visit the rocks and have such widely varied ideas about them. The caretakers of Stonehenge tell us that the stones are remains of ancient civilization that used them for worship and sacrifice. Some people believe they were put there by aliens thousands of years ago. Others believe they were built by ancient civilizations whose technology far surpassed our own. Some people are modern pagans and come to visit in sincere practice of their beliefs while others believe they are signs from gods of a bygone era. Any place that holds so much mystery to so many different kinds of people all over the world is a place I am interested in visiting.

I remember studying Stonehenge as a kid and thinking visiting it in person was so far away and unattainable. Perhaps that was one reason why it hit so far up on my life to do list. It always just seemed like something I might never get to do unless I really pushed for it. And yet, almost by accident, Mark and I have found ourselves on a whirlwind tour doing and seeing things we thought might take a lifetime to get to.

When we got to there we were weaved through a maze of cones and lead to a grass car park. (That’s parking lot, in Brit speak.) Though it wasn’t very crowded, it was clear that the management was preparing for thousands of people to show up for Summer Soltice which was in 2 days from the day we were there. Generators and coned parking lots lined the road for over a mile.

We had fun playing with the camera as at this point in our trip we were still learning how to use it and we had only recently found the new lens which Mark really likes. It was really windy and cold which brought in really cool clouds and drove away lurking tourists.

So how do I feel after seeing the stones? I can’t say it changed my life. Well I did have honest expectations. I knew that ultimately they were some stones in some grass and I knew to be prepared for capitalist ventures fencing them off. It was very cool to see so many people visiting and also to see the preparation for Solstice.

When it comes to things like bucket lists and doing things you’ve always wanted to do, I think it doesn’t necessarily come down to needing to have an amazing or life altering experience. You just need to go out and do it so you can say, dude, I did that. You find your chance to do something, and when given an opportunity, you make your choice to take it and enjoy it. For us, that’s become a little bit what this trip has been about. Life only throws you so many bones. How many are you going to cast aside?

York & Edinburgh

Oh, my, god. We got back from last weekend and could hardly move. We must be completely insane for doing as much as we did in 72 hours. We stumbled back into our flat sore, sunburned, exhausted, and smug at the fact that we checked every.single.thing off of our “must-see” list from York and Edinburgh in three days.

Like I did with Bath, I’m going to give a run down of the weekend and post a link to pictures, and then when I get the time I’ll post more in depth about each of the things we got to do over the weekend. Believe me when I say, it’s a doozey!

We left Friday evening after Mark left the lab. We trained from Cambridge to York and we both discovered that traveling by train is by far the best way to travel! That is, of course, assuming you’re not on AmTrack. We got to York and it was quite late so went to bed so we could get an early start.

Saturday morning, June 26th:

Taxi to Clifford’s Tower and York Castle Museum, spend lots of money and time in the museum.

Walk through York, including the historic Shambles.

Eat lunch at very cool café. Order tasty things we can’t pronounce by pointing at the menu. Thanks Rick Steves for the tip off.

Go to the Museum Gardens. See the Abbey hospital, multi angled tower, and the ruins of St. Mary’s Abbey. The ruins of St. Mary’s Abbey currently top our list of most powerful thing we’ve visited.

Walk on top of the city wall. Magically no one is around for much of our walk and we have some peace from the crowds.

Visit the York Minster, give them our money, tour through the minster, listen to the bells, attend the evensong service. 

Grab dinner.

Catch the train to take us to Edinburgh. Breath.

Taxi to our hotel, where it is still broad daylight at 10pm.

Sunday morning, early wake up. Taxi to the Edinburgh Castle.

Spend lots of money and time in the Castle. Remark that some people we know could easily spend several days at the Castle and still not see it all if they read every plaque and listened to every blip on the audio guide.

Walk 1.25miles downhill down the “Royal Mile”.

Stop at St. Giles’ Abbey. Gawk at organ, one of the best in Europe. A youth school (9^th grade? 10^th?) is having a sound check and dress rehearsal. Luck strikes again and one of their girls busts out a clarinet and plays a movement from the Mozart clarinet concerto. A student pianist accompanies her.

