Stratford-upon-Avon

Last Wednesday we spent the day in Stratford, birthplace of William Shakespeare.  Our class did not have any visits planned, but we had received some suggestions of places to see on our own.  We arrived around noon and had no obligations until 7:30.  Our whole group of several classes had evening tickets to see Cardenio at the Swan.  Several of us explored the specialty Shakespeare shops and considered what we wanted to do.  Four of us decided to visit the Shakespeare Library, located in the discovery/tourist information centre.  The visit was quite nice and the librarian was sweet (separate post to follow).  The physical building is not large enough to accommodate our whole class; though in the past visits had been arranged.  The few of us who wanted to visit made a point of doing so, the rest of the class was free to do as they pleased.  

We then walked out to Trinity Church, the church which Shakespeare attended and where he is buried.  His grave is inside the church, up in the front.  On the walk back to town we followed the river and decided to get cream tea in a specialty tea shop.  The shop sold loose leaf tea, and had a 4 for 3 sale going on, so a friend and I each got two teas.  We wandered in a few shops and finally decided to walk along the river down to the Swan Theatre.  We were still early for the performance but we decided to sit and relax.

The Swan Theatre and the RSC Theatre

The Swan Theatre has recently been renovated and is not what I was expecting.  The theatre is oval shaped, with ground seats and two galleries.  Our group was in the upper gallery.  We had to lean forward over the rail to see the actors; we were looking down on the tops of their heads when they stood on our side of the stage.  Regardless of the angle we had a good view, and I liked the unique perspective it provided.  I really enjoyed Cardenio once it got going.  I didn’t know anything about it, but I was curious to see a lost Shakespeare play recreated.  At intermission I ran down to the theatre store and bought a copy of the play.  When the play ended we all headed back to the bus for our ride back to London.  We were all tired but excited from the performance.  Most folks seemed to have enjoyed it.  It made for a late night back, but it was worth it.  I saw two very different Shakespeare plays back to back, and I enjoyed them both.



Theatre and Cinema

This week I went to two Shakespeare performances.  On Tuesday morning I went to the Wyndam Theatre and took part in their daily lottery for tickets to Much Ado About Nothing.  Twenty seats are offered for only 10 pounds.  There were about 50-60 people there.  I was lucky and managed to win a seat!  I got to see David Tennant and Katherine Tate Tuesday night.  The show was amazing, everyone worked well together and some of the dialogue between David and Katherine was just fantastic.  Then on Wednesday night our class went to Stratford-upon-Avon and we saw Cardenio at The Swan Theatre.  I’d not even heard of the play before but I went.  Considering it’s a lost Shakespeare play, and has been re-imagined I understand why I was unfamiliar with it.  I did enjoy the performance.  The Swan Theatre has been recently renovated and we had seats in the second gallery, so at times we were looking down on the actor’s heads.  The play was good, even if it made for a late night home.

Friday night after we got back from Oxford I decided to go to the Odeon Theatre in  Leicester Square and see when Harry Potter was playing.  I thought about going to see the movie Saturday night, since it was a free day.  As I was wandering around I noticed that the 8:15 show was sold out, and no wonder since it was Opening Day and only a half hour away.  I made note of the show times for Saturday and took a couple pictures of the posters.  All of a sudden a man walked over to my general area and asked if anyone wanted to buy a ticket for the 8:15 showing.  I responded and asked how much money he wanted for it.  He said 10 pounds, which was less than it cost.  Apparently he was part of a large group and they ended up with an extra.  I bought the ticket and went in with his group.  We had seats about halfway back on the left.  The movie was in 3-D, so I had to deal with the glasses, but it turned out being fine.  What seemed odd to me was the fact that many of the previews were also in 3-D, I hadn’t seen that before.  The previews also took a full half-hour so the movie didn’t start until 8:45.  Seeing the film with a lot of crazy Harry Potter fans was fun.  There were many costumes and folks clapped and cheered when appropriate. 
 

The film finished around 10:45 and I walked back to the flats, crossing the Hungerford Bridge.  I took a couple of pictures of the Eye and Parliament all lit up. 

