This was not a nature trip, but you can’t help noticing the animals everywhere in India. In my neighborhood I’m likely to see cats, dogs and squirrels, along with robins, wrens, finches, woodpeckers, chickadees, hawks, etc. But here was a new array of everyday creatures!
Dogs are hardly unusual, but they were everywhere in the streets, never on a leash or seeming to belong to anyone. This one was enjoying the sunshine while stretched out on block-printed fabric drying in Bagru. 
They appeared healthy and were beautifully behaved, so I asked one of our guides who took care of them. He said that when you made your chapatis in the morning, you made one for the dog, and when you made your chapatis in the evening, you made one for the cow. I’m not sure if that was metaphorical or literal…
There were several kinds of cows, some dairy cows and some not.
This dairy cow was strolling through Bagur.
This beauty was surrounded by words that I can’t decipher.
And this one seems to have been decorated?
Monkeys were ubiquitous, climbing up telephone poles, along the rooftops, and hanging from wires. 
These monkeys were outside of the vegetable market in Jaipur.
This one was strolling along among the tourists at the Taj Mahal.
This monkey is posing with a kite at the step well. (Kite flying is a huge pastime in Jaipur, and we saw these tiny kites in the sky all the time, especially at the end of the day. When they coat the strings with powdered glass for competitions, they can be a danger to people and especially to birds, but it is beautiful to watch them soar.)
This mama and baby were climbing above electrical wires in the spice market in Delhi. We were cautioned not to play with them or feed them, and, fascinating though they were, I wasn’t tempted.
We saw a few elephants thumping along the streets, but the only one I captured with my camera is this one, decorated for tourists, along the lake.
Cathy is paying the driver for permission to pet it.
Camels were seen more often, usually as beasts of burden but for tourists, too. Here’s a glimpse of one in the street in Sanganer that carried a load on its back.
This one was waiting for customers down the road from our hotel who could be tempted into a ride.
But the creepiest of all was this human monkey. He was roaming around in a craft market we visited. If I had managed to get a video, you would have seen just how awful he was, coming up behind people and grabbing their bags, racing along on all fours like a real monkey, and in general behaving like a scary creature that’s supposed to be funny. I think he might have been a representation of Hanuman, a god who is “generally depicted as a man with the face of a monkey and a long tail.” Although the people in these pictures are laughing, there were a couple of children in tears.
Finally, a note on exoticism. It’s defined as “the charm of the unfamiliar,” but it can also be a way of distancing yourself from what you are seeing. In a culture as different from mine as India is, I’m afraid that some of what I saw was just that: a strange and fascinating way of life that I don’t really understand. But I’m trying!
(
Our first stop today was Hailes Abbey, a Cistercian Abbey that was mostly destroyed in the Dissolution, so all that’s left are some stones, pillars and arches. But when you look at the expanse that the church encompassed, you have a sense of how enormous it must have been. Unlike its sister Cistercian Abbey, 
Brexit loomed over this trip and we discussed it with people a couple of times. At the Abbey, the attendant told us that the EU had changed dramatically from when the UK first joined, now the EU dictated what each country could do. What if, he said, the US, Canada and Mexico were under one government, the American flag was taken down and the seat of government was in Costa Rica?? I have no idea if this is a real scenario, but somehow I think not. But if that’s how some people see it, it makes more sense that after forty years, some of them want to leave. In any case, Alison encouraged me not to engage the man on the way out, so we escaped.
Most all of the tables were booked for a Sunday roast, but we managed to slip in for sandwiches before everyone arrived. Just as we were leaving, several multi-generational family parties arrived. The English have a sense of ritual – Millennium memorials, Sunday roast, etc. – that we have never had. It may be a bit stuffy but it’s also comforting.
This was a very relaxing garden, perhaps because within the spaces defined by stone walls or boxwood, plants twined somewhat wildly with each other. Lots and lots of roses, like this ‘Trumpeter,’ 
since this is the home of the famously enormous Kiftsgate rose (past its bloom now), but also at this time of year dahlias, Japanese anemones, asters and various other beauties. 
The water gardens were especially beautiful and imaginative. Just look at this elegant installation, with its flowers that gently pour into the pool.
and I thought of how this house and garden would be wonderful for entertaining. I wonder how the latest generation, who must be about our age, are planning for the future.
Leaving Oxford on a bright, clear day, we picked up a little white Golf to carry us to Stow. Our first goal was Blenheim Palace, but Alison got an email from them saying that because of an “incident” they would not be opening until lunchtime. Since the park was still open, off we set.
we came to yet another Harry Potter tree, a cedar which has been propped up to keep it alive by the skin of its teeth. (This is the one that Severus Snape hung from in Order of the Phoenix, when he was being bullied by Harry’s father.) 
You can see that it is carefully preserved from any rabid fans who might be tempted to try the same.
From here I continued around the Queen’s Lake while Alison went back to the shops. Gorgeous views, magnificent trees, thank you, Capability Brown!
See?? We parked in the next street just beyond, and thanks to friendly neighbors who encouraged us to find our house, we had the strength to pick up our groceries and bags and go back along the narrow alley in search of Carter’s Cottage. 
It’s just two up, two down (mostly) but with a really good bathroom and a washer/dryer (mysterious like all British appliances, but we made it work). Here’s a look at the cottage, which suited us down to the ground. 
and then had a delicious dead chicken from Tesco, along with a salad and shortbread for dessert, which we seemed to need. Looking forward to a real shower, that does not require standing up in a tub or kneeling!
then walked back down Broad Street to Blackwell’s, as much of a rabbit warren as ever and with so many books we both wanted to buy (only two for me, I was very proud of my restraint). Lunch at the Turl Street Kitchen hit the spot, two orange-yolked eggs over English muffins, then back to the Bath to check in and take a two-hour jet-lag nap.
It has an interesting history, with Dorothy Sayers among the famous residents. 
Our
The bathroom was quintessentially British: a tub with a shower spray, which meant you either knelt in the tub to wash your hair (hard on the knees), stood up and sprayed your hair and all the surroundings, or knelt on the floor and leaned into the tub. None was entirely satisfactory (shades of our Paris apartment!), but for three days we could manage.
Dinner tonight was literally around the corner at the renowned Turf Tavern, where we had steak and ale pies and french fries that made us both very happy. We admired the hanging baskets of flowers and the late sun on the New College bell tower. 
And so to bed.
Caroline's Garden and Travel Record 