The White Cliffs

Over the first May Bank holiday weekend (31 April-3 May), I headed out of Cambridge for a weekend on the Coast with a few friends from Churchill College for a girls' weekend. The plan: to relax in our adorable bed and breakfast on a farm north of Canterbury, to see the famous White Cliffs of Dover (and their famous castle, too), to visit Canterbury Cathedral and to watch BBC's Pride and Prejudice.

After a late arrival at our bed and breakfast (I managed to navigate us the wrong way around the M25--the motorway that circles London--at rush hour) on Friday, we headed out to Dover. It was a beautiful drive through the countryside in Kent: we saw bright yellow fields of rapeseed in bloom, windmills, the sea and a power plant along the way.

(left) Austin's Lane in Sandwich (right) power plant near Ramsgate

The weather was great in the morning. The sun was shining, so the white cliffs were at their sparkly best over the port of Dover, where--from our vantage point up on the cliffs--we could hear instructions for entering the U.K. being called out on loudspeakers in French, German and English. The crossing at Dover is a mere 21 miles to Calais, France, so it is the primary location for ferries to the continent (the entrance to the Channel Tunnel is nearby, too). On a clearer day than the one we had, you can see Calais from the cliffs.

the white cliffs (left) looking toward the port and (right) looking away from it
(center) me posing on the cliffs :-D

When it started raining, we headed toward Dover castle for a bit. The castle is very restored and quite cool--we rambled around the grounds and poked our heads into a few of the museums on the site.

a view from the top of Dover Castle

The next day we spent in Canterbury, where it poured. We split the time between Tiny Tim's teashop, trying on dresses, finding Pride and Prejudice and Now and Then in a local DVD store, and (of course) visiting Canterbury Cathedral for Evensong. Drenched, we headed back on the earlier side and watched movies until bedtime.

All in all, it was a successful weekend. Despite Sunday's rain, the only thing we'd set out to do that we didn't accomplish was to finish Pride and Prejudice--and, with its 5-hour running time, there were reasons for that!

Public Service Announcement

I interrupt your irregularly scheduled blog posts for a very important public service announcement:

Zombies dragons infest Wales!

Zombies are undead creatures that enjoy eating human flesh, in particular brains. For your own safety, it is imperative to know the location of the nearest specially designed zombie-bunker if you must travel in Wales.

If you encounter a zombie, you should take shelter in the nearest zombie-bunker. If this is not possible, (1) run as fast as you can and (2) prevent any contact with the zombie's blood, which carries pathogens that can turn you into a zombie.

a pub in Swansea exhibiting symptoms of the zombie infestation

Zombie dragons frequent Welsh pubs and research suggests that the Welsh zombies prefer to drink brains in alcoholic form, in the form of a beer of the same name. It is quite possible that the infestation has been rendered mostly harmless by this preference. However, despite being relatively harmless, the beer preference has reached epidemic status: Brains is said to be the Guinness of Wales.

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Thank you for your suspension of disbelief in today's update. I hope you got a few chuckles out of this--I found the pub sign hilarious and wanted to share my immediate (and irreverent) impression with you.

Brains is indeed a beer that is famous throughout Wales and is named after the family who has brewed it for the past 120+ years (and not a particular bit of human anatomy).

The next update will be in a more traditional style, promise!