Thursday, December 22, 1988

Canterbury Tales ...

First, some very good and relieving news... we found out that Bits is OK, and that she and her family were not aboard Pan Am Flight 103. Sid connected with her brother and he let us know they arrived in America safely. As it turned out, she and her family flew to America on an earlier flight. Here's the scary thing, though... they were offered a package deal to take the Pan Am flight that blew up.

By the grace of God, they turned it down. Even though it was a better deal, the only reason they didn't take it was because they wanted to leave earlier. That was a stroke of luck. I'm sure they are counting their blessings right now!

Today J.P. and I took a late morning train to Canterbury, which is a 45-minute train ride south of Sid's house in Longfield. It was well worth the time spent traveling!

We arrived in Canterbury shortly after 1 p.m., and began the tour by walking along the wall around town, then up a hill that overlooks Canterbury. From there we could easily see the famed cathedral off in the distance. We hopped back on the wall, and followed it until it led us into the town center.

There we soon found the entrance to the cathedral, as well as a gift shop, where I bought a tea towel featuring characters from "Canterbury Tales" for my senior high school English teacher, Mrs. Rogoff. (Last year I visited her class and mentioned I was studying in England for the year, which she thought was a fabulous opportunity. Then she gave me some money and asked if I would buy her some literary things for her classroom. This was the first time I found something useful.)

We entered the cathedral, which of course was quite majestic. We spent about a 1/2 hour there, then walked into town where we eventually stopped to eat at a Poppins. Later we came back to the cathedral shop to buy a few more knick-knacks, then walked around town again, looking for the King's School. We eventually found it, once we discovered that it was actually attached to the cathedral.

From there we entered a different section of the cathedral, which included the cloister. It was dusk by this time, and I was able to get a few good black-and-white photos of this part of the cathedral.

After buying some fudge, we headed back on the train to Sid's house, and after dinner, J.P., Sid, Viv and I watched "Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan." It was a good movie, and interesting that never once did they actually call him "Tarzan."

When the movie finished, Sid's parents came home quite drunk, which was quite amusing. It was getting late and we were getting tired, so this was a good time to go to bed.

Pictures: #1, The Daily Mail, with more details on the plane crash, one day after it occurred. #2, Rick on the hill that overlooks Canterbury. #3, Canterbury Cathedral, with tiny J.P. walking through the gate. #4, A close up of the sculptures outise the cathedral, in B&W.