Day 12- October 25th

Today was the most perfect of days, one of the very best of my life. It's hard for me to describe what I was lucky enough to see today. The weather was varied: in the morning we had mist and fog, the afternoon was warmer and the sun was out, the early evening was windy and chilly. But there were no overcast skies, no rain- not even a drizzle- to spoil my peftect day. At one point as drove along the side of Loch Lomond and listed to the song with the same name I was near tears, overwhelmed by the breathtaking beauty around me. If I have a checklist of places I was to go or things I want to see, there are a lot of checkmarks now. As I woke this morning I felt happy and excited about today, nothing could upset me- I wouldn't let it! I had breakfast downstairs at 7am and I knew that was it was going to be a great day because we had pastries on the buffet! The day started out sweet. I happily marched up the bus steps, greeted Andy, and sat in my seat determined not to doze off today. It didn't take long from Glasgow to hit the first of the Lochs- Loch Lomond. Our day was to be pretty flexible, we weren't going to have a major lunch stop so we could stop often for photos. Our first such stop was at a national park at Loch Lomond and I climbed up some steps out to an overlook for a better view. The morning mist was still lingering over the water. While admiring the view a small bird with a vivid orange chest came along to greet us. I managed to get a picture of the bird. All too soon it was time to leave, back on the bus to drive through more gorgeous scenery. You could hear soft "wow"s coming from various people in the coach and I knew that I wasn't the only one affected by the land outside our bus windows. Loch Lomond is quite large and no sooner had we reached its end then we were at the beginning of yet another Loch. Our next stop was at Glencoe and along the way we heard the tale of the slaughter of the MacDonalds by the Campbells, both by Doug and by song. Glencoe is in a valley and the colors here were nothing short of autumn magic. Our first stop at a town is in Fort William. There is no fort left, but I was excited to stop here nonetheless. It was a nice little town and I did a bit of shopping here. I picked up a thistle earring and pendant set for myself, a bookmark for Tif, a pillbox with a triskele on top that matches my neck tattoo, and a Scottish Gaelic-English dictionary to complete my collection. We are off again and Doug tells us that we are very lucky today as he can see the peak of Ben Nevis. As we departed from the hotel earlier in the morning Doug told us that we had a 1-in-6 chance of seeing the peak as it's usually covered in clouds. Ben Nevis is the highest mountain on the British Isles at 4406'. As today is my perfect day it was only fair that Ben Nevis didn't hide from us. We stopped for some photos at a place that had a monument for the Commandos who had died in WWII. I could see the peak of Ben Nevis, but the mountain was far away and my photos weren't especially clear. Off we go again, this time alongside Lake Linnhe and then Loch Lochy. I was able to take photos of both lochs. Our next stop was at Fort Augustus, which, like Fort William, also has no remaining fort. The south end of Loch Ness lies in Fort Augustus! Audrey and I again didn't feel like wasting any precious time getting food and took off to get some pictures. We walked down to the docks and had some excellent views of the loch. I tried to be all artsy taking photos of a boat that was docked there. Then we walked back to the town to get postcards. I popped into the tourist info center and along with my postcards I got a pop-up book about Scotland for my nephew. We only had about 40 minutes here altogether. Terry and Marcia had gone to get food when they got off the bus and it took so long to prepare that they didn't get their food until it was time for us to go. They were pretty mad and ended up breaking one of the rules and bringing it on the bus. I contented myself with an apple and some shortbread for lunch. We continued our drive around Loch Ness while Doug gave quite a bit of information on probably the most famous of the Lochs. At it's deepest Loch Ness is 846' deep! The loch is covered in peat along the bottom which makes the loch very dark. Because of this there is very little marine life as it is difficult for even the bottom of the food chain like plankton to exist. This is one of the reasons why an animal(?) as large as Nessie would not be able to exist in Loch Ness. Loch Ness is 23 miles long and it took some time to travel alongside its banks. We stopped at one point along the loch to see Urquhart Castle. We next stopped briefly in Inverness, the most populous city in the Highlands. I was able to get a photo of the castle here as well as one of the city itself. My only wish for the day was that we could have spent more time in Inverness. However, this time of year our biggest battle is with the length of time we get to spend in daylight and we were headed to a place I was very anxious to get to- Culloden Moor. All throughout the day Doug had been telling about the history of Scotland, leading up the rising of 1745. I was well versed in this bit of Scottish history, but it feels reassuring to hear it again and know that it didn't get messed up in your head. When we arrived it was pretty windy and thus, a bit chilly. Audrey and I ran off again for photos. Audrey has become my constant companion lately and we've had nice conversations. I've felt mostly like a big sister to her and can tell that she looks up to me. Suddenly it hits me, I'm here, I'm standing in Culloden Moor. For the second time today, I have tears in my eyes and I make another checkmark. I sit in the heather, lacking it's beautiful color this time of year, and soak in the atmosphere. Finally, I get up as there isn't much daylight left and I want to get in some more photos. As you walk around the grounds, which were replanted to look as it would have 250 years ago, there are gravemarkers made of stones here and there to mark the places were mass graves of clans were buried. Just as it's time to go, I turn around and get one last shot of the moor, catching a flag waving in the distance. I dash into the gift shop and pick up a small book about the Battle of Culloden, a thistle ornament, and some postcards. We are off again, heading to our hotel in Aviemore called the Macdonald Resort. I'm rooming with Kellie tonight. After checking in, Kellie and I walked down the main street in Aviemore, checking out some of the stores, and then back to the hotel for dinner at 7. For my starter tonight I had the choice of lentil and vegetable soup, some sort of herring dish, or chilled melon. I chose the melon and it came with a raspberry sorbet, but the sorbet was actually a bit spicy. Main courses were a selection of ham steak, swordfish, or stuffed zucchini. I really didn't want any of them as I'm a picky eater, but ended up choosing the swordfish. It was ok. Dessert was a choice of fruit salad, raspberry mousse (raspberry is a popular fruit in Scotland), or a lemon souffle. I chose the lemon souffle and it was pretty tastey. Afterwards I went back to the room, showered, wrote some postcards, and then lights out. Tomorrow we are off at 9 for Edinburgh.

Hotel: MacDonald Highland Resort. Our room was actually very small, there was barely room for our suitcases. I'm nearly positive that my single room at the prior hotel was larger than the room Kellie and I had. Also, there was some sort of party or something downstairs and it was VERY loud and lasted longer than I would have liked it to. The resort is quite big, with many buildings and a small shopping mall. There is a huge pool with one of the biggest waterslides I've seen not in a waterpark.