Stop at the Abbey café where it is obvious the ladies of the church are selling homemade desserts. Order things we can’t pronounce by pointing. Inhale sugar and coffee and tea. Realize we just took tea as it is about 4:00.

Continue walking down the Royal Mile. Walk some more. Walk more. Stand. Walk. Walk.

Decide to purchase 24 hour tickets to the hop on/hop off double decker tour buses.

Enjoy a 45min tour. See JK Rowling’s teacher college and the hotel where she finished The Deathly Hallows. (Other very historical sites too).

Starving. Must eat. Find restaurant that looks like it has yummy food. Realize it says fries on the menu (not chips). Finally realize we’re eating at an “American” themed restaurant, complete with a blond Canadian passing off as Californian. The same way that Scottish people sometimes work at Irish bars in America. Awesome. We enjoy a club sandwich, cheeseburger, and ketchup on our fries. (The British put vinegar on their “chips”.)

After dinner go to a bar and have cider and listen to some live music. It was not Irish music, just your typical singer/guitar/electronic back ups cover group but they were good and we enjoyed ourselves.

Taxi back to the hotel. Go to sleep while it is still light out.

Monday… must find The Elephant Café! Visit café where JK Rowling wrote most of the first few Harry Potter books before she became famous. I try not to completely freak out. Another thing off my bucket list.

We hear the 1:00 cannon fire and then get lunch at McDonnalds where Mark gets the tiniest McFlurry ever. Americans would do well to learn from British portion sizes.

More bus tour as we can hardly stand or walk from exhaustion and the bus will take us to the outskirts of the city. We drive by the Botanic Gardens.

We stop at the Holyrood Palace but don’t go in because it is expensive. Across from the palace is the recently built Scottish Parliament building. We go in and walk around and decide we need to take a trip to Washington DC sometime soon.

We bus back to the bottom of the Royal Mile where we duck into the Edinburgh Musuem which is free.

Finally we take a bus to the Edinburgh airport, where we catch a flight and then a train back to our flat. 

We are momentarily surprised not to be greeted by Mr. Finnigan and Jenny. Then we pass out.

And so we did it: we knocked everything off the list with just 72 hours and limited funds. Honestly we wouldn’t have done it any differently. Maybe one more day and maybe more money for eating at nicer restaurants, but we had a total blast.

You can see our hundreds of pictures from the weekend here:

June 25th

June 26th 

June 27th

June 28th 

Next weekend: We take on London with even less time.

Quick update from Edinburgh

Hi from Edinburgh!

Mark and I are totally exhausted from two days of whirlwind sightseeing through York (yesterday) and Edinburgh (today). We are having an amazing time touring without jetlag and finding everything as wonderful as promised. Here's a quick rundown. (No pictures yet as I'm on the guest computer at the hotel, but don't worry, there are 654 new ones on our camera and we have almost a whole day left tomorrow!)

-Trains are by far the best way to travel.
-In the UK they make alcoholic apple juice. They call it "cider" but they're not fooling me. Juice box for grown ups.
-We ate at an "American" food genre restaurant and enjoyed ketchup on fries.
-We've seen castles, cathedrals, minsters, museums, bars, alleys, streets, looks outs, the North Sea, sat on the open top of a double decker bus, and sat under the arches of ruins.
-We watched some of the world cup in a pub here in Edinburgh, where it turns out Scotland roots against England.
-I got to see the hotel where J.K. Rowling finished The Deathly Hallows. I also saw the teacher college where she went to school to be a teacher (pre Harry Potter fame, of course.) Tomorrow I'm going to the Elephant House, which is the little cafe where she wrote most of the Philosopher's Stone before she became famous.

And that's just the last 48 hours folks. We're getting our money's worth. And burning off those croissants!

Pictures to come next week when I go back to visit the library!

