Port Meadow

27 November 2014

The sun came out around noon.  We took a bus to the center of Oxford, and then walked to the southern entrance to Port Meadow. A trail map at the entrance pointed out where the meadow floods in winter. This was the only part of the footpath that was raised and dry.

We followed the path to Burgess Field, to the east of the meadow.

Then we doubled back to the entrance and walked west toward the Thames River.

We walked north along the muddy towpath.

On several gates around the meadow were notices that an environmental impact study was taking place ahead of a proposed development.  It was on the towpath that we saw this sign:

I turned around to look.  They lost the battle:

A dirt road led away from the river to a village.  We decided to follow it.

The Perch, the pub in the village of Binsey:

Again we doubled back, this time walking south along the Thames canal towpath towards the center of Oxford. The sun would be setting at 4:02 p.m. We had half an hour to get back.

Eddies in the canal:

The new graduate housing complex loomed to the left.  It was ugly and obtrusive.  It might not have been so bad had the architects attempted to blend them in with the older buildings in the city.  I didn't take any pictures.

Duckweed:

Ducks.  (Mallards.)

An expansive community garden, the second that we saw:

Graffiti or not, Oxford likes its walls:

We emerged a quarter mile from the train station, where we could catch a bus back to Beechwood.  Here's the bicycle parking lot:

I chose the top level front seats so that I could get one good, last view of Oxford. At the edge of the shopping area is a churro truck, one of a small handful of food trucks around the city.

Tomorrow I have to be up at 5:00 a.m. in order to get to the airport by 8:00 for my 10:30 flight.  Every side and corner of my suitcase is stuffed with boxes of chocolate.  I can just barely get the thing zipped.

So that's it, my summer vacation.  See you at Winter Larry's ride on Sunday?

Wandering Around London Again

 Oxford Street, London

26 November 2014

We thought we'd get to two exhibitions today:  Hogarth's London at the Cartoon Museum, and Disobedient Objects at the Victoria and Albert Museum.  

The bus got us nearer to Hogarth, so that's the one we started with.  First, though, we got lunch, and then we stopped at Jarndyce Books. This is a serious antiquarian bookstore near the British Museum.  It's serious enough that one has to ring a buzzer at the shop door in order to get in.  Jack hit pay dirt, finding three books printed in the eighteenth century, two of which are by the forger he's been here in Oxford to study.  There would have been a fourth if a colleague of Jack's hadn't snapped it up first.  At least he knows where to find it.

We spent much longer there and at the Cartoon Museum than we'd planned.  There wasn't enough time to get to the V&A before closing, so we decided to wander the streets instead.  I fed "sweets" into Around Me; there was a shop about a quarter mile away.  To get there, we walked down Oxford Street, which is like walking down Park Avenue in New York City.

I loaded up on licorice that should last me a few months.  Jack got more of those abominable foam bananas. At the register, Twinkies were for sale.

More Oxford Street:

We were close to Soho, so we went that way.  We paid homage to the former Omygod storefront, now a hair salon.  We passed sex shops targeting gay males.  We found what looked to be a serious coffee shop: they had raw and roasted beans for sale, including Kopi Luwak.   It's bad enough that coffee growers are paid unfairly; it's just as bad that civet cats are being confined and force-fed coffee fruits.  Sumatran is one of my favorite single-origin coffees, but I'll take my beans before a civet cat eats them, not after, thank you very much. 

I did buy two single-origin beans I've never seen before, from Indonesia and from Thailand.  Jack said that if I end up liking them a lot, I'm screwed, because I'll never find them again.  "You're here for three more weeks," I replied.

At Picadilly Circus we turned onto Regent Street, which is even more posh than Oxford Street.  The holiday lights surrounded ads, though, which was cheesier than the lights themselves.

Cheesy, but still pretty, and they look like antlers, so...

The Slug and Lettuce is a chain bar.

A big boob light hangs over a Victoria's Secret store where Regent Street and Bond Street cross:

Bond Street east: peacock feathers;

Bond Street west: feathers and boobs.

Further north on Regent Street, a pedestrian walkway:

One thing we've noticed about most of the holiday lights:  they're LEDs.

The fog had turned to drizzle.  We arrived at Marble Arch minutes before the X90. We got dinner in an Oxford pub, by which point the drizzle had turned to real rain.

Tomorrow is forecast to be sunny, though, so we'll stay in Oxford and go walking in Port Meadow or along the Thames.