We went to St. Albans by accident.

I think we meant to go to Winchester but somehow we ended up at St. Albans and it didn't help that I had a cold.

It also didn't help that I'd thought there was a charming market there and that turned out to be somewhere else.

O that it was the day the local university had its graduation ceremony and you couldn't move for people.

We had a look at some of the Roman ruins of 'Verulamium' but first we found a different relic.....of the Olympics.

There were lots of arguments about the 'Olympic legacy' and I haven't seen too much of it myself.

Most people's involvement was watching it on the T.V. or if they were lucky like me they got a chance to watch the Olympic Torch go by.

But this is a real legacy, it's a collection  of sports facilities in the park including exercise machines that anyone can use to keep fit;

Well anyone except me - my back wasn't up to it.

It was nice to see the symbol of the games again;

And this was pretty cool;

Here's the Paralympics symbol;

I missed most of the Paralympics - I was in St. Peter's Hospital getting my misdiagnosed ankle sorted out. I didn't have T.V. apart from one hour at lunchtime when it was free.

I will never forget the determination of the Cerebral palsy runners, so painfully vulnerable - I watched the interviews from my bed.

So this is very true;

They laid a rubber matting surface over the whole area - you can't hurt yourself - a great facility which I haven't seen before.

We also took a look at some of the Roman ruins - part of the old Roman city wall;

Nowadays looking it's age but it was well built;

There is a very fine mosaic in a wealthy official's villa. I imagine that this was meant to impress and intimidate the local population;

The hole exposes the under floor heating system - the 'Hypocaust'. A slave tended a fire in a little room next door while little under floor tunnels heated the room and the fumes went up corner chimneys and up out.

It was simple but beautiful;

Made up of hundreds of thousands of individual 'Tesserae'.

 

 

St. Albans also has a Roman Amphitheatre and a museum but I'd reached the point where I had had enough of entrance fees - the amphitheatre used to be free - and it isn't exactly The Coleseum in Rome!

 

Neil Harris

(a don't stop till you drop production)

 

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