Glastonbury, Wells and Portsmouth

Wednesday we visited Glastonbury and Wells. Glastonbury is home to the Tor, a large, mystical hill that some people believe was King Arthur's Avalon. Long ago it was an island with an abbey on its shores and local legend claims that Christianity was brought there by Joseph of Arimathaea. Monks at the abbey purportedly found the body of King Arthur on their land, but that may have been a publicity stunt to bring money to the institution. The abbey was the second largest in Britain in the early 1500s (after Westminster) but Henry VIII had it destroyed when he broke with the Catholic Church. The abbot was taken to the top of the Tor and killed, his head was posted outside the remains of the abbey, and his drawn and quartered body was given to Anglican churches in Somerset. The abbot's kitchen is the only building on the property that remained intact (monks couldn't worship there and there was no lead in the ceiling to be stolen) and that is where I made bread with a darling fake monk. The Coordinatrix took a video of it, but I haven't yet decided if she's allowed to post it. Too bad we can't cut me out of it and just show the cute British monk boy.

Abbey Ruins

It was pouring (England, why you gotta be that way?)

Lady Chapel Ruins

Wells Cathedral may have just become my favorite cathedral. It's so beautiful inside! Go look it up online, because I don't have access to any of the photos of it right now.

Yesterday we drove to Portsmouth on the southern coast. It's the home of Admiral Nelson's HMS Victory, the Royal Naval Museum, and other sea-lover attractions. Ships are really big. I only got us lost twice on yesterday's journey, but one of those detours involved a trip through Limpley Stoke, a village with the narrowest streets I have EVER seen.

Tomorrow AandA go home, the Coordinatrix and I go to the Lake District for two nights, and then we join our good friend Pinchy in Scotland for two weeks.