New Adventures

So it might look like we haven't been anywhere since our trip to England in 2008 - not so. Somehow we missed posting our trip to Glacier & Banff National parks in 2009, but here is our 2010 road trip to California ~

First stop was Yosemite, which was beautiful, but more crowded than the mall the day after Thanksgiving - not what we want when trying to experience the great outdoors!

Scene's like this would be spectacular in the spring thaw:

And would you believe that people actually book a year in advance to climb to the top of this rock!

The beauty is all around ~ but some look-outs are a little too high for Marylin's comfort zone!

Then onto the Sequoia National Forrest. If you look closely you can see Marylin standing by the fence - the trees are beyond enormous!

This is the General Grant tree - impossible to get it all into one frame without an ultra wide angle lens:

Apart from the trees, the scenery is totally beautiful:

And then over to the California coast - windy...

with morning fog:

Breath taking sunsets:

and the awesome Redwood Forests:

Gary took his car where no self respecting mercedes should be taken:

So that we could explore Fern Canyon - where dinosaurs roamed in the making of Jurassic Park:

The driftwood was mighty tempting to bring home - shame about it being so big, and the Mercedes so small:

But of course, it is the trees that take your breath away: The most amazing thing is how they continue to survive even after been badly damaged during fires. This one had an empty core, but still had living branches:

How insignificant we are:

Then we continued up the coast into Oregon, and woke to a perfect morning for a last soul restoring walk on the beach:

Back inland to Crate Lake:

Where Marylin got to feed over fed, friendly chipmunks:

And then homeward bound across some very desolate landscape:

Where - at 9.30pm......in the middle of nowhere............

Not one.....

But Two flat tyres/tires within 2 miles of each other!

Thank goodness there are still kind people travelling the road - and we were lucky enough to be able to hitch into the nearest town (109 miles away) leaving the car on the road overnight (no sleep for Gary!) and then went back out the next day with a tyre repair service and were able to continue on our merry way.

Until next time............

ENGLAND ADVENTURE

Well, it's a rainy Labor Day and I find myself in a rare state of having nothing pressing to do so I though I'd post just a few pictures of our England trip. For the full slide show you'll just have to come see us! You will note from the pictures that we had magnificent weather. Despite the common perception that it always rains in England, we had nothing but beautiful sunny weather our entire trip!

This is the apartment "flat" that we stayed in. Marylin's sister Felicity works as an live in care taker for a wealthy woman with advanced MS. She and her husband have this beautiful place in Poole (an English resort city) which they use as a retreat from the hectic pace of London. They graciously offered it for our use while we were there. What a blessing!

Marylin's sister Lyndsey who we had come to England to visit lived in Poole about 10 minutes from this place where we were staying which was very convenient.Marylin has previously posted pictures of her sisters and other family so I'll stick to the "vacation" aspect of our trip. Even given the somber circumstances of our trip we had a wonderful time touring England. We drove about 700 miles in two days and saw much of the English countryside. The purpose of our road trip was to visit Scothern Village.

It was a beautiful little village on the outskirts of Lincoln, a large city in Northern England. The picture below is the Main Street of Scothern Village. It is now little more than a bedroom community for Lincoln. As far as I could see there were not stores or businesses in the village.

We encountered the postman who said there were no longer any Scotherns living in Scothern Village. The photo below is of the Church of England chapel in the village.

We walked the graveyard surrounding the church and although there were graves going as far back as the mid 1700's we didn't find any Scotherns. Hard to say if any of our progenitors were actually from Scothern Village.

England is dotted with beautiful cathedrals and castles. One of the most magnificent is in Lincoln. We were privileged to be there early in the morning before the crowds and were among only about half a dozen people in the entire cathedral. Although photography is not allowed in most of the cathedrals we were able to take some pictures of the inside. The following pictures are of Lincoln Cathedral.

All of the incredible stone work in the castles and cathedrals is hand carved, not cast. The craftsmanship is astonishing.

You can't begin to experience the grandeur of these buildings in pictures.

On the way to Northern England, we stopped a Kings College at Cambridge. Those who have seen the movie "Dead Poets Society" will recognize this square as the one they raced around.

The following pictures are of Kings Cathedral at Cambridge. We would marvel at the craftsmanship in this building if it were built today but when you consider that it was built nearly 400 years ago it is mind boggling!

The English country side looks much the same everywhere you go. Quaint little villages, thatched roofs, etc. Really beautiful.

Typical English country road. They have hedge rows that go for miles and miles unbroken except for an occasional cross road or driveway.

And yes... this road is only one car wide with occasional wide spots for passing. If you encounter an oncoming vehicle between wide spots, one must back up to allow the other to pass. The blind corners can be VERY exciting too!! There are places where the tree canopy over the road is so thick and so long that you have to turn your lights on mid-day to see where you're going.

When you get outside the major metropolitan areas, the villages all have a similar look. Here are a couple ...

The following pictures are a few shots of Castles and Cathedrals.

Anadale Castle

Canterbury Cathedral

Windsor Castle

You'll notice that the Queen Guard have replaced their muskets with Automatic rifles.

We wanted to spend a couple of days in London and were very discouraged by the train fare from Poole to London ($90.00 each round trip) and staying anywhere in London was out of the question. Then I had what turned out to be, I think a moment of inspiration.

We wanted to go to the London temple as part of our trip and as we were lamenting the high cost of transportation to and from London, it occurred to me that the Temple had guest accommodations. We called and were able to get the last available room at a cost of $18 per person per night! So, we drove to the Temple, (about 35 miles south of London) stayed there and took the train from there to London. We were also able to do two sessions at the temple which was wonderful and the temple grounds were magnificent!

London is breathtaking! The architecture over the centuries is nothing short of unbelievable. The following few pics are just a sampling.

I'm sure everyone recognizes Big Ben

Houses of Parliament and Big Ben from the Thames River

Another view of the Houses of Parliament

Buckingham Palace

The Tower of London

Westminster Abbey St. Paul's Cathedral ... There are 515 steps to the top of the

dome and 515 back down. We walked every one of them!!!!!!

Tower Bridge

On the Sunday prior to our departure from England we were sitting around the "flat" wondering what we might do on our last day. We pulled out the map and discovered that Stonehenge was only about 40 miles north of Poole. En route we passed through Salisbury and discovered another magnificent cathedral.

Salisbury CathedralI put this picture here to give you some scale of the size of this building.