Salisbury Cathedral

I decided to post some more detailed stories about last weekend's trip, so if the recap and pictures bored you, so will the following few posts. It might take me a few days to get through each thing but as I have been assured that I have at least one reader out there, I figured I would give it a go.

Our first stop last weekend, after getting the car and orienting ourselves to the left side of the road, was Salisbury. Salisbury was a cute little town that was more or less on the way to Stonehenge. It was our first cathedral of our trip and neither of us were sure how much of interest it would be. We were surprised to find that they were having an open house of sorts, and in addition to that the choir was having an open rehearsal.

Walking into the cathedral we were met with breathtaking arches and columns. I wondered who designed such a marvel, and Mark said simply "the best". The entrance was formed with geometric shapes that also framed the stained glass windows, choir seats, and other areas of the cathedral (my Catholic friends would know the proper names.)

Mixed in with old tombs and statues was this modern fountain. Its stillness was striking compared to the bustle of the tourists roaming through the cathedral. Each edge had a different verse that related to different water themes. I love how you can see the stained glass in its reflection.

Depsite all the beauty, there were some terrifying things in the cathedral too. Did you know I am absolutely terrified of cherubs? And they are all over the place here! As proof that they are scary, here is this picture. Take note of the naked cherubs holding the skulls. I challenge anyone to try and tell me it isn't at least a little creepy. Luckily I was so tired I didn't have nightmares.

After walking around and admiring the open areas of the cathedral, we stopped to watch some of the choir's rehearsal. We couldn't imagine rehearsing in front of a huge crowd of tourists (though we certainly know what it feels like to perform for them!) but the choir seemed completely at ease. Please forgive the video quality, as it is one of the first videos ever taken with our new camera. Also people kept walking in front of us as they thought we were taking a snapshot and not a video. In the video, the conductor (Cantor?) is clearly rehearsing the entrance of a certain part of a song. Even to our very trained ears, it sounded perfect to us. Unfortunately the video is not a good capture of what we heard, so we'll try to get a better one at the next performance we go to. 

Regardless of faith or religion, the music was soul stirring. It seemed to come from the walls themselves, or possibly even our own hearts. I could have sat and listened all afternoon. Hearing the evening song performances at more abbey's and cathedrals moved up on our priority list after hearing the Salisbury Cathedral's choir. For any musician or music lover, hearing a choir in an abbey or cathedral should be on the top of your to do list on your next trip to Europe. 

That's all for now! It might not be until next week that I get to Stonehenge, Bath, and Windsor Castle but  eventually the stories will get told. For now I have to continue my job applications and get ready to catch a train to York. That's the original York, by the way, not the new one.

More pictures!

I'm back at the library, maxing out my upload limit and gambling on battery life as there are no seats open near outlets.

Here are links to more pictures. I've put in captions on a lot of the pictures so if you have the time (*cough* retired *cough*) or are being sneaky at work (I know who you are!) then going through the pictures one at a time might read like a little story of its own. You have to click on each picture to see the entire caption.

June 19th Part 2

June 20th 

June 21st

June 22nd

It's been very warm here, and muggy too. All the ladies wear dresses and skirts and contrary to what Rick Steves says, the guys under 50 wear shorts. Mark and I are over dressed in long pants and warmer shirts as we were promised rainy cool days by the 10 day forecast yet it has been bright and sunny and HOT every day we've been here so far.

Tomorrow evening Mark and I are headed up North to York and then continuing on to Edinburgh. We're traveling by train and only taking one backpack and our camera for three nights. This will definitely be a new kind of travel for us, but we're looking forward to the adventure. It will be my first time ever traveling by rail (other than the Disneyland Express and trams at airports) so I'll be interested to check it out.

Pictures!

While the rest of you are sleeping, I've been busy trying to a) find an outlet in the library and b) upload my max 500mb for today so you all can start seeing some of the pictures we've taken. Unfortunately, 500mb isn't a lot so you'll just have to be patient as I just upload what I can.

For those interested, here are some specs on the camera we've been using.

