“In ancient times,
hundreds of years before the dawn of history,
lived an ancient race of people.
The Druids.

No one knows who they were
or what they were doing.
But their legacy remains.
Hewn into the living rock
of Stonehenge.” ~ N. Tufnel

As we described in our last post, the whole reason for this quick trip across the Channel was an exhibition at the British Museum centered on Stonehenge. It was, however, part of a particularly busy day for us; the kind of day we mostly try to avoid nowadays. It just really couldn’t be helped. We had checked into our hotel in the Whitechapel neighborhood of London, which isn’t necessarily the most centrally located, but with that city’s outstanding public transit system who cares? Speaking of transit, we were in town for the opening week of the Elizabeth Line, a project 20 years in the making which adds a half-dozen or so brand new tube stations and miles upon miles of new track. I won’t pretend to be educated enough about London infrastructure to tell you whether it accomplishes its goals or not, but the stations are clean and modern, and the trains are likewise as comfortable as they are ever likely to be. We took it whenever we could, snug as bugs in rugs. However, our first stop was not via the train. Our first stop was, in fact, about 200 feet from the door of our hotel. Whitechapel Gallery.

To be totally honest, I don’t know if we’d normally be hip enough to know about, much less go to, Whitechapel Gallery. Fortunately cooler people write reviews in newspapers about these things and, to date, they remain willing to sell their papers to the non-cool. The specific reviews that caught our eye were for an exhibition called A Century of the Artist’s Studio: 1920-2020, and it was indeed a treat. Not only were there art pieces depicting the studio spaces of artists (for example photos of Pablo Picasso and Helen Frankenthaler in their studios), there were actual full-size recreations of several artists’ studios, including a corner of one room mimicking Andy Warhol’s Factory and the actual cage that Nikhil Chopra spent 60 hours in at the Havana Biennele. It was absolutely something different from what we normally would have sought out, and all the more illuminating because of it. John was vaguely reminded of an exhibition we saw at Tate in 2007 called “State Britain.” A law had been passed that required protesters to be X feet away from government buildings, where “X” was some absurdly large number. As a result, part of the circle formed by that distance actually passed through the Tate museum. Museums being what they are, they turned that information into an exhibition where the actual protest barricades drew the borderline exactly through the galleries of the museum. Anyway, it was an incredibly immersive experience. And all that before lunch!

From Whitechapel Gallery it is … enh, a 15 second walk to the nearest tube station. Two trains with a transfer later, we were popping up just a few minutes’ walk from the British Museum*. First, though, was a lovely lunch at The Shell. Random seafood isn’t always our go-to, but we’d just had a week of Italian exclusively, so something simpler felt like a good idea. (Expect a review on our Facebook page shortly.) Then we scooted to the Museum for our timed tickets into the world of Stonehenge.

It was a fascinating display, although if we’d thought about it much ahead of time we’d have been able to predict the nature of it. After all, the certainly weren’t going to haul the stones themselves to London. (Where would they find that many willing Welshmen for starters?**) Instead, the exhibit was focusing on shifts in human culture before, during, and after the age of Stonehenge’s “useful” period. Strange to think, but it was only a few hundred years after its erection that the focus of early religions shifted from skyward devotion to mysteries of death and the soul, at which point giant stone calendars, while useful, didn’t hold preeminence. Yes, Stonehenge became obsolete pretty darn soon after it’s completion. In any event, there were fascinating artifacts on display characterizing the culture within which Stonehenge would have been conceived and executed. There were also depictions of other henges, including an actual “woodhenge” made up of a circle of tree trunks that had been hidden completely underwater until a couple decades ago. A rare positive from global warming.

As busy as this all sounds, we weren’t done yet!

We had a date for tea in the Great Court restaurant, which is the mildly-fancier offering of museum food as opposed to the adequate-but-not-recommendable cafeteria fare otherwise available. Great Court offers high tea in the afternoon, made up of little sandwiches, scones, and sweet snackage. We’d hoped (and were happy to discover) that it made for a pleasant respite in the late afternoon.

