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And we are off!

A very early morning today! We had to get the rental car back to sixt, take our baggage out of the rental and load it into their airport shuttle van, and get to the airport by 8am. It was a bit of a stressy drive to the rental place, rather unnecessarily so as there were hardly any cars on the road. London doesn’t come alive very early on a Sunday as the shops etc are closed until 11.30! Fabulous idea I think! We had a couple of hours to fill in at the airport but that was okay as we had a lovely leisurely breakfast to drown out our sorrow of that part of our holiday being over! Not that we are not thankful. It ha been amazing! But it means that normal life is just around the corner!

The flight went quite fast…although 10 hours long. I watched 3 movies!  All approx 2 hours long each. The best was a movie about an autistic boy who lost his father in Sept 11 at the World trade Centre. I cried most of the way through the movie! I think it was called ‘Extremely loud incredibly close’. We arrived in San Francisco at 1.30pm to a beautiful hot and sunny day.

We are staying at the Raddison at Fishermans wharf. So, once we were unpacked, we wandered off to discover Fishermans wharf. It was buzzing with thousands of people and street performers. We had a lovely meal at one of the many fish based restaurants….all while we were fighting off falling asleep. Our bodies were still in UK time and it was the middle of the night for us! We even went through the wax museum to fil in time. I thought it was great! I was the only one of us who hadn’t been through one before!

We finally hit the sack at 9.30 exhausted! I was asleep first believe it or not! First time in the whole trip! I was so tired! Anyway so far San Francisco looks great! I am going to enjoy the next 3 days 🙂

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Windlesham and Windsor – Our final day in England!

We had a fabulous evening with Daniel and Marysia and a really good nights sleep. The plans for today were to do the walk through Windsor Park starting off at Virginia Waters, and then walk the long mile and end up at the Castle. We woke to a beautiful sunny and hot day. So pleased as it would have been less fun to walk it in the rain. We had planned for Glenda to get to Dan and Marysias place and we go together, but she got stuck in traffic and was running late. So the plan was changed and we met Glenda at the park.

The walk was great and along with the views we had plenty of time to chat and enjoy each others company. We arrived at Windsor Castle just after lunch time so we found a cafe and had lunch together. After lunch we walked down to the river and looked at the swans and the boats. Lots of families were at the river and surrounding parks because of the beautiful sunny day.

We had to catch the 6pm bus back to the gates to Virginia Waters and the Windsor walk entrance so there was time to have a coffee at a cafe near the Castle. We arrived back at Daniels around 6.45pm. Glenda was able to stay for tea so we all went to the local Indian restaurant and enjoyed our last meal together.

What a fabulous time we have had in England! Tomorrow morning at 6am we are off to Heathrow airport to catch our plane to Singapore. This certainly has been a full holiday! It’s hard to remember the details of our whole time away. I will be reading this blog to help jog the memories. Onto the next chapter of the holiday….

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Bournemouth to Daniel and Marysias place

After a reasonable nights sleep we were up bright and early to get started on our big trip to Windlesham. We had so much planned. Our first stop was a little pub in Bournemouth for breakfast. We found a park on the sea front and were blessed with amazing views over the ocean. The sky was a beautiful blue and hardly any clouds and the sea was calm. Bournemouth has an amazing beach, and Poole even better. They just don’t get a long hot summer!

Len has family in Tiptoe, which is just north of Bournemouth and in the New Forest. New Forest is very different from other parts of England as it has lots of wide open spaces and also forestry areas. It also has animals roaming free all over. You see horses, deer and cows often and they are very near the road. We travelled through New Forest after having a lovely morning tea with Lens cousin and his wife.

We drove on to Salisbury to have a look through the Salisbury Cathedral. It is a great Cathedral to visit as the grounds are well kept and picturesque, and the Cathedral itself is very tall, big and interesting both on the outside and the inside. We took heaps of photos and decided to have lunch in their cafe as well.

