England, Yeah?

My time in England confirmed something I have long suspected: I love the British. Their clothes, the humor, their obsession with pre-packed sandwiches, the large selections of vinyl in their music stores, their tendency to keep left…I could go on.

The view from the kitchen in Tara’s flat. Speaking of flats, the cost of living in London is just as bad as you’ve heard, if not worse. To live in central London in the same flatshare as Tara and Sarah would cost me more than 4x what I pay for my reasonably sized apartment in central Calgary. Yikes.

Bored? Walk around and you may come across a free concert by some very talented, foul mouthed Glaswegians.

The Pants searching through vintage finds at Portobello Market. A crowded gong show, but so much fun.

Windsor Castle in Windsor. Oldest working castle in the world and home to the queen, when she’s at home. She was not home when we were there. Silly Liz. We were of course not allowed to take photos inside, and I was at the stage of the trip where I obeyed the rules. You will later see my sneaky snapshots in various museums. Actually, if you hit up Tara and Sarah's blog you'll find a better account of the Windsor visit, and probably better pictures, too.

St. George’s Chapel at Windsor. This place was amazing. It was such a gorgeous church and was the site of many royal marriages and tombs. They even had a 1st edition Leviathan on display. Ack! We decided to attend the service later in the day and were absolutely bowled over by the traditional Catholic mass in the inner chapel, complete with chanting choir and Latin. I was enthralled to be in such a historically important place, listening to beautiful music, never mind the tomb of Henry VIII right in front of me.

Ah, th’moors. Heathcliff? Actually, this is just the edge of th'moors. Diehards, calm down.

Yorkshire. The land of some of our forbearers and great accents. And so many sheep! The little white dots on the other side of the valley are our fluffy friends. We were sitting on the top of a hill, having a moor rest, when all of a sudden the loudest, most frantic bleating you’ve ever heard came echoing across the valley. We were hysterical for about 10 minutes.

Small town Yorkshire did not win The Pants’s heart. In fact, we altered our Irish itinerary and had to miss the Gaeltacht area because three days in small town Ireland would have been just as bad and might have killed her. The best part was the following conversation:
“I’m bored. Let’s go to a movie.”
“But they don’t have a movie theatre in Haworth.”
Silence. “But, how can it not have one?”
“It just doesn’t. It’s too small.”
Confusion evolving to wrath. “I. Hate. Small. Towns.” Her deep-seated hatred of small towns is the result of an unexpected breakdown in Boulder, Montana a few years ago. She’s never recovered. Probably for the best as getting to Haworth was a ridiculous ordeal involving rickety trains and an elusive bus station in Keighley.

I, however, enjoyed seeing a bit of regular English life, as London, I was assured, is decidedly not English. Haworth was obviously built long before modern construction equipment was invented so the unleveled ground made for some insane hikes up some of the steepest streets I’ve ever encountered. We were mortified as little old ladies trucked past us.

York was an incredible city. All cobblestones, narrow streets and old buildings. I seem to recall that it's the oldest city in England, but I could be wrong. As we walked back to the hostel after midnight it was horribly foggy and the gothic spires of the looming Minster scared us silly. We walked very quickly.

The Pants having a chat with her new friend Constantine.

Next: Scotland.