England - Cambridge and York

It's now been well over a year since we took our trip to the UK, but for the sake of ever having a chance of remembering anything we did, I'm going to try to finish all the blog posts for our last two European vacations.  I think I lost motivation when there were no more trips to be taken and just couldn't get going again.

Our trip to the UK began with a bit of confusion, lots of frustrating delays, and a mid-flight emergency.  We were scheduled to leave Lajes around 10:30am on Friday, May 25th.  In the days leading up to our departure, there were rumblings of an airline strike circulating around base.  Needless to say, we were nervous!  Unlike US airlines, the Portuguese airlines are actually proactive in the face of a known delay.  They called to reschedule us on Thursday night flight off the island.  They would cover the cost of our hotel in Lisbon, and give us meal vouchers for all the meals we would be forced to eat at the airport.  Talk about customer service!  We arrived at the airport on Thursday evening... which turned into Thursday night... which ended up being 2 am Friday morning!  Finally, though, we were up in the air, and that's really all we could ask for.

Not surprisingly, we were both exhausted.  We sent to sleep for a while, but when the food service came around, Chris couldn't get me to wake up.  After repeated attempts by both him and a pediatrician on the flight, I finally came around.  Lack of sleep and a lack of food had caused my blood sugar and, subsequently, my blood pressure to crash.  No blood = sleepy brain.  The flight attendants got me several bottles of juice and within a few minutes, I was feeling somewhat better.  This episode led to me getting checked out by the airport EMT's upon arrival, a cab being called to take us to a hotel I still can't remember, and a very panicked husband.

Sometime Friday afternoon, we returned to the airport to wait around for our very delayed flight to the UK.  All-in-all we ended up landing only five hours after our scheduled arrival time.  We picked up our rental car and mentally prepared ourselves for a night-time dive into driving on the 'wrong' side of the road.

About midnight, we finally arrived at the Holiday Inn Express in Cambridge.  The last time I was that thankful to see a hotel, I was ten, and the Holiday Inn rescued a family trip to Monterey, CA that nearly ended with the four of us spending the night in a pay-by-the-hour establishment (maybe that's why we stopped taking family vacations after that trip).

The next morning, we headed into the heart of Cambridge for a quick tour of the beautiful university town (and the hometown of our good friend Ben, who you'll meet later in this trip).  Our bus dropped us near Market Square, just behind Great St. Mary's church.  

We stepped into the church for a quick look around before heading across the street to the famous King's College chapel.

       

The chapel was easily the highlight of our stop in Cambridge.  Constructed by Henry VII in the 16th century, the fan vaulting supported the largest single span roof anywhere at the time. The chapel is also home to the largest concentration of Renaissance glass anywhere thanks to several good strokes of luck and the removal and storage of every pane of glass during the bombings of WWII.  We visited nearly 100 churches, mosques and chapels during our two years of traveling and this was one of my very favorites.

  

Next door to King's College, sits world-renowned Trinity College.  Some of history's most famous scholars graduated from this prestigious college.  Most of the college grounds were closed as we were visiting during finals week (no pressure building in any of the adjoining dorm rooms, I'm sure), so we were only able to see a small portion of the college.  We did, however, get to see the cloister where Sir Isaac Newton determined the speed of sound (huge nerd moment!!)

and were able to visit the Wren Library.  The Library houses hand-written journals by Newton and the original Winnie the Pooh.  The British, we would come to learn, have a thing for beautiful libraries, and the Wren Library was no exception.  There were no pictures allowed, so you'll have to settle for this picture from Wikipedia instead.  When we visited, there were tables set up on half the library for students to use while studying for finals - can you imagine!

We spent the rest of our morning and the early afternoon wandering around the beautiful college grounds clustered together around the River Cam.  Given more time, we would have happily rented a punt (flat bottomed boat with a pole) and enjoyed the beautiful afternoon sun on the river.

However, Evensong at the York Minster was calling our name, so we packed up and headed north.  Just over three hours later we had successfully navigated the A1, taken in the sites of the English countryside, and squeezed our tiny rental car through the even tinier old city walls surrounding York.  Our bed and breakfast was tucked away at the end of a quiet residential street - which our car almost didn't fit down.  We dropped everything and walked the 1/2 mile to the York Minster for Evensong.  The 45 minute service was beautiful - a musical experience led by the Minster's extremely talented all-boys choir.

With hours and hours of daylight stretching before us (thank you summer in the far northern hemisphere), we started in on the Rick Steves tour of the town.  We began in the park grounds surrounding St. Mary's Abby where we enjoyed an ice cream cone and a quiet chuckle at all the Brits sprawled out sunning themselves on every available patch of sunlight.

Then, we continued around the city atop the ancient walls.  It was fun peeking into the back yards along the way to admire the many beautiful gardens.

   Next, the tour led us through the heart of the city on picture-perfect streets lined with quirky old shops.

At some point, we got lost among the winding streets and gave up on the tour.  We wandered for a while, enjoying the beautiful weather, before ending up at a temporarily-installed Ferris wheel near York's train station.  We took a sunset ride and were treated to outstanding views of the city.

We ended our night in York with dinner at a quintessential English pub - complete with fish, chips, peas (I will never understand the mushy peas thing), and a pint.

The next morning, we woke up early and enjoyed a delicious English breakfast that included eggs, ham, toast, tomatoes and baked beans.  No complaints here!  We made our way to the Castle Museum for a peek at the history of York from Victorian times to the present.  Our favorite part of the museum was the completely reconstructed Victorian main street.  The reconstructed street look surprisingly similar to the real streets just blocks away.

The final stop of our time in York was the York Minster.  Most of the church was closed when we had attended Evensong the night before, so this was our chance to really get a good look around.  The proud Gothic cathedral was completed in the mid 1400's and was spared from destruction during the early Anglican church's separation from Catholicism because it was not associated with a monastery.  The highlight of the church was the Chapter House.  This octagonal room was home to England's very first Parliament, way back in 1295.

 

We wrapped up our tour, packed up the car, and headed north again.  Next stop... Hadrian's Wall and Scotland!

The rest of the pictures for this section of the trip are conveniently located in the "Pictures" tab.  They are also located in the "Travel" tab.  Just scroll down and click on the picture of the King's College chapel.  All the pictures and posts from our awesome vacations end up archived here.