It's a Nikon D5000 DSLR with a Nikon 18mm-105mm lens (We found the lens for a great price at a camera shop in Bath). For the most part, we've been shooting in auto sans flash mode. Before you camera freaks flip out about the auto mode, consider that we are newbies into the camera world and we wanted to first and foremost enjoy our trip and take in the sights, and second take pictures. More advanced photography will happen someday though, and indeed several of these shots were taken by Mark in some of the manual modes. You can tell because they are the good ones.

We're going to post all of our pictures up on Picassa, so feel free to take a look, comment, send along to third cousins who don't really care, etc. I should also note that there are about 60 here and several hundred more coming in the next few days, and we're taking more every day. I'm going to try my best to label pictures and in general say where they are, but if you have questions feel free to comment on them or otherwise let us know!

Go here for pictures!

I love libraries, and you should too.

I finally found a free source of interwebs! The Cambridge library graciously let me sign up for a membership, which not only was free but allows me to check out books while I'm here as well as use their computers. As if that wasn't enough, I can also bring back my laptop whenever  I want to and use their WiFi, which means that as soon as I can pull myself away from sightseeing long enough, I'll come back with my laptop and post our pictures on picassa. Whew! For a few days there I was worried I would have blog when I get back to the states.

Our trip so far has been wonderful. Here's a quick rundown. I'll likely post more when I bring my laptop with pictures.

Thursday-Friday: Travel from Santa Barbara to Bath via Los Angeles, Atlanta, and London. We took a ride from a friend, a bus, two planes, and another bus. Our travel was as smooth as any transantlantic traveler could hope for.

Saturday:

We got our rental car and Mark drove better than the characters on the Amazing Race. We drove a Leon hatchback which was virtually brand new and quite sporty. It rand on diesal and we used less than 1/2 a tank for ~350 miles. In total we spend about $60 USD on gas. The car was very cool in that the engine stopped when the car stopped, much like a hybrid, and started again when you put the clutch in. At first we thought Mark may have been stalling, but we figured it out.

After getting our car we drove on to Stongehenge, seeing a few small towns on the way. The drive was scenic but terrifying. And by terrifying I don't mean Mark was a bad driver. I mean imagine a two lane tiny highway in the US where the speed limit might be 35mph or maybe 40mph, and then put no shoulder on it, and then put yourself in the left lane, and then everyone drives about 60mph because that's the speed limit. And oh yeah the middle paint is white not yellow so you can never be sure if you're on a two lane one way or a one lane in each direction road. CRAZY. What boggles my Californian mind is that these are the roads kids learn on before tackling the "dangerous" motorway which has nice, wide lanes and decent shoulders and the speed limit is still 60mph or 70mph (though we quickly discovered most people go about 80 or even 90...despite the camera cops.)

Stonehenge was very cool. Even though it was ultimately rocks and grass it was amazing to see it in person. Seeing stonehenge has long been on my bucket list so I crossed another one off. It was slightly disturbing to see the finely manicured grass and touristy turnstiles next to the ancient stones but I've been to enough to US monuments to know that where's there's an oppurtunity to make money, it will be taken. We also saw the set up for the summer soltice crowd, which looked intense. That's one line I can't say I'm sorry to miss.

Sunday:

On Sunday Mark and I went to check out the Roman Baths in Bath. Although expensive these turned out to be better than we anticipated. Although very much a tourist trap (expensive museum) it was very well done and an enjoyable experience. I personally enjoyed that I could pick the kids' version of the audio guide to listen to which I found to be more concise and entertaining. It was just so incredible to be able to experience something so old right up close.

Sunday afternoon brought me my first real castle. Now, in my book, turrets=castle, so pretty much every building ever that I've seen here counts, but there's this whole historical thing about being used for war and royalty and what not. So Sunday afternoon we went to Windsor Castle which was yet again a big tourist trap but we enjoyed it anyways. I got to see the queen's dollhouse including a lot of her doll collection and doll clothes. As a girl who grew up playing with dolls, this was VERY COOL. Definitely one of the highlights for me so far. We also saw real suits of armour and tons of swords and guns and war things, lest anyone think I made Mark go look and princesses and dolls.

