England - Land of Hope and glory!

England – Land of Hope and Glory!

Yay! Landed on English soil and it isn’t raining either! A rather dodgy, bumpy flight from storm-ridden Nice to the calm waters of London. We managed to negotiate our way through Gatwick Airport to get our rental car (which we up-graded from a ford focus to a 118 BMW with built in GPS. Far too flash for me to drive.

So off we go – Dave fiddling with the GPS, me with my map book – down to Salisbury (Stonehenge). It is only under 2 hrs from London, however today is Friday afternoon, so of course all the ones with a nice little cottage outside London are taking off and going home for the weekend.  Oh ….. is that what you do if you have money? Not too bad driving but as we got close to Stonehenge it was bumper to bumper, slow crawl as you drive pass the big stones! Which are just there in a paddock!

I made a decision to visit them then, so off we go off down a little road till you see this amazing new visitors centre (2 years old). Not too many cars in the carpark, so we pay our money, and hop onto a shuttle bus which takes you to the site! Some people walked it, but it is quite a hike and the time was ticking on….. it is a National Heritage site so cars aren’t allowed near it (tho there is that busy road rushing pass along the edges!)

Very interesting actually – not just a lot of up-right stones. You have little guides  that let you know what each group of stones meant. Did you know that there was a road that led up to it for the pilgrims who came to leave offerings to the gods they prayed for? And also there were lots of little round humps in the fields around the outside that are all part of it as well.

The museum at the visitors centre was great – showed how they got the stones shaped, dragged and how the ones along the top got there 4000BC. Quite technical.

So after spending a couple of hours there we went onto our country hotel, which was a 950 yr old farm house done up. Very lovely, with lovely people running it. We met these older English guests in the little bar room, and had dinner there in the dining room. (gorgeous food – best pork belly since Off the Track!).

Today was a visit to Salisbury Cathedral – with our own personal guide (little old lady volunteer who likes dressing up in Regency costumes and going to balls – think Pride and Prejudice!) It is cool on the outside (gothic) however the inside was rather boring decorative wise (it has a copy of the Magna Carta as well – only one of four made).

 This is one of the oldest working clocks in England (in the cathedral)

 They had a harvest festival last weekend (Autumn 'stuff')

After looking around this place, lovely villages, tree-lined roads, neat little cottages, open green fields, I decided I could quite like it around this area. Very pretty.

Bath

We then drove to Bath (about an hour from Salisbury) through all of the above countryside. First thing – I always thought Bath was by the sea! It is not – it is by a river. Secondly – it is again a lovely town with lovely town houses, but I thought it was a bigger city (don’t know why).

 The Bath Abbey (not a cathedral)

 Lovely river views from our river walk towards the main centre

We found the Roman Baths (where the romans bathed in the hot springs 2000 years ago). No that was an amazing place. They have made it into an interactive type museum- no-one can bathe in them now. We were there about 2 hours so really worth visiting.