From London, St. Pancras Station to Rye in East Sussex

Allie and LT are now safely tucked away in their Jesmond Dean Hotel, half a block from the St. Pancras International Train Station--a tall Victorian fantasy that looks like a Scottish castle out of Harry Potter, and which was, in fact, used in all the Harry Potter movies as the station from which students departed for Hogwarts.  In addition,  the neighborhood is quite familiar because nearly 28 years ago, in order to satisfy the residency requirements for getting married to Elizabeth in England, LT had to live 3 weeks in a B&B on Argyle Street, right across from the train station.  And then, five or six years ago, when LT, Eli, Hill, and Allie visited London, they all actually toured Argyle Street and visited the "Registrar's Office" inside the 6 story government building on the corner of Argyle Street, which house the small, official, legal office where LT and Elizabeth were married.  So, in a way, Argyle Street is just as important in the "Wooster St" Thomas chronicles as the High Street in Rye is in the annals of Grandma's Phyllis' Alexander family.  But,  perhaps, the narrator is getting ahead of himself and had better return to the beginning of the day.

Allie in front of one of the Thorpe houses in 19th century .

LT had another fine full English breakfast, packed his bags and was down in the lobby of the Falstaff fifteen minutes early when Allie stepped through the door with her black backpack and stylish blue duffel bag.  We said "au revoir" to the hotel staff and walked two quick blocks to the train station and were lucky enough to catch a train to Rye ("Change at Ashford International").  We arrived in Rye at about 10AM.  It was a beautiful day, with blue sky and just a few puffy blue clouds on the horizon.  We walked across the street from the train depot, up two mildly steep streets and were on the "High Street."  Aunt Phyllis Ann had emailed us exact addresses, so we knew to turn left and walk south towards the very end of the High Street, towards # 5, which was the Thorpe house, and which is now a spicy Indian Restaurant.  Right across the street (again thanks to PAN's--Phyllis Ann Nordstrom--email, we knew to look for two more Thorpe houses, # 114, which was a high fashion boutique called "Bird" and # 110-111 which housed an trendy antique store and a store which sold soldier memorabilia--small model soldiers from the Napoleonic wars, WWI, WWI, etc.  It was really inspiring to be walking at the end of the street where Grandma Phyllis' grandparents lived and worked.  The houses are are the very end of the High Street,  (it's actually called "East Cliff") and right next to #114 are several benches where folks can sit and admire the view out over the Romney Marsh and even glimpse the English Channel. 

The churchyard around St. Mary's in Rye.

Next, LT and Allie walked north on the High Street and turned right on East Street and walked (again uphill) straight up to St. Mary the Virgin Church.  We toured the cemetery which surrounds the church, but couldn't read any of the grave stones, even though PAN had sent us pictures of where to look for the Thorpe graves.  But, since it was a bright sunshiny day where ghosts certainly would not dare to appear,  we thoroughly explored the place, peering at every stone.  To be honest, most of them were covered with more lichen than legible writing.  Since it was still not 12:00 Noon, we next visited the 13th century Ypres Tower, an ancient square Saxon structure, commissioned by Henry III.  The tower had great views of the Romney marsh and the navigable River Tillingham which leads to the English channel.

LT sips some Chablis in the Mermaid Tavern in Rye

At 12:00 Noon, LT and Allie adjourned to the Mermaid Inn, one of Rye's most historic buildings and the site of smuggling from the 1200's to the 1800's.  They sat in a corner by the window, overlooking another view of russet red brick houses, black slate roofs, and winding streets.  LT ordered the full Dover Sole, with buttered spinach, and the cheese course for dessert.  Allie more prudently selected from the Vegetarian menu, and had the mushroom, artichoke, spring herb salad (with a truffle egg. Hi, this is Allie again, making last minute edits and additions to the blog entry.) and a fricassee of woodland mushroom and artichoke. 

Allie at the top of the Bell Tower of St. Mary's Church in Rye

After lunch, they walked back to the church at the top of the hill and paid 2.50 pounds each to mount the 83 tiny stairs to the top of the square belltower above the church.  At points the ladder/staircase was so narrow that LT--despite his slender, bicycle-riding reduced waist-- had to move sideways in order to ascend.  The view from the top was awesome in all four directions.  We could see the train station where we had arrived, the contours of the High Street, the bulk of Henry James's "Lamb House" (our next destination) and again the Romney marsh, where flocks of spring lambs were grazing, and the River Tillingham running out to the sea.

LT and Allie in Henry James house.

At 2:00PM, LT and Allie were the first to enter Henry James's house.  LT had visited her in the 1970's and he and Eli had again visited the famous home of the "master" of English novelists in October of 2010, so this was LT's third visit to the house where the subject of his Ph. D. dissertation had lived and written for 18 years.  They toured the "oak" room filled with photographs, the dining room, where James had fed and entertained Joseph Conrad, H. G. Wells, R. L. Stevenson, Stephen Crane, and also walked out into the gardens and lawns.

LT poses near a fountain in James's Lamb House

By this point, Allie was close to breaking the Lamb House rules (this is Allie again, by the way! Hi.) and curling up on one of the roped off sofas, so the father-daughter duo decided to head back to Canterbury and set off for London and the Jesmond Dean Hotel. They took a train from Rye to Ashford, and then from Ashford to Canterbury. After that, the two split up, Dad to get the luggage, and Allie to get a ticket to London for herself. Although she had to deal with a surprisingly snobby ticket seller, Allie got her ticket quickly, and was able to meet up and help out LT with the bags at Falstaff. They got on their train (high speed to London, no changes, oh yeah!) and within an hour, Allie and LT were in London! They checked into the very nice JD Hotel, dropped off their bags, and then headed back to St. Pancras International. Why St. Pancras, the imaginary readers of this blog ask? Well, Allie and LT were pretty wiped out by this point, and decided that buying food from Marks and Spencer's was better than wandering around London looking for a restaurant. For dinner, they bought a chicken ceasar salad, smoked salmon, green olives, pesto pasta salad (apparently, throwing in tomatoes and baby spinach into cold pasta makes it a salad, who knew), and a teeny tiny bottle of wine (no, I'm serious, it was only a little larger than the remote!) They returned back to JD and ate, and Allie finished off her dinner with a couple of Samoa Girl Scout Cookies (THANKS MOM!) Dad wrote most of this blog and went to bed, while Allie decided to stay up and add photos. Tomorrow, adventures in London!

LT in Lamb House garden 34 years earlier.