A Queen's cathedral

We finally visited the thing that draws most people to Ely yesterday -- its amazing cathedral.

And I decided this could very well be my favorite of all the cathedrals we have seen these last five-plus months. It's huge, but light, and still very well used (there was a graduation rehearsal from the nearby U.S. Air Force Base, and the way the young voices echoed as they sang "God Save the Queen" and "The Star-Spangled Banner" was something we'll never forget). You get the sense it really is the soul of this small city.

You enter through a labyrinth, which is a kind of a maze except there are no dead ends, and the kids loved it. Apparently, the number of steps it takes to get from start to finish is the same number of steps it would take to walk from the bottom to the top of the tower that rises above the entrance.

You then walk by an old stone pillar or cross which is more than 1300 years old. It is the oldest item in the cathedral, which was founded by Queen Etheldrede in 673. Jack was concerned that the Latin etchings at the bottom were from "someone being really naughty", but I reassured him that this kind of stone marking was pas de probleme.

After passing the prior's door...

And some soaring ceilings...

...you end up in the heart of the cathedral, where the two lines intersect to make a cross. An old Norman tower once existed here, but it collapsed and in its place, a one-of-a-kind octagon lantern was built, and it is just amazing.

From here, you walk by small chapels to the Lady Chapel, which is the largest chapel devoted to Mary, the mother of Jesus, in all of England. A janitor was there when we entered, and smiled when he saw the kids. I think he overheard me saying that all of the nooks used to be filled with sculptures but during King Henry VIII's time, they were all destroyed (they have a great book about this king and his daughter, Elizabeth, thanks to the May family in Beaune). He said to the kids conspiratorially, almost in a whisper... "they missed one!"

Then he led them all the way the length of the chapel and pointed up high inside, where one small saint's head still remains.

He then asked them if they liked dogs. (Do they like dogs? What a question!). So he told them the man who designed the chapel must have liked them too because in between all of the religious imagery, he added one little hound chasing a hare... and he showed it to them, too.

He told us he had been working at the cathedral since he was 15, and that it had lots of good stories to tell. He then said he had to get back to work, and I got this picture as he walked away.

We hardly had time to thank him -- but since then, I have been thinking that this short encounter may have done more to "teach" them about history, art, and religion than a whole semester in a classroom could.

We finished walking around the cathedral, stopping for a thousand questions or so in some of the small chapels and as we read signs near the brass inlays on the floor (the kind that their brass rubbings were done from), and took a few more pictures ...

... before we decided to leave for the day.

We want to come back to its famous stained-glass museum, but needed to have lunch. And we happened to be right near the Thai restaurant, so headed there for delicious peanuty goodness.

The kids have become slightly more adventurous eaters these last months, too... not just the Thai here, but Jack's experieneces in the French cantine have made him much more open to new and different foods. The weekend with Ravi and Kavi added to that, and I have great hope that eventually, they will love spicy, flavorful, interesting food as much as John and I do.

We can hope, anyway, right?