It’s a long way from Lindisfarne to London in more ways than one.  The four hour train ride from rolling country to Kings Cross Station in downtown London is like falling asleep in cornfield and waking up in New York City.  (Yes, all you Harry Potter fans, this is where the train  “Platform 9 3/4” from the movies is found.) 

There’s lots to say about London – Westminster Abbey, St. Paul’s Cathedral, hundreds of naked bicycle riders crossing the Westminster bridge over the Thames River – for example! (I’d have never believed the bike ride had I not been standing right there.) What a collision of the old and the new, pop culture and high culture, the London of a historical Christian past and a wide-open anything goes present.  The picture of us is from the front of Buckingham Palace.

We saw a lot places, and because Marcia visits the people as much as the places, we met all kinds of folks.  We learned on the train of a place where the London locals congregate called “Gordon’s Wine Bar”.  It’s a restaurant underneath the street made from old hollowed out rock- sided storage caverns.  We met a young couple (Jenny from Ireland and her boyfriend from Italy) and got the insiders point of view of what it’s like to live in London.

As Marcia likes to say, ask a question and people will tell you a story.  Today I am waking up in Iowa (how’s that for contrast) at the Summer Writing Festival at the University of Iowa.  More later!