London

We celebrated Independence Day this year by hanging out in the capital city of the mother country. There were no fireworks, but we had a great time. We were not alone. London is a city of 10 million inhabitants, plus (at this time of year) another 10 million tourists.

A round trip train ticket to London cost us about $85 apiece (our students will be able to do it cheaper, and there may be discount fares we haven't discovered yet). Given the price of gas here (about $8.35 per gallon at the moment), the fee to drive within the City of London ($16 per day), the high cost of parking (up to $50 per day), and the general hassle of traffic (priceless), we consider it a bargain. The trip takes anywhere between an hour and a half to three hours, depending on the number of stops.

We left early Sunday morning, arriving at St. Pancras station (you've seen it in the Harry Potter films) by 10 a.m. We topped off our "Oyster Cards" for unlimited use of London mass transit at a cost of a little over $10 per person per day and took "The Tube" subway to St. Paul's Cathedral, arriving in plenty of time to get excellent seats for the 11 a.m. "orchestral Eucharist" featuring St Paul's Cathedral Choir & Boy's Choir, and City of London Sinfonia, performing Mozart's Missa solemnis in C (K. 337). It was a wonderful performance/worship service.

The afternoon (and the whole of the next day) was spent scouting museums and other locations for the trip back we'll make with our students in the fall. Even though we've visited London a few times before, it's good to refresh the mental picture. New to us was the British Library, a building just opened in 1997. Highlights were Codex Sinaiticus (the oldest complete copy of the Christian Bible in existence) and G.F. Handel's original manuscript of Messiah (messy handwriting). We also had to check prices and make some bookings for the group.

We had wanted to go to a play in the evening, but most of the West End theaters are dark on a Sunday. We also waited until two days before our trip to make reservations -- not exactly planning ahead. With a bit of online sleuthing we discovered an all Bach concert. We didn't recognize any of the groups or individuals and didn't know a thing about the hall itself, so our expectations were low. It is called Wigmore Hall, and appears to be a venue rented out to various groups who need a place to perform. As it turned out, the acoustics were amazing! Plus, the group we heard was obviously made up of professional musicians who were even more amazing. They played on period instruments and we have never heard Bach's orchestral suites and Brandenburg Concertos played better. We were so tired, but never even nodded off during the concert. Our only complaint was not enough leg room in the seats and no ventilation in the balcony, which is probably typical in Great Britain.