DAY TWO
Wednesday, May 18
The day of things going wrong but still going great!
Fortunately, most of us slept well last night! We left the hostel at 8:15 to walk in light rain to Paddington Station to catch a 9:50 train to Windsor, where we had a 11:30 talk and tour. At least that was the plan. When we got to Paddington at 9:15, all trains had been suspended due to “an incident” at Twyford, which apparently was a fire. I picked up our tickets anyway, since they were pre-bought, and talked to an employee who told us to walk to Edgeware Road tube station and take the Bakerloo line to Waterloo, where we could get a different train to Windsor. (the Bakerloo line normally runs through Paddington, but not right now, as they are doing work on it).
So we headed off to Edgeware Road. I hadn’t bought our Oyster cards yet, so I had to do that, and my school P-card didn’t work, so I had to put the first five on my personal card. Then I figured out if I held the card a certain way in the machine, it worked. But in all that, I think I didn’t put the same amount on all of the cards. And people were in line behind me….so that was kind of stressful. But we made it to Waterloo, and there was train in 10 minutes. So we dispersed to quickly get buy some sandwiches to take for lunch. Alas, one of our lot, didn’t get back in time, and he and I were left watching the train take the rest of the group away to Windsor. And we waited for another half hour. So now we were waiting for a 10:58 train instead of a 9:50 train, and the Waterloo train takes 45 minutes instead of 30, which is what the Paddington train takes. And the Waterloo train goes into the station that is a little further from the castle (why are there TWO train stations in Windsor? It’s so tiny!)
We ended up getting up to the castle about 12:30, and GOD BLESS THE TOUR FOLKS THERE! They were waiting for us and ushered us in and took us up to our tour guide, Adam, and they had tea, coffee, and biscuits (cookies) waiting for us. WE WERE EXTREMELY HAPPY! There is a special exhibit on Shakespeare and the Royal Court in the Drawing Gallery, and Adam gave us a 45 minute talk on the connections between the royals, Windsor and Shakespeare, and then took us around the exhibit and answered questions, getting into deep conversation with the students. He was simply terrific (he read history at University of Sussex, and was about a year out of school).
The exhibit has a first, second, and third folio on display. The second was owned by Charles I and had his annotations on it; he had this book with him when he was awaiting execution.
The third folio had a strange list of ‘other plays’ in it that I need to research (The Tragedy of Thomas Cromwell?? The London Pauper??)
We also saw a drawing done by Queen Victoria when she was young of Romeo and Juliet.
There were lots of cool things about The Merry Wives of Windsor too.
Everyone enjoyed the Castle very much, and we worked our way through it all, ending in St George’s Chapel, which I love. I found my cousin Graham’s coat of arms hanging in the Choir, where all the living Knights of the Garter have their emblems. His is hanging right over the tomb of Henry VIII! Crazy.
Had much silliness taking selfies with the guard, and headed back to the other train station and fortunately got the Paddington train, which was MUCH quicker. Tube back to Oxford Circus, and walked back to the hostel for a quick refresh before going to dinner. Went to Forty Dean and had their prix fixe, which was very good (but a little pricey). Rushed off to the Duke of York’s theatre to see Doctor Faustus with Kit Harington, which I still have to write about.
