London!

Do you recognize this landmark? Of course it's Big Ben, which sits at one end of the Parliament complex. Actually, the clock is NOT named Big Ben, but the chimes in the clock tower are, hence the confusion! Can you see the London Eye in the background? That is actually on the opposite side of the Thames. Note the blue sky!! It's a "postcard day" in London today!! No time to waste!

First stop, Westminster Abbey. This massive medieval cathedral was begun in 1055, making parts of it 957 years old! There are many kings and queens buried here, including Mary Queen of Scots and her cousin, Elizabeth I, who also ordered Mary's imprisonment in England and, eventually, her execution by beheading. You might also remember Mary Queen of Scots from our trip to Edinburgh. There are also monuments to literary giants, including Shakespeare and Dickens, and musicians like Handel. 

Westminster Abbey has also been the site of coronations and weddings of England's monarchs. One year ago yesterday, April 29, 2011, it was the site of the royal wedding of Prince William to Kate Middleton. 

There was quite a queue to enter, but we waited patiently and spent a good couple of hours touring the insides. Unfortunately, no photography allowed, except in the cloisters.

I have often read about the flying buttresses on the exterior of the Abbey. Their purpose is to help transfer the weight of the nave. The nave is only 35 feet wide, but it is 105 feet high, making it the highest in England. That's a lot of weight! Anyway, the flying buttresses are actually quite massive on their own.

After we finished the Abbey we meandered past Parliament and hopped a double decker red bus for a general tour of London. We were able to see quite a few parks, a lot of monuments, some famous residences and neighbourhoods, and traffic, traffic, traffic. London is the host city for the Olympics this summer, and I cringe to think what the traffic will be like then. There is an official countdown to the Olympics in Trafalgar Square, and Scott was able to take a photo as we passed by. At of the snapping of the photo there were 88 days, 3 hours, 38 minutes and 49 seconds to go!

Our tour wrapped up back at Parliament. Can you name the current Prime Minister of Great Britain?

Our hotel is about a 15 minute walk from Parliament, so we headed back. Are you noticing the beautiful blue skies in the pictures today? Heavy rain and wind is moving in tonight. It is England, after all. For every day of bright sunshine there seem to be many days of clouds and at least the threat of rain. We are determined not to let the weather dampen our adventure, however. Tomorrow we are booked into a tour that begins at 8:00 a.m. We are taking a private tour of the Tower of London, a boat ride on the Thames, and a tour of St. Paul's Cathedral. We are supposed to see the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, but it's doubtful that the weather will be cooperative tomorrow. Our tour ends at Harrod's. Can you hear Scott groaning all the way across the pond?!

Windermere

We have been using our free time on the weekends to explore the fells and lakes around us. Over the past few weekends we have visited the deepest lake (Wastwater) and viewed the highest fell (Scafell). This weekend we decided to visit the biggest lake, Windermere. Windermere is also one of the "hot spots" for Lake District tourism. We've been told that the country roads are overrun by tourists in the summer so we decided to take advantage of a nice April Saturday to make our visit. There are a couple of seaside towns alongside the lake, and, with Bowness being the town recommended by our guidebook, we set our sat-nav and headed off for an hour or so drive through the fells.

Bowness is a quaint little town with lots of shops and restaurants, rowboat and small motorboat rentals, and the tamest swans I've ever seen! In fact, they showed no worries about approaching people and gathered in great groups around those who brought food for them. I even saw one swan put it's great beak on a lady's shoulder trying to snatch the bread she was holding and actually trying to eat as part of her own lunch!

 Scott aggravated the swan a bit to distract him from the lady with the bread just off camera!

This area of the Lake District is home to many famous authors, including Beatrix Potter. Her home is near Bowness, and within the town of Bowness is "The World of Beatrix Potter" attraction. Scott was a good sport and accompanied me into this attraction. We watched a short video about Beatrix Potter. It was interesting to see how her home and the animals around here were the inspiration for her stories. A week or so ago I watched a short piece on t.v. about this attraction as well. The narrator accompanied a tour group of families from Japan as they went through the exhibits. It was fascinating to learn that the Japanese know these stories by heart. It seems that the stories are used to teach the children to speak and write English in Japan!!

After riding around the lake on a boat, experiencing the Beatrix Potter attraction, and meandering the streets a bit we headed for home. Sunday's weather was absolutely miserable: heavy rain and wind and cold! After church we grabbed a bite to eat, ran by the grocery, and headed home to wrap up plans for our trip to London this week (not to mention laundry, which is a blog for another day). 