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Day 11- October 24th

My dislike of the Brittania Adelphi continues this morning. Bags out was supposed to be at 8am and the porter knocked at our door at 7:40 for our bags. I was not happy about this at all. I normally get my bags out a good 5-10 minutes before deadline but 20 minutes was ridiculous and I wasn't finished pack up all the little last minute things I need in the morning to get ready. I told the porter to give me 5 minutes and then I hurriedly finished getting ready. Breakfast was not good and all told, I was so done with the hotel I couldn't wait to leave. I told Doug that so far this has been my least favorite hotel of the trip. He kept thinking that I meant because it was old. I have no problem with old hotels, indeed later on the trip we stayed at even older hotels that were my two favorite of the trip. Finally we are off and leaving behind the Adelphi. Our final destination today is Glasgow and I try to summon my excitement of reaching one of my life's dreams- visiting Scotland. Traffic was horrible, Doug told us that it was half-term for school and many kids were out so families were out on holiday. We drove through the Lake District today, made famous and protected thanks to Beatrix Potter. We passed by Lake Windemere, which is the largest of the lakes in the Lake District. Traffic was so bad that we changed our lunch stop from Gretna Green at the Scotland border to Grasmere in the Lake District. Audrey and I have decided that we are tired of making our stops about food so we have parted from Jane, Marcia and Terry. We walked to the church where William Wordsworth is buried. It is a beautiful church and a lovely river runs next to it. Audrey and I took some photos at the gravesite and then walked to an old school house to buy some gingerbread. The gingerbread there is famous and has been made there for a long time. After that we walked to the other side of the town and visited Dove Cottage where Wordsworth lived and wrote. It was a beautiful day and we still had time left over so we walked over to Lake Grasmere to find a good spot for some photos. Time was running out and Audrey wanted to get some postcards. We went to a shop and I found a coaster with my family's coat of arms. As I was buying this Jane came in and told Audrey that she found a Scottish shop with a great selection of charms. Audrey was collecting charms for the places she visited on her tours. I headed back to the coach and stopped to use the toilet. We were off again and stopped next at Gretna Green. Gretna Green is just over the border into Scotland. The old blacksmith's shop here is quite famous for marrying runaways from England in centuries past. The laws for getting married were more lax in Scotland than in England. Now there is a woolen mill here and some other shops. Audrey and I found a shop that is a whiskey wonderland. They have an entire wall filled with mini-bottles of different brands of scotch whiskey. You can purchase a nice wooden box that has slats in it to make 5 compartments. The box is big enough to hold the mini-bottles. I purchased the box and chose different bottles of whiskey because I knew that this would make a perfect souvenir for Justin. I stopped at another shop and bought a pair of earrings that looked like the Scottish thistle for Tiffany and also bought some shortbread. Eddy had told me earlier that Scotland is famous for its shortbread. Audrey was in that shop buying yet more charms. We got mixed up on the time and Doug came and found us, we were only five minutes late. As we drove on to Scotland Doug played some bagpipe music for us. When we arrived in the city we had a brief orientation tour. We staying at a Quality Hotel- Central Station. Doug joked that the name means nothing and not to expect quality. We arrived around 4:30pm. I have the room to myself tonight. This hotel is even older than the Adelphi. It's a pretty awesome hotel, which turned out to be my second favorite of the tour. It's built over the train station in the city center, but you can't hear the trains, at least I didn't from the various places I was in the hotel. The hallway where our rooms were at seemed amazingly long. When Jane and Audrey came upstairs they asked if there were mirrors, but no the hallway was really that long. I remarked that the hallway reminded me of the one in The Shining where the twins showed up as Danny was pedaling on his trike, asking him to come play. Jane started to hit me. She gets easily spooked and was convinced that there was a presence in her last hotel room. The only bad thing I have to comment about the hotel was that it took FOREVER to get our bags. I wouldn't have minded except that Audrey, Terry and I were anxious to leave and see some of the city before the sun set. We walked out to George Square. I took a lot of photos here as the square is littered with statues of famous and important Scots. It would have been nice to have had more time in Glasgow as we didn't get to visit Glasgow, we just stayed overnight here. Dinner was ok, it would have probably been better if I wasn't such a picky eater. However, it was much better than the dinner at the Adelphi. After dinner they served tea and coffee in a sitting room near the restaurant. Jane, Audrey, Terry, Marcia and I were a bit goofy this night. There was a piano in the sitting room and we all pretended like we knew how to actually play it. Down the hallway was a ballroom where people were learning how to dance. The door was open and we could see them so Marcia, Jane and I pretended to learn how to dance as well. A police officer showed up and we joked that we were getting arrested for bad dancing. None of us were ready to retire yet and we headed to the hotel bar. I got a nice pint of Strongbow, and then shared another pint with Audrey. Terry and Marcia met a nice Scottish lady and her daughter from Aberdeen, I can't remember their names though. They were in Glasgow on holiday. A bit after 10pm we went upstairs to our rooms. Tomorrow is the day I've been looking forward to this entire trip. The weather was perfect today and I hope that it holds out for tomorrow.

Hotel: Quality Inn- Central Station. Room was nice. It was set up much like the Adelphi with a small foyer with the bathroom in a room to oneside and the bedroom in a room off the other side. I was extremely happy to see that my bathtub had a shower, and a real one too, not just some handheld thing. The food was ok, but really the entire atmosphere of the hotel was great. It's centrally located in the city.




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Day 10- October 23rd

Wake up today was very early as we had to catch the ferry back to England. We were out of the hotel by 7am. This crossing is slightly shorter from this part of Ireland so it was to take about an hour less than the earlier crossing and it did certainly seem shorter. I spent my remaining Euro in the duty free shop on the ferry as it was my last opportunity to use it. I bought a Christmas ornament that looks like an old Irish pub, a canvas purse, and a map of Britain and Ireland. I got the map in order to highlight the roads that we took on tour. Outside was pretty windy and cold, but I managed to get some gorgeous photos of the sunrise. I sat with Jane, Audrey, Terry, and Marcia for the crossing. Our ferry docked in Holyhead, Wales. Our first stop was to the town with the longest name in the U.K.-
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.
This translates to "The church of Mary in the hollow of the white hazel near the fierce whirlpool and the church of Tysilio by the red cave." I browsed through the visitor's center and ended up purchasing some postcards. I walked with Audrey to a nearby grocery store to use the ATM as I only had about £3 on me. Audrey had already been to the ATM and must have emptied it because I was unable to get any money out. I dozed as we drove onwards, back into England. Our next stop was in Chester. This was actually a pretty neat old town. Doug gave us a walking tour of the city. Our first stop was at the cathedral that was dedicated to St. Werburgh. We had time for a few photos before continuing on our walking tour. We lost Jane, Marcia, and Terry here as they lagged behind taking photos of squirrels. Apparently they don't have squirrels in Australia. We walked along the old walls that were built to fortify the city back when Chester was an important port town. Along the way we stopped at an excavation site where they had found Roman ruins of an amphitheater and then again at some Roman gardens. Next we stopped at some very old houses built in the 1600's, the oldest of which was 1622. We concluded our walking tour here and had 45 minutes of free time. Audrey and I headed to McDonald's because she was hungry and I very much needed a restroom. I ended up just getting some fries. After we had eaten, I was on a mission to find an ATM. Jane flagged us down. She was sitting outside a cafe with Terry and Marcia. Jane pointed out an ATM just around the corner. I had totally missed it because the bank was actually attached to the cathedral! After I got some cash, Audrey and I went back to sit with Jane, Terry, and Marcia. Then we were back on the bus and onwards to our final destination of the day- Liverpool. Liverpool is home to the largest cathedral in England. Tonight we are staying at the Brittania Adelphi hotel. It was built in the early 1900's when Liverpool was a major port for transatlantic voyage. On the first floor there is a massive mezzanine which is pretty fancy and modeled after the smoking room of the Titanic. It's actually used fairly often in movies when they need to film a scene in an old cruise ship. Tonight I'm rooming with Jeanette and our room was very near the lift. Most of us met Doug back down in the lobby at 5:30 to do a brief walking tour to the Cavern Club where the Beatles first played. This is on Matthew Street. Across from the Cavern Club, which is really a replica since the original was destroyed to make an underground trainline that was never built, was a statue of John Lennon standing by the Cavern Club Wall of Fame. On this wall, each of the bricks is engraved with the name of an artist or band that performed at the Cavern Club. Around the corner was a statue of Eleanor Rigby sitting on a bench. We were back at the hotel and dinner was at 7. After dinner I went back to the room as I was pretty tired from the early wake-up. Tomorrow we are off to Scotland!

