Wordfull Wednesday- Memorable Family Vacation

I was so excited.  Chestnut had kept up his math grades through the end of the year- and it meant a lot more than just that to me.   At the time my grandparents were living in England for my grandpa's job- and they had promised Chestnut and I a trip over there if he did his Algebra well.  

Sometime in June we set off as unaccompanied minors on a plane to England.  Because of this, we sat with flight attendants in a dumb little room in the airport for our six hour layovers, doing nothing.  That part was a nightmare.  Except for on the plane to the London Heathr

ow Airport.  There we got free ice cream sundaes just because we were unaccompanied, and got to ride in business class for the last hour of the trip.  

But when we got there was when the fun really started.  We arrived very very late at night and just zonked out at the lovely little English cottage that our grandparents lived in.

The next day we went on a walk through the beautiful wheat fields and poppies, the lush green forests, and the wooden fences of England.

It seemed like you couldn't keep things from growing over there, while here in Idaho you have to nearly force things to grow.  It was beautiful.

On a misty-moisty morning we set off on a Harry Potter-esque train for London.  

Once there, we rode a double-decker bus to go see "Wicked" at the London Broadway.

We also visited a bunch of museums- but I didn't take any pictures.  I thought they were a bit boring compared to all of the other spectacular things there were to do in London.

Just as it started to rain, we got aboard the London Eye, a HUGE ferris wheel on the Thames river.  There were about 42 glass capsules, going extremely slowly so that you could get on and off without stopping.  I took a bunch of pictures of Big Ben and the house of parliament, along with London on the Thames. (Sorry for the droplets of water on the glass- it was raining)

This is my favorite picture.  It just shows London in all of it's glory (with London weather!)  

On a Sunday we set off to see the cliffs of Dover.  They were GORGEOUS!

It was misty and rainy again, so we couldn't quite see the french coast, but we had a blast walking along the cliffs, watching the sea and the ferries taking off for France.

We also visited castles while we were there.  Bodiam was my favorite.  It was the essence of what a Medieval Castle should be, ancient, unfurnished, sitting threateningly above a beautiful moat.

There I also learned the treachery of Medieval tower staircases.  Don't ever believe it when the movies show people fencing up and down these- here, if you fell, you were basically dead.

We also visited Leeds, "The Ladies Castle" because it was primarily owned by the queens of England throughout the middle ages.  It wasn't as excitingly MEDIEVAL as Bodiam, because it was furnished nicely, but it was absolutely gorgeous nonetheless.

We also visited Windsor, the home of the queen today.  The rulers of England have been living here for thousands of years.  It definitely gave me a shock of awe.

And last but not least we visited Oxford.  Personally I was a bit disappointed.  The highlight of the entire thing was a disappointment in the English people themselves- Rooting for Obama. . .Pah!

Altogether England was a fascinating and wonderful adventure for me.  I hope to be able to go back someday.