Category: Family

Day three meant leaving London and heading to Dover. Time to start our 9 day whirlwind driving odyssey!

We rode a lovely high speed train out of London, and here it is:

Dover is a seaside town, half tourist resort and half stopover on the way to Paris (the channel tunnel starts near here). It has three major claims to fame: a massive port, a historically important castle and the very famous ‘white cliffs’.

That’s the beach above. A classic ‘pebble beach’. A seawall breakwater creates a waveless lagoon in which swimmers practice to swim the English Channel. Our first activity was a boat tour to see the White Cliffs from the harbour:

The cliffs are white due to chalk content, and run for miles. They are quite impressive (relatively) up close. Here’s a better shot, and please pay attention to the top:

That’s a castle up there, and it was our second attraction of the day.

After lunch, of course:

Yep, that’s a bucket of cockles, whelks, prawns, mussels and fake crab.

The castle is up on the cliff overlooking Dover, and was built in 1197. It is enormous and contains such attractions as an authentic Roman lighthouse (from back when the Romans occupied England) and a Saxon church. During the Napoleonic years tunnels were carved deep into the cliffsides, and during WW2 the tunnels were expanded and outfitted to be used as a base of operations. From these very tunnels – which we toured – the Dunkirk evacuation was masterminded.

We explored the old castle keep as well, which was tall and mazelike and shows that the architecture of all those RPGs I’ve been playing for most of my life isn’t too far off reality:

And here is our breakfast as the Dover B&B (called the Restover). It was extremely comfortable and far better than our London hotel…

We haven’t ridden The London Eye yet (that’s the big Ferris Wheel), but on our second day we went to the Tower Of London.

This is a large castle in the middle of the city, right alongside the Thames. It’s been there since the 12th century, and is remarkably well preserved and presented. Many kings and queens have lived and ruled from the tower, and many famous peoples have been executed or buried there as well. It reeks history, and every part of it is fascinating.

Nothing less, perhaps, than the Crown Jewels. They are on exhibit in a heavily fortified building inside a gigantic walk-through safe. They are the actual crown jewels, so we got to see (for instance) the biggest diamond in the world and a gold-plated punch bowl big enough to bath in. Unfortunately photography is prohibited, so no photos, but I assure you it is a sight worth seeing.

Second most interesting is the Royal Armories. This is the exhibit of the collection of weapons and armor owned by the royals. Three such examples:

The left shot shows a suit of armor and horse armor that was made for (and presumably worn) by an English king from almost 500 years ago! It’s difficult to see in the image, but the armor is fully engraved all over and is just an amazing work of art. The rightmost shot is a close up of another royal suit of armor (from 1600 if I recall), this time gold plated and – again – fully engraved. Awesome stuff.

The collection’s not just old stuff though:

A few years ago London had an anti-crime program where people could anonymously turn in guns without fear of punishment (guns being illegal here). The above photo shows a pistol that was turned in, and yes those are real (over 1500 of them…) diamonds. All the was known was the gun was made in Germany; by or for whom is a mystery. It is now in the royal collection.

We took a guided tour from a beefeater; saw the ravens that live in the tower; saw 500+ year old graffiti and even ate in the cafe inside the tower. For all my joking about the current royals (check your mailboxes for postcards…) I have to say I greatly enjoyed the history in the Tower.

Here’s a shot of the Thames from just outside:

And here’s a shot of my lunch, and KLS’s ordering-of-dinner:

Cricket on the telly and page 3 girls in the paper…

We arrived five days ago, and our first two days here were spent in London.

Day one we were (obviously) tired after the flight – we’d arrived at around 7am. We dropped our bags off at the hotel and decided to take a bus tour of the city to see the main sights without too much effort.

This included such things as the London Eye and Big Ben amongst others.

Many of these sights we want to see in more detail, but it was very exciting to see them all from the top of an open-topped double-decker bus 🙂

We were all very tired as well, and at various times all of us were nodding off on the bus! Our ticket included a boat trip on the Thames as well, which was a lot of fun.

Late in the day we headed back to the hotel, including walking through Hyde Park

That’s the lake in the park, called Serpentine.

On my notes I described the hotel we stayed at in London – the Ibis – as a “ripoff hotel with insane internet prices”. And by insane I mean £20 for four hours (that’s about $8/hour). Oh well, here I am!

I don’t even remember how the first day ended, how tired we were.