Sunday 26 July 2015

Cambridge


Cambridge is impressive. It's full of tourists (like us) who have come to see its picturesque old college buildings.
Part of King's
I think this is St John's






Posters everywhere for end-of-term productions
Swans and cygnets




Traffic, bicycles, punts.



Sunday 12 July 2015

Winchester

I've been in Winchester for two weeks. Well, not quite Winchester but Sparsholt College, which is out in the Hampshire countryside, about eight km from the city.  Last Sunday, being up and ready, I walked along the narrow lanes to get to the cathedral in time for a ten o'clock service; a really special event where a number of men and women were being ordained as deacons. It was a real pageant of colour and ceremony, in which two  (at least) bishops, an abbot, a lady in a judicial wig took part. The acts included the bishops and abbot washing the feet of the ordinands (people who were being ordained) I've never seen anything quite like it!
Winchester cathedral is rather special. Part is Norman, part Gothic.

This bit is Norman,

with massive columns and rounded arches

Here is some of the Gothic stuff


On the outside, the Norman bit

The Gothic West window
The font has rather familiar carvings:
they are so like the ones we see in the cloister of San Juan de la Peña or the cathedral of Jaca.
the cathedral close

I think this is the old cloister

In Winchester High Street, statue by Anthony Gormley, I think

In Winchester Great Hall, Queen Eleanor's garden.

 I expect it's an Eleanor falcon.
A curiosity I noticed approaching the city

Quite an old postbox. Edward VII