On Earth as it is in Heaven

Oops, I'm bad; I haven't updated in several days....

Today was our trip to Bath and Stonehenge!  We had to, unfortunately, wake up really early to load onto coach buses and drive up to Salisbury to see massive mysterious stones.  Honestly, it was a bit anticlimactic to drive up to the hill and see...a bunch of rocks.  People on our bus were literally more excited to see sheep on the neighboring meadow, baa-ing and ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the poufy white things.

The weather was forecast for pouring rain today, but when we got to Stonehenge, obviously someone was playing a trick on us.  It was brilliantly sunny and quite warm.  The stones of the henge are just as you'd expect, and just as you've seen in frillions of photographs before.  Personally, I really enjoyed being in the presence of the stones, but I could see how others might find it boring.  I like being amidst all the mystery of how the stones got there, what was the purpose, etc.  It made me feel like I was witnessing history, standing in a field and looking at a structure 5,000 years old.  Yay!

Then, we drove over to the Roman city of Bath (Bahh-th, with the accent).  We had a guided tour to the famous bits, like the Royal Crescent (LOVE - want to live there), and the Circus (not a real circus, obviously).  We had lunch at a pub for a good price, £3.95 for my bangers and eggs and chips.  Then, we toured the Bath Abbey on our own.  I was very impressed by the abbey and I felt...je ne sais quoi...standing in there.  The ceilings are lofty and covered with spindly webs of fan vaults.  The stained glass windows are very intricate and colorful.  I was very impressed at the architecture of it all.  Plus, it made me feel the passion that has driven religion, particularly mine, for 2,000 years.  It makes me want to go home and go to church every Sunday.  Almost.  I wanted to support the church somehow, so I bought a little stone with The Lord's Prayer printed on it for my grandpa:

Our Father who art in heaven

Hallowed be thy name

Thy kingdom come

Thy will be done

On earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread

and forgive us our trespasses,

As we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation

But deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom,

the power and the glory, 

For ever and ever, Amen.

I learned it ages ago when I was a good little granddaughter and followed my grandparents to church on Sundays, so I thought it was very touching and lovely.

Finally, we toured the Roman Baths.  I remember back in sixth grade (apparently, the year when I learned all the important things about the world and architecture; see: Parthenon marbles), we learned about the structure of a Roman bath: the tepidarium, the slaves who would slick you up with oil and then scrape off the dirty crap that seeped from your pores, etc.  Oddly, the Bath baths did not emphasize this stuff.  It featured lots of things by Minerva (my favorite goddess).  It was, again, very interesting to be in the midst of something so ancient and important and real.  At the end of the walking bits, we tasted real spring water from the baths.  DISGUSTING.  It smelled and tasted like metal, probably from the ancient pipes from which the water flows, and it left an aftertaste that kind of resembled...blood?  It was as though you bit your lip really hard and then tasted the blood in your mouth.  Ick, ick, ick.  BUT, the water has supposed healing properties, and I figured I couldn't go to Bath without partaking in the tourist tradition...so yes I gulped a glass of Roman bathwater.  Hooooray for history!