We started in London, which is a city full of texture and patterns. Every building is interesting, and every time I turned a corner, there was something else amazing standing there. The British Museum was about our favorite stop of the whole trip. The ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman sections were unbelievable. There were also some really amazing ivory carvings (with minute details), a fabulous watch and clock collection, and a really neat Medieval collection as well. The ancients really had a way with patterns, and story telling via pictures. A number of the stone wall carvings we saw I thought would make great quilt patterns -- zig-zagging fish, swirling waves, trees with patterned leaves. The Rosetta Stone is there, which was neat to see as well.

Also in London, of course, is the Victoria and Albert Museum, which isn't as organized or as fine a collection as the one at the British Museum, but oh, do they have needlework! After looking at some more ivory carvings (we marvelled at those), we headed to textiles. There was a woman sitting at one of the tables looking at a sampler, and as I walked past her, I said, "That's not..." She said, "It is!" Then we both just gushed about this sampler -- the Jane Bostocke sampler, the earliest dated and signed sampler that anyone knows of. It turned out the woman is the designer for Forget Me Nots in stitches. She was in England to teach, and had stopped by to see the V&A's very fine needlework collection. I can't even tell you how wonderful some of the pieces were. After peering at Jane's sampler, I headed to the bookshelf-like area where the samplers are stored in frames with handles on the sides. You can read at the end of each row what is there, and then you just start pulling and looking. There were amazingly fine examples of bobbin lace, needlepoint, classic English samplers, even some UFO's (this should be inspiration for all of us. Even a UFO can be good enough to land in a museum some day!)

In London, a few of the other really fun things we did were to go to King Lear at Shakespeare's Globe Theater, where I found an etching/signed print of SHAKESPEARE'S PEDDLER!!! I bought it, of course, and am going to have it framed for my office. The actors were all very fine, and as we arrived early and waited at the front (groundling level), Steve and I ran in when the gates opened, and stood front and center, with our elbows on the stage for the entire play. We were spat upon, splashed with water, dusted with sand and covered with dust. (For $7.50 -- what a deal!) We also saw the Reduced Shakespeare Company's "Complete Works of William Shakespeare: All 37 Plays in 97 Minutes" (at The Criterion). That was a scream, and in a small theater, such fun that the entire audience got involved. I had the best desserts I have ever had in London -- Steve and I shared a chocolate mousse and a berry tart, and they were perfect in every way. We found the English to be good humored and fun loving. Everyone's willing to chat for a bit, and we loved the accents we encountered.

We took the Eurostar Train through the English Countryside, under the English Channel, and then into France to get to Paris. I speak a little French, so we did all right in Paris. Croissants every morning, perhaps a pint of strawberries from the grocer across the street. Food in France was inexpensive, but drinks were not. I don't think I drank a Coke for under $3. We ate some stinky cheese and had crepes a few times (chocolate of course.) We also ate a bowl of French Onion Soup (yum) just outside Notre Dame Cathedral, where the rose bushes were taller than me, and the roses as big as my hand.

We made it out to Louis XIV Palace at Versailles. The art there is amazing, and the grounds are unbelievable. The gardens are like mazes, but organized ones. The shrubs are clipped, trees grow in boxes, every time you turn around, there's another statue or fountain, and it seemed every flower bed had onions in it. Unfortunately, at Versailles was the first of our bouts with large tour groups. Paris seemed to be overrun with them. And the problem with any large tour group is they move en masse, so instead of winding your way through a crowd of small groups, you are faced with tidal waves of people that are all moving in the same direction at once.

In France, I really got the feeling that a lot of the tourists weren't really appreciating what they were seeing. In the Orsay, a fabulous museum with a wonderful Impressionist art collection, men slept on chairs while their wives looked at the art. At the Louvre, everyone streamed past centuries of great Italian art to take pictures of the Mona Lisa (and then leave.) The French are a reserved people, polite, and helpful. They have an eye for beauty and work hard to keep Paris looking its best.

After Paris, we flew to Ireland, where we stayed in a little town called Dun Laoghaire (pronounced "dun leery") seven miles south of Dublin. Instead of another hotel, we stayed at Windsor Lodge, a bed and breakfast with a view of the ocean, cozy beds, and a huge breakfast every morning for $50 a night. Steve and I felt like we were at home; Dun Laoghaire is like a Minnesota Lake town, and we found some things to do there, walking along the beach picking up sea glass, touring local castles, doing a little shopping. We had a great Italian meal there, and of course had drinks at the pub.

Ireland had postponed its St. Patrick's Day festivities for the weekend we were there, so we were treated to a parade and a fireworks display that was put together by the same group that did the Sidney Olympics. Also in Dublin we took a wonderful guided tour around the Trinity College area, saw the Book of Kells (an illuminated copy of the Bible that is about 800 years old and amazing!), and I bought a piece of Waterford Crystal, a vase pattern only available in Ireland.

The Irish are so friendly; my first encounter with the Irish was in the ladies' room. A pre-teen girl was sighing that her life was a mess, and then she came over to tell me about how she had a pimple, and that night was to be her first "hop" (dance). She told me I sounded a lot like her uncle from Boston (did you know North Dakota and Boston accents are the same?) She was sweet, as were all of the Irish we encountered. What happy people. The Irish are a people very proud and reverent of the people who have gone before them.

What did I learn on my travels? I learned that although the Internet makes the world seem like a smaller place, the world is still very large. I learned that we all should take advantage of the treasures in our own communities. When we attended Sunday service at St. Paul's Cathedral (which was so beautiful, I cried twice), there were only about 150 people in attendance. Out of 14 million people in the London area.

I also learned that travellers need to be realistic about what to do on vacation. If a person doesn't like art or museums at home, why will they like the art and museums of another city? There's no excuse to pay to fly to Paris and then sit and sleep in a museum. If you like to shop, go shopping. If you like the theater, see a bunch of shows. If you like art, there's plenty of that. If you like to eat, spend your time in restaurants. Dance, sit in the park, exercise, talk to the locals. Do what you enjoy while on vacation; don't do things just to say you've done them.

Did I get much stitching done on vacation? Not necessarily, but I did get to spend time with my husband in three beautiful cities seeing amazing treasures large and small. Then I got to come home to my wonderful kids and my sweet little house. Have you ever seen a show where a weary traveller gets down on bended knee to kiss the ground? I understand that feeling (be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.)

© 2007 Theresa Venette. Articles on this site may be reproduced in needlework group newsletters or other handouts with permission of author and proper attribution. Send questions, comments and suggestions to: xspeddler@yahoo.com