{"id":3584,"date":"2023-05-04T23:59:00","date_gmt":"2023-05-04T22:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/?p=3584"},"modified":"2023-05-08T22:18:01","modified_gmt":"2023-05-08T21:18:01","slug":"summing-up-canterbury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/?p=3584","title":{"rendered":"Summing Up Canterbury"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I’m trying to combine a round-up of all of the other bits of Canterbury, plus some sort of round-up of how the working process went. Let’s see how this goes, shall we?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Roman Museum
<\/strong>Did this on on the Sunday, partially by accident because while I’d planned to go to it, I was just out for a wander and happened to spot the sign down a sidestreet.
It is, I think, aimed at a younger audience; The audio tour certainly was.
Lots of reconstructions of ‘Roman Stuff’ with models & life-size displays, but also actual historical information & artifacts scattered in there. Mention of the existence of slaves, but not dwelling on what that actually means. It was a bit difficult to figure out what they were trying to say in some places; The layout of pictures and descriptions of Roman Canterbury through history meant that it took me a bit of cross-checking to get “the city grew, and then people just stopped being there anymore, and we don’t really know why” as the high-level summary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That said, it was interesting and fun, and they have a thumping great section of mosaic floor preserved where they found it, which is kind of cool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Generally Wandering Around
<\/strong>I did a lot of this on the first few days, partially to get a feel for the place, and partially to get out of the hotel room for a while. The side of the main street which hasn’t been developed into a giant roofless mall, still has some of the ‘narrow streets and slumping buildings’ feel of old cities; A lot of cafes & restaurants & places selling tourist stuff, and also an art gallery and a Harry Potter shop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There’s a chunk of the main street which is being paved, or re-paved, or something, but it means that a wide pedestrian zone is reduced to two narrow walkways which get clogged with people almost immediately, and can be brought to a screeching halt by an uncooperative toddler or a few confused tourists. Was glad to have a rough idea of the twisty somewhat parallel streets when that happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There wan’t much to photograph which hasn’t been captured a thousand times already by better photographers than me, so I mostly went with things which amused me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A fraction of a second later the young woman in the headscarf did a grinning double metal-horns gesture at my camera; I’m sorry I missed it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Westgate; Not perhaps their best attempt at naming, though it is at least in the North-West of the city.
Canterbury West railway station, on the other hand, is almost due North of Canterbury East railway station.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Also a nice park which eventually wraps around towards the other railway station, following the path of the remains of the city wall.
I did take a few walks along the wall, and up the Dane John mound<\/a>, but didn’t take any photos. Nice place to walk along though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On To The Overview
<\/strong>I enjoyed Canterbury.
It didn’t go perfectly, but it was fun, and I learned a few things about remote working & travel in the ‘what to do differently next time’ department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n