In which we meet lots of sheep

Or, the second part of our trip to Europe.

On the Saturday after we arrived, we drove to Perry Green to see the Henry Moore sculpture garden, which had a special exhibit by Auguste Rodin. (Here’s a virtual tour of both men’s sculptures.) The Moore sculptures are outside, and widely spaced, and for the special exhibit the Rodin sculptures were dotted around the landscape as well. It was a really nice setting to see the art, especially the larger pieces.

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I didn’t expect to walk through a sheep pasture to see things. The closer one here is called “Sheep Piece”. The sheep seemed to appreciate its shade. The sculpture in the distance is called “Large Reclining Figure”. I was not impressed with Henry Moore’s titles.

Afterwards, since we weren’t that far from Cambridge, we drove up there and walked around, looking at the ornate buildings.

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I like the light and shadows in that one.

We peeked through the gates into a lot of courtyards.
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I bet the students just love all the tourists.

Then we stopped for dessert. I had Eton Mess, which is broken up chunks of meringue mixed with cream and topped with cherries and walnuts. It’s like a big pile of the topping for a real dessert. Tasty, but different.

Sunday, we went on a walk along some canals.
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The Basingstoke canal didn’t have much of a current and was covered in bright green algae, at times a solid mat. There were a lot of locks, which I imagine makes traveling very slow.

Cygnets! We saw some that were almost adult-sized, and some very small ones still on a nest with one parent while the other supervised from a few feet away.
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We stopped for lunch at a pub where I got very tasty (and hot, and greasy) fish and chips. It seemed like the appropriate choice.

We took a different route back, not along the canals, and passed a field of corn. I would have thought I was back in Illinois, but then we walked out of a forest and and found this:
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On the drive home, I was too slow to get out my camera for the ruins of a stone church standing in a field–no roof, just sharply peaked stone walls with long holes for the windows.

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