Oxford and a Hint of Spring

Yesterday we spent the day in Oxford with our friends Tom and Christina. It is about a 2 hour drive from Cambridge so we set off in the morning and got to Oxford around 11. The city itself was similar to Cambridge in a lot of ways but on quite a larger scale. We went on a walking tour that we had printed out, so we saw several of the highlights of the city. Here are a few of them:

Christ Church College:
One of the largest colleges, where King Charles lived during the English civil war. Has a large cathedral on site, of course with damage from the reformation. Notable alumni include Lewis Carroll (author of Alice in Wonderland), John Locke, John Wesley. Also the great hall is where the inspiration for the great hall in Hogwart's came from and some of the scenes of the Harry Potter series were filmed at the college.

Tom, Christina, and Ryan outside of Christ Church College

The Great Hall

The Eagle and Child:
We had dinner at this pub, which was a favorite hangout of C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkein and their friends called "the Inklings" who met in the pub every Tuesday morning for over 30 years. There was a letter on the wall written by C.S. Lewis and signed by their group of friends.

Ryan outside of the Eagle and Child

New College:
A college that is built around the old city walls of Oxford. Also in New College is a hill that was a burial mound during the plague in England.

Christopher Wren architechture:
An alumnus of Christ Church college, Christopher Wren designed several buildings in the town including the Sheldonian Theatre and the tower in front of Christ Church college.

Kelly inside of Christ College, Wren tower in the background

It was a beautiful day in Oxford. We enjoyed sunshine for most of the day and saw crocuses and snow drops blooming all over town. In Cambridge we even saw a few daffodils blooming! The warmer temperatures are a very welcome break from the cold we have been having lately.

Norwich

This past weekend we went to the town of Norwich. It's about an hour and a half north and east of here so we drove out Saturday morning and came back Sunday afternoon. We stayed at a little bed and breakfast that was really just a room in a home there, but the couple who ran it were very nice.

Our B&B

We checked in and then walked into town. It's quite a small town, probably a little smaller than Cambridge, so it was easy to get around by walking.

Random street in Norwich

First we spent some time in the downtown market, a permanent fixture in Norwich (except on Sundays as we found out). Then we headed to the castle, one of the main attractions of Norwich. It is a Norman castle that dates back to the 1100s and much of the castle keep is very well preserved. It has been turned into a museum and was really well done. We saw a lot of artifacts that were uncovered during the archaeological digs of the castle mound. The castle was also used as a prison during the 1800s so there was a lot of evidence of that left.

Kelly walking up to the castle keep

Going down winding stairs in the castle

We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around town and enjoying people watching and temperatures above freezing. We decided to go for an early dinner, as we realized that it was valentine's day and we did not have a reservation anywhere in town. We felt quite fortunate to find a nice Italian restaurant with one table left unreserved for the night and had our Valentine's Day dinner there.
There were an amazing number of churches in Norwich. Every block seemed to have 2-3.

Just another church in Norwich

Sunday we went to a "sung eucharist" service at the Norwich cathedral, the cathedral with the second tallest spire in England. We saw the tallest when we went to Salisbury last year, so we figure we'll just work our way down the top ten tallest spires :-).

Kelly in front of the cathedral

The cathedral was in an area of the city called "Tombland" which sounded like it would be a macabre amusement park or something, but disappointingly was just a section of town. It was raining Sunday afternoon, so we shopped around town a little more and then headed home.

Ryan in "Tombland"

Yep, the building really is that crooked

Next weekend we are going with our friends Tom and Christina to visit Oxford.
The baby/pregnancy are going well. I'm in my 23rd week. Next scan is March 30, so more baby pics then.

Baby Update

Today we had the heaviest snowfall in 18 years in Cambridge. The funny thing is that here they don't have any snow plows, so though we only had a total of 4-5 inches of snow on the ground, only 1 out of 5 people in Cambridge made it to work today, all the schools were closed, trains were shut down, the London buses were taken out of service, half the tube was shut down and the airports were shut down or severely delayed.
So in this mess, we had an appointment for our second ultrasound on the other side of Cambridge from where we live. We didn't trust the people here to drive in the snow, so rather than take our car out we saw that the Cambridge buses were running and caught a bus. We waited for about 25 minutes for a bus to come (they usually come every 15 in the morning) and then had a slow 40 minute ride to go the 3 or 4 miles to the hospital. But we got there. We were 15 minutes late, but that ended up being fine because several of the staff hadn't made it in and they were running way behind.
So an hour after our scheduled time, we got in to have our scan. It was amazing! It was so fun to sit and watch the baby squirm around. The scan was about a half hour and the sonographer explained everything she was checking as she did it. I think I could have sat there the rest of the day and watched the baby. All the things that she checked looked completely normal so we are so thankful! And we found out that it is a little boy!

During the Ultrasound

Baby Boy DuBois

I'm feeling very well lately. I'm not sick at all anymore and I'm not big enough for my bump to interfere with my daily activities much. I'm still managing to run 5 days a week 5 or 6 miles, so I'm glad that I'm able to do that. My bump doesn't fit in any of my clothes any more, so I've taken the plunge and started wearing maternity clothes which are so much more comfortable!

Baby bump at 20 weeks

Not much else has been happening lately, thus the shortage of blog updates. We have another quiet weekend this coming weekend, but then the next we are going for Saturday/Sunday to Norwich, UK (a medieval town with a castle) and the week after we are going to Oxford which we have not seen yet. We're trying to get some of our UK travel in while we're a little short on vacation.