Liverpool!

We left the hotel the next morning and travelled on up the road....

And found ourselves in Liverpool on Penny Lane!  YES!  The home of the Beatles - I was an avid fan as a teenager and this was awesome!  The lady in the picture is Debbie.  She was one of our travelling friends - a very nice person!  As we travelled along, the bus stopped at Strawberry Fields....
 
Strawberry Fields was an orphanage midway between John's home and Paul's home.  This is the front gate. 

This stone was embedded in the sidewalk in front of the orphanage - we're not sure how it got there or who put it there!

 Not far away was John's family home.  It is in good condition and quite nice.

 The rain had eased up a little when we stopped at Paul's family home, which is now called a townhome, but was known then as a council house, built in WWII as housing for families of soldiers fighting in the war.

 Just before the building was this sign denoting the location as the McCartney home.

Here is a better view to give you the general idea!

 Since George and Ringo lived in various places and were more remote from the downtown area, we were granted some free time to explore Liverpool in the vicinity of our hotel.  As usual, in all UK cities, the buildings are old, well-maintained and beautiful.  The next few shots I took as we walked toward our final stop for the day...

 ... this is the top of the building in the previous photo.

 We headed down the street...

 ... a shopping district where we admired the architecture....

 ........which didn't disappoint....

 ....then, found ourselves in a busier area...

 ... with a bar called The Cavern...

 ...then we found another venue called the Cavern, and a little further up on the other side of the street...

 ...was the actual Cavern Club...

 ....where the Beatles made their debut for the general public, were a rousing success and eventually became famous!

 Inside it was small and dark...

 ...and crowded....

 There were photos from the days when they were not so famous...

 ....and displays of things used in days-gone-by....

....here is Poppa in the entrance which was a dark and winding staircase leading underground to the Cavern!

 Outside there were life-sized statues of John and Paul...Here I am with Paul trying to adopt his stance while Poppa tried to figure out how to use my cell phone to take a photo!  

I took a photo of this church on our way back to the hotel!  Then it was definitely time for bed!  What a day!  I'll never forget this trip!

More Views of the Countryside!

We were getting closer to Scotland all the time - but we weren't there yet!  The scenery just kept getting better....

 
 ..... I loved the view of the surrounding countryside....

 .... including all the little critters in the fields....

 ...... I could see yarn growing everywhere!!!

And this sign was on the door of a wonderful shop where all the goods were woven from fine Scottish wool - from sheep that look a lot like this!

It has been a while...

... since I posted.  With the stay-at-home situation resulting from the COVID-19 virus - I have been busy taking advantage of the situation to get some knitting done - of course, it isn't going anywhere now - but I'll have some ready for the hospital when normalcy resumes (someday I hope!) as per the instructions below!

So - let me see - where did I leave off?  Hmmmmm...........

.... oh yes!  We were in the bus - heading north from Wales to Scotland!  I took this picture so you could see what good company we were in... see the little bear hanging in the window??  Oh my gosh - they knew we were coming!  😊

Our tour guide - James - was using this time to make sure all the plans were coming together - when he wasn't on the microphone telling us about the sights - he did an excellent job of keeping us entertained and informed.

The view out our window just kept getting better.  There are a lot of these hand-crafted stone fences in the farmer's fields in Britain, built many years ago and still sturdy.

This is a view of one of the villages we drove through.... 

 ... the buildings are old and very-well kept, as are all the old buildings in the UK!

 The streets are very narrow - I can't imagine travelling on roads this narrow in Canada!

 Since we were ahead of schedule, and thanks to our very proficient tour guide, we stopped for a boat cruise up the river.  

 You can see that we were not the only "Canadians" visiting (see the "Canada" geese?)..

 The scenery was beautiful - the whole country is beautiful and very green.  I recall asking Phil's Mum one time what she missed most about England, her response was the "green" - she said there was a lot more green in England.  At the time I couldn't figure that one out since we have lots of green in Canada.  But......the green is somehow greener - I can't explain it, but now I know what she meant.

 This was the view out our side of the boat - a little road in the middle of the forest.  I wondered where it went!

 This is a couple of young ladies on our tour.  All our tour-mates were friendly and very nice.  In the background you can see the shape of the boat.

 Another part of "the gang" and the view out the other side of the boat.

And, all too soon, we were back on the bus heading north again, while James worked out tomorrow's details.

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!