Yesterday we went to Greenwich and toured the newly opened Cutty Sark clipper ship, which was a real treat, and we visited the National Maritime Museum and Royal Observatory. Yes, we stood on the Prime Meridian.
http://www.rmg.co.uk/cuttysark/?
http://www.rmg.co.uk/explore/astronomy-and-time/astronomy-facts/history/the-prime-meridian-at-greenwich
We enjoyed a slow boat ride from Westminster to Greenwich, so traveled about an hour each way. I definitely love traveling on the Thames. I felt like Mole and Rat in Wind in the Willows, though perhaps it was a little easier though certainly colder. We have managed to change the drought conditions in CT. London, and Scotland. We've had rain every day we've been gone.
I am certainly happy we are leaving London before the Olympics. Preparations are underway. Yesterday we watched helicopters land and take off from an aircraft carrier, and police boats speed up and down the Thames. It was a practice security drill. A blimp flew overhead. I can't imagine what it will be like during the Olympics as security already seems a bit much to me.
On May Day there was a scheduled demonstration in Trafalgar Square. The purpose was to encourage the end of world hunger, but I think there were more security people than demonstrators. All was peaceful, as, of course, it should be, and yet, I wonder if a point was made.
Being here has been fascinating. How could it not be? History is alive, perhaps too much so. I see that Bonnie Prince Charlie is a hero in Scotland, and a rogue in Britain. Each museum has its own slant. It's a good lesson. I also wonder about a land so caught in the past. When we do we memorialize and honor, and when are we individually, and as a country resting on laurels and overly bound by the past?
I think it is for each of us to look at each day, this balancing of the present on future and past.
