Oxford - Day 3 (30 Apr)

When developing our trip itinerary, we realised we had to make some adjustments to ensure we had some 'down time' and weren't just go, go, go day-in, day-out. Our 4 night stay in Oxford was my first opportunity to do just that!!

So today is even easier than yesterday. We have a 3hr cruise (including a picnic) down the Thames at 5pm tonight and that's it!! Very slow start to my day - I don't get up until 8.30am, which is my latest time thus far 🙌. My runny nose has now moved to both nostrils, but I still feel OK.

Start my day with a turmeric tea and croissant and then fluff around on my laptop all morning catching up and doing some pers admin. Sue has grabbed a cuppa and gone back to bed, so around lunchtime I ask her if she's ready to get up, ride the bus into town for lunch at the pub and visit the History of Science Museum. Her response "I'm thinking about it!!" About 30 mins later, decision made and she's up and getting ready 👌.

We find a pub and the sun is shining, so we grab ourselves a drink, order our lunch and trot on outside. We didn't end up in a 'traditional' pub, as our lunch choices are heavily influenced with Asian options - we both enjoyed them though.

After soaking up some more sun, we trotted off for a short walk to the History of Science Museum - originally a dedicated space to explore 'Natural Philosophy' (what we now call science). When the  building opened on 24 May 1683, the basement included a state-of-the-art experimental chemistry laboratory and space for public autopsies. The middle floor lecture hall was a hive of learning and practical science demonstrations and the top gallery provided practical support for research and learning.

From 1860, the collections moved to newly built homes but curious minds still passed through, including J.R.R. Tolkien, author of the The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings (who worked here for two years on the Oxford English Dictionary). In 1925, the Lewis Evans Collection of scientific instruments went on display in the top gallery and as it gradually spread to every floor, the building became a museum once again.

Here's a bit of a summary of what's contained within the museum:

Astrolabe with Geared Calendar - clocks were developed from star-gazing devices like astrolabes. The astrolabe we saw includes the oldest complete geared mechanism in the world.

Charles Baggage's Difference Engine - in 1822 he started work on an automatic mechanical calculator - the difference engine. Never finished, it was an early step towards modern computers. We saw parts from the first prototype. This picture shows about 2,000 parts and was built by his engineer and master toolmaker in 1832. This 'finished portion of the unfinished engine' represents one-seventh of the complete design:

John Russell's Moon Globe - a keen stargazer, painter John Russell was obsessed with the Moon. In 1797, he finished a Moon globe which shows lunar libration (the Moon's 'wobbly' orbit of the Earth) and lunar parallax (how much the Moon 'shifts' relative to the stars when viewed from two far-apart points on Earth). The Earth is the small ball in the middle on the left:

Periodic Table and Penicillin - we discovered these Oxford science stories: Harry Moseley's ground breaking work on the Periodic Table, Howard Florey's life-saving penicillin team and Nobel Prize winner Dorothy Hodgkin's 3D penicillin model.

Einstein's Blackboard - in May 1931, Albert Einstein gave a lecture to discuss what Relativity has to say about the universe. The museum has one of the three blackboards he used showing his calculations. Footnote - his writing was very neat and clear!!

Leaving the museum better informed than we arrived, we meandered off to our cruise meeting point. Thankfully, we passed an ice-cream shop, so treated ourselves to a single cone before continuing. Arriving at our meeting point at 4.45pm there was one other couple. We sat down to wait and soak up a bit more sun when a lady came to tell us that if we needed the toilet we best go before the cruise (as there was no toilet aboard). We duly took turns to complete this task and then a guy came over to say he'd settle us on the boat. It was then we discovered we were the only passengers!! Fantastic. We had a wonderful serene 'choof' down the Thames on an electric boat, happily chatting and munching away on our picnic which included:

• a non alcoholic drink (although we could have bought one if we wanted)
• water
• quiche
• potato salad
• 3 x sandwiches - salmon, egg & chicken
• 2 x scones with jam and cream.

Yummo

Here's some shots as we cruised down the Thames, going through one lock, seeing lots of rowers (some from the colleges and other novices) and long boats.

We finished our extraordinarily relaxing cruise 25 mins early as we'd both had enough, but our guide was also needing the toilet!! Walked back to find our bus home and the lovely bus driver picked us up when he shouldn't have, drove us to the correct bus stop (he was on route there when he saw us running to the incorrect bus stop) and then we tapped on and waited 5 mins for the bus to take us back to our airbnb.

Great day ended with watching some British true crime - then off to bed.

Tomorrow is a completely free day, so depending on how we feel, it could be a very very short post.

Night!!