A Walker in the Suburbs

One more backward glance before I move forward. This was one of the last sights I saw in London, a view of Picadilly Circus just as the lights were coming on.

It doesn’t get dark till almost 10 there, and we were trying to make our way back to the Victoria Station neighborhood before dark. It was not to be. Too many twists and turns. We jumped in a cab instead. I’m finally solvent enough that I can do that. For most of my traveling life, I’ve had to walk or take public transport (impractical in this case) no matter what the situation.

I love the energy in this photo: the people strolling, the puddles evaporating, the marquee twinkling. The evening was just coming alive. I hated to leave. I always do.

We flew back in time yesterday, shedding the hours we took three weeks earlier and landing back where we started — in the New World.

We left the Roman walls and the castle keep built by William the Conqueror. We left the narrow alleys of York and its magnificent minster. We left the locks on the River Wey — and thank God we left them intact.

We left the trains and the Tube and the half-timbered wall, the tea and the Thames and the Marks and Spencer Food Halls. If someone offered me a ticket back tonight, I would take it. But I don’t want to be greedy. I live in the New World with all its space and energy and eye-popping green. (Virginia must have had as much rain as Britain has these last few weeks.)

We’re back in the New World, yes, but today I’m wishing I was back in the old one.

There’s never a perfect time to leave England, but the day after a trip to the Greenwich Observatory may be as good a time as any.

Visiting this place taught me about the struggle to calculate longitude, made me think about time and time-keeping, about journeys great and small.

At one point yesterday, I had one foot in the eastern hemisphere and one foot in the western. Traveling allows for such straddling, for slipping out of one life and inhabiting another.

Today we’ll be in one hemisphere only. And today, all being well, we will be home.

Such a beautiful word, evensong. Beautiful as it is, though, it doesn’t capture the experience of a York Minster late afternoon service. Last night was our seventh and final night in York and our third and most spectacular choral evensong.

It was Pentecost Sunday, and the clergy processed in on a cloud of incense. The choir boys and adults wore red cassocks, and the adults wore white surplices over them. But as with previous services, we heard the voices before we saw the singers.

After they took their place in the quire, they began with the introit, then moved on to the responses and the psalm. Their voices rose in harmony and counterpoint as they sang anthems by Stainer, Palestrina and Rooney. The organ thundered behind them.

Because it was Sunday the service included a sermon and a hymn, which the congregation joined. This was not like the singing back home; it was robust and full.

As we prepared to leave, a shaft of sunlight pierced the west window and lit up the gothic pillars in the quire. It was a fitting farewell to this beautiful city.

York is a walled city. Almost two miles of wall separate this ancient metropolis from its (in some cases) less ancient surroundings. Though the walls were built for defensive purposes, they are now one of its primary tourist attractions.

A quick climb up and you’re on top of the world, or at least the walls.

Today I strolled two stretches of wall: one south from Lendal Bridge and the other north from Bootham Bar to Monk Bar, two of the Roman gates into the city.

As a walker in the suburbs, I don’t spend much time on top of walls. In fact, I generally stay away from walls entirely. So it was delightful to amble along the old stones today — and see what I could see.

Because my most profound experience of York Minster Cathedral could not be photographed — the evensong service, which we’ve attended twice — and because the grandeur of York Minster can’t be captured by my puny camera anyway … I’m sharing a detail of the chapter house ceiling.

The chapter house, used for church meetings, sits to the side of the grand nave. Completed in 1290, its ceiling is an engineering marvel. Somehow, the ancient timbers stay upright despite a central column.

To be in this room, or next door in the quire, where evensong takes place, is to be uplifted, inspired, taken to another place altogether. When the last notes faded from the organ recessional tonight, I could barely make myself leave.

Today we ventured out of the city into the Yorkshire Dales. We toured Hawes, Grassington, Hubberholme and Langstrothdale, pictured above.

I envied the sheep gamboling on the hillside. They live their lives amidst this beauty; I have to go home next week. On the other hand, I will not end up as a lamb chop on a dinner plate, so I have the best end of the bargain and ought not to complain.

Still, the landscape is stunningly beautiful and I’m thrilled we saw it today. Yockenthwaite Farm, which you see here, is home to the Hird family. They have farmed the land for five generations and now make and sell granola, muesli and porridge locally and around the world.

Their home and land are also the set for Heston Grange Farm, Helen’s home, for fans of the show “All Creatures Great and Small.” It wasn’t hard to imagine James and Helen up on the roof of the barn, having their first kiss.

I photographed it in the rain and in the sunshine, in the morning and in the evening. I photographed it up close and at a distance.

As British Prime Minister Keir Starmer faced down challenges to his leadership and lightning flashed near Buckingham Palace, we strolled and snapped, strolled and snapped.

What I photographed most — no contest — was Big Ben. I couldn’t get enough of London’s iconic clock tower framed by the Houses of Parliament. I tried to stop myself, then I’d see it in another light or from another angle — and snap another shot.

Before pushing “publish,” I counted the images of Big Ben I captured today: 31. Luckily for you, dear reader, I only posted one.

Speaking of Eleanor (as I did on Monday), yesterday I spotted an Eleanor Cross at (drumroll) Charing Cross Station. Charing Cross took its name from the Eleanor Cross installed in the late 13th century.

Shortly after that cross came down in 1647, a statue of Charles I on horseback was erected its place, a very special place, in fact — the exact center of London.

In 1865, a replica Eleanor Cross was set up a few yards away — and that’s the one we saw yesterday. After reading and writing about Eleanor crosses a few months ago, I was thrilled to see this re-creation. There are only two originals left of the 12, and I’m not going anywhere near them.

The cross was elegant and ornate. When we spied it, the weather was just starting to change, spitting rain, and the gray skies made a perfect backdrop. Medieval splendor with a Victorian twist, snapped by a modern iPhone.

(Photo: Celia Capehart)

Dad would have been 103 years old today. If he’d been alive for the celebration, he would have gotten a kick out of knowing I spent the day in London. And what a day it was: no clouds in the morning and no rain until late afternoon.

Dad loved England, talked fondly of his time in Old Blighty during World War II. “Everyone said the American GI was overpaid, oversexed and over here,” he chuckled.

To hear Dad tell it, he had been sent here in part to defeat Hitler — and in part to enjoy himself. He jitterbugged at USO dances and made ice cream in the unheated cabin of a B-17 bomber. Of course, he also flew 35 missions as a tail-gunner.

As I walked across the Millennium Bridge and ogled the skyline of St. Paul’s, I felt that Dad was with me. I felt like I was living a double life for a day. My eyes were his eyes, my feet his feet. I was giving him a birthday present of sorts — only it was gift for me, too.