England and Scotland for Dad's 70th
Day 6 - Tuesday - England
After yesterday, today is a nice leisurely morning
around the flat,
hanging up our laundry in Francesca's fabulous bathroom (it also has a
multiple
clothesline you can pull over the bathtub), getting ready for the day,
recovering from yesterday.
On the way to the Knightsbridge station, we stop at
Harrods so Dad can
FINALLY see it (or a lot of it -- it's huge), checking out the
downstairs food sections (for groovy gourmet European treats), and
ending a couple of floors up at the Wedgewood
section for a little present shopping for Mom, and then across the
street to the station.
Onto Windsor!
We have to catch the Windsor train at the Waterloo
train station, where
we stumbled on a film crew shooting a tea commercial. In the
middle of this big station where passengers were walking all over the
place, there was a group of people who looked like passengers and
suddenly stepped into synchronized dancing when the lady with the
bullhorn counted over the loud music "One! Two!
Three! Four and turn and one!" There was a guy with a
Steadicam camera, which I pointed out to Dad, another guy with a
Betacam and way off a real film camera up on a high angle (in front of
the dreaded clients huddled around their own monitor -- it looked just
like U.S.A. commercial production). I teased a crewmember about
where the scripty was, and he smiled and said they weren't recording
sound, so... I told him that's why people like me had vacation time!
After changing platforms (you've got to listen when
you're in a big
station like that, or the train you think is taking you to Windsor
could land you in Liverpool), we got on our train and headed to
Windsor. A big guy from Chicago (a cross between Randy Quaid and
Tom Arnold) sat across from us and told us all about his work as a
delivery guy with FedEx, his investments, some really interesting facts
about fire ants, and some other stuff. We get to the Windsor-Eton
station, and I point up at the castle -- "There it is."
So Dad and I plod up the hill through the little
touristy town toward
the castle, debating lunch. It's all ready past one, do we waste
more time? We go straight for the castle (many pictures
everywhere), and stand in line for Queen Mary's (Queen Elizabeth's
grandmother) dollhouse, which I've never seen. While waiting in
line, a group of small uniformed school children, little boys in shorts
and ties and little girls in dresses and straw hats, parade by on their
way to an educational tour. We see the doll house (Whew!
Amazing Buckingham Palace miniature with little electric lights), and
my tummy is rumbling terrifically (I'm hoping for some Queen Mary
Shortbread in the gift shop!). We walk through the restoration
exhibit (of the huge fire in '91 or '92) and state rooms -- the gilded
room that was gutted by fire has been restored with breathtaking
beauty. I could see how it would have broken the Queen's heart to
walk through the wet and sooty rubble.
Outside at the gift shop, I bought some Prince
someone orange chocolate
to gorge on while waiting for real food. Started writing some
post cards,
but a guard told Dad that St. George's Chapel would be closing for
service soon, so I was whisked away to the chapel. More beauty,
naturally, and we see the tombs of King George and Queen Mary
(Elizabeth's grandparents -- and first Windsors of the castle?) and the
Albert Chapel (where I discover the gardens I heard wasn't open today
--
Frogmore garden and mausoleum -- is where Queen Victoria and a bunch of
royalty are buried). Back outside for more pictures (most
notably, a shot at the guards who are walking around with machine guns
which Dad tried to get but they kept walking by too fast), and another
gift shop.
Enough of Windsor Castle, we push through the town
to Eton to show Dad
little posh school boys running around in uniform and, most
importantly, the clock tower Harold Abrahams and Lord Lindsey ran
against in Chariots of Fire
(doubling for the real one at Trinity
College in Cambridge). Naturally, it's past visiting time, a sign
telling us to go away, but it's right at the huge open doorway leading
into the courtyard and there's a bunch of people crossing here and
there. So I pull Dad in the 4 steps and point at the clock and a
wretched little woman with beady eyes zooms in on me and just as Dad's
asking if he can take a picture and I'm saying I don't see how that
could be a problem, she steps up with that little Nazi authority smile
and pleasantly asks if we have a ticket? I say, well, no, but --
and she pushed us out, telling us we would have to leave, no, no, we
would have to leave. Oh, yeah, like you went to Eton! I wanted to
say. So I got a picture of Dad standing by the door, with the
clock tower visible through the door. Hag.
We tromp back through the town, me telling Dad we
can tell people we
were thrown out of one of the finest schools in England, and look for
food. There's nothing. NOTHING! Restaurants that are
closed or unappetizing or both, pubs that stopped serving food after
lunch. We finally land at McDonalds (cheap and dependable).
Back to the train station, and lovely -- some young
punks are
swarming the place, making stupid noises and "Oy!" just being
obnoxious. They steal onto our train, and our ride is delayed 45
minutes while the rail people wait for the police to go car to car,
checking under seats, to de-train them. Dad and I step out after
one of them jumped onto our car, and we chat with a couple of other
disenchanted riders (a woman on a cell phone tells her friend some
hooligans jumped on the train and she'll be a little late) and rail
employees.
Back to Sloane Square, where we are fortunate to
find a grocery store
that's open after 5 p.m. and stock up on milk, cereal (Wheat-a-bix and
Special K), orange juice, Penguin cookies (my fave!), scones (I simply
haven't had enough of those!), Jellybabies and other candies.
Tea with Francesca and sleep!
England and
Scotland for Dad's 70th
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