June 2013 -- England
A couple days in England afforded me the chance to explore. Many of London's sights are found alongside the Thames. A particular highlight for me, as a fan of the Bard, is the recreation of Shakespeare's Globe Theatre (a pillar of the Tate Modern is on the right).
Just around the corner is the famous Millennium Bridge. Outside of London, it is probably best known from its destruction in one of the Harry Potter films. When it was first installed, it was subject to a particular side-to-side mode of oscillation that was amplified by people lurching as they tried to walk a straight path along an oscillating bridge. In other words, resonance of the dangerous kind. The bridge was reinforced, and no longer vibrates.
Westminster Abbey is the resting place of many famous Brits, including Newton, Faraday, and Darwin. There's a landmark in the background here.
I took a day trip to Cambridge, home of the famous university. Unfortunately, the town is overrun by tourists during the summer (I guess I don't get to complain, though, being a tourist myself). The river Cam is exactly the sort of thing you'd expect to find at one of the world's top schools.
It seems that few of those tourists make it to the museum at Cavendish Labs. This is probably for the best, as Cavendish is a bit far out of town (although the walk is very nice!) and you'll need to get a visitor badge from reception. There's a fantastic collection of old instruments, plenty of background information on signs, and a gallery of annual physics department photos dating back to the late 1800s. These snapshots of history are a vivid reminder of Cambridge's enormous influence over the development of modern physics, with dozen of Nobel winners to be found.
It was odd being in England. Indecipherable non-English chatter has become familiar for me, so overhearing Geordies and Scots -- who sound foreign but are not -- was strange.