Hotel: Britannia Adelphi. Our room was very pretty. It was almost like a suite. The main door opened into a little foyer with a closet. There was a door to the right that led to the bedroom and a door to the left that led to a bathroom. The bathroom was quite large. However, it only had a bathtub and no shower. There wasn't even a handheld showerhead in our bathroom as was in everyone else's bathroom. In addition, there was just a thin, sheer curtain in the bathroom and the window looked out on the busy street. The front of the building also had scaffolding on it. I was hoping that we would be gone in the morning before the construction workers arrived as they would have easily been able to see into the bathroom. I was very disappointed in not having a shower as I do not like to take baths AT ALL. And I certainly wasn't going to take a bath in a tub when I was sharing a room with a virtual stranger. The bedroom had two twin-sized beds, two closets, a TV, and a vanity. Dinner was probably the worst on the tour. The food was just not good. What made it even worse was that this was the worst service we had of any hotel on the entire tour. Doug had talked up this hotel and went on and on about how wonderful it was, but to be honest, I very much disliked this hotel and would not choose to stay here again.





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Day 9- October 22nd

Today was our latest wake-up of the entire trip- 9:30am. We start the morning with a city sight-seeing tour and drive along the River Liffey. We went through the Georgian Squares and saw the famous Dublin Doors. I was able to take pictures of a few of them. We then saw the statue and post office that were shot during the civil war between the treaty and anti-treaty factions. After a lot of fighting for Irish independence, a deal (treaty) was struck with some of the leaders of the Irish Independence movement and the English. Some of the other leaders didn't like this compromise as it still didn't give total Irish independence. Fighting then ensued. What's interesting about the statue and post office is that you can still see the bullet holes from the fighting. I was a little sad I wasn't make it back here today to get better photos as the only pictures I got were from the coach. We drove past Christchurch Cathedral and then made a quick stop at St. Patrick's Cathedral. The grounds here are really lovely. There's a garden with a fountain and alongside the walls are little enclaves dedicated to famous Irish authors. We drove through Phoenix Park, which is about 7 miles long. We stopped at the visitors center which had a small museum and a castle, which was really a tower house. Our final destination was Trinity College. I was excited because this is where the Book of Kells is housed. I headed towards the Book of Kells with Eddy, who would be my companion for the day. I had mentioned to him a bit earlier in the tour that I was disappointed that the Guinness Storehouse Tour and Dinner wasn't being offered to us as an optional excursion. I had really wanted to do that one. Eddy told me that his son, Jason, was currently living in Dublin and was going to pick him up this afternoon to take him to the Guinness Storehouse. Eddy invited me to come along. Sadly, only four people ended up going to see the Book of Kells. It cost €8 for admittance. Eddy, Mary and Peter (an older married couple from Australia), and myself ended up going in. The first area was very interesting; it showed how the book was made. Different areas showed how the paper was made (vellum), how the paints were made, how it was written, and how it was bound. There were large illuminated copies of some of the pages as well. Some of the areas even had demonstration videos you could watch. I found the one on the binding of the book to be the most interesting. Later you moved into the room where the book was held. Unfortunately, no photography was allowed here. In this room there was a large table in the middle that was glass enclosed. It contained 2 of the 4 Gospels from the Book of Kells. One was opened to display pages with amazing artwork, the other opened to pages with more text. Even the text was ornate. I couldn't believe that I was actually looking at the Book of Kells. It was just one of those moments on the tour for me, I hate the word surreal but it's the word I'd have to use. There were two other ancient texts here as well. They were smaller in size and less elaborate but still beautiful. From here you were moved into the Long Room of the library. There are a series of tables in the middle of the room that run nearly the length of the room. These tables are also glass enclosed. They contained old texts and first editions of famous novels. It was pretty impressive. Eddy and I didn't stay long here because we had to make sure we were back at the hotel by 1:30 to meet his son. You exit through the normal gift shop. I purchased a postcard of the Chi Rho page and a small booklet about the Book of Kells. After this, Eddy and I walked down Grafton Street. I was trying to find Lush, a store that sells natural soaps and shampoos. I wanted to get a specific soap for my roommate and these stores aren't available where I live. I had the address, 116 Grafton. Grafton St is a pedestrianized shopping street. As we were walking down it, I had looked over to my left and found some numbers, they kept going up, but by the time we got to the end of the street we were only in the 40's. It was starting to drizzle a bit and we were getting crunched for time so I had given up the search and we headed back down the street. About halfway back down the street I looked to my left again, this time it was the other side of the street, and saw that the numbers were going up! Turns out that in Dublin the numbers go up on one side of the street and continue going up on the other instead of alternating from side to side like I'm used to in the states. Now that we knew this, we soon found Lush, just to the right of the entrance to Grafton. I felt silly that we had walked so far and the store was actually so close to where we entered Grafton. The store was pretty small so the smell of all the scents was fairly overwhelming and I hurriedly found what I was looking for. Eddy and I then made the "10 minute walk" back to the hotel. Our tour director, Doug, must run instead of walk because everytime he would let us know how long the walk was someplace it always took much longer. When we got back to the hotel I had enough time to run upstairs to my room, use the restroom, and grab my raincoat. Eddy had warned me a few times that morning that his son wasn't very talkative so I wouldn't be offended. Jason picked us up and took us to the Guinness Brewery and the Storehouse. We went inside and Jason paid for all of us (€14 each) to get in. Your "ticket" is actually this clear object that looks like a paperweight. It has the Guinness logo on it and inside of it is a drop of Guinness. On the underside is a black rubber ring that you pull off and turn in at the end of the tour for a pint of Guinness. The Storehouse is a museum that goes up like 10 floors or so. As you wind your way up the stairs to each floor you learn about how Guinness is made. The most interesting thing that I learned was the the founder, Arthur Guinness, purchased a 9000 year lease on the land that the vast majority of the brewery is still on for £45 a year. This lease was purchased back in the 1740's! About halfway through you're offered a sample of Guinness North Star. It's a special brew that is only available in Ireland. It actually wasn't that bad, probably because it wasn't as thick as regular Guinness. The very top floor of the Storehouse is the location of the Gravity Bar. The room has floor-to-ceiling glass windows with fantastic views of Dublin. I took some photos of the view and passed on the pint of Guinness. On our way out, I pulled out my camera to take a picture of the Guinness sign . An American couple was standing outside and offered to take my picture under the sign if I would take theirs. I declined the photo of myself but still took one for them. I took a photo and then took a photo of Eddy and Jason with Eddy's camera. We drove back to Jason's apartment, which was actually adjacent to our hotel, to drop off his car. Then we walked to a nearby cafe for some lunch. I had a slice of pepperoni pizza. It was ok, but the pepperoni tasted nothing like the pepperoni back home. Our pepperoni tastes much better, in my opinion. Then Eddy and I walked back to the hotel. He was going to rest and freshen up and then spend more time with Jason. I ended up heading back out to the city and walked around on my own four another hour or so. It was dark when I got back to the hotel. I showered and repacked my suitcase. I probably did too much walking today as my foot was starting to throb so I called it a night, skipping dinner as I just wasn't very hungry.





