London Calling!

Hope you had an excellent Thanksgiving! I personally love Thanksgiving, it is one of my favorite holidays. Nothing beats having my family come over to our house and sharing the day with us... but since this year, that wasn’t an option, I guess London was a pretty good alternative J

It was so wonderful going there this time of year! Everything is all decked out for Christmas

We even found a Christmas carnival

Because the airline messed up our flight reservations, we only really had a day and a half in London, so we CRAMMED everything into our trip.

Kensington Gardens

Harrod's

Holy Trinity Church

Buckingham Palace

Big Ben

Westminster Abbey

London Eye

Don't let the name fool you. It was my Thanksgiving Sandwich: Turkey and Cranberry Sauce on Cranberry Wheat Bread. 

Millenium Bridge

London Bridge

Thank God for Starbucks… their free wifi and a place to sit was our savior. I don’t think I have ever gone to Starbucks so frequently in my life… literally. We went there 5 times in the course of 2 days.

I absolutely loved London, and got to see a ton of things, but I kind of feel like the trip was missing something. There was not a whole lot of time to wander around and explore. We mostly sprinted from site to site when google maps was NOT leading us in the completely wrong direction. Guess I’ll have to call London back some other time…

Hadrian's Villa and Villa D'Este

Last week, we went on another class trip to Hadrian’s Villa and Villa D’Este. I don’t know how much you know about Italian villas, so here is a little background info:

Villas date back to imperial Rome. It was very common for the elite to have a palace in the city, and a country residence, called a villa. That tradition was revived during the renaissance; the wealthy/ruling elite would have their palazzo(s) in the cities, and their villas with elaborate gardens as their country retreat. Hadrian’s villa is one of the few surviving ancient villas, and served as the model for many renaissance villas.

It was built for the emperor Hadrian, and it is a GIANT sprawling villa complex that has an almost urban scale.

Model of the Hadrian's Villa Complex

It had all the amenities an emperor could wish for, including a theatre, a bath house, a fish farm, guest houses, you name it.

an example of Roman building technology: this wall was built so straight, that when you stand at the end of it and look at it dead on, it looks like a single column.

house of the emperor's personal deities

the emperor's living residence

complete with indoor fish pond. 

pavement in the guest bed rooms

roman brick masonry

temple space

fish farm

bath house roof

reflecting pool

Villa D’Este is a renaissance villa that is famous for its incredible gardens.

The gardens slope up a hill toward the palace.

It has some of the most incredible water features

Including a water organ

Apparently, in its heyday, when some of the fountains sprayed water, the mist formed the coat of arms of the villa’s patron. It is simply incredible that the hydro-engineering technology back then was advanced enough to produce this.