Weekend Travels

This past weekend I traveled all across the southern countryside.  On Friday and Saturday the program offered day trips to two locations each day.  On Friday we visited Stonehenge and Bath.  This was my second time to Stonehenge, but I still enjoyed it.  It was quite windy on the Salisbury plain, but it stayed dry.  Not so in Bath.  We got some scattered showers while we were out wandering.  I saw the baths, the Regency architecture and visited the Jane Austin Centre.  Two of my fellow LIS students and I decided it would be a good idea to be indoors for a bit, so we walked back to the Centre.  It had a Regency tearoom on the upper floor so we stopped there for tea and lunch.  We dried out from our brushes with the rain and warmed up with good tea.  I got the Jane Austin blend and enjoyed it.  I also got my photo taken with Mr. Darcy (the portrait of Colin Firth.)  We headed back outside to meet the bus and the clouds darkened on the walk.  It started to rain, and then it poured as we stood and waited.  We tried an umbrella shield but it didn’t work too well.  The bus ended up being very late and we ended up soaked.  The fact that it took us four hours to get back to the flats just made things worse.  We arrived back in London after 9 pm, after having set out at 8 am.  I was cold and just wanted to get off the bus by the end of it. 

Saturday had better weather.  Less people turned out for the second trip than the first.  From the complaining Friday night it sounded like several of them were not willing to suffer a long bus ride again.  I was not deterred both because the trip was to two places I’d never been to and because these locations were a shorter distance away than Bath.  We first went to Dover Castle then on to Canterbury.  Dover Castle was a good castle, extensive lands, nice walls, and had areas from all across history.  It has a Roman lighthouse, a Saxon church, medieval tunnels, and WWII bunker tunnels.  We climbed the keep and could see pretty well across the Channel, we thought we could see the French coastline.  After a couple of hours we got back on the bus and headed to Canterbury.  I paid to see the cathedral, had lunch at a café, walked on the wall, and saw the old Norman castle.  Our entrance fees to both Stonehenge and Dover had been waived because we were an educational group.  So I decided to go ahead and see the cathedral, since two other sites had been free.  We had amazing weather on Saturday and we actually arrived back in London by 7pm, and had enough energy to do something before crashing.

Sunday afternoon I went to Windsor Castle with a friend.  It was nice to not have to get up early and sit on a bus for hours on end.  The train ride took about an hour, with lots of stops.  The weather was nice once again and we were able to avoid the huge queue since we had pre-purchased our tickets.  We were able to see the royal apartments and state rooms.  We spent a couple of hours seeing the sections that we could see, although we avoided the doll house exhibit, both because of the long queue and because neither of us had an interest in seeing it.  After the castle we got lunch and tea and the Crooked House of Windsor and then headed back to London.  I had a good weekend, full of traveling and seeing castles, churches, and old stones.

Harry Potter Premiere

On Thursday as I walked through Trafalgar Square I saw the Harry Potter preparations under way.  I took some pictures of the set up process.  There were some diehard fans already camped out near the stage, and we saw plenty of Potter outfits and facepaint when I went to Tesco for lunch.  I sat on the steps of St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields and observed the craziness beginning. 

On Friday night I decided to attend the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows world premiere in Trafalgar Square.  I knew that this would never happen again, I was here in London and I didn’t have any plans.  I walked up to the Square and found a spot near the edge of the crowd.  Most of the square was barricaded off so that the die hard fans who had camped out were on the inside, up close to the stage and screen.  Many fans were standing on the steps to St. Martin’s-in-the-field; their view partially blocked by a statue.  I had a pretty decent view of the huge screen; I was far enough back to see it over the banner barricade.  For those of you who have been there I was back near the National Gallery, standing against the short wall.  I was on the left edge of the crowd.  The wall was too crowded for me to get up there and get a better view, but I was fine. 

Around 7:15 a few of the stars walked down from Leicester Square to see the fans.  Dan, Rupert, Emma, and Rowling came down along with the producer and director.  They all thanked the crowd, autographed items, and spoke to fans.  They each had some time with the microphone; I could hear bits of Emma’s and Rowlings’ speeches, but not the guys.  Emma and Rupert ended up in tears; Dan managed to hold himself together.  Apparently lots of the actors turned up at Leicester (I don’t know all the actors names): Hagrid, Ginny, Snape, Molly Weasley, Voldermort, the twins, and Dumbledore.  Around 7:50 they headed back up to the Odeon for the show, and then a 10 minute preview/series summary was shown on the big screen.  Literally 5 minutes after it ended the police were out trying to get folks to go home.  I was exhausted from a long day and was happy to head back to the flats.  For one night I got to pretend I was a crazy Potter fan.  It was fun being on the fringes of the crowd.