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Day 8- October 21st

We are off at 8am today, without our usual driver. Andy is required to take time off so in his stead we have Pavel. Pavel is from Poland. Our first stop today is the Cliffs of Moher. No doubt about it, this stop was the coldest point of the entire trip. It was incredibly windy and by the time I climbed down the steps of the cliffs my hands were frozen. It was all worth it, however, when you see the amazing beauty of the Cliffs of Moher. The cliffs are a sheer drop into the ocean. As cold as it was, it was crazy to see someone out there on a jet-ski! It's quite a climb to the top of the cliffs, and I wish we would have had more time here as there was a whole segment of the cliffs that I wasn't able to get to. There is, of course, a ruined tower at the top. I climbed back down and warmed up in the gift shop. I bought an Irish-English dictionary to compliment the Welsh one I had purchased earlier. I also found a plaque with my last name on it and learned that it is of Welsh origin. We're back on the bus and on the way to Galway for our lunch stop. Along the way we learned about the infamous Lynch stone, which the locals in Galway told us was just a made up story. We also stopped in a very rocky area called The Burren for a photostop. In Galway, I really wasn't in much of a mood for walking around so decided to actually have lunch today. Jane, Audrey, Terry, Marcia and I found a local pub where I had a toasted ham and cheese sandwich and potato crisps (€4.95). We really didn't have much time here and I never did make it to the Lynch stone. After leaving Galway our next convenience stop was in a town named Killgarren. Of note here is an old whiskey distillery that has been turned into a museum. Out back, behind the main building, were huge stacks of barrels and casks. I walked around to the front of the building to see the waterwheel that Doug had told us about. We were all disappointed to see that it wasn't working. The area around the building still smelled faintly of whiskey and that turned my stomach a bit. It made me incredibly happy that we weren't going to be touring a functioning whiskey distillery. I took one of my favorite photos of the trip here. I was walking down an alley beside the distillery and there were these 2 chairs, just sitting there beside green doors and colorful brick. I think it turned out pretty well. We were driving on to Dublin and I was dozing. I woke up while we were driving through some sort of parade. It was a bit early for Halloween but most people were dressed up. I'm not really sure what was going on there. We got in to Dublin around 5pm. Dinner is on our own tonight. Our hotel was in the financial district, which is where the old docks used to be. I'm rooming with Kellie for the next two nights. I did some clothes washing and then met Jane, Terry and Marcia in the lobby at 7pm. Audrey needed some downtime tonight. We all decided to walk down to the Temple Bar area. It was about a fifteen minute walk. This area is just blocks of pubs, restaurants, and cafes. There were also lots of street performers out and about. It was a Sunday night, but it was still bustling with tons of people around. We walked around for awhile, taking in some of the more notable places like Oliver St. John Gogarty. We weren't really that hungry, still full from lunch, and decided to sit at an outside cafe and have some dessert. I had banoffi for the first time. Banoffi is like a chocolate/caramel/banana pie. It was DELICIOUS. While walking around I had noticed a Hard Rock Cafe down what was described to me by my Aussie friends as a "dodgy" alley. I went in and bought a shot glass for my roommates. We got back to the hotel around 10pm and Kellie was already in bed. I was considerate and left the light off, choosing to listen to an audiobook on my ipod instead. Tomorrow we have nearly an entire free day in Dublin.

Hotel: Jurys Inn Customhouse. The hotel is in a pretty good area of Dublin, being near Temple Bar. The River Liffey is just out front of the hotel. I loved the carpet in the lobby as the main feature of it was the same as the tattoo on my neck.




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Day 7- October 20th

Today we did quite a bit of driving around as we are off to see the Ring of Kerry. This is a roadway that goes around the southwest tip of Ireland. Along the way we had more lectures about the history of Ireland and I felt very proud of myself over how much I already knew. Our weather today is overcast, but no rain, and not too cold. We had a few photo stops along the way. At one point we stopped at a little inn along the way for a convenience stop. The view here was just gorgeous as the sun was trying to peek through the clouds creating the most amazing god rays. I cross my fingers hoping that my photos come out well. The view is of Dingle Bay and on the other side is Dingle Peninsula. Next to the inn is a house and sheep are roaming through the backyard, complete with mini soccer goals. Andy is definitely earning his pay today between crazy roads, kamikaze sheep, and making room for other cars. I tried to take a lot of photos from the coach today, but wasn't sure how well they would turn out, especially the photos I tried to take of the remains of a Celtic hill fort. We had a stop near the end of the Ring of Kerry in a small town called Sneem. The buildings here are all very colorful and the River Sneem was beautiful. We drove through Killarney National Park on our way back into Killarney. We got there around 1pm and had an hour for lunch. Had a toasted sandwich and walked around the shopping mall area with Jane and Audrey. There wasn't much more in Killarney that we were interested in seeing. Back on the bus for the drive to Limerick. Driver was pretty uneventful. We got to the hotel around 4pm and dinner was on our tonight as not enough people had signed up for the Irish Evening optional. Jane, Audrey, Terry and I walked around Limerick for a bit, taking photos of the River Shannon and we had a good view of King John's Castle. We asked at the tourist center for a good pub to eat at. We went back to the hotel and got Marcia and then walked to a pub on the docks called Dolan's. The food portions were HUGE, and they say American portions are out of control! I had a steakburger with cheese and chips for €12. Audrey and I decided that for the rest of the time in Ireland we were just going to split our food. After enjoying the pub atmosphere, we went back to the hotel, stopping at the grocery store across the street to get water and treats for the next day.

Hotel: Jurys Inn. My room has a fabulous view of the River Shannon. I had the room to my self this night. I also had a huge column in my room. I joked with everyone that my room came with a stripper pole!

