Our friend Gary arrived yesterday for a weekend of rest, relaxation, and exploration. Today we ventured into the Great Smoky Mountains National Park by exploring the Oconoluftee Farm Museum and Mingus Mill to get an idea of what life was like in the area a hundred or more years ago. We wandered among the farm buildings that have been relocated here from various parts of the park and and talked at length with the miller on duty at Mingus Mill. And in general just enjoyed geeking out over late 19th and early 20th Century technology as well as walking in the sunshine on a gorgeous autumn day in The Smokies.
Ever since its debut on Broadway the two of us have wanted to see “Wicked the Musical”. Today we realized that dream. In the Apollo Victoria Theater in London’s West End we were witness to the incredible prequel to The Wizard of Oz, the story of the Glinda the Good and the Wicked Witch of the West.
London’s National Portrait Gallery’s temporary exhibition, “Six Lives: The Stories of Henry VIII’s Queens” presents an amazing collection of portraits, jewelry, personal effects, books, costumes, and more to illustrate not only the lives of the six women who married the second Tudor king, but the effort across five centuries to keep their memory alive.
The purpose of our trek to Strawberry Hill House in Twickenham in the southwest of London was to see a recently recovered bronze bust of the Emperor Caligula but we discovered so much more in the recently restored 18th Century “little Gothic castle” built by Horace Walpole.
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