Down House

I finally got to where capris! Yes, I know I did other stuff during the day, but that seems a particularly noteworthy fact.

This morning we met for class and headed to Greyfriar's Gardens. The weather for kind of gray, but still warmer than it had generally been. The church was closed when we got there, they're reroofing, so we had class out in the garden. We mainly just talked about the monastic period and some things that McGee suggested we go see, like the exhibition at the British Museum right now called Treasures of Heaven that's about medieval worship. We headed back, and learning that Down House was indeed on (there had been some doubt about this for a little while) I headed out a bit early to get lunch before we left.

We took the train, and while having a small mishap, made it to Orpington and took cabs to Down House, home of Charles Darwin. The inside of the house had been restored, with original furiture if possible, to how it would have been in Darwin's time. The tour was neat, though not spectacular. The grounds, however, are very much worth the trip. There are so many flowers and pretty walks, as well as a green house with carnivorous plants and a beehive. The bees were cool, they had a little comb inside a glass box, so you could see them working, and a tube so they could go outside and pollinate all the flowers.

After walking around Down House for a while, we called for cabs and split the fare between three of us back to the station. Well, to a pub, that it turns out did not serve food. Some of the people hadn't had lunch, so we headed to the main drag and found a cheap cafe that was nonetheless very good. I think I'm going to go back there and try to find the three Harry Potter books I'm missing. They had a lot of the same type of shops as Canterbury where I found the ones I have.

I'm going to attempt three museums tomorrow. I'm going to get an early start, and hit the John Soane museum, finish the Natural History Museum, and see the Victoria and Albert Museum. I found an audio tour for the John Soane that is now on my phone and supposed to be about an hour. I figure about two hours for each museum, but that gives me extra time if I need it.

I'm going to put up pictures now, because it'll be a little while before I can sleep, because it's Thursday and the pub down the street has a college night, which means yelling, screaming, and various cateurwalling late into the night. :P