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Day 6- October 19th

Today we are off at 8:30am, we have a lot to do and see. Our first stop today was at the Waterford showroom. We only had a half hour here, which just wasn't enough time. Doug told us we could buy the crystal when we got to Blarney, but there was so much to see! For me, the highlight was seeing a crystal plate commemorating Andre Agassi's Wimbledon win in 2000. I didn't have my camera with me, as I didn't think I would want it, but I regretted it later on. I didn't buy anything as there just wasn't enough time. We drove a bit more, hearing a lecture about the economic development of Ireland. It was interesting to learn that in the last 30 years or so, Ireland has gone from the 22nd wealthiest country in the world to number 4! Our next stop was in Blarney, we had just over two hours here, again, didn't feel this was enough time. But really, it's part of being on a tour. We were dropped off at Blarney Woolen Mill, which was near the castle. Andy pointed out a short cut to the castle for us. Jane, Audrey, Terry, Marcia and I went inside the restaurant at the mill and got some take-away sandwiches. To save time we were going to eat as we walked to the castle. It costs €8 to get into the castle, you also get access to the park there as well. The climb to the top of the castle, where the Blarney Stone is, is very strenuous. There are over 100 stairs and they are often steep. The stairwell just keeps getting narrower and narrower. The view from the top of the castle is wonderful! I didn't kiss the Blarney Stone; I decided to pass on being blessed with the gift of eloquence as I had heard too many stories about how the stone is cleaned. Jane, Audrey, Terry, and Marcia all kissed the stone and I got photos of all but Audrey puckering up. They take your photo when you kiss the stone and you can purchase it at the bottom of the castle at the exit. Going down the stairs was far easier than the climb up. Time was running out and I, finally, wanted to do some shopping! I left my companions and headed back to the woolen mills. I had an idea in mind of what I wanted to get. I stopped at the Waterford showroom and picked up a set of icicle ornaments and a claddaugh ring. In another shop there I got a matching earing and pendant set of a claddaugh ring for Tiffany. I went to the Aran wool section where I made my biggest purchase of the trip. I bought a handmade zip front sweater with hood. I also bought a scarf here. I had just enough time to find a restroom before I had to get back on the bus to head to Killarney. Once we got into Killarney we were dropped off outside one of the entrances to Killarney National Park for our Jaunting Car ride. These are horse drawn carts that seat about 6 people or so. My car had Jeanette, Terry, Kellie, Sandy, Henry, and myself. Marcia sat up front with the driver. We drove to the castle and walked around for about 15 minutes before we got back on the jaunting car to head back to the city. Our driver was very funny and it was difficult for most of the people in my car to understand his Irish accent. For some reason, I didn't have a problem with it, so I "interpreted" for my companions. When we were dropped off, I met up with Jane and Audrey and we went with Terry and Marcia to a very modern decorated bar and cafe. Everyone else had scones and coffee or tea, I didn't feel like having anything since dinner wasn't too far away. Our hotel was the Killarney Court hotel and I was rooming with Jeanette. Dinner tonight was pretty good. There were 3 choices of starters- chef salad, turnip and carrot soup, or chicken liver pate. I skipped on the starter as I had splurged and had some Bailey's chocolates, that I had purchased at the woolen mill, a bit before dinner. The main course was a choice of veggie spring rolls, chicken, or fish. I had the salmon. Dessert was a choice of pear belle Helene (poached pear, ice cream, chocolate sauce), chocolate cake, or lemon cheesecake. I had the chocolate cake of course! After dinner I went on a short walk with Jane and Audrey. Tomorrow we are off to Limerick.


Hotel: Killarney Court hotel. About 5 minutes away from city center. Hotel had good food and service. The room was pretty much like the other hotels we've stayed at. Nothing to complain about this one.















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Day 5- October 18th

This morning was very cold; I could see my breath as I went outside to get on the coach. Today we are off to Ireland! We drove for a bit and then had a convenience stop at a sort of rest area. It had a gas station, restaurant, and a convenience store. I just bought a bottle of water. On the road again! Our main stop of the day was in a seaside resort town called Tenby. It had warmed up considerably by then. This was also to be our lunch stop. The town still had quite a few Norman walls and the entrance to the main shopping area was called The Five Arches, as the Norman wall here had five arches. I walked around with Jane, Audrey, Terry and Marcia today and along the way I had lots of lessons about Australia. I ALMOST bought a very pretty Welsh love ring but there were none in my size. We ate lunch at a restaurant called Candy’s. It overlooked the seaside. I had fish (cod) and chips. It was very good. I had a laugh and had to take a picture because on the menu there was an item called “baby dinner.” Terry told us that there as a very good view of the coast from the toilet. Jane went up and took a picture - Terry was correct! We walked around and took some photos and then continued to browse the shops. There wasn’t that much to do in the town. I bought my requisite postcard. It was time to get back on the coach and we drove to the docks in Pembroke to catch the ferry to Ireland. The ferry had 11 decks and was pretty large. Inside there were restaurants, game rooms, bars, and a duty free shop. It took about 4 ½ hours for the crossing and to dock in Ireland. I sat with my lunch companions and we chatted along the way. They told me stories about their adventures on their previous tour of Europe. The sun was setting during the crossing and I got some lovely photos of the sunset and a lighthouse seemingly in the middle of nowhere. The motion of the ferry wasn’t too bad, probably because it was such a large boat. It did bother me a little bit, mostly just giving me a headache. We docked around 6:30pm in Rosslare. We drove to the hotel, Quality Inn, and I was rooming with Kellie tonight. Dinner tonight was the best so far. There was a choice of 3 starters: leek and potato soup, chilled melon, and Cajun chicken strips. I had the chicken strips, which weren’t breaded but rather grilled. They were delicious! For the main course the choices were roast pork with red wine au jus, pan seared chicken, or salmon. I chose the pork and it was also very good. Dessert was a choice of ice cream, double chocolate cake, and something else I can’t remember. Of course I chose the chocolate! I was very tired, side effects of the motion sickness, and called it a night early.

Hotel: Quality Inn. Food was excellent here! The room had a double bed and a twin bed. I took the twin. The TV in Ireland is much better than in England.

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Day 4- October 17th

Woke up to a beautiful sunny day, it's only fair since it's my birthday! I went down to breakfast at 8am and sat with Jane, Audrey, and Kellie. Jeanette came in and handed me a birthday card from Glastonbury Abbey that was beautiful. On the bus at 9am. Shortly after we said our good mornings to Doug and Andy, Henry stood up and said he had an announcement to make. He said that there were 2 birthdays on the bus, mine and Terry's. The whole bus sang happy birthday to me and then to Terry. Our first stop of the day was at Caerphilly Castle. I think this is the prettiest of all the castles we stopped at during the tour. It was built in 1270 by Gilbert de Clare. I thought at the time that I was lucky enough to get some gorgeous photos and I certainly did! Next we began our drive through the Brecon Beacons. The landscape here is beautiful. It got a bit windy and nippy here, so when we made some photo stops most people hurriedly got back on the bus. Along the way, Doug gave lectures about the history of Wales and the impact that coal mining had on this area. We stopped at the visitor's center of the Brecon Beacons National Park. I took some photos and browsed the gift shop. This area looks to be a great place, when the weather is warmer, for hiking, biking, etc. There were quite a few locals there drawing from various places around the visitor's center. I went downstairs to the cafe and sat with Eddy and Jeanette. Jeanette gave me half of her pastry, which was very yummy. Eddy insisted on buying me a drink, since it was my birthday I wasn't allowed to buy one, and I opted for a bottle of water. We were back on the bus and we headed to St. Fagan's National History Museum. It was a bit of a drive and Andy took the scenic route. I think that most of us took this as an opportunity for a doze. St. Fagan's is a Welsh life history museum and much of it is open air. What they've done is moved old buildings and rebuilt them here, furnishing them with appropriate decor and furniture. We had two hours here and it was also to be our lunch stop. Eddy insisted on buying me the visitor guide, so I allowed him. I walked around for about an hour or so. Two hours wasn't nearly enough time, you could spend an entire day here. I chose a route that was towards the Celtic village, as this is what I was most interested in seeing. The first building I came to was the Kennixton Farmhouse, originally built in 1610. Next to it was an old bee shelter and a circular pigsty. There were a couple of pigs playing in the mud there as well. The next place I came upon was the Melin Bompren Corn Mill, originally built in 1852. I got kind of turned around by the signs and instead of going to the Celtic Village, which was pretty close by, I went the other direction and went past an old tannery, an old post office, a cockpit (which reminded me of Harvest Moon because I am a nerd), a tollhouse, and a workman's institute. I finally found the Celtic Village. I was a bit disappointed that it was only a recreation and not the real thing, but it was pretty cool nonetheless. There were a few different types of buildings like roundhouses. You could go inside of them, the insides were too dark to take photos. From here I started to walk out to the old totem circle, but the ground was extremely muddy and I turned around. For the first time on the trip my foot started to bother me. I think it was because none of the grounds here are paved and so it's uneven, which I think is what made my foot hurt. I headed back towards the main building and went to the downstairs cafe. I ended up grabbing a small ham sandwich and one of the best green apples I've ever had from the kid's section for £1.50. Afterwards I browsed through the gift store, picking up some postcards, a red dragon (symbol of Wales) Christmas ornament, a Welsh-English pocket dictionary, and a gift for my nephew. We got back on the bus and headed to the city center of Cardiff. We had a brief drive around the city and then some time to walk around. I went with Sandy, Henry, and Eddy to the National History Museum. It was free to get in and there was an Impressionism exhibit. There were these two Welsh sisters who amassed an incredible collection of paintings and sculptures. The highlight of the collection, for me, was a set of 4 from Monet's Waterlillies. There was also a bust of Victor Hugo done by Rodin, and paintings from other very famous artists. We had to head back to the coach and along the way we stopped at a small park that had a statue of John III Marquess of Butte. The Butte family was extremely important to the Cardiff area and are also responsible for the rebuilding of Cardiff Castle. Back at the hotel, dinner at 7. I packed up as much as I could and wrote some postcards. At dinner I sat with my museum companions. I had salad, poached hake (fish that tasted a lot like salmon, it was very good), rice with curry sauce, and a bit of turkey. For dessert I had strawberry gateaux. Eddy insisted on buying me a drink at dinner (dinner only came with water, coffee, and tea) so I let him buy me a diet coke. Eddy loves buying people drinks! That night he also bought beers for Terry, Doug, and Andy. Back in the room I showered and then made some hot cocoa. Tomorrow we leave at 9am to head to the coast and then onwards to Ireland. I reminded myself to put motion sickness meds in my backpack just in case since we will taking a ferry to Ireland.
















