Flight to London, drive to Cambridge

8/16/2013:  Our (BA) flight to London was to leave @ 10:10 PM – S thought he’d sleep better and we wouldn’t have to wait around to get into our hotel room, if we took the later flight rather than the usual 6-ish PM.  I’d gotten Dr. Kong to give me Ambien, when I thought I’d be flying economy to Japan, but that didn’t happen, so I had tablets to bring along.

The flight was late, but we didn’t want to change the taxi pickup, so we waited & got sleepy.  I had a flight of wines (3 1 oz servings) and read a murder mystery by Kathy Reichs (Mimi’s rec).  We boarded, I took an Ambien and fell asleep before dinner was cleared (Steve reported), clutching my wine class.

So the flight seemed far less long than usual.  We got into Heathrow, took train from T5C to T5A, picked up luggage.  I got coffee and a bun.  S scouted out where the Hertz shuttle was (S’s bag doesn’t have wheels, so he was carrying it by backpack straps), and got our car, set off around London on the M25 and north to Cambridge, S driving and me squeaking in alarm when I thought he strayed too far to the left.

Hotel Felix is a couple miles outside Cambridge proper.  We arrived w/o incident, slept a couple hours, ate here last night (service v. slow because of a wedding upstairs).  My lamb vg, but the “home baked” bread in my appetizer could have been fresher.

Slept like logs (despite it being somewhat damp and sticky), got up, breakfast vg, set off for King’s college in good order.  Vg exhibit (same as 15 yrs ago, I think) on how Henry VII and VIII continued Henry VI’s construction as a sign of being legitimate successors.

S noted (I didn’t) that the red Lancastrian rose was a later attribution, not used at the time, nor, at the time, was the conflict called the War of the Roses.  Kings’ College as lovely as I remembered, but full of school/camp groups – many sounded Chinese(?).

We went on to Queens’ College – much quieter—1/2 timbered building lodges the president.  Mathematical bridge is in Queens’.  The Cam v clogged w/ punts.  We had lunch at a pan-asian noodle place – next to a lg. Chinese family group, slurping w/ gusto.

We tackled the Fitzwilliam museum – I don’t know why, but the collection didn’t grab me.  S v. taken by two Hogarths titled “Before” and “After” (showing a couple looking flushed & disheveled in the “After”).  It took him a while to realize “After” what.  There was a Van Gough that I liked in the postcard collection in the gift shop that I hadn’t seen (neither had S) and some Japanese paintings I’d missed (the 2^nd floor v stuffy – no AC except in a room w/ Flemish paintings).  V. comprehensive collection – starting w/ Babylonia and ending in the present.

We spent a couple of hours – I mostly reflecting how travel makes me appreciate little things, like finding a rest room when I need one and getting a drink when I’m thirsty.  Then we had tea and a piece of cake at a tiny patisserie and headed over to Emmanuel College (Wren architecture and a stained glass portrait of John Harvard).  

 To our surprise, no admission fee and no signs in the back forbidding walking on the grass.  A small ornamental pond w/ ducks and pairs of queer black birds w/ long legs and red bills – a larger one w/ a glossy feathers & a smaller one w/ duller feathers.  Later we saw chicks – little balls of black fluff on long legs w/ their mommies.   V pretty and peaceful – we sat on a bench for a long time watching the ducks swim back and forth and back and forth.