More Summer Adventures

Recently, I've been kept quite busy with day trips and friends, and it rounded out the end of May very nicely.

Callum and I went to Cambridge--it was lovely.  The weather was really warm and we spent the whole day outside.  The Cambridge campuses were closed for visitation due to exams, but we could still walk around on the outside.  We happened to catch a short music concert in a little cafe--really nice.  And we spent a lot of time at The Banks--the rivers that run through Canterbury--just sitting, talking, enjoying the sun, and watching the "punting" boats go by (think of gondolas, only in England).  We also had a fabulous Spanish lunch at a really great restaurant--yum!

Niki Green came to visit soon after.  The first day she was here, it poured and we just stayed in watching movies.  That Saturday, we went to Canterbury with Beauty and Callum.  It was wonderful!  I really like the city of Canterbury--a very nice pedestrian-friendly area.  And everything was so lovely to look at.  Beauty and I visited the Cathedral while Niki (who had already seen it) and Callum (who prefered not to see it) stayed outside reading and looking around.  The Cathedral was beautiful and has much history associated with it--I love all the little stories places like that tell.  Afterwards we met up and did some wandering.  We visited the original city wall and took a nice long walk.  We had a great dinner at a nearby pub as well.  It was a very good day.  Visiting Buckingham palace and my area of London and a day trip to Greenwich rounded out the rest of her stay.  I really liked Greenwich!  It is only across the river, but it is so much quieter, more space, yet still a thriving city.  It was beautiful, home of the very first enclosed Royal Park and beautiful architecture.  It is one of my favorite places so far. Then Niki continued on to Germany the coming Tuesday.

I headed straight to Norwich the next day for Callum's birthday.  We spent the day at his Dad's and had a great birthday dinner of lamb, yorkshire pudding, peas, and stuffing.  It was delicious.  The following day we celebrated with his friends out in the city of Norwich, going to a pub and a club down there, which was fun as well.  We came back to London the following day.

Today I visited Beauty's home and met her family.  They are really sweet!  Her mom insisted I have a traditional Indian lunch and had this whole spread of rice and curry and chicken and things with names I couldn't quite pronounce!  It was all delicious and it was really nice to meet all her family.  We watched a movie and she took me around her area of London near Bethnal Green.  It was a very relaxing summer's day.

I'm looking forward to going to the Zoo on Monday and possibly Oxford this week.  I posted some pictures of my other events on facebook. :)