The next place was a place that Judy needed to see. Stonehenge! Len, Robin and I had already seen it, but it was still good to visit again. Once again we took plenty of photos and the added bonus was that we got in free! We brought tickets to the English Heritage when we first left on our tour of England and they have well and truely paid for themselves.

From Stonehenge we had the biggest part of the journey, and that was to get to Henley on Thames to meet up with Glenda for tea. We were so pleased to get there as we were stuck on the motorway for ages as there had been a car accident. Henley on Thames is a beautiful town filled with historic buildings. Glendas place was one of them. We wandered through the town and along the river than had a lovely meal together.

The final part of the trip was to get to Daniel and Marysias at Windlesham. They have such a neat little place and it was so good o finally be with them again. We had a big catch up, had Daniel blow a candle on his belated birthday cake that Marysia had made him, had supper then went to bed. What a very long day…but a very good day as well.

The photos for today were loaded in yesterdays blog by mistake so that is where they will stay until I have time to fix them up. I hope you enjoy looking at them. We have seen some amazing sights!

 

 

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Painswick to Bournemouth

What a neat experience staying in our B&B last night. Robin and I slept in a four poster bed that was so high we needed a stool to get up into it. The whole place was centuries old and was in an area surrounded by historical buildings. We all slept really well and even managed to get some washing washed and dried!

Well what a huge day we had today! The list was 1. The Cotswolds 2. Bristol Suspension Bridge 3. Bath 4. Shaftesbury – Gold Hill 5. Burnemouth and tea with Robins family! The distance travelled seeemed like MILES! Both Judy and I are getting a little sick of sitting inthe back of the car. Worst of all is having no control! Anyone who knows me knows that I am a control freak!

But the day was great! We saw so much and loved it all. The Cotsdwolds are very picturesque to drive through. We stopped at a couple of the little villages to look around and see the historic houses closer up. One place was Bibery which had a trout farm and also one of the most pretty streets in England. I will add some photos of this place.

Bristol Suspension bridge was a recommendation by all the visitors guides, so we just had to divert to Bristol to check it out. We weren’t disappointed..it was quite a sight…and long and very high. We stopped under it for some photos but it just didn’t look as good as in real life.

Now Bath!! If you haven’t been to Bath, you have to add that to your ‘bucket list’. It HAS to be done. What an amazingly pretty historic town. Very much built on Roman influence. We included a visit into the Roman Baths this time. I was so pleased as I have been to Bath before so I had seen most of the touristy spots, but not inside the Baths. It was like a museum and very interesting 🙂

We have a photo at home of Barbara (Robins Mum) walking up a very steep hill with Ken and Margater Pittwood. The little houses in the photo are so quaint and old. I have always wanted to go to that very same spot. So that was our next port of call. Shaftesbury! We arrived around 5pm. Parked the car and walked Gold hill looking at the distant views on the way and also those very same little houses as in the photo. Such a great thing to do.

Next thing was piling into the car and driving as fast as we could to get to Bournemouth. The only trouble was the roads were very narrow, windy and hilly! The trip took much longer that we thought. But we also saw some very good views the whole trip. We arrived in Bournemouth at 8.15pm and booked into our B&B! Went to KFC and brought the worst tea of our whole holiday….yuck! But we didn’t have time to do anything different for tea as we had to take it around to Ken and Margarets place and eat it there. We are running out of holiday time very fast! But, we did have a lovely evening with the Bournemouth Pittwoods (well 3 of them) and had a pretty late night. The internet was useless at our B&B, so once again I could update my blog or load any photos.