Especially since there was an entire extra exhibition at the British Museum that we hadn’t even known about when we booked the trip(!). (See earlier posted thoughts on cultural events going on that are both under-publicized and truly fascinating.) In this case the exhibition was “Feminine power: the divine to the demonic.” This time the focus was on depictions of feminine spiritual beings across the planet and throughout history. One of the benefits of doing an exhibition with a “hot” contemporary focus is that loans from other museums seem easier to come by; we only know this from inference, but the exquisite collection of pieces from literally around the world seemed to support the theory. The exhibition did not have an activist viewpoint – that is, it wasn’t arguing for change. Rather, it was trying to scrape the crust off of these feminine figures that already exist and already are powerful but are rarely given full attention in the current dominant cultures. They weren’t being held up, they are up and merely wait for us to turn our heads in their directions. It was an incredible show.

Wrung out from this last art sprint, we lumbered back to the tube and into our hotel, where we made use of the on-site restaurant to put together a pretty simple meat and cheese plate for dinner. From there it was a good night’s sleep before our (relatively) early rise. After all, we had a train to catch.

*- before anybody asks: yes, we know about the Elgin Marbles and the broader problem of plundered loot on exhibit there. We didn’t look at any of that stuff (no really, we breezed past the Rosetta Stone without turning our heads). The case for boycotting the place entirely is compelling. Our reasoning here boils down to the fact that Stonehenge is, in fact, in England, so the particular exhibition is what they actually should be doing in the first place.

**- this may be the dumbest joke John has ever written, which is saying a lot.

By which we mean our trip to London, natch.

When we were in the midst of planning for our move to Portugal, it could get hectic. Very, very hectic. To the point where more than once we’d ask ourselves just what the hell we were doing, and maybe let’s think this through again. So, to keep ourselves sane (by our standards, ok? no judgment), every now and then we’d revisit our reasons for wanting to move in the first place. As you might remember from our talking about our winter trip to Spain and France, we spent a lot of downtime planning out that “first trip” to other countries, and made a point of putting it early in the calendar so it would feel like something to look forward to. (In retrospect, Braga itself would have been the “something to look forward to”, but we hadn’t been here yet.) The other things we’d daydream about were the spontaneous trips that we didn’t even know about yet, but that we were certain would happen because it would be so much easier to accomplish.

(Again, foreshadowing. It can’t be over-used, can it?)

On many of our trips to cities both abroad and within the US, John would grab the local Time Out or similar publication and check out what was going on in the city that wasn’t big news. When we went to New York a few years ago, Lisa bought John a ticket to “Hamilton” while the original cast was still performing, and that was great. But John found out about a play called “The Woodsman” that is in the running for our favorite theatrical experience ever. It was something wondrous to behold, and it helped give rise to John’s working theory that amazing things are going on all the time, all over the world, and outside of their homes you hear very little about them. (It’s not much of a theory, more of a “no shit, Sherlock”, but still…) Case in point: “Hamilton” was a cultural phenomenon that managed to break through for the world’s attention, but “The Woodsman” was our favorite. On our honeymoon in 2012, we found a theatre housed behind a socialist bookstore in Dublin, a little black box with maybe 100 seats in it; but, we saw Love in the Title and haven’t forgotten about it in the 10 years since. (Although, to peek behind the curtain for a moment, we forgot the name of the play, and there’s been about two hours between those last two sentences as John went down the rabbit hole to find it. No, you probably wouldn’t have cared if we didn’t name it, but once he starts looking…) From events like these we (and John in particular) have latched on to the idea that if we had easier access to more places, and more time to go with it, we’d take advantage of interesting cultural events that would have passed us by in the past.

