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Our last night in London, some of the kids decided they wanted to take the tube over to the London Eye. The Eye was built in 1999 and for several years, was the tallest ferris wheel in the world. It sits on the bank of the River Thames and never stops rotating (it moves slow enough to allow people on and off the capsules). Due to the fact that it was once known as the tallest ferris wheel in the world was reason enough for me to by-pass this particular tourist attraction (read: fear of heights). Fortunately, my daughter has no fear and was able to document this part of our trip for me ;-)
This is the “Eye” from a distance (I took this picture from a good place – standing on the ground…..)
And here are the pictures Cait took…..check out the one that is looking down at the people on the ground (just looking at this picture makes me dizzy….)
(Thanks Cait for taking these great pictures and being so understanding when I begged off back to the hotel ;-)
Ok, back to trip postings……….
Due to flight delays and plane problems, we were able to spend only about a day and a half in Scotland but we got a lot of sightseeing crammed in our time there. One of the top attractions in Edinburgh is the Edinburgh Castle. It is quite a fortress and you can see it from miles away as it sits atop the volcanic Castle Rock. They say it has been a royal castle since the 12th century and continues to this day as a military base.
Again, if you left click on the individual pictures above, it brings up a larger picture with whatever description I’ve added…..I’ll get the hang of this sooner or later ;-)
Here is a way to test a friendship to determine whether it is really true….
First, ask a good friend over for dinner. For the purposes of this post, I am using the pronoun “she”.
Second, serve her a recipe that you’ve never tried before consisting of cube steak and flour. Said steak must be thick and tough.
Third, after she has managed to choke down dinner, see if she volunteers to do your dishes for you.
Fourth, while she is doing your dishes, pop in a frozen apple pie in the oven (after all, you need to be doing something too).
Fifth, after she has done your dishes and is resting on the sofa, have your puppy jump in her lap and give her kisses (after said puppy has had nose rubbed in an accident by another member of your household.)
Sixth, after she has unsuccessfully fought off the dog, have her sit through 2 hours of your vacation photos.
Seventh, after she nods off at about picture 862, wake her gently. At this point she’ll probably want to “head home” so be sure and send along a piece of your apple pie that you forgot to serve.
If this friend talks to you the next day, count her as one of your blessings ;-)
(Love ya K ;-)
In addition to taking a lot of pictures of bicycles while in the UK, my daughter also likes to take pictures of signs…..most of these were taken by her and most are self-explanatory……
I apologize for the small pictures but if you click on them, they’ll enlarge where you can halfway read them ;-)
We left early Saturday (3/19) morning to make our way to Stonehenge which was about an hour and half west of London. It was pretty much in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by sheep pastures. Here is a cut-n-paste excerpt from another website about Stonehenge:
Stonehenge is a prehistoric, mysterious circle of upright stones in southern England. Construction on the great monument began 5,000 years ago; the famous stones that still stand today were put in place about 4,000 years ago.
The great age, massive scale and mysterious purpose of Stonehenge draw over 800,000 visitors per year, and several thousand gather on the summer solstice to watch the sunrise at this ancient and mystical site.
The stones are aligned almost perfectly with the sunrise on the summer solstice, and it is almost unquestioned that Stonehenge was built as a spectacular place of worship.
Although the faith of the Stonehenge builders predates any known religion, the site has become a place of pilgrimage and worship for Neopagans who identify themselves with the Druids or other forms of Celtic paganism. It is also popular with New Age devotees, who report powerful energies at the site.
It was truly a spectacular view…..
And the stones weren’t the only thing we saw from another era……
The Roman Baths are the heart of Bath which was begun around 45 AD as a spa for Roman conquerors. They found that the hot springs cured a number of ailments – not surprising, since the mineral content in the springs/baths contain over 40 different minerals. In the 1800’s and early 1900’s it was THE destination point for Kings and Queens.
Beautiful green algae water (wonder what made them think this would be great to swim in?)
Bath was one of those quaint towns out in the English countryside…..it took us about an hour and half to get there by bus but definitely worth the trip. Many shops and awesome architecture….
(Note the angels climbing the “ladders” on the Abbey….such interesting detail everywhere ;-)
As I underwent the monumental task of downloading the kazillion pictures that Cait and I took on our trip, I noticed that about 20% of the 976 pictures that Caitlin shot were of bicycles…..I don’t understand it, but thought I’d share some of her pictures……
What does one find to eat in the UK? Fortunately (or unfortunately, if you asked Caitlin), most of our meals were already planned for us…..breakfast at the hotels consisted of scrambled eggs, bangers (sausage looking things), broiled tomatoes and pork n beans (along with the usual cereal, bagels and fruit). Our evening meals were set up by our tour guide and we never knew what to expect. Well, except for peas – they were served with every meal.
This is a banger…..picture was taken by Caitlin before she shoved the plate away and wished for pizza. Not sure if it was the bangers that made her lose her appetite, or maybe it was the fish pie the night before or the promise of meat pies the next evening…..perhaps it was one of the following sights….
(Yes, those are whole cooked ducks – heads, beaks and all)
(Note the sign to the right…”Goat meat now on sale”…good thing because I just hate paying full price…)
Desserts were scrumptious though….
We did get a chance to try out different restaurants for lunch – we usually ate at Italian places (read: pizza for Cait).
Here are a few of the out-of-the-way quirky places we got to eat at……
Woke up to a very rainy morning and headed to Windsor Castle. One of the most intimidating fortresses we’ve seen so far. Wasn’t a good day for outdoor pictures (hated getting my camera wet) and they would not allow pictures inside at all – too bad because the interior of the castle was unbelievable. We did get to see the Royal Corgi’s going out for their morning walk but no sight of the Queen ;-) Here’s a picture of the changing of the guards at Windsor….
And Cait in front of the castle……
I guess if the Queen gets tired of Windsor Castle, she can always hang out at Buckingham Palace (because of the rain we did not see the changing of the guards there but you can see one of them in the little shack by the door ;-)
(as of this writing, it is 12:15 a.m. Sunday morning and we are leaving for the airport in 4 hours…..it’ll probably be another day or so or whenever I recover from jet lag before I post more pictures. This has absolutely been trip of a lifetime.)
We made a stop in Oxford Thursday afternoon and toured the area. Unbelievable buildings and history in this area.
And, of course, a picture of Cait with one of the locals…….
Apparently you have to be super smart to attend any of the colleges at Oxford so we had to show them the ole “Boomer Sooner”!
I hope when I get home and have more time to review my notes on the buildings and areas, I can post more pictures with descriptions – truly have seen some awesome towns!
Coody's Bluff 