Athena Visits the UK

Forwarded from Athena's e-mail

Hope you guys are doing well. I just got back earlier this week from visiting Steve and the UK. I spent 12 wonderful days. I didn't want to come back. We had a great time.

I left on 20 Apr but didn't arrive until Thursday, 21 April. Despite having a very long flight the flight wasn't bad at all. Steve's company paid for business class which ends up being first class on British airways. You get a huge seat that reclines all the way back to a bed, your own personal TV and real food. No crowding. Nice flight....my best ever.

The first night I met Steve's "harem" of women co-workers and temporary UK boss (Art) and his wife (Susan) at an Indian restaurant in Newcastle. Friday I wandered around Newcastle while Steve was working. I saw many different churches/cathedrals, monuments, bridges, and a nice museum. Later that night we went to his boss' home to have a wine tasting. I have never had so much alcohol in my life...I started to get a headache after the 15th wine and had to slow it down..we ended up tasting about 20 wines, plus a few dessert wines. Too much alcohol for me but an interesting experience tasting wines from around the world.

Saturday morning Steve and I took a train to Edinburgh, Scotland. We stayed at the Caledonian Hilton which was a beautiful hotel, however it was partially undergoing reconstruction. When we arrived we wandered around the city and gawked at the beautiful centuries old architecture. Not only that but it was so green. Really beautiful. We walked along the "Royal Mile" which is where the oldest buildings are and the street ends at Edinburgh Castle. We also took a tour of Mary King's Close. Closes were small alleyway's that people used to live off of. Many of them were built over a long time ago however there were still some existing underground. Pretty neat. Sunday we took a 4-bus tour of Edinburgh and saw the sites. We saw the school that Sean Connery went to as an adolescent. We also saw Holyrood Palace which is the Royal residence of the queen when she comes to Scotland. Monday we went to Edinburgh Castle which was huge and neat. It also provided many views of the city itself. Monday night we headed back to Newcastle by train. I attempted to make my famous chocolate chip cookies for his coworkers because he was ranting and raving about how great they were. However I didn't have my normal ingredients and I had to figure out the different temperature systems (C instead of F). They came out okay but not my normal great cookies.

Tuesday I wandered around Newcastle again while Steve was working. I saw Castle Keep which was a really neat and tall castle. Who knew they just loved spiral staircases a long time ago...I guess to save room. No elevators then. I was out of breath by the time I got to the top. I also wandered around the Baltic flour mill museum which used to actually be a flour mill and wandered around the Tyne and Millennium bridges.

Wednesday evening we headed to London, England and stayed at the Waldorf Hilton. The next day Steve and Art had to go to an all day meeting. I was so excited that I wandered all over London on my own. By the end of the day I had walked 9 miles (I don't know what I was thinking). I saw Big Ben, House of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, Hyde Parke, Kensington Palace, and many monuments. I didn't actually go in the places because some were closed and others were so expensive (around 12 pounds which ends up being 24 bucks). I wanted to go into Buckingham Palace and would have paid the fee however it is only open to visitors in August/September. I watched the changing of the guard for about 45 minutes....but after that I had enough of the changing of the guard. It was neat to see the men in their uniforms which looked like they had a large furry animal on the tops of their heads. I don't know how they saw since the hat seemed to cover their eyes. I wandered around Hyde park which is sort of like the central park of new york to London. it was so beautiful, green, and well kept. they keep the grounds with so many beautiful flowers. By the time I got back to the hotel I was so exhausted. We went to a great little Greek restaurant for dinner.

The next day Steve was working some more for about half of the day. I wandered a bit around the British museum, the bridges, and St. Paul's Cathedral. After lunch we both went to the British Museum which was just amazing. We saw the Rosetta stone (http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/writing/rosetta.html), the Parthenon marbles, and tons of other Greek and Egyptian relics. We were just in awe. We weren't able to see everything. We also unfortunately weren't able to make it to the national gallery. Later we went out for good Italian food and then saw "The Lion King" on the British version of Broadway. It was really good.

Saturday, after walking around everywhere Steve and I took the Tube, which is UK's version of the metro and visited more cathedrals, the museum again, Tower Hill---a huge castle, the Tower and London Bridge, and we walked around Notting Hill. Later that night we went to a beautiful Greek Orthodox Cathedral, St Sophia's, for the orthodox Easter service. We had never seen so many Greek people in one place in our lives.

Sunday we went on an organized tour. We saw Avebury henge and Stone Circle where there were tons of sheep and lambs. On the way we could see the beautiful green grass fields and the beautiful bright yellow orogold grain fields. We then saw Stone Henge---which was the one thing I really wanted to see on my trip. It was amazing. Unfortunately you couldn't go right up to it. It wasn't on as high of a hill as I thought. It was still amazing considering when it was built. We also saw the remains of Old Sarum Castle. We then headed to the town of Salisbury and saw the Cathedral there and where the house that they filmed Sense and Sensibility. The Salisbury cathedral contained one of four remaining copies of the Magna Carta which was another neat piece of history to see. Also during the tour we drove past Sting's huge tudor mansion. Pretty neat.

Monday morning we awoke bright and early and headed to the airport at Heathrow Airport and headed our separate ways--Steve back to Newcastle (he will return to the US at the end of May) and me back to the desert in CA. I watched a ton of movies of great movies on the flight back to LA then I drove back to Fort Irwin.

It was a whirlwind trip but fantastic and I have lots of pictures and memories.

love
Athena (and Steve)