Windsor, Stonehenge and Bath

On this day we did a fun little loop in the English countryside.  Just as a side note, I took way too many pictures this trip.  I posted about 150 of the 500 pics I took on facebook, and there are even fewer here on my blog (for obvious reasons).  So, if you haven't seen all the pictures I have posted, but would like to, you can see more of the highlights in my facebook albums.  We were blessed with gorgeous weather while in England and Scotland.  It was sunny, and beautiful the majority of the time we were there.  A few days were cloudy, and it only rained part of 2 days out of the 11 we were there.  I think that is a pretty amazing feat for English weather!

This day, was one of those beautiful sunny days!

 Windsor, the Queen's favorite residence

 One thing I really liked, and probably have mentioned before, is...every tour comes with an audio guide.  Typically we would have to pay extra so would fore go...but not in England and the kids LOVED it.

 Such a pretty castle!

 While there, we got to see another changing of the guard ceremony.

 This is St. George cathedral, the church connected to Windsor.  Buried here are Henry VIII, King George and his wife, the Queen mother, as well as the Queen's sister...Princess Margret.  As well as many other's that I don't remember

 While taking a picture of the English countryside, this man hopped into our photo.  So hilarious, I don't think he realized he was quick enough to actually "make" into the picture.  It makes me laugh though..so I kept it.

 Stonehenge was amazing.  Looking at these pictures, it doesn't seem real.  They look like those backdrops you see at Universal Studios, you can stand in front of for photo ops.  These are no back drops people, This is the real stuff!

 To end our day, we went to Bath to spend the evening there.  Being the Jane Austin fan I am (are you surprised...!) I have always wanted to go to Bath.  This is the Cathedral in the center of town.  

 We toured the Roman Baths, which was a fun experience.  The built the museum on and around the ruins of the baths.  So it was pretty neat to see new meeting old, and they did a really good job trying to recreate the image of how it would have been in Roman times.  

 The baths are fed by a natural hot spring that has believed healing properties.  At the end of the tour, you can get a sample of this "healing" water.  A white gloved waiter brings it to you in a crystal goblet and everything.  It was kind of gritty, very warm, and really not that tasty.

 It was fun to sit around the edge of the Bath and watch the water bubble from the hot springs.  I was worried the whole time, just waiting for one of the girls to fall in!  The boys, thank heavens, were safely attached to Matt and I's backs!

 Blurry picture, but it made the cut because it makes me laugh!

What are they doing???

On the road again, heading back to our hotel.  Tomorrow we leave for a few days in Scotland!

These boys are such troopers, they love to watch "show shows" and pretend they are so cool.  And, No, Hunter is not holding a double mocha latte.  It is just milk, but we discovered (since we left our sippy's at home) that the hotel coffee cups and lids make a great replacement for sippy cups!  

London, England

Our first couple of days in England we spent touring London.  We packed a lot in, looking back I am still impressed by how much we were able to do!  I think we did just about everything that was on our wish list!  Sorry about the length of this entry, we took over 500 pictures, and it was so very hard to narrow down.  These are the highlights!

One of our first stops was an english phone booth.  These are very stinky, so I wonder if anyone ever uses them at all anymore.  We liked this one the best because you can see Big Ben in the background.

We like to get ice cream where ever we go.  In England they have a style of cream they call "mr. Whippy".  It was very different then the rich gelato we are used too, but still very good.  The best I can describe is, it is soft serve that is almost like a rich whipped cream.  Very light, creamy and refreshing on a hot day!

 It was neat to see the olympic rings on the Tower Bridge

 We went on a river cruise along the Thames river, it was a great way to end one of our evenings in London!

 walking across the Tower Bridge

We took lots of breaks through out the days.  This stop the girls are putting together a sticker book they had gotten in the Tower Bridge.

 We went to the Winston Churchill war rooms museum.

This was fascinating, all a series of rooms in a bunker built underground, right near Parliament.  It was pretty fascinating to see their system, and also to see they still had their creature comforts...like separate bedrooms for Mr and Mrs. Churchill, private dining rooms and kitchens...fascinating how the aristocracy lives, even during war times.

 Big Ben, next to the House of Parliament.

 Westminster Abbey

No pictures were allowed inside, but we saw some awesome things.  My favortie parts of these old churches are the crypts.  We saw the tomb of Edward the Confessor, Elizabeth I, Mary queen of Scots.