After the castle we made it to a little hotel that we expected to be mediocre based on the steal of a price we paid for it. But when we got there it turned out to be a very nice room inside of a mansion. Literally! We were disappointed to only stay briefly because we had to wake up the next morning to get ourselves to Cambridge.

Monday:

Mark and I met up with the lab Mark will be working with and we were given the grand tour. The lab is very cool and unlike many of the buildings here in the town of Cambridge, the lab is in an ultra modern building. Much of the lab is built with wood so as not to affect their experiements, and as a result the lab as a cool rustic feeling with high arched ceilings and wood beams. After the lab we head to check into our flat, which is located right in the centre of town. Mark and I were thrilled to discover that the flat they have put us up in is bigger than our current apartment in Santa Barbara. We dropped of the rental car as much of the center of Cambridge is closed to cars during the day (and the car was expensive) and Mark headed back to the lab while I goofed off.

Last night Mark and I made no less than five trips to the grocery store which is about five doors down (two houses in a U.S. neighborhood). The food at the store is extremely cheap! We bought jam for 40p. That's $0.60USD people. We're not entirely sure what makes the food so cheap. Eating out is very expensive and the food is very heavy and greasy for our California taste buds, so buying groceries was a welcomed chore.

The other interesting thing is that we are finding there to be a bit of a language barrier. What, you say? Yes, even in an English speaking country, the thick accents and the different words for things compounded with jet lag have made for more than a few incidences of Mark and I walking away from someone and he asks "did you get that?" and I say "not a clue".

That's all for now!! Pictures in the next day or two, I promise!!

Just a quick note....

We just wanted to do a quick update!

1. We did make it here exactly as planned. Every leg of our travel was smooth, on time, and boring.
2. Jet lag is awful. Just when you think "I'm fine" you wake up at three in the morning and wonder what you should do. And then since you're so far north it gets daylight at four in the morning and you get really screwed up. But you realize you're in Bath, England and you don't really care.
3. Mark and I have both checked off giant things on our bucket list in the last three days. Suhweeet!
4. Tomorrow we move into our little flat in Cambridge.
5. Internet access has been scarce and expensive. So if we don't post again soon... just wait longer.

More to come later. For now, Happy Father's Day to my brothers, and especially our Dads!!

And to Mom and Dad Brady, we wish you a very special happy anniversary!!

Traveling with Science

Hi all, Mark here. Just wanted to share a couple of photos!

First, I took an entertaining shapshot of my luggage. Surprisingly I took the carry-on suitcase through security and they didn't even do anything special. Apparently a foot square metal board with electronics on it is the same as a laptop, according to the LAX x-ray dude. Hey, I'm fine with that! Now we'll see what the UK customs folks say when I stroll in with $15000 worth of equipment and try to get it into the country without paying lots of money to the customs people.

Second, look at this photo and guess where it was taken:

Let's see, fancy mall food court? Actually, it's the Atlanta airport. So much better than crapitty crap LAX! Oh, also the free wifi at ATL is far superior to whatever they have at LAX.

Next up, get on a plane for the UK!

I'm on a plane!

(pictured: us on the Santa Barbara Airbus)

We're off!! The bus we took this morning from Santa Barbara to LAX reminded us a lot of college. I wonder how many different charter buses we took in those four years? Unfortunately we weren't able to take the bus straight onto the tarmac for this trip. The lines for security at LAX were a mess but after lots of waiting and shuffling of items we managed to get our bags checked and onto the plane. They didn't even blink twice at all the plugs in Mark's suitcase.

Our next stop is a layover in Atlanta. Then we have our red eye to London, we have to clear customs (which will be tricky with the equipment Mark is traveling with) and then catch our bus to Bath.

So far everything is going smoothly. In flight WiFi, though not cheap, is amazing. I can't wait for the Alaska fleet to upgrade to it for all of our future flights. I always heard about in flight WiFi but as we normally only fly on little planes for short flights I never really considered it. Now that I've been on a plane for over three hours I see that it is awesome!

