Colchester Castle and Cups of Tea

Here we are in England sat on our friends' (Lara and John) couch ready to order a take away while we type of our visit so far. We've had a trip into London where we met our friends Helen and Pete; visited the Tate Gallery (old, not modern) where we saw Ophelia, but our favorite, Lady of Shallot, is on tour in Amsterdam. We visited the British Library- really interesting stuff: Magna Carta, Queen Elizabeth's I letter explaining why she wouldn't marry, many historic religious texts, and, of course, original copies of various Beatles lyrics.

Yesterday we were off to Colchester. It's a city about 45 minutes from Andy's hometown. Brilliantly displayed history of the city at a museum in Colchester Castle. Colchester is the oldest recorded city in all of Britain and was the site of the famous battle in which Bodicea (who was actually named Boudica) overthrew the Romans.

Tomorrow we head into London again and will end the day meeting up with a friend Andy's not seen in over 20 years... he's excited to catch up. We plan to also go the the Inns of the Court where the barristers can be seen coming and going and was the site of the filming of the Knights Templar part of DaVinci Code. We'll also visit the National Portrait Gallery and possibly go to Harrod's.

We've had good visits with family and friends and lots of nice cups of tea. Looking forward to our trip to the north of England which begins on Friday with a train journey to Newcastle-on-Tyne.

Although the weather's been cold and rainy, it hasn't been as freezing or snowy as other parts of the country. We shall continue to make these entries despite Andy's dad's opinion that it's a "bloody waste of time!"

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"She said she usually cried at least once each day not because she was sad, but because the world was so beautiful and life was so short." (Brian Andreas- Mostly True)