Pretty fascinating!

Big Ben 

Inside the House of Parliment.

We actually sat in on a debate conducted by the House of Lords.

White wigs and all, it was pretty cool to see.

The boys had to wait outside in the hall, I wonder why?

The London Eye

 Inside the Eye.

This was probably one of the more expensive things we did, but we thought it was worth the money.  It gave a great overview of London, and was just generally a cool experience.  I was amazed at how many fit in one compartment, it was much larger then I had envisioned.

 Some 30 statues of the Olympic mascot were placed around London.  We didn't find all of them, but ran into quite a few.  This was one of our favorite...he is dressed up like Big Ben.

 Going under the London Bridge while on our river cruise

 Buckingham Palace

 Buckingham Palace

 Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace

I was amazed at what a ceremony this was.  It lasted well over an hour, with many parades of soldiers, a brass band  concert, and then the final march as the guards left the Palace grounds.

Next we visited St. Pauls cathedral

We got to hike up the dome, and learned that whispering domes make our boys even louder...if that is even possible!

The Tower of London

here is traitors gate, where one of our ancestors, Robert Overton, was imprisoned.  He was probably brought in through Traitors Gate by boat, that is how most prisoners were brought in.

 One of the many "towers" in the tower of London.  This place was huge, you could easily spend the better part of a day touring all the different buildings of the Tower.  We only had little over an hour, so just hit the highlights.

 One of the "highlights" is the White Tower.

This was the main residence of William the Conqueror, and is also built along side the ruins of the old Roman settlement Londonium.

The Crown Jewels are housed in this tower.  Also the medals for the Olympics were kept here until they were awarded.  We weren't able to view the medals...they weren't on display for the public.  But we were able to see the Crown Jewels, which are pretty amazing

This guard was awesome.  The boys were so fascinated with him, that he started marching for them.

 One of our last evenings in London, we walked in Hyde park, and ended up on the border of Kensington Park to see the statue of Peter Pan.

Each night ended in a ride on the London Tube, as we headed to where we parked our car.  The london tube was so vast.  It was mind boggling, but by the end of our London excursions we were traveling it like pros.

We loved our time spent in London.  It was so fun to tour a city and be able to speak and understand the language!  so refreshing!!  

Our Summer Vacation: England and Scotland!

We took way to many pictures on our trip.  It was also a very long trip, almost two weeks, so I will post in shifts.  Here is Day 1, our travel day.  We took the ferry over to Dover, England from Calais, France.  

 Hunter loved the Ferry!!

 It was very windy!

 Please pardon the water spots :)

Our first glimpse of England were the white cliffs of Dover.

What a beautiful welcome to an awesome country!

our first "English" castle

Dover Castle

We were on a bit of a time constraint, trying to maximise our time in England with the days off Matt was given.  So we did the Travel all in ONE day!  Doing it over, I think I would break it up into two days.  It was a very LONG day of traveling when you combine it with the wait time for, and ferry ride. The kids were troopers for their crazy parents though, and all did marvelous!

Legoland Deustchland!!

Matt had the 4th and 5th of July off of work, so late the night of the 4th he got this wild idea in his head that we needed to go to Legoland.  We have been to the San Diego Legoland, and our kids really enjoy it, so it is on our list of things to do here.  It just came a lot sooner then I expected.  I thought we were going to go to the zoo, but Matt woke us all up early and told us we were going to Legoland!

 can you see us?  we are that blob of humanity there under the "A"!

Anya on the first roller coaster she decided was fun.  She rode this one in San Diego, and was super excited to learn they have one here in Germany too!  Go Dragon Coaster!

you never know what you might find inside a shark!

I thought Jack would jump overboard at any given moment.

Anya and Matt tried out this new ride.  It was too scary for Anya when we were in Cali., but she decided to try it here.  She loved it, and said it felt like how she imagined flying on a dragon would feel like.  Matt is lower left, and Anya is right above him to the right.

We always have to have fun in the water area.  Here it was a series of splash and water works areas.

I love Hunter's face here.  It is like he is trying to figure out how they made that!!

Of course, lego mini land is always a hit.  It was fun to see some of the places in Europe we have visited made into mini's.

Neuschwanstein made the cut of course!

As well as the Rialto Bridge in Venice.  We rode a gondola under that bridge!

 Hunter looks like he is up to something!!

 My kids and I!

We had a great day in Legoland!!