Little Lambs

These lambs seem to eat constantly

It is spring in this area, and that means lambs! A few weeks ago these little lambs could barely walk, and never left their mum's side. It has been fun to watch as the lambs grow older and more adventuresome. Today we saw, again, some nearly newborn lambs, barely able to stand and walk, along with some older lambs. We also came across a full grown sheep who was definitely outside of his pasture. Frightened by our car, he nimbly jumped over a 3 to 4 foot stone wall and back into his field. Who knew?! Anyway, Scott took some pictures of the sheep and lambs in Buttermere today. Enjoy!

Twins

My favourite little lamb! We watched him for quite a while. He never left his mom's side!

This new born had to be moved with a little help from the mindful dog.

Buttermere

Scott had work commitments on Saturday, so our forays out into the English countryside this weekend were limited to Sunday after church. The weather forecast was not the best: high in the mid-forties with an 80% chance of rain, but we decided to make the journey to Buttermere anyway. We live in an area of England known as the "Lake District". The locals are quick to tell you that there is only one lake that has the word "Lake" in it's name. Many, like Buttermere, are both the name of a town or village and the name of the lake.

After about 40 minutes of driving on country roads in between miles of sheep farms and with fells all around, we arrived at the tiny village of Buttermere. In the Lake District fell ambling is a huge past time, and Scott has come to really enjoy his time ambling around the lakes and fells. We parked and set off on a hike around the lake. There are actually two lakes in this area, separated by about a half mile of pastures and the tiny village. We began walking and found, after about two miles or so, that we were hiking around the second lake: Crummock. Our guidebook recommended Buttermere as the more beautiful of the two lakes, and also described the walk as an easy, 2 hour, 5 mile walk. So, we doubled back and followed the trail to Buttermere.

The path to Crummock. A very pretty lake, but not the one we were looking for!

Unfortunately, by the time we reached the lake the dark clouds had moved in and showers were threatening at any minute. No matter! We had already enjoyed almost two hours of hiking! We asked a very nice gentleman, who had some very professional looking camera equipment set up on the lake shore, if he would take our picture. We took a short walk to a waterfall, then turned and headed back through the sheep pastures to the town.

Buttermere

We settled in at the Fish Inn, enjoyed a bowl of lentil and carrot soup and a sandwich, and warmed up with some hot tea. While we were there the heavens opened up and the rains began to come down. By the time we were leaving, little ice balls were mixed in with the rain. As is common in the fells, a few minutes and a few miles away we emereged from the heavy clouds into beautiful sunshine, and enjoyed our ride home. We finished off the afternoon sitting on our balcony watching the activity in the harbor.

This week coming up will be a relatively normal week. Next week, however, Scott has work commitments in London. Of course I'm going too! He has arranged to take a day off and so we will leave by train on Monday, the 30th, and return on Friday. We have plans to see quite a bit while we are there, and I'm certain there will be many blog updates as the week unfolds :-)!

Wast Water

Saturday dawned bright and sunny, although definitely cool. We are learning that "Spring" in Cumbria means temperatures in the high 30's to mid-40's with rain possible at any minute. A sunny day was not to be wasted, and since we had to stay close to home this weekend, we decided to re-visit Muncaster Castle. We came across a sign that proclaimed that the Bluebells are lovely and in full bloom, and we decided to check them out. After a nice long walk past several fields of bluebells we came around to the castle, and the owls. We spent several hours at Muncaster walking and taking pictures. Saturday night we went to the local civic auditorium where we saw "The Wizard of Oz" performed by a local amateur theatre company.

Sunday morning after Church we decided to take a drive to Wast Water, England's deepest lake. Scafell Pike, one of the fell's near the lake, is England's highest peak at 3,210 feet. We were amazed at how close Wast Water is to our home in Whitehaven: about a half hour's drive. Hope you enjoy the photos!

Bluebells in bloom at Muncaster Castle. We walked past fields of these on our walk.

There is a World Owl Conservatory at Muncaster Castle. There are many owls from all over the world here. The aim, of course, is to rehabilitate the owls and return them to the wild. They are also undertaking breeding of certain owls as these owls are endangered in the wild.



















Sunday Pictures.....

Wast Water Lake and the fells beyond.

Another view of Wast Water Lake and the fells.