My goodness have we stayed at some interesting places, seen some amazing things and had lots of laughs….so good for the soul 🙂

 

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Fishguard to Painswick

There’s not a lot to say about today as we were catching the Ferry then driving on the motorway for most of the day. Not a lot of photos taken either, so I will load them up with the next days photos 🙂

I overate last night and suffered a very windy tummy all night. So it was a restless night for me! The tea was so nice though. I think it was all the garlic in the gravy! When the alarm went off at 6am, I wasn’t very happy. It was way too early to get up, but we had a ferry to catch. During the night I decided not to eat any breakfast but when we got down to the dining room and I saw the food…and I ate it all up! Our accommodation was great and the owners were very friendly 🙂

We got to the ferry terminal within about 5 minutes as it was just down the road. The boat trip lasted 3 hours and was a pretty calm sailing (thank goodness). We had a bit of a distance to travel so we got on the road only stopping for a quick lunch and a drink later on. When you drive down the M4 you don’t really get to see much scenery, so when we got closer to our Bed and Breakfast we left the motorway and travelled down the country roads for more views.

As we got closer to our B&B the roads got narrower and narrower until it was just a single lane. We really wondered if the tom tom was leading us wrong, but eventually we got to the place and found out that we had come through a back road. It was quite an experience. I booked our B&B through last minute.com while we were on the ferry, so I was a little bit worried that it wouldn’t really be suitable. There weren’t many available so we couldn’t be fussy. Thankfully we are all very happy with it. It is a historic building that has been done up and converted into a B&B and it is so nice. We haven’t stayed in anything like it before and we feel really blessed to have the experience!

We had tea at the restaurant downstairs which is run by a lovely Romanian couple. Another super meal! After tea we went for a walk to have a look around the local area. It is full of historical buildings with narrow roads. We love it! We have taken some photos but it was getting late and they are a little dark. I will add them anyway when we get internet next. Only 3 more nights in the UK after tonight. Sadly we are getting to the end of this fabulous holiday, but we have so many memories and thousands of photos 🙂

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Cork to Rosslare

A sleep in this morning until 8am!!! So nice…not that it hasn’t happened before but I was up writing in my blog and loading photos until 1am! We still managed to get packed up and leave the B&B and be sitting having our breakfast at 9.30. We decided to go to a local cafe for breakfast as 9 euro each fro breakfast at the homestay seemed a little too dear. We all had a good nights sleep and the place was clean and the people welcoming 🙂

We needed to travel to Rosslare today, a 3 hour drive if we just drove without any stops, but we wanted to see some sights on the way. So any spots on the map that had a star on it we decided was worth a visit. A little beach resort named Ardmore was our first stop. We had beautiful blue sunny skies all the way there, but as we drove down to the village the sea fog came in from the sea and covered the town. It was still a great little place to visit and we walked part of the way down their cliff walk.

Our next place was another little narrow street village called New Ross. A lovely place! We wandered the streets and then had our lunch at a little restaurant. Quite basic but very friendly people.

We travelled on to the Dunbrody Abbey and Castle. The Abbey was a litle walk from the castle where there was a little shop selling tickets. The castle itself wasn’t open as what was left of it had been converted to the shop. The Abbey cost 2euro per adult and we were given the key to be able to go and explore all on our own. Well…it was great! We were so pleased that we decided to visit it and to be able to wander through as long as we wanted was an extra blessing. It was in ruins but what was left showed us just how big and magnificent it would have been in its time. It was constructed in 1170 and took 50 years to complete. How they built such amazingly big buildings in that era just astounds me! I will attach some photos 🙂

We drove on to another town that had viking influence. Another narrow street town. It was lovely. It’s hard to describe how cute these towns look. The little shops all join together and are painted in different colours and all without verandahs. As you drive up to the street Judy and I are saying ‘Oh..wow!! I have videoed many as we drive through, but photos just don’t do them justice.