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Day 3- October 16th

Wake up call for today is 7am, breakfast and bags out at 7:45am, on the coach at 8:45am. I didn’t sleep well last night and I was awake at 6am. Breakfast was pretty good. I had some fruit, yogurt, toast, and sausage with some juice. A lot of other choices were available. I sat with Matt and Renee for breakfast. They are also from Australia, and probably mid-twenties. They had just done a 31 day tour of Europe with Contiki and then spent 8 days in London before this trip. They’ve been pretty quiet, staying to themselves, and sitting in the back of the bus. People pretty much sat in the same place on the bus today that they sat in yesterday. It had rained all night and it was still drizzling a bit as we drove out to Plymouth Harbor. The traffic was bad, but Doug told us that Andy is from Plymouth and knows side streets and pretty soon we get to the harbor. We had 40 minutes to walk around, which with the weather being crappy was plenty of time. I took some photos of the Mayflower steps and of the harbor and then wandered through one of the stores there. I got some postcards, a pirate magnet for Justin, and a pamphlet with a listing of all the passengers aboard the Mayflower. Back on the bus- we’re headed to Glastonbury. Along the way, Doug gave us some history on the Plymouth area, especially about Sir Francis Drake. Once we left the Plymouth area, Doug talked about the legends about Joseph of Arimathea and King Arthur. We arrived at Glastonbury, this is also our lunch stop. We had one hour. I went to the abbey which were fairly ruined but absolutely gorgeous nonetheless. Ran into Eddy there and we walked around together, taking photos. I took the first of many photos of him with his camera. It started to rain so I headed back inside and browsed the gift shop, bought the usual postcards. I skipped lunch to walk around the town a bit. I meandered through some shops in town. They had quiet a few of shops centered around magic, myth, etc. Back on the bus at 1pm to head to Bath. I’m very excited to see the Roman baths. Doug gave a lecture about the history of Bath and the Georgian architecture there. Bath is an absolutely beautiful place. We drove around the city itself, it would be great to come back and explore it another time. We were dropped off at Bath Abbey where Doug described some of the design to us. I took some photos but didn’t go in because I wanted to see the Roman baths instead. It costs £10.25 to get in to the baths, but it was well worth it. You get an audio guide which looked like a giant phone receiver. You choose your language and then punch in the number that’s posted next to whatever it is you’re looking at. The baths are simply amazing. At the bottom there is a huge pool-sized bath. It steams and bubbles and is a greenish color. I took a ton of photos of the bath, the statues, and the artifacts on display. I bought postcards of the city since I wasn’t able to take photos of it from the coach and an ornament of Pulteney Bridge, which is a bridge in Bath that looks like Rialto bridge. I also got a book on how the Roman baths were built. My further wanderings led me to a fudge shop. I bought a slice for my birthday tomorrow. It was raining quite a bit now so I just kept wandering through different shops to try to keep dry. I found a group of fellow tourmates, we located the bus and got on a few minutes early. We are off to Cardiff. Our hotel is the Park Inn. It’s located a bit outside of the city center. I get the single room to myself for the next 2 nights. Tonight we are doing the Welsh Evening optional. I did some clothes washing and wrote some postcards. Only 8 of us were going- myself, Matt & Renee, Eddy, Jeanette, Kellie, and 2 Australian women who were traveling together whose names I didn’t know at the time (they were Niki and Gloria). The dinner was held at Cardiff Castle. This castle was rebuilt in the 1800’s by the Marquess of Butte. It was designed by William Burgess. When we arrived we had a tour of a few rooms of the castle. The first room we went to was in the clock tower and was used as the gentleman’s smoking room. The designs of the rooms were incredibly intricate and most had a theme. The theme of this room was time. The very top of the ceiling had a carved sun and the chandelier came down from it. On the ceiling around the sun were 8 of the zodiac symbols. On the 4 walls were scenes depicting activities of the 4 seasons and each wall had one of the remaining 4 zodiac symbols. In each corner of the room was an angel holding the sun at different levels with one of them turned around so as to be black to depict night. The next room we visited was the ladies parlor. The theme here was Arabic, a play on the fact that there would be many women in the room like a harem. The floor was Italian marble, the fireplace was a pretty green Irish marble. The ceiling was very ornately carved and there were lots of parrots painted and carved in the room. Next, we went into the library. On the walls, every foot or so, there was a painting of a man holding a sign with a famous writer’s name. On either side of the fireplace were Shakespeare and Moliere. The wood bookcases and desks were beautiful! The real books aren’t kept there anymore; instead the bookcases are used to hole the archived minutes of the Cardiff city council. Next we are off to the banquet hall which is still used for functions performed by the Prince of Wales and for other important dinners. The ceilings have the coats of arms to show the family’s history. More than half the room was covered in scaffolding, however, so we couldn’t see most of it. From here we were steered into a room with a bar to wait for dinner. There was one other group at dinner, but it was much larger than ours. It was some sort of group of people from all over the world and from different generations who were attending some sort of conference together. The host came into the room and right away started with the jokes. He was pretty funny. He started asking where everyone was from. I heard Norway, France, Australia, Germany, Ukraine, Spain. I was the only one from the U.S.! We moved into a long room where there were tables that sat perpendicular to the stage. There was a harpist on the stage; she played most of the evening. On the table were carafes of water, white wine, and red wine. The first course was brought out to us. It was seaweed! It wasn’t seaweed like I thought of, like with sushi. It was sort of ground up, mixed with a vinaigrette dressing, and wrapped in bacon (not like American bacon, more like Canadian bacon). I am not an adventurous eater, but I tried it anyway. It was delicious! The next course was a sort of stew with lamb and vegetables. I heard it pronounced as cowl, but I have no idea how it’s really spelled. I’m not fond of lamb OR vegetables so I sort of just had some of the broth. Before the main course was served, the funny host guy started a group song. He first told it as a story and then started to pick people from the audience to play certain parts. A lady from Norway was chosen to be like a skier and say “swish swish” when pointed at. Matt, from our table, was chosen to be a bear and make his hands into claws saying “rawr rawr” when pointed at. A French guy was chosen to a dog and had to bark “woof woof” when pointed at. A French girl was chosen to blow kisses and say “mwah mwah” when pointed at. Lastly, an older gentleman from Norway was chosen to be the French girl’s father, make his hand into a gun and say “bang bang” when pointed at. Then they sang the song and during the chorus would point at each person in turn. It was pretty funny. The main course was chicken with a lovely sauce you could pour onto it. The chicken was very tender, you didn’t even need a knife to cut it. They also put bowls of potatoes and vegetables on the table. There was more song and dance and then the dessert was served. It was a sort of lemon mousse with a raspberry sauce. When describing the optionals, Doug had told us that the Welsh evening is usually enjoyed the most. I have to agree, it was a wonderful evening. We got back to the hotel about 10:30pm. It had been a long but fantastic day.

