The British Museum

This morning I signed up for membership of the British Museum. I’ve been considering doing so for a few days as I really love the place and would like to support it. I work in Camden Town, not a million miles from the museum, and intend to visit after work sometimes and maybe on occasional weekends too. It’ll be nice to be able to have a quiet cuppa and a sit down in the members’ room while I’m there.

An Afternoon in Docklands

Yesterday afternoon we spent a very enjoyable time in London’s Docklands. At least we did once we managed to actually get there. First there was trouble on the bus to Stratford when a group of people decided they didn’t want to pay. Eventually they got off and we were on our way again. On our arrival at Stratford we found that the DLR wasn’t running. There had been no notice of this; in fact, it wasn’t included in the station announcements along with the other lines that were closed. We found our way to the rail replacement bus, after a bit of grumbling, and soon we were on our way.

Once we arrived at Canary Wharf we located a handy pub where we had a drink while awaiting the rest of our party’s arrival. Having had a bit of a chinwag we spent a very enjoyable time in the Museum in Docklands, which currently has a very good Jack the Ripper exhibition on. Not so much about the murders as about the time in which they happened.

After that it was back to the pub for a meal before wandering over the road to the cinema to see Hellboy II, which was great fun. Not only does it look fantastic but there’s bags of humour. If you like that kind of special effects extravaganza, go and see it.

An uneventful couple of bus rides brought us home again at a not-too-unreasonable hour, but I’m still very glad it’s a bank holiday Monday today.

Winchester and Portsmouth

I won’t bore you with too many details of my weekend, but I will say that I had a fantastic time doing mediaeval re-enactment in Winchester, despite the cold, on Friday night and Saturday, before heading to Portsmouth to see the Mary Rose, which was very worthwhile. While there I was lucky enough to see the Sea Stallion, a replica Viking longship, and chat with a member of the crew.

I got home last night feeling absolutely knackered, but very happy. I’m still very very tired today. I’ve learnt my lesson; if I’m going to have a very busy weekend in the future I shall take the following Monday off.

Goldsmiths’ Hall

Yesterday I met up with some friends at Goldsmiths’ Hall to see the Treasures of the English Church exhibition. We were expecting to see a great deal of Victorian silver and just a little mediaeval stuff (our main interest), but actually there was a great deal of beautiful and fascinating mediaeval church silver on display. I did pick up a very cool fact, though. Apparently the Victorians built so many new churches that specialist suppliers started to sell their wares through catalogues, from which you could buy everything for your new church, from gold and silverware through pews to general fixtures and fittings. The Victoria and Albert Museum has some of these catalogues, which I’d love to see.

Once we’d finished at the exhibition we repaired to the Cittie of Yorke for a spot of lunch and then made our way via a couple of other pubs (we wanted to check them out for possible hire for an event) to Clerkenwell where we had a quick look at the well before heading to St. John’s Gate and the museum of the Order of St. John there.

I arrived home with very sore feet but I think it was well worth it.