Journeys

The boys and I have just been on a journey. We are currently in Brighton visiting friends which, of course entails vast quantities of driving in order to get here. I realised that along with a now older less dependent family there are a few perks. One of which is that a five hour drive to Brighton is no longer a military operation for which I must steal myself for days with organisational skills that would shame the military. In fact I can, almost, pack and go. Granted we did leave the camera behind - again!!! but otherwise we arrived intact with nothing major forgotten, nor major arguments (unless you count the usual leaving the house melt down that seems to accompany us on every journey, often even ones of half an hour or less.

In fact it was very pleasant despite that fact that the first national trust place we stopped at did not open on Mondays and we had to forgo our  sophisticated leg stretch and frothy coffee for a decaff in a local greasy spoon, still a step up from motorway services even if they do have an M&S. we arrive in Oxford for our long stop and found that the Ashmolean was also shut on a Monday and all the tourist tours were full. Sounds nightmarish when I write it down but in fact we had a lovely day. We diverted to the Natural History Museum and the Pit River Museum instead which were fabulous!!! And I mean FABULOUS. The displays were what I thought of as stuffy and old, lots of glass cases with dead stuffed things in them, but there were so cleverly arranged and described that they provoked thought and educated you just by being in the room. Even the pillars holding up the room were made from different rock from round Britain and they were all labelled with type of stone and where they were from. Animals were presented in formal classification with fossils in the same class/order.genus being presented alongside animals that we recognise. There was so much stuffed into such a small space (along with hundreds of kids on half term - a big downside for us) that in the end we were overwhelmed and left. We hardly saw any of the Pitt Rivers collection which was behind all the natural history stuff and that was more interesting- half a million objects donated to the museum by Mr Pit Rivers (whose full name is impossible to remember) on condition that they be housed in a museum for public viewing and displayed according to category rather than age or culture which is more unusual 'in order to display the sheer ingenuity of humanity' (quoted from the guide leaflet). In comparison to the recent revamp of Manchester Museum, which I have not seen for myself but have heard hideous things about, it was gold dust. Maybe the bods at Manchester could take some time to nip down to Oxford and take a peek, preferably in half term when you cannot move for kids and exasperated people who have forgotten it is half term, something that sadly cannot be said for Manchester Museum any more.

Also impressive about Oxford is it's terribly efficient park and ride scheme. Once we were in the city centre we could see why it has had to become so good but we parked the car for £1.50  for the full day, the kids were free on the bus and I was £2.20 return. I can't get to the local shops for that near us, not with the children with me.

And so we have arrived in Brighton. I have spent the day ignoring children and reading 'how to be a woman' by Caitlin Moran which could lead me into all kinds of feminist rants but i really don't feel like it. We all know being a woman is both fabulous and desperate at the same time usually and while I am a flag waving feminist, I appear to have left my flag at home. The children have spent they day with their friends making a movie, well they have made the trailer for it and it is fab, all black and white mood shots. Sadly no-one knows how to post it in the net but we will have a DVD by the end of the week to bring home and show off with.