London 2012

 Mother planned another great trip this year which also included my 10 year old niece Ava.  She has always loved hearing about our prior trips to London.  When she was 4, she actually told her pre-school teacher, "My Grandma is going to London to see the Queen."  My parents have a London coffee mug in their cupboard and that was always the glass she wanted to drink from.  Mother promised her years ago that when she was 10 she'd take her to London and by gosh, she did.  Mom did her homework and basically got her a free airline ticket between her frequent flier miles and her Delta Sky credit card credits.  Her transportation was cheap because she can ride the Tube for free.  We rented an apartment for a week and a half and had a great time in Merry Olde London.  This is of course Big Ben and Parliament and behind that is Westminster Abbey.  She was thrilled of course and even though I'd been there before, so was I!  London never gets old.

 I'd never ridden in The Eye before which was something we did on this trip.  All I can say is England should have absolutely no national debt because of this thing!  There was a huge line both when we got on and got off and it was $20 a crack to ride.  It was worth the price of admission though.  The wheel never ever stops, it just slowly goes around.  There is a security check when you get to the front of the line and they bunch you into groups of about 20 or so.  Then they herd your group up to this large platform ramp thing and the pod comes along, the doors open and a group steps out, staff step in with mirrors to security check the pod, and then your group steps in--all while the wheel is moving.  The pods were air conditioned and it was an awesome view of the city.  You can see Big Ben in the lower right hand corner of the photo.  The Eye is right across the river from Parliament.

We also took a day trip out of London to Salisbury to see Stonehenge which I'd also never seen.  There were a bunch of Druids and Morris dancers inside the stones when we were there.  That is one combination platter I wouldn't order.  We civilians had to stay behind the rope but we did see a Latvian Harley Davidson enthusiast promptly escorted out after she stepped over the rope and touched the stones.  At almost $30 per ticket, that was an expensive stunt to pull. 

We explored the town of Salisbury a little as well as visited the cathedral.  This church is the tallest spire in the UK and leans almost 28 inches to the east.  The adjoining museum houses the Magna Carta.  We learned that even though Salisbury had secret plane manufacturing facilities, the town was never bombed during WWII.  The German pilots were given strict orders not to bomb Salisbury because they'd use the spire of the cathedral as a landmark and then follow the rivers up to London.  While we were inside the church, there was a full orchestra and choir rehearsing pieces from Haydn.  Hearing that glorious music made the space even more magnificent.

My other favorite day trip was a train ride to Dover to visit Dover castle and the WWII tunnels.  Dover has always been a significant location as a fortress and military outpost.  The castle was interesting with it's intact buildings and walls and mock ups of medieval living, but I enjoyed the WWII tunnels the most.  This was the sight of the historic Dunkirk evacuations, aka Operation Dynamo.  Hundreds of thousands of allied troops were isolated and surrounded without supplies or transport on the beaches of Dunkirk.  The Germans were bombing any and all rescue attempts and the Allies couldn't risk their large hardware.  In the end, civilian fisherman and merchant boats rescued thousands and thousands of troops and brought them back to Dover.  They were blessed with both calm weather and German inactivity for a few days and got the job done.  We toured the tunnel that served as command center for the mission as well as a hospital tunnel.  The tunnels were dug and used before WWII during the Napoleonic wars and used after WWII in the 1960's as a Cold War regional seat of government.  The weather was rainy and cloudy when we were there so we were unable to see France.  We did get to see a bit of the White Cliffs of Dover.

I loved all the WWII memorabilia and picked up a few items.  I wasn't going to get the thermos because I already have one that size and it was L17, but I found one that was reduced to L13.60 because it had a slight dent in the cup!  Whoo-hoo!  I also never knew the British TV show "Dad's Army" was set in a fictitious town similar to Dover.  I will be getting that on my Netflix.

We were so busy with our daily activities and day trips that we had time for only one yarn shop, but I picked a good one!  We went to Loop which was quite easy to find.  We rode the Northern tube line to the Angel stop and then followed the signs about a block to the Camden Passage and there it was. 

It was a lovely two story shop that was well stocked with tools, notions, books, patterns and help.  Lots of designer brands as well as plenty of English brands.

It was very busy in the shop!

We bought a pattern book written by one of the proprietors of the shop and all the pattern examples were in the shop which was nice to assess the garment size.

I also bought a beautiful book of embroidered Estonian gloves.

I bought a skein of Madelintosh for a baby sweater in the Loops book and 4 skeins of Quince and Company linen yarn.

They also sold Sajou threads and scissors.  I so wanted to get an Eiffel Tower pair...but they were over L50.  So instead I bought the charming L8 pair instead.  We also visited the Liberty store where I got some Sajou ribbons and a few knitting tools.

My other favorite purchase was this herb grinder from the Tudor Kitchen shop at Hampton Court.  It is beautiful burled wood and filled with thyme.  Ava learned a lot about Tudor life, Henry VIII, Elizabeth I as well as Queen Victoria. 

My mother Queen Elizabeth III planned yet another great trip!