Day one

Day one seemed like two days--actually I think it was two days. We flew out of Tampa Thursday at six fifteen PM and arrived in York at noon on the next day. Somewhere along the line we lost five hours. We had a wonderful time exploring York with Evan. By the time I took a shower and lay my body down I felt like I could sleep forever. Well, I didn't sleep quite that long. I woke up at 5:30 AM.

The trip was long. Two very unhappy toddlers made it seem longer, and the plane bouncing unexpedly  interrupted the little sleep I managed find. I was so excited about being in London I didn't care. We found baggage claim and reclaimed our bags then walked through customs which amounted to walking through a room with rows of tables, but no people to do any checking. That was easy! Next we took a trolley to the South terminal where we found the trains to take us to London to St Pancras station. From there we walked around the corner to King's Cross train station where we obtained tickets to York, a two hour train ride. The countryside was beautiful! Evan was waiting for us st the station. It was wonderful to see him again!

We had lunch at a funky little place called The Trembling Mushroom...no that's not it. I forget the name--it' trembling something. We had to go up very steep, narrow steps to the little pub and ordered two platters of meats and cheese and other tasty treats. The building had timbered walls and plaster. Evan said it was built in the 13 hundreds-- or was it in 12 hundred? I really should take notes. It's amazing to be in a building so ancient, and still in use. I guess it's a hopping place in the evenings.

I'll post more pictures when I get home. I'm having technical difficulties transferring photos from my camera to Facebook. I'm posting only from my phone. When I do you will see narrow cobbled streets with ancient buildings. For Harry Potter fans I saw the street that was used as the inspiration for Dagon Alley, the place where the students from Hogwarts went to buy their school supplies. I think they did some of the filming there. Also in this town of York is the place where they filmed the dining room scenes at Hogwarts.

Evan took us around  to see several libraries where he did research for his dissertation for his doctorate. Hummm... Dr Evan McWilliams has a nice ring to it. The libraries were small but rich in information about the history of the church and its architecture. He plans to finish up by the end of summer, then who knows where he will go from there? It's been great to spend time with him. He's a young man on the brink of opening the door to the next phase of his life. I can't believe he' twenty eight.