Category: Trip

Day Trip

  • August 2, 2016

Yesterday we went on a bus tour.

Our first stop was Leeds Castle, a beautiful old castle that has had many owners and iterations over several hundred years. The interior is an unusual mix of the old and new.

My favourite room was the library 🙂

We could have easily spent more time in the grounds of the castle exploring the hedge maze and falcon show but we’re on a tight schedule and only managed to squeeze in a sausage roll!

Our next – very brief – stop was the pebble beach at Dover.

We then continued to lovely Canterbury with its famous Cathedral, the seat of the Anglican Church.

This is a seriously old building, almost 1000 years in fact, and awe inspiring in its size and majesty.

I was particularly impressed by the abundance and beauty of the stained glass. That’s a more recent example above, and was many meters tall.

After Canterbury we then ended up in Greenwich for a Thames cruise back to London. It was a long day, but we got to see a lot 🙂

Kew

  • July 31, 2016

Today we visited the Royal Botanical Gardens, known as Kew Gardens. We spent hours there and saw many things. Here’s a taste:

That’s the Palm House, one of the star attractions. It’s a gigantic greenhouse with full sized palm trees growing inside (and a basement aquarium!). One cycad on display is over 250 years old!

The Princess Of Wales greenhouse contains 10 ecosystems and (it seems) at least a trillion plants. This is where some of the world largest water lilies are on display. Nearby, we found this guy.

The gardens are hundreds of acres and contain all sorts of varied arboretums and plantings. Between exhibits we stumbled upon a hydrangea grove.

A highlight of the gardens is a treetop walkway many meters above the ground. It’s a bit of an effort to get to the top (the lift was out of service) but was absolutely worth it!

Bees were everywhere, but notably concentrated in flower gardens planted beside a long walkway between the major greenhouses. Overlooking the flowers was a seasonal exhibit honoring bees called ‘The Hive’:

Here’s a shot from inside:

It’s hard to believe this will ever be removed, such is the work that went into it (lights and sound are based on the activity at a nearby beehive that the structure is wired to) and how popular it was with visitors. I’m glad we saw it.

Overall Kew was great and certainly lived up to expectations. If you’re ever in London, this is an easy recommendation. 

London Calling (again…)

  • July 28, 2016


Tomorrow we’re off to England for a holiday. We’ll visit several cities, see many things and (one of us will) eat a lot of Bacon rolls. 

As always, I’ll be blogging and sending (too many!) postcards. Look forward to it!