We are now sitting in our very nice B&B. We have had tea at the local pub and were served by a lovely  girl. The Irish people are so friendly! This is our last night in Ireland. Tomorrow we catch the Ferry to Wales. We will be sad to leave Ireland as it has been a fabulous time here, but we still have so much yet to see. Now to get some photos loaded, shower and sleep 🙂

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Killarney to Cork

Last night we actually stayed in a Hotel and it was busy! It was called a bed and breakfast Hotel but it really was a Hotel with a restaurant and a Bar. We went down for tea and there were children running around everywhere and the noise was unbelievable. Lovely happy sounds though of families out having fun together. Breakfast was included in the room rate so we were able to go down to the dining room this morning and have a lovely full breakfast.

So once again we packed the car and were off on our way to Cork. It was a really easy and quite a fast trip. We arrived at Blarney Castle at 11am and found a car park straight away. Blarney Castle is a really high Castle and has plenty of Castle left to explore among the ruins. We paid the entry fee and started our 3 hours of fun! We started at the bottom looking at the lower rooms. Some were very dark and damp but quite interesting as the doorways were low and the floor wet and muddy. Each level had plenty to look at and amazing views from the windows. The fun part was walking up the steep spiral uneven stairs! Exciting and scary! But the most exciting thing was actually kissing the Blarney Stone! To do this you had to lay on your back on the floor at the top of the castle. A man holds you while you slide out over the edge, hang your top half of your body down and kiss the stone on the wall! I was first and then Len. Both Judy and Robin had decided not to do it as it looked too scary (Well I think Robin was more worried about losing his hearing aids and glasses)…but eventually they both did it as well. It was fabulous…a really great thing to do! Another thing I can tick off the bucket list! And once again, it is something you just have to experience to really appreciated the thrill of it all!

We continued exploring the gardens and surrounding areas of the Blarney Castle until 2pm and then went and had a late lunch.

After lunch we continued on the drive to Cork and to our accommodation. The late afternoon was spent looking around Cork and then finishing off with a lovely meal out.

Another fabulous day to be had by all. I am now sitting on my bed writing this while the other three snore away! I will add some photos and join them in no time. Apparently I snore the loudest at times…so Judy says…but she can’t hear herself like I hear her now 🙂  (hehe)

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Dingle to Killarney

Today we had breakfast with another couple alongside us. They came from Holland and were very chatty. The male of the couple had been to New Zealand and he loved it. He is busy saving for another trip as he has only been to the North Island and he wants to go to the South Island as well. He thinks that Ireland is very much like New Zealand. Funny thing is that we have been saying the very same thing the whole time we have been travelling in Ireland as well. Although, I think it has a lot more rocky parts. I have been amazed at how much of the land is very stoney. The poor Farmers must have to shift so much of the stone in order to get more fertile farm land. At least they have made good use of the rocks. Every fence line is made up of stone walls. They look great too! When you are a up in the highlands looking down on the lowlands you see the patterns of all the walls decorating the scene. It looks almost patchwork, and very picturesque. I have taken so many photos! I hope that I can remember the sights all my life J

We travelled from Ventry near Dingle to Killarney via The Ring Of Kerry. Now…if you want to see some amazing views that is the place to go! One moment we were down at the seaside and the next we were driving up steep narrow roads and ending up on very high hills. Most of the places that had the best views had lookout points…and every one of them was filled with tourists. The tour buses travel that route and they know where to stop. It’s no wonder though as the views are wonderful. The sad thing for us was that it was raining this morning and even though it did clear up, and we had sunshine in the lowlands, as soon as we went higher we were in low cloud and rain again. Not all the time but quite a bit of it. We still got as many photos as possible, but they would have been much better if it was fine and clear.

We are staying at a Bed and Breakfast Hotel this time. We are settled in for the night and have been and had a lovely meal…much like a home cooked one tonight and it was great! Robin has done some washing and we have his clothes hanging everywhere in our room and bathroom to dry. Judy and Len have been doing a little every night, and I have kept up with knickers and bras! We still have lots of clothes to wear though so all is good! Makes you appreciate automatic washing machines I tell you.

Well off to sleep now. We are heading for Cork tomorrow and I may kiss that Blarney Stone!!!

