My professor, David Tucker, owns and runs the company “London Walks” which literally does exactly what it sounds like: he and his band of 20 guides run tourist walks around London, because he believes hoping on a bus to see the 5 major sights means you miss out on “real” London. He is a Character, but pretty fun and always hilarious. He had his guide, Fiona, run Thames Beachcombing. We’ve also met his “English Rose: Mary” or his wife, and a male guide who’s name I forget.
Anyway, Fiona started off her hour with instructions to “wear these plastic gloves and don’t touch anything without my approval.” Nothing makes me feel quite as safe as the fear of Vile’s Disease, an illness picked up in the Thames and spread through rat urine. Lovely. I’m on the lookout though for flu like systems that show up in 5-10 days after my Thames adventure. “Caught early, your fine, caught late, you’ll die!” Fiona cheerfully passed out warning slips. She also shared the wonderful news that “In America, they say you’re never more then 4 feet from a spider, but in Londontown, you’re never more then 9 feet from a rat,” which went over like a lead balloon. Have the class had a mass attack of the shivers, and my love of rodents means that’s been on my mind with every step I’ve taken since. Ew.
However, at this point we were already down the mossy stairs to the “beach,” if you can count a 20-foot stretch of rocky, pebbly ground and brown water as a beach. Fiona showed us examples to look for, such as the bowls of old pipes, roof tiles, ceramic pottery, and animal bones.
I found a few pieces of Tudor era tile, which are now being cleaned. When I have those back, I’ll try to add in pictures of them.
This was one of the coolest field trips I’ve been on, and while I can’t say Vile’s Disease has me in a hurry to go back, those Tudor roof tiles are pretty awesome. Just the idea of beach, sun, and swimming (not that you'd EVER want to swim in the Thames) has me excited for summer.
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