Since we had found a mooring in Paddington Basin last night, we decided that we had enough time to spend a full day here. In the morning we topped up our supplies by walking down Edgware Road to a Waitrose store. This was the nearest 'full size supermarket' - the others are all of the 'local' variety. Although they claim not to have different prices in the local shops, the limited size does seem to mean that they tend not to stock the less expensive items which we might usually see in the larger outlets. Nevertheless, this was a pleasant and well laid out store.
We had lunch back at the boat before setting out for the afternoon and evening. Our first target was the British Museum which Christine has not visited for some time (Mike has taken Jess and Alice here in recent years)
On our arrival we were immediately attracted to one of the first rooms which is used for special displays. At the moment it contains a work Larrakitj by a native Australian Wukun Wanambi who bases his work on ancient tree log coffins but decorates them with thousands of tiny sea mullet shapes.
After this we went into the main central area with its impressive dome that means that this area, once open to the weather, is now a sheltered space where lots of visitors gather. We collected a map of the museum and saw that there is a good series of free gallery talks - each lasts about half an hour and they start every 15 minutes - so one cannot do all of them in one go!
The next available talk was in a gallery devoted to the history of money, from the earliest examples of coins right through the evolution of paper money to a hint of a society where cash is no longer needed. Even in some of the ancient civilisations, although goods were traded in terms of special metals, quite often nothing changed hands and one cabinet contains a part of an ancient tablet which has a series of debts inscribed on it. No chance of them being easily forgotten!
We failed to find the talk on medieval Britain so looked around the displays on our own, but the information panels are sometimes almost as interesting as the artefacts themselves. This particular gallery also highlights the finds from Sutton Hoo including a very special fighting helmet.
Finally we joined a talk an Assyrian culture. A very pleasant volunteer, obviously very knowledgeable in this subject, starting with the huge figures that lined the entrance gates, took us through the clay tablets that were created during the reign of King Ashunasirpal and lined is palace walls. Many of them have an identical inscription in cuneiform, extolling the virtues and achievements of the king.
As with so much political art, key people are depicted in a specific way so that they can be instantly recognised by visitors to the palace. In this case, the king always has a hat, cone shaped but with a flat top. IN some cases he is shown in fighting action (always about to be victorious|!) and sometimes with symbols that reinforce the belief that he derived his authority from the most important gods of that culture.
We left the museum with enough time to have tea and picked out one of the many eating places near Russell Square. It seems that it has only been open a few weeks in this form and the staff were very pleasant and keep to serve us. Christine enjoyed a rather special slice of carrot cake whilst Mike had a crepe.
We made our way to Trafalgar Square where it had been the annual pillow fight day - most of the participants had left but a few were still adding to what must have been a mountain of feathers!
Some performers were still plying their trade to the crowds of visitors.
Earlier we had booked tickets for a 6.30 short concert at St Martin in the Fields given by the church's choir. Although it lasted just over an hour - the church was sold out for the event - the singing was amazing and most intense. The final item was a version of Stabat Mater by Scarlatti. Earlier in the program we heard Allegri's Misreri and a setting of the same text by James MacMillan. From start to finish a wonderful, inspiring, concert.
Fortunately we had prepared our dinner before setting out in the afternoon so it was just a matter of bringing the salads to the table as soon as we returned to the boat!
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