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The Burren to Dingle

Oh my goodness…did I order way too much breakfast or what!!! We had to put our order in the night before…and it was before tea…and I must have been hungry! I ordered the cereal and the cooked breakfast. The bowl of Muesli was filled to the top…and the cooked breakfast had half a plate full of Baked Beans, as well as Bacon and eggs…and toast. I was soooo full!

We had a really good nights sleep though and woke up to a beautiful sunny day. We packed up and drove off to Dingle. On the way we went over a high hill range and saw some very pretty sights…well I call them pretty…but really just some amazing landscapes. We stopped the car a few times for photos. Our first real stop as tourists was the Cliffs of Moher. At first we thought that Mokau in New Zealand has better to offer, but as we walked closed and actually looked down the cliffs, we realised that they really were quite spectacular! Photos will help to describe them…I hope!

We passed through some lovely little villages and made our way to Killimer. At Killimer we caught the ferry to Tarbert Island…which isn’t really an island! We went from County Clare to County Kerry. The ferry was great fun. Just drove on, sat in the car (or walked about like I did taking photos) and then drove off a half hour later. And this time the water was very calm and it was a pleasant ride 🙂

We had a late lunch at Tralee (you know ‘The Rose of Tralee contest at home!), and we were quite suprised at how big Tralee was. Last night we decided to look up Limerick on the internet and You Tube and decided that we would give it a miss and just drive on to Dingle. Dingle is a lovely little seaside place, and we have now settled into our homestay. We’ve been out to tea at a local cafe that was celebrating ‘Bastille Day’. They had a pianist and violinist playing for entertainment while we all ate. It has been a lovely warm day, but has cooled off during the evening. The wind was a bit cool at the cliffs of Moher too, but we didn’t have rain and that was really good!

Well I will attach some photos, have a shower and wash my hair, then maybe play a game on my iphone. Isn’t it so nice to relax! I just wish some magic fairy would do all the washing that is in my suitcase! I am fast running out of clean clothes!!!

We are doing the ‘Ring of Kerry’ tomorrow! A lot of driving but we have heard it is well worth it. Ending up at Kilarney 🙂

 

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Dublin to The Burren

Woke up to a wet morning and worried that the day was going to continue being wet. Packed up the car and headed off in the rain to Galway. About a half hour down the road the rain had stopped, and we then had a beautiful warm sunny day for the rest of the day!!! Galway is a lovely town We parked and walked to the town square and had lunch at a very old pub. The food, atmosphere and the furnishings were fabulous but we forgot to take any photos to show you! We wandered down ‘Shop Street’, a well known street that locals and tourists frequent. It was full of people. I couldn’t get over the huge crowd! There were also buskers everywhere….and human statues…and actors! Very entertaining! Some were a little odd though I must admit 🙂 We walked right along the boardwalk by the river and took some photos. There were many extentions to the river around the town and weirs for the Salmon. The place is well known for it’s Salmon. We took a couple of photos of men in the middle of the very fast flowing river trying to catch fish..either Salmon or Trout….we weren’t quite sure.

On the road again and we arrived at our Bed and Breakfast at The Burren. The name of the B&B is Cappabhaile House and it is lovely. We are so thankful to have some room after the last 2 nights at Dublin. We ventured out to the local for tea and once again were fed really well! I am beginning to look about 6 months pregnant! I don’t know how I am going to be able to do mainly music when I get back home. I joked about getting up at 6.30 in the morning and going for a jog….yeah right!..anyone that knows me well will know that that is an impossibility! I am NOT a morning person at all! The Burren is a lovely area. We are by the sea and we even went for a walk down the little jetty after tea.

We are off to Dingle tomorrow via the cliffs of Moher, and will be catching a ferry at Killimer! We had a beautiful sunset tonight so lets hope the fine weather will continue. Here are some photos of another lovely day…