Procrastinators always prosper

In case all you doubters were wondering, we're packed and ready to go, bright and early tomorrow morning. Who says we can't do it all?

We leave tomorrow... and we're not packed.

I am still having a bit of trouble wrapping my brain around the fact that tomorrow we're getting on a plane and, if all goes as planned, not getting off of it until we're in London. In all the recent craziness its been easy to lose sight of the fact that I'm about to travel for the furthest and longest I've ever gone in my life. Let's just take a moment to think about that. Ok done. (Hey I'm on a tight time schedule here!)

Today we are working, cleaning, packing, prepping, job applying, shopping, planning and fretting. The entire ___-ing family has closed like an accordion into the last possible 24 hours.

Our plan for tomorrow is to leave our apartment at 7:30am local time. We're hoping to get to our hotel in Bath, England approximately 26 hours later. That's one ride from a friend, one bus, two flights, another bus, and a long walk later.

I could really go for one of those Amazing Race credit cards right about now. And probably another four coffees.

Departure in less than 48 hours!

We're leaving the day after tomorrow! Things are really starting to ramp up around here.

First, in case you missed the memo, Mark defended yesterday so he is officially Dr. Lingwood now! We were so fortunate to have family travel to us to support him as he participated in the UCSB commencement on Sunday and then gave his formal doctoral defense yesterday. Now we're officially done with grad school and appropriately, Mark is spending the day in lab! (To be fair, he's getting ready for our trip to Cambridge...)

I thought about giving an outline of our trip, but instead we'll just post as we go. Something to keep in mind though is that this is actually a working trip, so time is deceptive. Much of our time will be spent in Cambridge itself, while Mark works with the lab there and I sleep in work on job applications. However we will have some very cool sightseeing, including a trip to the town of Lingwood!

Cheers!

Custumary customs

We're now 8 days away from departure and while I'm busy thinking about castles and Hogwarts film sites, Mark is busy trying to figure out how to get through security and then customs. It turns out that bringing a bunch of science equipment to the UK in a post-9/11 era is not as easy, as, well, bringing a bunch of tubas and a drum set to Chicago.

These customs forms are not simple. You would think that between the two of us we'd be able to figure it out. Consider that I have three years experience doing paperwork for a UC school, which means I have seen every stupid form imaginable including cover sheets for cover sheets that REALLY did have the acronym TPS. I thought I could figure out most any illogical form until Mark showed me customs form C88. Yeeesh. I'm sure in the end we'll (he'll) figure it out though.

Meanwhile planning is still happening for our trip. Slowly but surely details are coming into place and we're starting to come out of denial... we really are going to get to go on this trip!

My love/hate relationship with carry-ons, but mostly hate.

If you've read any travel book ever, talked to the kind of people who traverse several continents per summer, ever had a bag lost or delayed, or if you are too cheap to pony up an extra $15-$25 for a checked bag, then you probably fall into the "carry on" club. I always get very excited about the carry on club, and then at the last second withdraw my membership and check my bag.

The carry on club is full of the kind of people who meticulously pour their shampoo and face soap into 3oz bottles, and then organize them carefully with their mini toothpaste, mini deodorant, mini sunscreen, and mini contact lens solution into quart size bags. They probably patiently fold and re-fold (or roll an re-roll) their clothes until they fit into a slightly-larger-than-it-should-be but you-can-get-away-with-it "carry on" size wheely bag and then jam their "personal" item backpack full of stuff too. The carry on club knows to put their wheels out when putting their bags in the over head space and they know that you can carry a purse and a backpack IF the purse can fit into the backpack. The carry on club scoffs at bag checkers who have to wait 15-20min for their bag to come down the ramp and knows that getting on the plane first is important if you want to avoid a gate check.

