Rediscovery: London and Suffolk

As I mentioned the other day, we're going to have to space the retelling of my trip to England over the week.  There's just so much to share!  But before I start at the very beginning - the very best place to start* - I'm going to jump ahead to a conversation I had with a few lovely bloggers last Tuesday night.  (More on that tomorrow.  Hang tight.)  We were debating the most elegant way to include lots of photos in a post; one said she hated seeing image after image with no text, while another said that she found captions disruptive to the visual narrative.  I don't know what's proper, but I can't figure out how to format photos and text together in a way that doesn't annoy me, so I'm going to just break it all up into chunks.  A few of the photos have already been Instagrammed, but I tried to include as many unedited originals as possible.  Okay... let's go!

After an eight-hour flight (which included two glasses of wine, thirty minutes of a film, an Ambien, and seven hours of sleep), I dashed through security at Heathrow on Friday morning.  Jon met me at the airport - look at him up there; doesn't he look handsome? - and we tried to limit the PDA as we followed the Picadilly line north into central London.  We stopped at King's Cross for brunch, which is still a bit weird for me because, when I lived there in 2009, the area was a dilapidated mess, but it's undergone a massive redevelopment since and is now hoppin' and trendy.  We enjoyed a few hours at Jon's flat getting reacquainted and freshening up before heading back into town for a drink and our engagement session with Tarah Coonan.  (Again, more on that later, but know for now that it was perfect.)  We wandered around Shad Thames, one of our favorite places in London, and caught a few sights and a beautiful sunset.  In the evening, because I was afraid I'd get hit with the jetlag stick, we made our way back home for a quiet night in with a curry and a movie.

On Saturday morning, we woke up bright and early and hied ourselves to Suffolk (passing by the Olympic Park on the way) to see Jon's family.  We spent a lovely luxurious day relaxing - except for the hour we spent picking blackberries, which was strenuous work and which obviously deserved the reward of a hearty roast dinner, which was accompanied by a "wine tasting" in the name of wedding planning.  We did manage to clear our heads on Sunday morning by heading out through the heath on a long run, and once we'd recovered from that we drove to Southwold, a neighboring resort town on the coast, and took a brisk walk.  (One of the things I love most about Jon's family is that their walks aren't for amateurs, but that a stop at a pub for refreshment is always included in the plan.)  Happily, I was able to catch the premiere of the third season of Downton Abbey in the evening - no spoilers here, though I will say that it was marvelous in exactly the non-threatening and blissful way you'd hope.

Monday morning was spent on wedding things - which you'll hear about on upcoming Wednesdays, so be patient - and then we took the train back to London.  Check back tomorrow to catch up on the rest of our week!

*10 points if you can name that movie