oxford

Amy and Rob set us up with some of their best friends, Will and Aga who also moved over to England recently (Rob and Amy are just so awesome that they are like magnets, you can’t help but want to move close to them).  Will and Aga are delightful and even though they barely knew us they invited us up to Oxford (where he is studying) for a day.  It was incredible to see that ancient place with such great tour guides.  Not only did they get us into tons of colleges that we would have either had to pay a bundle for or that just plain were off limits to us outsiders, they treated us royally.  Fed us lunch, gave us all kinds of information about Oxford and were fun to talk to, easy to be with.  It was a perfect day….and I didn’t have to do anything to make it that way.  They have two beautiful girls.  Hazel and their oldest, Daria were like two peas in a pod….  I wish they didn’t live so far away.  Here the kids are sitting next to an old roman wall.  I think Will said it’s one of the oldest things at Oxford….but I can’t remember.  It would have been good to blog about this while it was still all fresh in my memory.  Will really did give us so much information.

I walked around in awe of how old and beautiful everything was.  And also so grateful for a tour guide.  That place is huge and overwhelming in all its grandeur.  harry potter court yard.  Isn’t that tree amazing?  I wish I remembered how old Will said it was.  Next time I’ll take notes.We went to the natural history museum there, which was AMAZING. This picture (above) is off these spectacular tree root sculpture outside of the museum.  Just tree roots, on their sides with all the dirt cleaned off.  They were beautiful (and fun to climb on). The architecture of this museum alone was spectacular.  All the bones of the building surrounding all those dinosaur bones.  And the kids could really touch pretty much anything, so they were in heaven.  Tons of stuffed animals and interesting things to look at.  Hazel and Daria did a little hunt with one of their children’s trails and it kept them busy for too long, finally we had to tear them away. 

Attached to the natural history museum was the Pitt Rivers museum.  We did a quick walk through, but we could have been lost in their for hours.  It was jam packed full of all kinds of weird (and spooky) artifacts, like shrunken human heads.  It was dark and cluttery and pretty fascinating.  Will took us to the Eagle and Child where C.S. Lewis and Tolkien and friends had their Inklings meetings.  The kids were pretty excited to see that since we’ve been making our way through the Chronicles of Narnia and they LOVE the Hobbit.Will took us to his college, Pembroke College.  It was a small, intricate, beautiful place.  I’m jealous that Will gets to fill his mind there. 

We popped into the Chapel there and it was empty except for a student practicing the organ.  Hazel walked around, jaw dropped, in awe of the beauty of the place and power of the music all colliding together.  I was touched too, had tears in my eyes as I watched her, awestruck.  I’m so happy that she gets to experience and feel and see these things.   She feels them deep down.  She is an old soul.  She’s not going to forget all of this, sure, maybe she’ll forget the details, but it’s part of who she is now.  That makes me happy. Christ Church Collage (thanks for the correction Barb).Here is THE Harry Potter Dining hall…..which is actually just the Christ Church dining hall.  Wouldn’t you love to eat your meals there?

Thanks to Aga and Will for showing us such a fabulous day.  Even though I’ve already forgotten a lot of the important details of what was what, I’ll never forget that beautiful day, surrounded by so much history and being taken care of by such good new friends.