So, back in March, John had a review cross his feed from The Guardian newspaper about an exhibition at The British Museum titled “The world of Stonehenge” that was rapturous in its descriptions. Interesting, he thought. Then, the very next day, he say a different review for an exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum (and let’s not be coy here, he had no idea where that museum was until he looked it up) presenting Camille Pissarro in the context of his relationships with the Impressionists. That was very interesting, he thought. And then, no more than a couple of days later, he read about A Century of the Artist’s Studio: 1920-2020 at the Whitechapel Gallery and it was apparently really excellent. Once he confirmed that Whitechapel is, in fact, in England, this sealed the deal. He presented all of this to Lisa, and with no reluctance at all they decided to make a weekend out of it. And so it was that on very little notice we decided to make a quick trip to London, with a day trip to Oxford(!), to take in highlights of the artistic season. And to top it all off, we decided to add a delay for the National Gallery since we hadn’t been the last time we were there, and with no notice whatsoever we discovered an exhibition of Raphael’s work, giving us all the omen we needed, if we needed one, that this trip was a good idea. And so, coming up next, our long weekend in and around London.

The short answer is that we’re fortunate beyond words for how well it has turned out. This isn’t actually obvious at first glance. The apartment we’ve moved in to, which we were smitten with at first glance, has turned out to have a couple of almost-literally fatal flaws, to the point where we are moving out early to get to a new place. That story will probably come in more detail later, but the fact that we are packing up everything we own, again, slightly less than 4 months after we did it the last time, is certainly not optimal. Our first trip out of the country was not a resounding success. I mean let’s not kid ourselves, we saw and did some really amazing things, but we were overwhelmed at times in Barcelona and the chaos in the middle of our trip to France left us off-balance even as we tried to salvage the experience (which we did by and large). Certain goals that we set for ourselves and our health are more work-in-progress than mission-accomplished; as anybody’s therapist will tell them, the one thing you are certain to take with you wherever you go is yourself. I remember as a kid I heard “wherever you go, there you are” and thought “well that’s dumb.” Hang on, younger me, it’ll make sense one day. How exactly is it so amazing then?

Shockingly, we’ll explain by telling you a long story. Way back when we were in the planning stages of uprooting our lives and moving to a foreign country, we’d talk about why exactly we wanted to do it. For my (John’s) part, there was this hypothetical story I’d keep going back to. “Whenever we’re in a big city like New York or London or … wherever, you read the paper or Time Out Istanbul or or or … and read about all sorts of amazing cultural events that don’t even make the news. Like, when Lisa surprised me with a trip to New York to see Hamilton while the original cast was still there (<—brag), we dug around in the papers and found a little play that you never heard of outside of the city, called “The Woodsman”, and by golly if it wasn’t one of our most favorite theatrical experiences ever. These things are happening, all the time. We’re always seeing reviews of gallery exhibitions or plays or concerts that are taking place in far-flung corners of the world, and they might as well be in Narnia. How amazing would it be if we could actually go to these things?” Side note: whenever we travel to an English-speaking destination we make a point of rooting around for local theater options; we’ve had fantastic experiences in places like Dublin and London. More stories for another time. Anyway.

A couple weeks ago my news feed brought up a review of an exhibition going on at the British Museum in London, The World of Stonehenge. It sounds absolutely fascinating. Interesting. I mention it to Lisa and we both think it sounds neat. Then, a couple days later, another review pops up: A Century of the Artist’s Studio. It looks really fascinating, if maybe a little brief. The mental tea kettle starts to rattle. Then the dominoes start to teeter: in Oxford at this same time is Pissarro: Father of Impressionism. Now the kettle is whistling. We do some quick checks of the calendar, fiddle with a half-dozen websites and, just like that, we’ve got three days at the end of May where we fly to London, see a couple of amazing exhibitions, hop on the train for a day trip to Oxford to see the Pissarro and just sight-see one of the great universities of the world, then back to London to chomp on a Raphael exhibition at the National Gallery that we didn’t even know was there when we planned the trip. Do you see what I mean? Even now that we’re paying closer attention, a pretty fantastic event was going on that is aligned perfectly with our interests and we’d never have heard about it, but here we are seeing it.

Another story. Lisa likes the beach. Waaaaay more than I do, although I’m coming around. Back in the States we would occasionally try to work out a trip every couple of years to somewhere with decent beaches so we could sun ourselves and splash around a bit. This year, she says she’d like some beach time for her birthday. No problem. Plan A is to head to the Greek islands to hit the Mediterranean, but the truth is we were just there a couple years ago and that trip left a mark (another story for another time) so maybe give that a rest. So instead, right now we’re in the middle of planning a few weeks in the south of France and the Loire valley. We’ll splash around in Nice for awhile, then head up into the center of the country and take a gander at a dozen gorgeously-restored castles and their magnificent gardens.

