Day Trippin in May

I can't remember why we decided to take a quick day trip one weekend in May, but I think it had something to do with just doing something different and getting out of the house.  We traveled north into Wisconsin (not that far from us believe it or not) and up into Milwaukee.  After we arrived for a bit, it was decided that we would stop at a kite festival they were having right on the lake.  We stayed there a while and looked around and decided it was time for some lunch.  After getting turned around on the highway loop a couple of times, we found an amazing area filled with restaurants.  We decided, hopefully, on a cute little Mexican restaurant and were pleasantly surprised to find it the closest to what we were used to in Arizona.  It was awesome to have that little taste of home.  Afterward, we stopped on our way home at...The Cheese Castle.  Yes folks, a whole castle full of cheese and anything you could ever want to eat with cheese.  You can find more information here.  Then a short drive later we saw an A&W stand and decided the kids should have a proper rootbeer float.  Seriously, does anyone make them as good as they do?
It was a lovely, unexpected day, and hopefully one the kids will remember with a few smiles.

The British Museum...

The British Museum is in London and is dedicated to human history and culture.  It was established in 1753.  Some of the items that it houses are of intense controversy, such as the Elgin Marbles from the Parthenon.

I could easily spend two days in this almost religious temple of a place.  By the time we left to catch our train we were all exhausted and overwhelmed with all that we'd seen.  I  had taken hundreds of photos and my mind was swimming with just how many artifacts and collections they have there.  It's inspiring to know that this was all created so long ago by what must have been supreme artists working year upon year. 

If you ever get the chance, go.  It is worth it.  It is life changing.  You will be amazed.

Exterior of the British Museum

Love the interior of the Museum which was obviously outside at one point but now has this curved triad ceiling of glass that lends a beautiful glow to all beneath it.

 

A copy of the Rosetta Stone that you can touch.

Totem poles from British Columbia made of red cedar wood from about 1850.

 

Exquisite detail on this enormous pedestal that looked like an enormous bird bath.

Easter Island statue
Cult image, made between 11th and 17th centuries. Eighteenth century visitors including Captain Cook recorded the giant statues still standing, many destroyed. Surviving examples now re-erected on the island, a World Heritage site. This statue was collected by British survey ship HMS Topaze in 1868, presented to Queen Victoria by the lords of the admiralty, and by her to the museum.

quartzite statue of Amenhotep III, dating from c.1350 BC, was found in the massive mortuary temple of the pharaoh Amenhotep III on the West Bank of the River Nile at Thebes (the present-day settlement of Kom el-Hitan) in Egypt.

Part of the Egyptian exhibit.  It was enormous!

Head of Rameses
Egyptian, 1270BC. Presented by JL Burckhardt but taken from its site at Thebes by Giovanni Belzoni, a circus strongman turned professional antiquities hunter.

The actual Rosetta Stone.

The Crouching Venus is a Hellenistic model of Venus surprised at her bath. Venus crouches with her right knee close to the ground, turns her head to the right and, in most versions, reaches her right arm over to her left shoulder to cover her breasts.^[1] To judge by the number of copies that have been excavated on Roman sites in Italy and France, this variant on Venus seems to have been popular.

Parthenon marbles
Greek, 5th century BC. Bought from the Ottoman rulers of Greece, dismantled by Lord Elgin in 1799, and then recovered from a shipwreck in a hugely expensive operation which left him deeply in debt. Bought by the government for £35,000 and deposited 'in perpetuity' in the museum in 1816

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The Portland Vase

Perhaps from Rome, Italy, about AD 5-25

The most famous cameo-glass vessel from antiquity

September 2012

More Pictures from London

The Thames at Sunset.

We ate an awesome Thai Dinner in the only strand building to survive the great fire of London.

Ministry of Justice.

Buckingham Palace is even more beautiful at night.

Loved the large portrait of HRH The Queen on the side of the building that says "Life is Beautiful".

The (now called) Elizabeth Tower with Big Ben (the bell inside).

The London Eye.

The Marble Arch...right down the street from our hotel.

Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain in Piccadilly Circus.

Statue of Queen Anne outside St. Paul's Cathedral.

St. Paul's Cathedral.

The enormous doors of St. Paul's Cathedral.

 

St. Paul's Cathedral.

The Tower of London.

Joci and Jon goofing around in a London souvenir shop.

Trafalgar Square.

The National Gallery at Trafalgar Square.

Hooge Family in Trafalgar Square.

September 2012