Pictures from London/Oxford [Bryan]

Below are some pictures of our England trip. We had a wonderful time. My highlights:

• Staying at New College, Oxford, and presenting a paper in that evocative intellectual environment (New College, ironically, was founded way back in 1379).
• Seeing all the old churches and cathedrals. Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's were awesome, obviously. The Henry VII chapel at Westminster was particularly beautiful. But even the little church at New College had a charming cloister and a painting of St. James by El Greco.
• Experiencing "Speakers Corner" at Hyde Park. I always wanted to see this famous place. When we went on a Sunday evening, there were about 150 people, broken up into groups of 2 to 10, arguing fiercely with each other about every topic under the sun.
  
• Falling in love with some new, old paintings at the National Gallery. Some new favorites include Raphael's "Portrait of Pope Juilius II," Bellini's "Doge Leonardo Loredan" and Holbein's "The Ambassadors." I also loved Jackson Pollock's "Naked Man with Knife" at the Tate Modern.
  
• Taking an evening walk around "The City," which includes the financial district and some of the most famous streets in the world -- Cheapside, The Strand, and Fleet Street.
• Contemplating the graffiti in the prison at the Tower of London.
  
• Tasting the best roast beef I've ever tasted at Simpson's on the Strand. Even the boiled cabbage wasn't bad (although Ellie suggested the rest of the world should stage and intervention and gently suggest to the English that nobody really likes boiled cabbage).
  
• Staring at Big Ben -- a monument that is more impressive in person than in pictures.
  

Tower bridge

Off to see the crown jewels, housed in this building at the Tower of London.

View from atop St. Paul's, looking down Ludgate Hill.

Millennial Bridge, from the Tate Modern, looking toward St. Paul's

Ellie dressed up for our night at Simpson's.

Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery

Westminster Abby

Some statuary "borrowed" from the Parthenon in Athens at the British Museum

London at night after our ride on The Eye of London.

Ellie is the world's best traveling companion!

Speaker's corner. The man on the right is on his "high horse," dressed in the blue robe and goat horns. Not sure what his message was.

The Gardens at Kensington Palace

The Renaissance statuary at the Victoria and Albert Museum

Buckingham Palace

The Radcliff Camera, at Oxford

The trees associated with Alice and Lewis Carroll at Christ's Church, Oxford.

The Bridge of Sighs, Oxford

The Cloister at New College, Oxford

New College, Oxford

The old city wall and gardens, New College, Oxford