Oh, and in October we’re taking the Orient Express to Venice to spend a week, and we’re trying to sort out which cities’ Christmas markets we want to visit this year. And when we aren’t hitting the road, we live in a charming European city complete with cobblestone streets and an easy pace to life. Whatever travails we’re going through, bumps in the road or whatever you’d like to call it, the truth of the matter is that we are living exactly the life we’d hoped to be living; we know it, and we’re so so grateful for it.

Our breakfast was lovely — smoked salmon and scrambled eggs for me, and a bacon-cheese croissant for J., accompanied by tasty decaf coffee, toast, juice, and jams. This meal, included in the price of the room, really made the accommodations a bargain. The room was not much other than room for the bed, with a wardrobe in the corner, and the bed was nothing remarkable. But the shower was magnificent — excellent pressure and heat. I would happily recommend The Florence House to anyone visiting Portsmouth.

We got a bit of a late start because we needed a recharger for my camera battery (urgently), but were on the road by 11:30am. . . and off the see the south of England.

Our first stop was the Long Man of Wilmington. There is a lot of mystery and controversy surrounding this figure, which purports to be 100s, even 1000s of years old, but there is no mention of it (AT ALL) previous to the 17th century. To keep it intact the National Trust has covered the carved lines with concrete blocks and mow the grass around it diligently. (Which raises the question: how was it maintained prior to the Trust?) J. was a bit let down that we couldn’t see the actual chalk figure, and we regretted not having wifi so we could explore the mysteries a little deeper than the signage provided.

At this point I reexamined the map and discovered that we were due south of Stonehenge, and it really wouldn’t be out of our way to go there, so we did. And it was stunning and moving and incredible.

It was also very busy (where do these people come from? Oh, there are a dozen or more tour buses right there. Got it.) and not at all the serene experience I might have desired. But the stones are magnificent in their brooding, and I was quite affected.

Once again, I had planned to see more than time really allowed, so we skipped the Knowlton Church & Earthworks and went straight to see the Cerne Abbas Giant.

Like the Long Man (and the White Horse of Uffington), this priapic figure is surrounded by mystery. People want to believe it is 5000 years old, or even 500, but no mention exists before 1645. The view point is across the valley, and you’re not supposed to walk on it because that damages the figure, but when we were there a groups of people were doing just that. If I’d been able to, I would have called the police, it was upsetting to see the vandalism in progress and be so helpless to do anything about it.

We continued into the west to our home in Devon for the next several nights — Swallow Barn, outside Lewdon and not far from Dartmoor National Park (of ‘Hounds of Baskerville’ fame). Our host, Simon, met us and gave a tour of this lovely cottage. We have a woodburning fireplace, hardwood floors, white washed plaster walls, a full kitchen, garden sitting area, a tub made for soaking, skylight over the bed for stargazing, and even two cats. Esther and William are 22 and 16 years old and would like nothing more than to share their presence with us. Our hosts even provided fresh farm eggs (their own chickens), milk, apple juice pressed from their own trees, a loaf of ciabatta, and butter. This is a perfect little hideaway.

But there was no wifi service, so we were ‘dead’ when home. Which wasn’t too much of a problem, we weren’t missing checking email, or reddit . . . but was a nuisance when we wanted to research the next day’s plans.

On recommendation, we drove to nearby Lifton for dinner at the Arundell Arms, a nice hotel with a bar and restaurant. We ate in the bar, apparently for less than the restaurant would have cost, but with the same menu. J. had the xx, I had the mixed grill, and was slightly disappointed that the fish was pan-cooked instead. Overall the meal was good, although not outstanding, and we felt it was a good start to this leg of our adventures. (Meal cost = 60 pounds for water 2 cokes, 2 lg glasses of chardonnay, 2 mains, and a dessert.)