A Delightful Vist from Home: Mom and Dad visit England!

No, we don't own that adorable Volkswagen camper van you see in the photo.  I know, I wish it was ours too.  And no, my parents didn't come visit us in a Volkswagen camper van (though that would have been pretty cool!).  So why am I pictured here with my Mom beside this happy little vehicle?  First of all, my parents did come to visit us in Cambridge!  And second of all, why wouldn't we want to take a photo here?  I think this photo captures the essence of our time in England with my parents.  Joyful, fun, special, and memorable.

It had been six months since seeing any family from home.  So, you can imagine just how excited we were to welcome my Mom and Dad here from Canada!  Zack finished work on December 19th for two weeks of holidays, and I was lucky to get the time off as well.  So, on the afternoon of Friday the 19th of December, I paced anxiously around our apartment until the time came to meet my mom and dad at the Cambridge train station!  After a long, tight squeeze from my mom and a big bear hug from my dad, we were chatting as if no time had passed at all.  I'm lucky to have the relationship with my parents that I do and was excited show them what life in England really looks like for us.

Though my parents had just endured a long, overnight flight and were very confused as to what day it was, they were troopers and were excited to get out and explore Cambridge right away.  And Cambridge did not let them down- the beautiful old architecture and the amount of history in this city made it simple to "show off" our new home to them.  I knew my mom must be loving it when we couldn't walk for more than 5 minutes before getting another photo.  "Oh, look at that cafe!!" "Oh, and those blue doors!” she'd say as she'd double check with my dad that her camera was on the right setting (don't worry mom, I am the exact same way- I have been here for four months and I still take photos as if I am a weekend tourist).  That's not to say my dad didn't rack up a crazy amount of photos as well!  He was excited about all the historical facts and I knew taking him to the location of where the Double Helix was discovered (Cavendish Laboratory) would be something that would really get him wound up.  We even had a pint at the exact pub where James Watson and Francis Crick ran over to and exclaimed that they had discovered the secret of life in 1953.  My Dad also exclaimed to have tried "the best meatball in his entire life!" (Quote from Robert Janzen himself), when we took them out for Algerian food along Mill Road, where you'll find restaurants of all different ethnicities.  Zack claims it must be a "Janzen" thing to make such strong statements about food.  I do admit, I can tell you the exact time and place when I exclaimed, "this is the best burger of my entire life!" (I'm not joking- it was amazing!).  I think I know where I inherited my excitement about food.  

 Our Algerian dinner table.

"The best meatball" of my Dad's entire life.

Our days in Cambridge consisted of a lot of walking, some good British pubs, full English breakfasts, punting on the River Cam, and on Christmas Eve we attended the famous "Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols" at the King's College Chapel.  This event is so world renowned, that in order to get one of the 600 seats, you must arrive before 9am and join the long queue for the 3pm service.  Luckily, time seemed to move quickly and we made friends with the other crazies who woke up in the dark on Christmas Eve to wait in line.  Specifically, we chatted with a young lady from Australia, and another woman from North-West England (my mom hit if off well with her- I’m surprised they didn't exchange email addresses in the end).  We were delighted to have some live entertainment while we waited from the King’s College choir boys themselves!  I tried to upload a short clip of them singing "Jingle Bells" but sadly it won't let me upload.  Just believe me- they were good!

Below, you can see the queue forming inside the grounds of King's College:

The choir boys (above) and the exterior of the college (below).

The interior of the chapel is also absolutely breath taking.  We weren’t able to take photos, however I snatched this photo off of google:

This service is broadcasted live around the world, and has been an annual tradition since the first service in 1918.  I look forward to tuning in to listen next year, especially because of the memories it will bring. 

Here is a jumble of photos of our time together (lots of these photos I snagged off of my parents):

 We stopped in at my work!

 Punting

Christmas service at City Church Cambridge.

We also ventured outside of Cambridge during my parents stay.  We spent one day in London and another in Ely, which is a town 20 minutes north of Cambridge.  Our day in Ely actually turned out to be a highlight of our time in England because of our tour at the Ely Cathedral.  The tour of the Octagon Tower brought us right up onto the roof of the Cathedral, offering us views of the town and countryside, and also brought us up past the rafters to view the interior of the cathedral from the top of the tower.  

I've included just a few photos from our time in London (full day of sight seeing!):

Mom on London Bridge!

And here's a few (or maybe a lot...) of our time in Ely:

 Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the ultimate photo bomb (below):

And that concludes my parent's visit to England!  I'd like to make a specific shout out to them for coming out this way.  We truly enjoyed having you here.

I could wrap this up with saying how hard it was to say goodbye.  OR... I could wrap this up by saying: stay tuned for more adventures!  We may or may not have boarded a plane on Boxing day and headed down to Spain.  I'll let you know in another post that is coming soon :)