Walking is Good for Me

Today was beautiful, partly because I didn't have much going on. I finally got mostly caught up on my homework, so after I finished my history class I decided to go to the Wallace Collection (for humanities) by myself. I've decided that I absolutely love going to art galleries by myself, because then I can just do everything at my own pace. Plus, we're all together 24/7 so occasionally being alone is nice. At first I totally went the wrong direction from the tube stop, but that was actually great because the area was a lot of fun to be in. Now I have another street to add to my list of 20 places to go shopping in the near future... After I finished looking at the paintings I decided to be a little adventurous and find my way home by walking. It only took like 45 minutes with a couple distractions and it was fantastic. The tube is great, but sometimes I feel like we miss a lot of London in between tube stops. So the moral of the story is: Walk. It's good for you.

The run-down:

• Westminster Abbey-- So, last time I wrote I somehow managed to forget that I went to the massive Westminster Abbey. It's even bigger then I imagined. There are seriously so many people buried in there, it would take weeks to read look at everything. I found a Croft buried in there and I decided that we're related, but it was all in Latin so I have no idea what it said. We also got to see cool people other than the obvious kings and queens, like William Wilberforce and William Pitt. Did I mention that it's huge? I do have to admit, I still think the idea of having a church be an expensive tourist spot and a sanctuary at the same time seems a little contradictory. Like, how do the people who are buried under where they put the food cart feel?
• Bach-- We had to go to a Baroque concert for humanities, so me and a couple other girls went to a Bach concert at St. Martin-in-the-Fields. The music was performed great, but I have to admit Baroque isn't exactly the type of music I usually listen to in my free time. As usual we got the cheapest seats, which meant that we couldn't even see the performers, but there was this really captivating window at the end of the cathedral that we decided looked exactly like a vortex from some sci-fi movie. I couldn't stop staring at it. Between the Baroque music and everything in the church looking exactly like it would have in during the baroque period there were a couple times that I was convinced we had all been transported back in time.
• Homework-- I put off that second paper forever, but in the end I did it. I'm sure you were worried about that.
• St. Bartholomew's the Great-- This is an amazing old church tucked away in London. It's probably the oldest church in London, and was built in 1123. It definitely looks old, but in a very beautiful way. It's crazy how it's been here so long but it doesn't look like it will ever fall down anytime soon. Even though it was so old it still had the feeling of being very much alive. There were even white flowers around the entrance for a wedding, and people chilling in the courtyard our front.
• the Banquet Hall-- we went there. It's the last remaining part of Whitehall or something like that. We looked for the Palladian architectural influence (hint: it's very symmetrical and has classical influence. If you care, that is). More interestingly right out front is where Parliament beheaded King Charles numero uno. It might just be me, but it seems like some famous person died at like every historic place in England.
• Ivanov-- It's a play by Anton Chekov, and it was performed perfectly. Also, Ivanov was played by Kenneth Branagh, who was totally Gilderoy Lockhart in Harry Potter. There were other people too, and it bugged me the whole time trying to figure out who they were.
• Running-- I've finally gotten down a good schedule for running almost every day. I absolutely love running here because since we live right across the street from Kennsington Gardens and Hyde Park I get to run there everyday and it is the best run route ever. There's a palace, and a lake, and flowers, and fountains, and the Peter Pan statue... It doesn't get any better.
• County Walk-- Along with the walking theme we got to go on a 6 or 7 mile country hike/walk out in Kent on Saturday. The countryside, like everything else here, was just stunning. One of the local church leaders, President Chiddick, and a couple of his brothers led us on the fabulous walk. We went through fields and churches and castles and whatever else happened to be along the way. It was funny though because it seemed like they were always telling us we were in danger of being hit by something, whether it was cars, or trains, or flying golf balls. Who knew a country walk was so dangerous?
• Gelato-- I swear we eat gelato like every night. I've been twice in the past three days. And I really want some right now.
• Hyde Park Walk-- We finally decided to do the official walk for class on Sunday because the weather was just PERFECT. It was fun going on a nice Sunday because there was just so much activity going on, including speaker's corner. It was pretty sweet to go there while people were debating since it played such a huge part in church history. It was also really interesting to just hear what they were talking about, and how they're try to get people in. Mostly they were all talking about politics and religion. There was even an English guy debating McCain vs. Obama. Oh man, you have no idea how much they love Obama here. He's everywhere. But back to the walk. It was fun.
• Buckingham Palace-- Yesterday was the last day that the state rooms were open, so we figured we should probably get on that. It was huge and ridiculously fancy, like all of the other old buildings here. I seriously do not understand how anyone could ever live in a palace. They had the tables set up like they would be for a banquet. Everything was so perfectly lined up. Monk would definitely have appreciated their work.
• Notting Hill-- Since we pretty much live in Notting Hill we decided that we should watch the movie Notting Hill. And of course we got some gelato to eat with it.

The Illustrations (for those of you who don't read):

The vortex. This picture doesn't do it justice.

The Banquet Hall. They had banquets there, go figure.

On our walk we ate lunch in the remains of a Norman Castle

The beautiful countryside

We live in the most awesome place ever. They have an open air art show every Sunday.

It's all serious business at Buckingham Palace.

Ok, maybe not.