Another Pilgrimage
We left the hostel fairly early in the morning, feeling that we'd experienced enough of York to both love it and to leave it. I think the hostel food killed it for a lot of students--most of these girls have never tasted the spoils of a public school cafeteria, and they complained of bowel discomfort most of the way to Ambleside--between interludes of North and South, anyway.
Durham is half cathedral, half-university ("Why can't we study here?" a bunch of people said). It's also the site of several saints' bones, including St. Bede (no longer the Venerable, for all you buffs out there), St. Cuthbert, and St. Oswald--or at least his head, buried with Cuthbert. Our tour led us around the cathedral and pointed out the gorgeous Romanesque pillars and rounded arches, and Nikki and I couldn't pay attention because we were staring at the stained glass. It was modern, made in the eighties--and absolutely stunning. The Joseph in Egypt window was lush and full of purples, reds, and yellows; some seemed Impressionistic, like a Monet transposed into glass, with vague droves of people traveling north to some paradise, all swept through and overwhelmed with color. Absolutely beautiful.
The best part was the famous cloisters, used to film passing periods in Harry Potter. Naturally we had to take some solid pictures before hitting the tiny gift shop and out into the town for some lunch. If it wasn't for Andrea's red hair, we never would have made it to the coach on time.
Like Hell
After all of North and South (thank Buddha, everyone needed to stop squealing whenever Thornton showed up, or stop squealing in general). I got to chat with Katy, Julie and Emily in the back. Katy talked about our next stop. Bede's world is a glorified museum, but most of it is outside, like that Shakespearean farm we visited. But over the summer, apparently girls thought Bede's World was a theme park. They were so excited that they disembarked and positively sprinted toward the front doors. One of the girls turned back to the profs, a little confused at the enthusiasm, and asked, "Is this an amusement park?" Katy was near a veteran of the program, who muttered, "Like hell."
But Bede's World was far from hell. It was cloudy out, but not too cold to walk around. I skipped out on the museum bit altogether and went with some girls out to visit the animals, all of which are identical to the ones seen in Bede's day --giant cows, some draft ponies, really oddly colored geese and chickens and ducks. I stayed by these for some ten minutes, talking to them--the ducks were all chasing a white one, who had something in his mouth. Girls came over and started watching too--except we realized the duck was trying to eat a frog. Having no teeth, the frog was being slowly squashed and whacked back and forth, limbs flapping, like a dog thrashes a chew toy. We watched in horror as the duck half choked and dropping this poor frog, who stopped moving after a while. Dumb duck--you don't EAT frogs.
After that little scene, Nicole, Jess, Rachel and I discovered a kid's playground, complete with slide, pirate ship, zipline, and bird's nest swing. We played hardcore for about fifteen minutes and I decided that recess being ten minutes long is a genius idea. On the far end of the playground is the Jarrow church where Bede's writing chair is kept. The ruins of the monastery are behind it. I found it less interesting than the playground and promptly returned before heading back to the coach.
Northern England
We were all so exhausted at this point from sleeping badly in the manger-like hostel beds that we all slept through the rest of the afternoon. I woke just in time to see the village of Wall before we stopped again. Hadrian, Roman Emperor, built a massive wall that still stands in Northern England, used mostly to build livestock walls. We stopped at the border of Scotland (the border of the Roman Empire) and walked up to the wall. Nothing but cold wind from the north. I wrapped my trench tight and tried not to tread in mud while I talked to the sheep on the hill (they were a bit skittish). We stood on the wall and looked out toward "Scotland" and the barbarians no doubt living in those hills. Grace had the brilliant idea to do the wave while we all stood on the wall there--it took some five minutes to get it all, but we were successful. A wave on Hadrian's wall, at the end of civilization as we knew it.
It was hard to get back to sleep after that. I looked out the window at the vanishing daylight and could only see misty green hills for miles. It was hazy and dreamlike, like the sleep that hangs around your eyes in early morning, or flashbacks in sitcoms. The lakes looked like they had emerald forests sunk under the water, and not a human light could be seen. The land felt so old because it had never been settled--the nearest lights of Ambleside at seven or so felt like a perversion, even though dark was gathering fast.
We settled into our hostel and had some dinner (a much nicer hostel than in York, with the Pier in our backyard). I wandered out into the night and sat on a bench by the water, unnerved by the total lack of waves. It was all black water, like tar, holding up empty sailboats. Ducks and geese huddled up on the beach to sleep, like so many river rocks. I sat for a long time just looking until the rest of the group came out, took loud pictures, trespassed on other peoples' docks, and ran at all the sleeping birds, forcing them frightened back into the black water. Count on stupid Americans to ruin a perfectly calm night in Ambleside.
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