Scotland!

We left England this morning and stopped at the Roman Army Museum to have a look around.  Noah took a lot of photos there which I’m sure will make it on to facebook in due time.  We then drove a short bit to see remnants of “Hadrian’s Wall” --- the wall that the Romans built on the approximate border between England and Scotland to keep the Celts out of the Roman Empire.  It was built in the first century AD --- and parts are still standing!  (The parts that are missing are missing because people took the stones to build other things over the years - like castles and other walls - rather than looking for their own rocks.)

We left when these friends decided to join us at the wall!

We finally crossed the border into Scotland and were met by a piper!   

Piper on the border between England and Scotland

Quick stop at hotel to change clothes and head out for an authentic Scottish dinner and show, complete with haggis, dancers, bagpipes, kilts and songs.  It was a great evening and I’m not doing it justice in today’s post but we are tired and ready for bed.

Piper outside our dinner theatre in Edinburgh tonight

Will post a farewell to Great Britain tomorrow after a day of sightseeing in Edinburgh, but will leave you with this quote we overheard as we were leaving the show--- A woman asked a Scottish man wearing a kilt why it was that he wore a kilt.  In a wonderful Scottish accent he answered, "Because balls this large cannot be contained.”  It made us laugh out loud and chuckle most of the way home.

Bus, train, boat, rain

Woke up to cold and rainy weather.  We boarded our coach and headed back to England for a tour of an English mansion – narrated by actors portraying the head butler and housekeeper.  We enjoyed it but skipped the tour of the garden and farm due to the continuing rain.

The drawing room

Library

Seriously- you're looking for a label on this one?

The main kitchen (as opposed to the scullery).  Note: only Noah was able to lift that cast iron pot on the near right front part of the stove handily....He was offered the job of kitchen man, but declined in favor of seeking a job with indoor plumbing.

We then drove to the Lakes District and took a short ride on a train pulled by a steam engine from Haverthwaite Station to Lakeside Station.  There, we de-trained and boarded a passenger ferry.  We traveled up Lake Windermere from Lakeside to Bowness.  It continued rainy --- until we de-boated.  That’s when the sun came out.  Just in time for an ice cream cone, short stroll around the posh little town of Bowness and a 40 pence pee.  (Many public toilets charge an admission for upkeep.)  The Lakes District is and has been home to many authors and artists over the years, including Beatrix Potter.

We didn't get a photo of our train but here's Noah on the bridge

This is what most of the day looked like today

This was followed by a relatively short coach ride to our hotel for the night in Lancaster and dinner with our group.

Okay - so when it stops raining, it is absolutely breath-taking!  This photo shows the stone wall dividing the paddocks.  (In Wales and other parts of England, these dividers are hedges

  

An early day tomorrow to head up to Scotland --- perhaps a 3-hour drive.  We are looking forward to the city of Edinburgh and touring another castle!

The best surprise at the end of the day--- a WASHCLOTH!!!!!YA-HOO!

Noah invades the blog space

Okay so this is Noah invades the blog.  So before you go shooting down at the comments and say anything about how it is different i warned you

      Today we started woke up and had breakfast in this beautiful castle. Our breakfast was good and we kinda did a mini adventure around the first level before we went on with our day because we had a hour later departure today. (Yay!) 

Ruthin Castle --- Our hotel

The gate through the stone wall of our castle/hotel --- You should see the bus, er coach, pull through this entry!

