July 17th, 18th and 19th July 17th we were at sea all day sailing from Edinburgh to Dublin. We arrived in Dublin on the 18th for two days in Ireland. On our first day we walked around town on Grafton St. This is a big pedestrian walking and shopping street. We headed to Trinity College and saw the Book of Kells. This is a very old book created over 1000 years ago in Ireland. The book is the New Testament with beautiful art and design. It is only opened to two pages to see every couple of days. We then saw [View Full Entry]

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July 15th and 16th , 2008 Today the ship docked in Edinburgh, Scotland for two days. We had a fantastic day exploring Edinburgh Castle. At 1:00 we heard the cannon blast. We saw the crown jewels of Scotland and had lunch in the Castle. Then later that evening we had a private ghost tour. Edinburgh is home to the show Ghost Hunters. Our guide was a very good story teller and took us all over Edinburgh telling us of the haunting and then took us under the city to the underground vaults and tried to scare us some more. I didn’t [View Full Entry]

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July 14th, 2008 This is our first Sea Day and also my Birthday. We are sailing from Dover to Edinburgh. In the day we all spent some time at the Aveda spa for massages and facials. This was very relaxing and wonderful. Then we all got dressed for the first formal dinner. Everyone looked great and sang happy Birthday to me. That evening we headed to the Luxe bar and somehow Kim and I ended the night singing karaoke. It was a great Birthday. Thank you to everyone for all of the Birthday wishes. [View Full Entry]

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July 13, 2008 We all got to Dover and boarded the Crystal Symphony. The ship is fantastic. We are all on the 9th floor on the same side of the ship with our rooms almost all next to each other. Wink, Jon and I got off the ship because we did not sail until 6 pm to go see Dover Castle. This is a fantastic castle with a lot of history built in 1190. King Henry the VIII spent some time there. There is a beautiful view of the white cliffs and the beach. [View Full Entry]

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July 12, 2008 On our last day in London before we headed to Dover to catch the Crystal Cruise ship Wink, Sai, Jon and I decided to go on the London Eye and then check out the costumes at the Globe Theater. The London Eye is a giant Ferris wheel with big glass pods that hold about 20 people each. There is a great view of the Thames, Big Ben, Parliament and Buckingham Palace from 443 feet. It takes about 30 min to go all the way around. After the Eye we took a taxi to the Globe Theater. We went [View Full Entry]

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Jon and I were in London for 2 weeks for Ascot and now we are back again. This time we are joining 14 of Jon's family for a cruise of the British Ilse and then we are headed to the South of France. So, we met some of Jon's family in Palm Springs and got on our Virgin flight from LAX to Heathrow. Once we got to Heathrow we boarded 3 vans and came to the Wyndham hotel. Today was our first day in London. Jon's Aunt Melanie and her husband Jeff and cousin Jordan and his friend Dane all went [View Full Entry]

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Ascot is all week but by far the best day for fashion is Ladies Day. Ladies wear show stopping hats and dress to impress. This is my favorite day of Ascot. Everyone drinks Pims Cups and had a great time. [View Full Entry]

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We always have an amazing time at Ascot. The Queens horse racing event is a fantastic fashion show. This year everyone was buzzing about the stict dress code and how they were going to enforce it more now for the Royal Enclosure. Everyone looked great and we all had a wonderful time ; even though we didn't bet on the right horses. [View Full Entry]

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There are so many amazing museums in London. Jon and I have been to many of them but I had not yet been to the Victoria and Albert Museum. This is a wonderful museum with so much to see. There is a great fashion section of the museum that has clothing from all time periods. There was also an amazing showing of jewelry. They had pieces from the beginnings of jewelry to now. We enjoyed the museum and then had lunch. Then in the afternoon we went to Westminster Abby. The church of Westminster Abby has an amazing amount of history. [View Full Entry]

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Camille (Jon's Grandmother), Jon and I packed up and left from Indian Wells to LAX to London Heathrow. We like to stay at the Wyndham Chelsea Harbour because it is a great hotel with all suites and it is easy to get to Ascot. The Royal Ascot horse races are in the town of Ascot that is about 1.5 hr by car from the Wyndham. This year Shirley Koenan and her daughter Sherry joined us. Shirely is a good friend of Camille's she lives in Santa Barbara and Indian Wells. Her daughter Sherry lives in Hawaii. They are a lot of [View Full Entry]

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