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Day 2- October 15th

Wake up call was 5:30am but had woken up at 5am anyway. I felt like a little kid at Christmas I was so excited! It was so great to have my suitcase and all of my stuff. I got ready, put my bag outside the room, and settled my bill with the front desk since I had made that phone call to my sister. Then I went down to the basement restaurant for breakfast. What a mess! Seven tours were leaving the hotel that morning and it was PACKED. In line in front of me was an older, retired couple named Sandy and Henry. Turns out they were on my tour. They invited me to sit with them at breakfast. Henry is 80 and Sandy is 65. Henry told me that he lived in Utah right before WWII at a training camp called Camp Kearns. Well there is no longer a training camp for the army there, but I was well aware of where Kearns was, it’s such a small world. After breakfast I waited in the lobby for the tour to be announced to leave. Just before 8am, my tour number was called out and I proceeded to the bus. The Tour Director greeted us as we got onto the bus, handing us an information sheet on our way in. It had his cell phone number on it in case we got lost in a city, it explained seat rotation, and it had some other useful information such as tipping on it. I kept waiting for more people to get on the bus, but it was just a small handful of us- sixteen in all. Our bus seats about 50 so we have a ton of room! The tour director is Doug, driver is Andy. Doug told us not to worry about seat rotation since there are so few of us, just asking that we be fair about giving other people a chance to sit in the front seats. Doug then discussed the optionals. I was a bit disappointed that some of the ones I wanted to do aren’t be offered because we have so few people or because of the time of year. For example, I wanted to do the Guinness tour and supper, but it wasn’t offered. I signed up for all the ones that were offered: Welsh Evening, Irish Evening, Jaunting Carts in Killarney, Scottish Evening, and Afternoon tea in the Cotswolds. I learned that everyone except Sandy, Henry, and I are Australian. About half the group is around my age, the other half were in their 50’s-80’s. I quickly learned the names of the two girls sitting in front of me- Jane and Audrey, and another couple- Terry and Marcia. The four of them met on the tour they did of Europe just before this one. During the day I also learned the name of the two other solo female travelers- Kellie and Jeanette, as well as the one single male traveler- Eddy. Kellie, Jeanette, and I all signed up for room share (the single supplement was fairly costly). Since there are 3 of us, Doug rotated who would get the single room in each hotel. It worked out well because there would be 3 times where we would be staying at a hotel for 2 nights, we each got one of those to ourselves. My single 2 night stay will be in Cardiff. I was happy about that since that would also be on my birthday. I didn’t learn the names of anyone else today. We started the day at Hampton Court. It was closed at the early hour, so we walked around the building and the gardens. Hampton Court was built in 1514 by Cardinal Woolsey who later gave it to Henry VIII. It was the first brick building built in England since the Roman occupation. I can only imagine how lovely the rose gardens will look like in the spring time. We were back on the coach and heading to Salisbury. Along the way we stopped at Stonehenge!! The area is fenced off and then the stones are also roped off some distance away. You can’t get very close to them. Doug told us that he wasn’t supposed to suggest it, but that rather than pay to get in and still not get close to the stones, we can cross the street and look at it through the fence. I think everyone except for Eddy did this. It was sort of surreal to know I was standing so close to something built thousands of years ago. I went back across the street and got some views of the burial mounds nearby. You can walk over to them and climb them if you want to, however we didn’t have time for this. Back on the coach! We are on our way to the town of Salisbury, home of the famous cathedral. We arrived shortly before noon, as the church bells later chimed and reminded me of the time. We had to be back on the coach at 1:40pm. I walked to the cathedral which is one of many places you can enter provided to give a “voluntary donation.” There’s nothing voluntary about it. If you don’t volunteer to pay, you don’t get in! I paid anyway as who knows if I will be here again. I walked around the cathedral admiring the beautiful stained glass and statues. There are a lot of ornate tombs inside as well. Attached the cathedral is a chapter house which houses the Magna Carta! Photography was not allowed inside the chapter house, however. I was pretty hungry now, so I wandered the town and passed by a pharmacy type place, kind of like a Walgreens. They had a refrigerated section where you could get sandwich or salad, snack, and a beverage for £2.99. I got a chicken and bacon sandwich, a fruit pack with apple slices and grapes, and a bottle of water. It was a pretty good deal. I walked back to the cathedral and sat on a bench and ate my lunch. It was nice and peaceful. I walked back to the pickup point for the coach and sat and talked with Kelie. I learned that she had gone to Africa just before this trip. Back on the coach! We are driving through the Dartmoor area. It was a fairly long stretch and most people seemed to be snoozing along the way. We came to an abrupt stop which woke me up- there was a pony in the road. I was feeling a bit carsick today. I think it was because I was sitting on the left side of the bus, right next to the roadside, and the motion of all the trees passing by quickly probably did it to me. As we approached our next stop, Doug pointed out the rock formations protruding from the ground. These are called tors. Our next stop was a little town called Widecomb-on-the-Moor. It was lovely. Kellie and I walked over to the parish church. It had an interesting cemetery. We looked around inside. Then I headed across the street to a little restaurant. I needed to use the toilet! Jane, Terry, and Marcia were inside having tea and scones. They invited me to sit with them. I also purchased some scones, but got a diet coke instead of tea since I’m not fond of tea. It was my first experience with scones and they were delicious! I found out that Terry actually has the same birthday as me, except he is one year older. At 5pm we were back on the coach heading to our final stop of the day- Plymouth. I’m sharing a room with Jeanette tonight. Our hotel is the Novotel and looks very much like an American hotel. Dinner was at 7pm. To start they had a salad bar, except over there a salad bar is nothing like what I call a salad bar. It had all these weird dishes, a plate of cold cuts and cheese, but very little salad. I had some cold cuts. I wasn’t too keen on the dinner choices (it was a buffet) and just picked at it. Choices were fish, veggie lasagna, or lamb. Later, I got over my objection to eating fish. I would have starved if I hadn’t! I had sat with Audrey and Jane at dinner. I learned that Audrey is a pastry chef. She wanted to try all the desserts. There was a chocolate mousse with a dark chocolate ganache (I had this and it was wonderful!), a lemon pie, apple pie, and some sort of cake with berries on it. After dinner Jane, Audrey, and I walked over to a nearby supermarket for supplies for the next day. I got a bottle of water. Here I found out that Jane had a huge addiction to malteasers, which are like Whoppers here in America. I got back to my room and get things ready for the next day.