This inn is at the head of the lake, in the tiny community of Wasdale Head. The inn is where walkers and climbers gather to share their stories of adventure in the fells. Scott and I had a nice lunch here. That small paved surface that goes in between the stone walls is the road! It is about a car width and half wide. Luckily there are frequent wide spots so vehicles can manage to get by one another without bashing mirrors, or worse!

Fell Walking

After our escapades at Muncaster Castle on Friday, we returned to the general area on Saturday and climbed aboard the Ravenglass-Eskdale railroad train also known as "The Ratty". This is a narrow gauge train originally built to haul iron ore down from the mountains. Once that industry dried up it was used to haul granite before finally being turned into a tourist attraction. Now it goes from Ravenglass, on the seacost, to Dalegarth Station; a trip of about 7 miles, but 40 minutes. Scott had in his mind to find another set of stone circles that we believed we could hike to from Dalegarth Station. At the station we bought a booklet describing many fell (mountain) walks including the stone circles and, after receiving some advice and directions from one of the workers, we set off. The day was cool and overcast, but the rain held off as we began our journey. Unfortunately, we began by taking a wrong turn, and, after doubling back, and consulting our booklet, we began walking again, straight up the fell (that is straight up!). As we climbed the views of the little town of Booth below and another set of fells in the distance were great. After about 45 minutes of steady climbing Scott reached the top. I was lagging behind, stopping to enjoy the views and catch my breath. Unfortunately, this was not the right way to go either and we began the treacherous journey back down the fell. After doubling back once again, and restarting our journey, we began a climb that was described in our book as "steep" and "zig-zagging". That was definitely true! After another hour of climbing Scott reached the top, managed to find the stone circles, and snapped a few pictures. I, on the other hand, went about 2/3 of the way up, decided that 3 hours of climbing around on the fells was enough for one day, and headed down the fell.  Once reunited at the bottom, we settled in at the local pub and enjoyed a glass of wine and the beautiful fells around us.

The view from along the trail. Those lines in the distance are stone walls like the one in the foreground.

Looking back along the path. The white buildings in the distance are the village of Booth. The train station is near the little village.

The stone circles at last!

Muncaster Castle

Well, Easter weekend has arrived and Scott, for the first time in memory, has a 4 day holiday! The weather here promised to be sunny, cloudy, and rainy-not all at the same time, of course, but any of those at any given moment. It's still quite cool here with temperatures in the mid-40's. Scott and I decided to take a short drive to Muncaster Castle, located a few miles away in the fells. Muncaster Castle has been the continuous residence of the Pennington family since 1208. It is also advertised as a haunted castle. Scott does not believe in such things, but I, on the other hand, tend to think that anything is possible. The castle is situated on beautiful grounds and is noted for the outstanding gardens. The World Owl Trust also maintains a center within the gardens.

It is still early April, but we were treated to some beautiful spots of color here and their in the gardens. We will be excited to return in a few weeks when the trees will have leaves and more flowers will be in bloom.  We did enjoy a tour of some of the inside of the castle and we wandered through the gardens to an old cemetery and church, which is still in use. As for the ghosts, well, there's a story. As Scott and I wandered from room to room inside the castle we entered one of 3 bedrooms on the second floor. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end and I felt goosebumps! I turned to Scott and said, "This room is haunted!". He, typically, scoffed at the idea until a few minutes later he found an article written about the room and the castle. Apparently scientists have been investigating the strange goings on at this castle since 1992. It is believed to be one of the most haunted buildings in England.....if you believe in such things. For the bold and daring, there are "ghost sits" held right in the very room we were standing in. Also, overnight ghost vigils are available for the daring. The goosebumps were enough for me, and I was out of there!!

Still, ghosts or not, we will return often to enjoy the beautiful grounds.                                                                                                                            

Fun "Stuff" from Edinburgh

While Scott and I did really enjoy the castle, palace, and cathedral in Edinburgh we found that there was so much more to see and enjoy. This collection of photos pretty much covers our fun!

Both days we were in Edinburgh we passed a bagpiper. We couldn't pass up the photo op!

Sir William Wallace, of Braveheart fame? This "Wallace" is a high school drama teacher. His picture is actually on all of the travel brochures and postcards for Edinburgh. He only does this to raise money for charities. This day he was raising money to fight leukemia.

Monument to Sir Walter Scott. It's 200 feet 6 inches tall. There are 297 steps to the top, and Scott climbed them all!

Edinburgh is the home of J.K.Rowling, author of Harry Potter. It is said that The Elephant House is the birthplace of Harry Potter!

Shopping on The Royal Mile. Ever wonder what's under the kilt?

Yep, that's us!