Again we got up in time for breakfast, and more news on the car bombs. We checked out of the hotel, leaving our bags, and headed down Vauxhall Bridge road because one of our maps shows two hospitals on it and we had a load of sharps we wanted to get rid of. The receptionist at the first hospital we encountered started out confused by our request to dump sharps, and eventually was flat-out angry at the idea. We didn't even bother stopping at the second hospital.
We continued down Vauxhall Bridge, following signs for Tate Britain, and were stopped by a municipal worker who asked us directions.
Once we got into the museum, we apparently looked lost enough that a volunteer sidled up to us to help, directing us toward maps and Room One. During our visit, we discovered we both prefer portraits to landscapes, so that allowed us to skip a lot of the rooms. I particularly appreciated how works of female artists were just stuck in where it was appropriate, with no great "look! a female artist!" fanfare. Many of the museum's Constables were bequeathed by the Constable children in 1888, while other paintings were acquired before 1850.
We went through most of "Historic British Art" (skipping the seascapes), then moved on to "Modern British Art," where most of what we saw was inspired by the world wars. A section on the history of slavery (abolished in the UK in 1807) included etchings of radical philosophers like...Leonhard Euler. In the early/mid 20th century exhibits, I found I particularly liked works by John Piper, Winifred Nicholson, and Naum Gabo.
I bought a pen in the museum's shop, we grabbed some sandwiches at a Tesco's, and we returned to the hotel to pick up our bags. We walked to the coach station in a light rain with a very comfortable cushion of time, and discovered that every single person waiting for the bus to the Dover Cruise Terminal was at least 60 years old. Except for us.
The drive to Dover was about 2-3 hours, and we slept the whole way. Any views we might have missed were blocked by fog. At the terminal, the oldsters from the bus were dropped off at a smaller ship, and we continued on to the Constellation with only four other people. A porter took our baggage and we went through security, passing through at least two large waiting areas, both empty. Apparently we were cutting it close, as we got onboard just as muster was called. We ran up six decks to our room as everyone else walked down, grabbed our life jackets, and headed to the assembly point. Fittingly, we were separated when we got out to the lifeboats, with Greg in boat 1 and me in boat 3.
After the muster, one of our bags arrived. We went to the sail away party and declared it to be lame, the sailing was delayed due to bad traffic between London and Dover (I wonder how many people had to miss the boat for them to hold it; probably a lot), and we just wandered around the ship until dinner.
At dinner, we were seated with two other couples: Ann and Tim, accountants from the San Francisco area; and Janet and Tom, Methodist ministers from rural Pennsylvania. I actually wrote down what we had for dinner:
S - mushroom puff pastry, tomato/black olive soup, salad w/roquefort, hake w/white wine sauce, creme brulee
G - duck terrine, carrot orange ginger soup, caesar, stuffed chicken, pistachio creme puff
Our second bag had arrived when we returned from dinner, and we celebrated by getting the ridiculously valuable soda sticker, allowing us a constant stream of diet Coke for only $5 a day. We visited the card room for a game of Scrabble (discovering too late the missing blank), then got online to find our wedding pictures had been posted!
Pedometer count: 13,382
We continued down Vauxhall Bridge, following signs for Tate Britain, and were stopped by a municipal worker who asked us directions.
Once we got into the museum, we apparently looked lost enough that a volunteer sidled up to us to help, directing us toward maps and Room One. During our visit, we discovered we both prefer portraits to landscapes, so that allowed us to skip a lot of the rooms. I particularly appreciated how works of female artists were just stuck in where it was appropriate, with no great "look! a female artist!" fanfare. Many of the museum's Constables were bequeathed by the Constable children in 1888, while other paintings were acquired before 1850.
We went through most of "Historic British Art" (skipping the seascapes), then moved on to "Modern British Art," where most of what we saw was inspired by the world wars. A section on the history of slavery (abolished in the UK in 1807) included etchings of radical philosophers like...Leonhard Euler. In the early/mid 20th century exhibits, I found I particularly liked works by John Piper, Winifred Nicholson, and Naum Gabo.
I bought a pen in the museum's shop, we grabbed some sandwiches at a Tesco's, and we returned to the hotel to pick up our bags. We walked to the coach station in a light rain with a very comfortable cushion of time, and discovered that every single person waiting for the bus to the Dover Cruise Terminal was at least 60 years old. Except for us.
The drive to Dover was about 2-3 hours, and we slept the whole way. Any views we might have missed were blocked by fog. At the terminal, the oldsters from the bus were dropped off at a smaller ship, and we continued on to the Constellation with only four other people. A porter took our baggage and we went through security, passing through at least two large waiting areas, both empty. Apparently we were cutting it close, as we got onboard just as muster was called. We ran up six decks to our room as everyone else walked down, grabbed our life jackets, and headed to the assembly point. Fittingly, we were separated when we got out to the lifeboats, with Greg in boat 1 and me in boat 3.
After the muster, one of our bags arrived. We went to the sail away party and declared it to be lame, the sailing was delayed due to bad traffic between London and Dover (I wonder how many people had to miss the boat for them to hold it; probably a lot), and we just wandered around the ship until dinner.
At dinner, we were seated with two other couples: Ann and Tim, accountants from the San Francisco area; and Janet and Tom, Methodist ministers from rural Pennsylvania. I actually wrote down what we had for dinner:
S - mushroom puff pastry, tomato/black olive soup, salad w/roquefort, hake w/white wine sauce, creme brulee
G - duck terrine, carrot orange ginger soup, caesar, stuffed chicken, pistachio creme puff
Our second bag had arrived when we returned from dinner, and we celebrated by getting the ridiculously valuable soda sticker, allowing us a constant stream of diet Coke for only $5 a day. We visited the card room for a game of Scrabble (discovering too late the missing blank), then got online to find our wedding pictures had been posted!
Pedometer count: 13,382
Labels: honeymoon
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