Hotel: Plymouth Novotel. Room had 2 double beds and nice sized bathroom. Food was ok, but had far better food other places on the trip.

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Day 1- October 14th

I finally made it to London! My flight from DFW was canceled due to engine problems. American wouldn’t try to put us on flights with other carriers and they had no other flights leaving on Friday night. I rebooked to leave DFW at 11:30am on Saturday going to RDU, leaving RDU at 6:25pm to London Gatwick. The counter agent told me that he had rerouted my bags. American put our flight up at the Gaylord Texan, a huge resort and conference center. The rack rate listed on the door said $700! It was a nice room but not worth that much money! I also got a $20 food voucher and used it to order room service. I also caught the tail end of the Rockies game. I had met a very cute young Italian couple on the bus to the hotel. They didn’t speak much English, but I tried my best to make sure they knew what time to get the shuttle back to the airport the next day. I had a change of clothes in my carry-on, but decided to save them in case my luggage was delayed due to the flight change. Note to self: remember to pack deodorant in carry-on! I showered and went to bed. Woke up at 6:00am and tried again to get to London. Last night I had a panic attack, pity party, and crying jag. I was going to miss out on going to Wimbledon, the London sight-seeing tour, and going to take the picture of the James Bond building for my friends. Saturday I was calmer. I realized that even though I was missing out on those things, I was still going to be able to see some really amazing things after all. While waiting for the flight to RDU I saw some people from last night, notably Veronica. Veronica’s daughter was doing a semester abroad in London and she was going to visit her during her daughter’s fall break. The flight to RDU was uneventful, however I really dislike that American only does a beverage service and no snacks, not even a bag of pretzels or peanuts. After landing in RDU Veronica and I changed our seats to something better than what they assigned us last night in the rush to get people booked on flights. Ran to Ellie, a nice girl from London trying to get home. I was behind her in line last night in Dallas when we were trying to rebook our flights. I chatted with her for a bit while Veronica went outside for some fresh air. I got something to eat and then Ellie told us how to take the Gatwick Express train to Victoria Station. Since I was arriving a day late, I missed my free transfer to the hotel and had to make my own way. While waiting to board the flight we saw even more people from the original canceled DFW flight. Finally boarded the plane. The plane right was uneventful and I finally used an airplane bathroom for the first time after waiting FOREVER for some stupid chick to spend like twenty minutes in it putting on makeup. The airplane food was OK. I had a salad with some sort of vinaigrette dressing. I had the chicken with rice and a roll with butter. The roll was very cold in the middle so I put it on top of the chicken for awhile to warm it up. Dessert was a pack of applesauce oatmeal cookies. Watched License to Wed which was AWFUL, but not as bad as My Super Ex Girlfriend (which I also saw on a plane). I dozed off and on for a few hours. Luckily my seat had a power port so I was able to recharge my ipod and watch a few episodes of Firefly. Breakfast was a croissant with jelly and butter, yogurt, and orange juice. We landed in London at 6:45 am. Met up with Veronica and Alison, another of our DFW compatriots, and went through customs. The line was very long, I was wishing I was part of the European Union as they had no line, but the line moved fairly fast. We were done with customs by about 7:30am. There’s a booth right outside of customs to buy tickets on the Gatwick Express train so we all bought some and then headed to baggage claim. Alison’s bag was there but not mine, Veronica’s, or two other couples that were on our original DFW flight. Turns out they had routed all of our bags on a flight from DFW that left earlier that morning. Our bags were to arrive a few hours later. We filed a claim with American and they told us they would deliver our bags to our hotels. Veronica and I got on the train followed by some police with HUGE automatic rifles and a sniffer dog. It was kind of nice not having luggage because it made having to navigate the train and tube much easier. When we arrived at Victoria Station Veronica was met by her daughter. Her daughter showed me where to buy a ticket on the tube. I took the Victoria Line to the Euston station. I couldn’t find my way out, probably because I was really tired. I stopped a nice young man and asked him which way was out, he told me to just follow him. Turned out he was from Mexico and was working in London. It was a very warm day when I finally reached outsideworld. No one seemed to know where my hotel was and after a half hour of walking around I went back to the tube station and asked the information desk. Turned out it was like a one minute walk around the one corner I hadn’t tried! By the time I arrived at the hotel I had missed the morning sight-seeing tour but signed up for the Tower of London optional. The COSMOS rep helped beg me a room as they didn’t have one ready for me yet. I badly needed a shower! I took a shower and then called and left a message on my sister’s voicemail to let her know I had finally arrived in London. Went down to the lobby at 1:20pm for the optional. It was still very warm outside. I took a lot of pictures while there. We had a guide who showed us around and then gave us time to do our own thing. I went and saw the Crown Jewels which are incredibly huge and ornate. Then I went to the White Tower which has an excellent display of arms and armor. Then I went to the Tower Shop and bought some postcards and a Christmas Ornament that looks like Henry VIII. Got back to the hotel and checked with the concierge. He called the airline for me and told me that my luggage was out on delivery but not at the hotel. I walked around to try to find something to eat. It was Sunday and pretty much everything was closed except for the Indian restaurants nearby. I wasn’t keen on trying Indian food so I walked back to the tube station since I knew there were some places to eat in there. I bought a bottle of water and had a very good ham and cheddar sandwich on some sort of baguette. Back o the room and I washed the shirt I had worn the day before in case my luggage didn’t get in today. I had a small crying jag over possible lost luggage and by that time I was very tired so I dozed a bit. I had dreams about lost luggage and trying to find a place that was open to buy deodorant when the phone rang around 9:00pm. It was the concierge telling me my luggage was here. Deoderant! Woo! I went down to collect my luggage and asked for 5:30am wake up call. Breakfast tomorrow starts at 6:30am and I’m supposed to meet down in the lobby at 7:45am to leave at 8am.

Hotel: Thistle Euston. Had a single room. It was fairly small with a single, twin-sized, bed, desk, and TV. The bathroom was a good size with tub and shower. I had to walk quite a way from the lift to get to my room and also had to go up a half flight of stairs to get to the hallway my room was in. The room faced the roadway so there was some traffic noise, but I was so tired that it didn’t matter.

MORE PHOTOS!!

October 2007 Trip

Earlier this year I purchased a trip to England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland as a birthday present to myself. It was an escorted tour through a company called Cosmos. I went by myself, which turned out to be pretty cool. I have no hesitation in traveling by myself in the future. It was nice not to have to worry about accommodating anyone else, making anyone else happy, etc. I was able to do my own thing when I wanted, I hung out with different people on the tour during the day or at dinner. I think that being by myself was actually advantageous in getting to know the other people in my group.

Overall, my trip was just fantastic. The only bad part of the trip was my original flight out. Once I was actually there, it was just one wonderful day after another. It was everything I had hoped it would be.

I kept a travel journal while I was there that I intend to share along with some of the photos I took.