There is nothing wrong with belonging to the carry on club. I'm secretly envious of this travel style. When I read in my now dog-eared Rick Steves travel book the chapter about packing advice, I usually announce to Mark for the eleventh time that I am going to only bring my carry on roller. I get very excited about the notion of rolling through the UK with my two shirts and one pair of pants and no hair products. I think I am a world traveler in the making and ready to be Mrs. Indiana Jones!!!! I am going to be light, free, ready to go at a moment's notice!!! Then Mark smiles and says "Sure hon" with a little bit too much knowing in his eyes. Soon I start to think about lumpy pillows that other people have used and wearing the same shirt every time I see the chemical engineers Mark is collaborating with and I panic.

I enjoy walking onto a plane with a small purse and feeling less claustrophobic for it. I like that I can be one of the last ones on the plane if I have an aisle seat and not worry about finding a spot to put my backpack. And, perhaps most importantly, I like my vacation to feel like vacation. For me that means my own pillow, my hair products, more than one pair of shoes, and enough choices in clothes to not wonder if I'm over or under dressed if we go out to dinner with people I've never met before. I like to feel comfortable enough to not feel stressed or yucky. I like to overpack.

My reasons for justifying a checked bag on a transatlantic flight are fairly sound. First, it's free to check a bag on most international flights. If it's free, it's for me! Also, Mark already has to check due to the logistics of bringing all of his science equipment and not to mention both business and casual clothes for five weeks. Beyond that, we will have a place to stay where I can dump my bigger suitcase and travel much lighter for our little weekend excursions.

However, since Mark already called dibs on our one (read that with me folks, ONE) suitcase bigger than a carry on, I found myself in need of something other than my roller carry on. However, space is at a premium in our apartment and we quite literally did not have a spot to put another biggish suitcase. I mean, really, we store Christmas decorations in one of our kitchen cupboards. Also, as much as we'd love to invest a few hundred bucks in a nice new suitcase, we would much rather spend that money on rail and plane tickets for our weekend in York (details coming soon!)

It turns out that the solution to my luggage dilema was waiting for me a TJ Maxx. It's an Eddie Bauer duffle bag with wheels. Essentially this means I can still unzip it and store it flat in my closet, but stuff it full of things I want to take with me when I undoubtedly overpack and then roll it through the airport instead of lug it on my shoulders. Perfect. Cost? $30. Love it!

So obviously I fall squarely in the checked bag club, where I've been for the last 9 years of my life. So it has been for each trip to and from Seattle/California, so it will be to London. I'm checking my bag, even if it makes Rick Steves cringe. But I might still throw a pair of underwear and a toothbrush in my purse, just in case.

Look Right

We've been promised by Google street view that while in England we'll get to see "Look Right" painted on various crosswalks and intersections. As you may or may not know, the UK is a country of left side driving. Unlike the US and other right-laned lands, it is necessary to look right, left, and right again before crossing any street. We promise to let you know if it's as crazy, fun, or stressful as the Amazing Race implies.

Driving on the left side of the road has long been on Mark's bucket list and it's one of the first things we planned when setting out to flesh out the details of our upcoming trip. Despite the ridiculous cost of fuel and a rental car, our first weekend is going to involve a mini road trip from Bath to Cambridge, stopping through a few points along the way. 

In order to rent our car, we decided to check out our local friendly AAA office to see what kind of travel agent deals they could offer us. Not surprisingly, we were able to beat their prices on hotels and rail, but they were able to facilitate a decent deal on a car. More importantly, they were able to help us reserve a car with a trunk. Apparently in the UK trunks are not standard so negotiating for one was a bit tricky (and pricey).

In addition to the trickery of the foreign car rental culture, it was also recommended that we get international driving permits. Personally I don't see the need for a translation of a driver's license when we are going to an English speaking country, however Rick Steves recommends it and so does the US Embassy. I am not going to argue with Rick Steves, except maybe about carry on luggage. That's another story though. 

So Mark got his driving permit, we reserved our car, and we set our plan. After our weekend trip to Bath and Stonehenge, we plan to set out on a drive from Bath to Cambridge via Windsor and an over night stop in Cheshunt. Here's the route map. 

View Directions to Cambridge, United Kingdom in a larger map

Departure in 15 days!