Liverpool: 

    Ah Liverpool what a awesome  place to be. I totally didn't expect it to turn out as amazing as it was. They where super huge into there soccer (futball) there. In Liverpool its either you root for Liverpool reds or Everton Blue.  Now there people who eat sleep and breathe soccer so it might be a bad idea to wear the wrong color with the wrong people... kinda like football in America. What Liverpool is mostly proud of is The Beatles. We saw quite a bit of awesome stuff like Penny Lane and what shops he explains that are there in the lyrics of the song "Penny Lane." Only places that are the same there is the Bank and Barber shop. we got  the story how The Quarry Men changed into The Beatles that we all know and love today. The last stop we went to in Liverpool before our free lunch was called The Cavern Club.  They closed for a little time for remodeling the re-opened and is still a music venue.  The Beatles played at this venue more than 300+ occasions. After The Beatles got big bands like Adele, The Wanted, The Who, Rolling stones,  and more came to play here. just the whole entire experience was stunning!!! I wish we had more time to wander around Liverpool. But we also had to go to Chester as well.  The time spent in Liverpool is something i will never forget.

The Yellow Submarine!

Penny Lane is in my ears and in my eyes...

The barber shop on the corner of Penny Lane

The bank

The place where the Beatles got their start...

Chester: 

  Okay Chester was a quiet small town that if Disney designed a town this is what it would look like. It still had the tower walls that the romans built for protection where you could only enter at North South East or West   (the stories you hear about castles is correct).  It was pretty cool but it followed Liverpool and i don't think anything can really compare to the love we had for the city and to follow it up was not really fair. It was still pretty cool on its on with the way it was built and how it was set up with a statue marking the dead middle of the city.

Near the center of the town of Chester

Cheers! - Noah

Bath and Wales

We experienced a lot of traffic between Bristol and Bath, but it was well worth the trip.  We weren’t able to go inside Bath Abbey but were impressed by the outside!  The Roman baths were incredible!  We took a self-guided tour and spent a good deal of time looking at the artifacts.  I was very interesting.  We walked around a bit in the center of Bath and then re-boarded the coach.

Bath Abbey - side view

 Abbey entry

The Roman Baths - date back to around 56AD! No longer used but preserved.

Another view of the baths with the Abbey reflected in the water.

Another Bridge of Sighs in Bath

The long drive from Bath to Wales was made even longer by road construction/repairs and fairly heavy traffic.  Finally, we crossed into Wales and it is absolutely gorgeous!  Rolling lush green hillsides and sheep grazing EVERYWHERE!  Stopped briefly at a little Welsh town called Llangollen and then on to Ruthin where we will be staying in a castle for two nights!  You’ll have to wait until tomorrow for castle photos --- we need to charge our camera batteries!

River Dee flows through the town of Llangollen - had to get a photo of your river, Dee!

The row houses in town --- note the doors are painted different colors.  Legend has it that this is so that you are able to tell which house is yours as you stumble home from the neighborhood pub.

See what I mean?  Wales is beautiful!  (All the tiny white dots are sheep.)

Oxford, Lacock Village & Bristol

Today, we left The Big Smoke and traveled to Oxford.  The landscape was pastoral on the way and I managed to snap a photo.  The white “dots” are sheep.  As you can see from the sky, our day was overcast all day and rainy some of the time…enough for our raingear but never a downpour.

Oxford was very impressive.  The architecture is breathtaking – particularly when you realize how many centuries have passed and the buildings are still in use.  We were able to go into the library where one of the rooms was used to film the infirmary scenes for the Harry Potter movies.

Noah in the room used as the infirmary in Potter movies

Bridge of Sighs

Lacock Village is a sort of historic preservation site --- often used as the site for filming things like Game of Thrones.  Noah and I didn’t go into the Abbey but we did stumble across some interesting graveyards and snapped a few photos of them as well as some of the houses.

The flowers have been in full bloom and quite impressive.  Caught these two bees enjoying them in spite of the rainy day.

By the time we got to Bristol, it was raining but we went on a city tour anyway.  The city was a famous harbor for hundreds of years but pretty much had to reinvent itself after WWII.  It’s most famous landmark is the suspension bridge which is very high above the Avon River.  (I do not recall exactly how high above the river it is located as I blocked it out completely in order to summon the courage to walk from one end to the other --- and back again.)

 

We had dinner at a local pub and are going to make an early night of it.  Cheerio!