Day 5 - Off to a Non-touristy mecca

My husband's parents are buried in the London Cemetery, and I encouraged his desire to visit their graves. This adventure led to one of our most delightful encounters with the living.

After yet another hearty breakfast at the Imperial College dining hall, we headed for an east-bound train. On the left, notice the now overgrown, former community garden. But notice, too, the wonderful tracery on the columns.

I don' find it easy to photograph the homeless, but this young man was so appealing that I made the effort to capture him with his dog.  The dog lay contentedly by the man's feet, and was provided with a clean dish of food and one of water -- and a loving hand to keep him company.

 

The train ride was followed by a bus ride through a rather rundown neighborhood. This woman's outfit in a kaleidoscope of colors and textures caught my eye.

The bearded gentleman, a gateguard-slash-docent, provided top-grade hospitality at the cemetery. He had traveled to America years ago, and indeed had seen many more parts of the country than I had. And he could commiserate with us about the trick tires on our rented car (from Day 1 blog).  Although the detailed database of the cemetery is not available on weekends, he was able to give us directions to the general vicinity where the Barnacle parents were interred. We set off on foot . . .

The above series is typical of the front, older section of the cemetery. Graves and their stones are sometimes still tended by family, but many are not. You can see a glimpse of one of the funeral chapels. Due to unusually dry conditions, London had experienced an early leaf-fall, especially apparent in this near-arboretum.

Now, we enter the more modern section of the cemetery, where smaller stones in great variety are set in orderly, close-packed rows. Here, there had been visitors to many graves, leaving all sorts of mementos.

We searched diligently through three sections, but found no Barnacles.  We know they are there, and look forward to a future visit, armed with specific locations from numbers on the official map.

Above:  A rose tree, so typical of the English, beautifying a grave. We chose to sit here, on a bench in the cemetery's "back 40" to eat our lunch, the rest of a scrumptious Cornish pasty, leftover from yesterday. Then, Roy enjoyed seeing the yew trees, so familiar from his youth. And third, part of the display at the front gate flower shop.

Looking back at the front entry to the London Cemetery, shrouded, as are so many historic places in London, in scaffolding for restoration.

The following are scenes from our subway ride back into the heart of London:

 Most of the underground platforms sport these Help Points, of obvious usefulness.

I call London "Pram City."  Babies were everywhere. This dad skillfully juggled baby and recalcitrant pram, while keeping upright in the swaying tube carriage.

Self-explanatory.  We had the privilege of attending Evensong at St. Paul's cathedral, both a respite from and a highlight of our on-the-go vacation.

This was the day we encountered actual rain. I purposely did not tell you of our post-cemetery attempt to visit a transportation museum -- trip aborted. But we did enjoy our one restaurant meal of the vacation (thanks to Roy's clever use of our first class rail tickets and the ready availability of good take-out here and there). This popular and colorful Lebanese restaurant is near our dorm. Because of the rain, the line to eat inside appeared to be interminably long, so we opted to eat at the outside cafe. The restaurateur is clever, too, having installed heat lamps (hence the orange glow) that dry customers off more quickly than the rain can fall.

There are no pictures from my evening, doing laundry. The College residence halls were emptying of summer tourists and filling with incoming freshmen. In the basement, I was alone while figuring out the "foreign" coin laundry machines, but as other people came in I was able to act as knowing concierge. I gave some laundry soap to a grateful young Chinese woman, who seemed as though she had never had to do her own laundry before. 

On the way back to my residence hall, I was able to help a Chinese family -- Dad, Mom, and freshman son -- not only find their dorm, but learn how to use the card entry system. A strange feeling came over me, however, hoping they had not had to abort any daughters to get to this point of family life with their bright son.

This is not a good note for ending a post. Let's see. Oh, at supper at the rain-challenged restaurant we had met a Polish couple, residents of Bristol. After we left, the young man chased after us to return the spectacles I had dropped. Friendly people everywhere.