Early this morning we returned to Carlsbad Caverns and this time we entered through the Natural Entrance, past the Bat Flight Amphitheater where we remember watching the bat flight at dusk one evening in September 1974. No bats there today though. They’ve gone south to Mexico for the winter. Today we opted for the ranger led King’s Palace Tour. The ranger embarrassed us by making a big deal out of the fact that we’d been there to celebrate our first anniversary and were back to celebrate our thirty-fifth!
The purpose of our trek to Strawberry Hill House in Twickenham in the southwest of London was to see a recently recovered bronze bust of the Emperor Caligula but we discovered so much more in the recently restored 18th Century “little Gothic castle” built by Horace Walpole.
London’s Imperial War Museum in Southwark founded even as the First World War raged offers insights into the myriad costs of the wars of the 20th and 21st Centuries. It was a most disquieting but valuable reminder of the myriad costs of war.
The two of us have long been fascinated with the history of canals and their role in the history of transportation, industrialization, and more recently recreation. This stay in London has given us new opportunities to explore and learn more about how canals contributed to the growth of this great city and how they are being used and preserved today.
What, no wild cave tour?! I bet Carlsbad would be an awesome cave to explore on one’s stomach.
You should have just grinned when the ranger mentioned thirty five years.
Sunday, November 23, 2008 – 07:27 PM