Becky and Duane's visit, part II

Sadly, Becky and Duane are a few days gone from the UK, but the second half of their trip remains to be reported.

Tuesday morning we dragged Duane out of bed (er, floor) at the crack of dawn and caught the train to Salisbury, where we jumped on the tour bus that goes to stonehenge. Actually there were three different trains we had to catch to Salisbury, and this is what happened on most of them:

Yeeees, sleeeeep. I'll be watching you....

And we finally arrived at Stonehenge, which is essentially a pile of rocks that no one can explain in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by some sheep:

But still a pretty cool pile of rocks that no one can explain. They realllly can't explain it, though. That's probably 85% of the content of the 30 minute audioguide tour--various ways of saying that the origins and purposes of stonehenge are mysterious.

Aside from being cool to see in person, Stonehenge was also an excellent photoshoot location.

Duane jumped for joy.

Claud came along on the trip, as well...

Duane was taking photos, per usual. This is how he looked for the majority of the trip.

And Duane and Becky took a page out of Claud's book. His pose IS inspirational.

Back in Salisbury, we had a hurried but amazing lunch at a Thai restaurant. Seriously, Becky's lunch came in a PINEAPPLE. And there were carrot flowers.

There was also a teapot that I really should've stolen. But we were too busy running to catch our train 12 minutes after our lunch came...

The train took us to Bath, where we saw Bath Abbey--

And, of course, the ancient Roman baths, which had been hidde for thousands of years underneath someone's house. I'm not really sure how that happens...

Duane and Becky took senior pictures at the Roman Baths---

And visited the Jane Austen museum...

On Wednesday I showed them around Oxford, and Duane took most of the pictures. I did take them to Christ Church, the college where the Harry Potter dining hall scenes were filmed.

I kind of go to school at Hogwarts...

Wednesday night we went to a guest night at Kellogg, where we enjoyed the food (and free wine) and they met some of my college friends.

Thursday I accompanied them to London town, where we found their baller hostel near Hyde Park, then walked through Kensington Gardens...

Clapping my hands by the Peter Pan statue. I believe in fairies.

We spent the rest of the day at the British museum, where we saw the Rosetta Stone, a bunch of mummies, hoards of french schoolchildren, and easter island statues. Then a quick trip down to Big Ben/Trafalgar square, and I was on my way back home.

It was so good to have friends from home here. I don't know if it's made me more or less homesick, as right around this time last term I was headed home for Christmas, and it's still all of March, April, May and June until I'm back in the mitten once more, but good nonetheless.

There'll probably be a term-end post later this week, then next week I'm off to Rome and Malta in search of sun and warmth.

Until next time, from all of us here to all of you there---

A cheery farewell.