Greetings from across the pond! I hope things are going well for everyone in the states...
London is still fabulous and fun! I have been going to lots of museums and have been to see some of the palaces so I have some things to tell you about...
Megan and I went first to the Science Museum (the South Kensington tube stop) but found that it really wasn't anything to write home about (although that is exactly what I am doing right now.) Anyway, it had some neat artifacts of medicine and the only display about the history of veterinary medicine I have ever encountered. Besides that however, I did not feel impressed.
Then, my friend Angela from home came to visit so we went to the British Museum and the Imperial War Museum. Both were incredible. The British Museum has a facade that I think is an exact replica of the Parthenon in both appearance and size. Really a fantastic spectacle! Inside we only had time to visit the Ancient Egypt displays and saw the Rosetta Stone (which is really an enormous stone with hieroglyphs on it!) as well as many mummies and sarcophagi, which were truly fascinating.
The Imperial War Museum (IWM) was my favorite museum so far and by far. We first went to an exhibition called Crimes Against Humanity which was an eye opening look at genocide from WWII to today. They said that prior to WWII, 90% of war fatalities were soldiers. Today, that figure is reversed. 90% of war casualties/fatalities are citizens/genocide victimes - aka, WWII, Rwanda, Darfur, Serbia...For evil to triumph, it takes but good men to do nothing. Very true and poignant, I think!!
Yesterday we visited Windsor Castle and Hampton Court Palace. Windsor was stunning. It is the largest continuously inhabited castle in the world. It was first used in the 1000's for William the Conqueror after the Norman invasion of England. The Saxons were apparently hard to control so he built moat and bailey castles everywhere. Today, Elizabeth II lives there on the weekends and she likes it more than she likes Buckingham Palace (which was not initially built to house monarchs!). We didn't get to see the Queen Mary's Dolls House because the line was 1.5 hours long, but I hear it is amazing! Has anyone seen it?
We saw Henry VIII's grave in St. George's Chapel buried next to his third wife Jane Seymour - the only wife (of his 6) to bear him a son (Edward VII) who died at 17. We also walked on the tomb of George III (the tyrant king during the Revolutionary War!) and felt like patriotic Americans for doing so!!
Hampton Palace was very nice too, though not as well maintained as Windsor of course. Hampton is about 500 years old and was built over 3 centuries, originally by Henry VIII's Cardinal Wolsey. Wolsey was arrested and Henry VIII took it over with his 5th wife, Catherine Howard, who was later beheaded for having an affair with Tomas Culpeper.
Anyway...I'm still having a great time! Paris is next weekend and I could not be more excited. I will put up some pictures of the palaces/museums from the last few days!!

Missing all of you!!

Katharine