The Joys of that little island across the pond
Last summer, to my great joy, I went to England and Scotland. Twas very bootiful. If you like, you can read a little about it below. | Our trip began with 5 days in London. We visited bunches of places. I rode a subway for the first time in my life and found it very scary. But it is also interesting to see all the other people who ride. At first I thought I wouldn't like London because it's so stuffy and crowded. But all the lovely parks kind of made up for it. And there's so many nifty places. So I forgive it for being a city. One of the best things of our trip was our visit to Hyde Park on Sunday morning. Hyde Park is a place where you can come and stand on a box and preach anything you want, and people come and listen to you. There was a radical Christian lady, and a guy dissing the CIA, and a black rights activist. But what we were watching was incredible. It was this guy, on a box, holding a potato and preaching the glories of potatoes! How cool can you get? |
| We saw Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. I did a really good brass rubbing in Westminster, which is now hanging on my wall. He has a name, but I forget what it is. Ah well. |  |
 | After London, we began The Drive to Scotland. The first day, we stopped in Stonehenge on the way to Bath. It was... incredible. Even with all the people there. They sell really cute sheep in the gift shop, too. |
| In Bath we stayed at this really awesome bed and breakfast that was a converted manor-house from the 1700s. Not only were the rooms beautiful, but the garden was just awesome. There was this really cool tree-swing, and a grass tennis court perfect for gamboling on. Not to mention the spiffy little enclosed pond-place nice for sitting in, when you are holding one of the cute sheep from the Stonehenge gift shop. |  |
 | After Bath, we took a detour through Wales. This was the first time I actually saw the mountains of Britain. They are magnificent, especially when you are driving on a small windy road in constant danger of toppling off and plunging into the grazing sheep below. So magnificent, in fact, that we stopped to climb one. But Wales in general was really cool. We stopped in this little mountain-town called Betsw-y-Coed which was very cool, and later at Caernaefon castle. I know I spelled that wrong, I'm sorry. |
| Finally, we arrived in Scotland, where we stayed in a little cottage on Shemore Sheep Farm. Sheep, by the way, are really cute. In Scotland, we went around and observed Wallace and Bruce-y things and thistles and bagpipes. Not to mention kilts. We spent one day in Edinburg, which was weird. I didn't really like the city much, and the castle was too crowded and closed off everywhere (although you could get your picture taken with a 'guard'). But there was this one street FILLED with weird street performers. As in, people with strange talents...I won't go into them, but it was really bizarre. |  |
 | Another day in Scotland was spent taking a trip to the Isle of Mull. This was really cool. We rode this spiff ferry to get there, and it was foggy, cold and wet. Very British, no? |
| Later in the day the sun came out and we had a wonderful time exploring the gardens/grounds of this 'castle' (it was really more like just a big house). It was really spiffy. There was a dovecote. There was this one part of the gardens with these weird statues from long ago lining a path for a little ways...except they were all broken in weird places, and ended up looking rather scary. Like the people who got turned into stone in the Lost Princess of Oz. |  |
Stay tuned for the coming trip to France this summer!