Hampstead and Winchester

Dr. Sawyers has informed me that I'm not to spend this four-day break we are on right now doing work like I planned so I'm taking a series of day trips from London. Four of the girls are in Amsterdam and one is in Dublin so I've been enjoying the opportunity to explore on my own. Yesterday was a SUNNY DAY and I went to Hampstead Heath (heath=hill), a 200 acre wooded park north of London. It's amazing to walk around in the quiet stillness of the Heath and think that you are still in Zone 2 of the Underground and a mere 20 minutes from central London. Dogs run off their leashes and ducks and geese abound although there are no maps or signs to be found so I frequently had to navigate using my shadow and what I know about sun angles this time of year. Hampstead Garden Suburb is as close as the English get to the American suburb where houses actually have yards and I think I even heard a lawn mower in use. The houses are still undeniably English with doors so small that I don't know how they get any sizable piece of furniture through. It's also where the money lives, confirmed by the presence of the first Hummer I've seen in the UK parked in one driveway.

Today I took the train to Winchester, a quiet little town 65 miles southwest of London with a grand cathedral (cathedrals are to small towns of England as grain elevators are to the Midwest) and loads of history -- it was larger than London until 1066. Since we saw the sun yesterday, that will fulfill the quota for the next 10 days at least and today was the typical cloudy with a light drizzle. I stumbled into a great lunchtime concert at the Cathedral, which has three styles of architecture in it, and wandered around the town which sits on the picturesque River Itchen. Evensong with the Winchester Cathedral choir was by far the best I have heard and I'm glad I stuck around for it. Coming back to London now feels like home, although I'm still perplexed by things like why people would eat prawn cocktail crisps and why Londoners can't seem to pick a side on the sidewalk. (Things like sliced Gouda at Sainsbury's and fabulous pastries make up for the crisps.)

My interest in the books of the travel writer Bill Bryson (an American born in Des Moines who lived in England for a while and then went back to the US) ended today when I picked up his Notes from a Big Country, his book on America written for Brits. The first few chapters were quite funny but it quickly changed to his soapbox whining about all the things that are wrong with America and how everything is grand in Britain. I disagree and the book is going back to Waterstone's tomorrow. Spending 3 months outside the US has made me appreciate how lucky we are to be Americans. It's great to travel and expand your horizons and I will continue to do so throughout my life, but I have never been more proud to be American.

Tomorrow may be a trip to Cambridge or Kew Gardens... three weeks from today is our last night in London. As our continent travel plans have shifted, I'm changed my arrival date back in the States from May 14th to May 9th.