Day 6 : UK 2013

Today was a solo adventure.  Took the train into London for a business meeting.  Was a very easy commute, I can see the appeal large city dwellers have with public transportation.  Coming from Phoenix we don't have that option.  The business men on the train bust out the laptop as soon as they got on and got to work.  Anyway finding the office I had to go to was a pain.  Unlike places I've been that have numbers above each door I had to walk up and down the street till I found two numbers to figure out which direction to go.  Then finally figuring that out I walked until I found the next number which was the one I was looking for.  It was a small door between a Subway(as in subs) and some other small shop.

After the meeting I decided to head to a shopping area, saw a sign for Harrod's which i had heard of so off I went.  Took the tube a couple stops, saw H&M and some other shops I see a lot in the US then finally made it to Harrod's.  Large fancy doors, displays windows all decked out advertising the Great Gatsby.  So room after room I see purses, okay there's gotta be cloths in here.  Next I hit a room of pastries, almost bought some fudge,  followed by almost buying petit fors, followed by wow check out those cup cakes.  The displays almost got me.  Well after making it out of the food section I saw a sign, egyptian escalators.  Now a picture does these stairs no justice, fancies steps I've ever seen.  From here I checked out all the floors, luckily the cloths were not my taste.  for me they looked like older lady cloths but what was odd even the kids stuff had that look just less material.  I saw one cute kids dress but it was 245 pounds, that almost $400, yikes.

Anyway enough shopping or browsing for me now I was off to the national archives.  First off i had to find a tube to Kew Gardens.  Oh but the fun with wandering without a real goal is if something catches your eye go for it.  So i was passing Victoria and Albert museum, most museums in London are free curtesey of the lottery.  (Hmm wonder were all our lottery funds go).  Anyway nice thing about this was there was no line so I hopped in picked a corridors saw stain glass, robes, ivory things, Italian columns, kinda cool information then when I'd had enough out I went no worry about cramming everything in.

So back to getting to the national archives, I enjoy attempting to figure out my family tree so figured is be a good place to stop.  Interesting yes useful unfortunately no.  It's free access which is nice but I can pay a fee and do the same searches from the comfort of my home.  Oh well, it was worth a shot.  

Day 3 : UK 2013

Yesterday we went to Dover Castle.  It's an impressive castle on the top of a hill.  You can see France from the castle tower.  Guess its about 35 miles to get over there, this is the general area where the trains use the Chunnel to go over to France.


Anyway they had a WWII event while we were there.  They had German and British soldiers walking around.  They had camps setup around the castle to show what you would typically see in a camp during world war II.  They had a spit fire plane and some other cool
cars.  There was a general store that you could see what was generally available.  Chocolate was very expensive.  Its funny but my aunt mentioned she saw her first banana after the war, she was so small she never experience life before the war so the rations seemed like the norm.  We also got to see a reenactment of an ambush.  The narrator gave a brief history of the main events for Britain during WWII, my history is very rusty I didn't remember they took over a lot of east and

south east countries before moving into France. They had a scouting party that had a jeep break down.  As they were working to fix the jeep the germans spotted the english and moved in.  They had rifles and a gatling gun going off in an exciting firefight.  Then the germans took over the british and captured their jeep, but one british soldier got away and next thing you know it a bunch of british soldiers come back and capture them all.  Very entertaining and informative.

So now back to the castle,  it was well position to see anything come from anywhere.  We were able to go up in the main castle to the top and have a great view.  On the way up they had the standard loo's (toilet), someone said that the name loo came about because they use to mark it with a 100.  But looking it up online that fun story isn't a real theory, most people think its just a play on words either french or english.  Anyway also on the way up the castle there was bedrooms and a kitchen showing what the place would look like back then.  The oddest thing i found is they beds were short and seemed small but the chairs seemed large.  Assuming the bed at least fit them then the chairs must have been designed like a throne, what was odd is they were so big i would image their feet never touched the ground.

Day 2 : UK 2013

So how bout those English lawn games that are played in the garden.  Now translate that to American and you get lets play some outside games in the backyard.  Some of the games are just like home such as jenga or some giant bowling pins.  But then there are the english games.




Scattles looks to be a game based on a Swedish game called Skittles.  It has twelve pins that are numbered and a stick for throwing.  The object is to get 50 points without going over.  So to start you toss a stick at the pins if you knock one down you get the points on that pin otherwise you get points for how ever many you knock down.  The fun part here is we're ever the knocked down pin lands is where it gets stood back up.  So you can imagine how scattered it gets.  Very fun but hard to win if you go over 50 you go back to 25 and the thing bounces all over so it's hard to hit what you aim for.

The other game that was different that they played was French cricket.  In this game one person has a cricket bat,  short fat piece of stick.  That person must protect their legs from the tennis ball, knees down everyone else is trying to his the person with the bat.  The bat person can't move when the ball is in play but if he hits it with the bat he can run away until its picked up.  If its caught they are out and the bat moves to he who caught it or was able to hit the batters leg.

So anyway a great relaxing day out in an English garden with family.

Day 1 : UK 2013

England's southern coast was a good place for things to fossilize.  Apparently the last time global warming occurred naturally due to volcanos and things the beach we went to was 400 miles away from the nearest land.  The place we went to was Eastbrook and the beach was below the first of seven sisters, guess some hills slash white cliffs that lead to the sea.  These white cliffs are actually chalk, kinda cool and mixed around the chalk there was also flint.  So chisel and mini hammer in hand no surprise when Quinn mentions "I can make sparks" within the first few minutes.

Anyway getting ahead of myself.  We met a gentleman named Roy for a fossil hunt at Beachy Head. We had bought a mini hammer and chisel for the kids from him.  Everyone had to put on a hard hat and goggles.  Luckily we didn't have any rock slides so the helmets didn't get used per say but the goggles sure did.  A six and ten year old with hammer and chisel can generate a lot of flying rock.  Anyway it was about a mile walk down to the beach, little more work on the way back than getting there.  The green grassy fields dumping into the sea was pretty amazing then coming up to the white cliffs and a tiny lighthouse down on the point. 

 A very pleasant place to be no matter what the activity.  Now we found a number of fossils as well as normal shells.  I think a lot of the fun is e cracking of rocks,  will there be something or not.  For us mostly not,  found a few fossils i didn't have to break into, if I was smart enough I'd remember the names, but Roy was great at explaining what each thing was and how it lived when it did.  Both for kids an adults if your ever in an area fossils is definitely a fun activity.

So here are our main finds..

Pre Trip 2013 - United Kingdom

One day left and we are off for a month to the United Kingdom.  At the moment its looking a might bit chilly for this desert dweller so I have my thermals and rain gear packed.  This trip will be different than any other in the past, we are planning to tackle public transportation.  Mostly trains but also some bus routes.  Really looking forward to the experience.

Anyway, Ive plotted all our main destinations out on a map so you can see the plan.  I will try to add to the blog as we have coverage and see interesting things.