End of Day Three in the UK

We travelled on after our tour of Cardiff Castle....

The buildings in this area are old and beautiful - and very well maintained....

The scenery is still beautiful....

When we arrived at Ludlow, they were having a flower festival...

This is a wider shot of this old stone structure - not uncommon in this part of the country!

When we got off the bus, we had some free time to wander around, and found ourselves walking on real cobblestone streets!

Poppa was captivated by this beautiful floral display.  He stopped to examine it closely since he would like to duplicate it for the front of our house!

Once again we were happy to call it a day - this is the view from our hotel room that night... and....

... this is the view in the opposite direction!  What a wonderful trip this turned out to be!

Day 3 in the UK (Part 2)

All too soon....

... we were back on the bus heading north.  The scenery in Wales is wonderful...

Poppa wasn't as intrigued with the scenery as I was and fell asleep as we rolled along....

......... but I was still looking out the window at the countryside....

......... which kept changing and was always lovely and contained some livestock from time to time, until....

... we arrived in Cardiff with some free time to stroll around.  We saw this amazing carousel and I had to get a picture for you!  After grabbing a bite to eat...

... we met James, our travel Director (who was VERY knowledgeable about everything, as well as very skilled in keeping everything under control!)... and then

... we all headed to Cardiff Castle, which....

...is absolutely stunning inside!

Trust me - the pictures do not do justice to the beauty and opulence of this famous castle!

I wished I had brought my big camera - my phone didn't really do it justice - imagine living here!

It is huge and we kept climbing spiral staircases.  When we reached...

... this huge dining room (where Poppa counted 34 chairs around the table!) 

...and the embellishments were breathtaking, but we were both a little tired and warm from all the climbing, so we decided to skip the last set of spiral stairs and went outside for a rest!  When the rest of the group came out of the castle,  we boarded the bus once more.

Where we were handed a timetable for the next day...

..... and dropped off at a lovely hotel in Cardiff where we didn't waste too much time getting into bed for a rest!

Day Three in the UK!

First Things First:  Thank you to our friend David who lives in the UK (more on that in a later post!) e-mailed me last evening to advise that the large building on the shores of the Thames (the last picture in the previous blog) is the British Houses of Parliament!  

Our trip to the UK just kept getting better!  After an early rise we boarded the bus again.  This time the bus stopped at....

...... did you guess?  YES!  Stonehenge!  I know it has been  diminished by time and tourists - but still - it made me catch my breath to actually be standing there!  

We couldn't get right up-close due to the deteriorating condition of the mysterious stones, touirsts are required to stay on a marked path - I didn't care!

There was no shortage of visitors - that's me in the white jacket - I was really there!

Of course, I had to get a picture of Poppa too!

But, all too soon, it was time to leave.  Back on the bus to our next stop....

.... another famous place - the Roman Baths in the city of Bath - of course!  Another stop at another place I had learned about, heard about, but never thought I would actually see!

This is the exterior - impressive!

The interior is equally captivating!

Old carved relics are numerous - and intriguing - and captivating!

And of course, there is the actual "bath"!  The water is constantly flowing and is quite warm.

The architecture is extremely picture-worthy - including the many statues!

These are stones used in the heating process - I'm not sure how, but the lower areas were full of these piles of huge rock!

And Poppa stood in line to buy me a souvenir at the gift shop!

Day Two in the UK (Part 2)

Our afternoon was also awesome!  Right after Poppa stopped for some breakfast in the hotel dining room...

.... we boarded the bus and arrived at....

...... the famous Tower of London!  Yes - this is the place where Henry VIII sent his out-of-favour wives to be beheaded!  

See the arches up ahead?

This is where we entered....

... for a quick look at the living quarters....

... and the altar of the resident clergy.

This is called the White Castle - the royalty stayed here occasionally...

Visitors could walk all the way around the perimeter up on the parapets and the views from there were wonderful!

For some reason Poppa strolled along much more quickly than I did!

This time he stopped to wait for me!

If I leaned over I could see the ground level stairs coming up!  As you can see if was quite high!

There were several of these large canons placed strategically to fend off the enemy!

A closer view!  

An inside view of the chapel.

A spot for Poppa to feel like a knight in shining armor!

A view of the Tower Bridge from the Tower!  When our tour there was finished.......

We made our way down to the Thames River for a boat ride.

There was space for a lot of passengers so we quickly grabbed a seat.

It was a wonderful, peaceful (no-climbing-involved) sight-seeing trip.  This huge ferris wheel can be seen from almost anywhere in the area!.

I think this is one of the royal residences - but honestly - we saw so much that I'm not sure which one!  When we got off the boat we had no idea (this was a "free-time" adventure for us) where we were in relation to the hotel.  We walked around for a while - just seeing the sights - and then hailed a cab back to our hotel.  Cabs are everywhere and if you just stick your arm up they will stop and take you wherever  you want to go.  The cab drivers are well-informed and very polite.  As we drove along our driver treated us to descriptions of interesting things along the way and filled out heads with information about London.  The cab ride was almost as fun as the actual sight-seeing we had done!  We were quite worn out by the time we arrived back at the hotel - it was a full day - and we had to be up bright and early the next day to board the bus for the next destination!