28 April 2009 On a day with light rain we walked into the centre of Aachen through the old town gate and visited the Dom (cathedral) where we saw Charlemagnes Palace Chapel, an outstanding example of Carolingian architecture built in 800. This was followed by a tour of the cathedral treasury which included many fines shrines holding many ancient biblical relics. In a very pleasant old town centre the other main building of interest was the gothic Rathus with statues of 50 German rulers on its front elevation. After getting back to the van we drove to Cologne and easily found another excellent camper stop on the banks of the Rhine. I rode along the bank of the river to the city centre 2 miles away and was really impressed by the size and complexity of ... read more

26 April 2009 As usual, the final packing and preparing the van took longer than expected and we eventually left home in mid afternoon for the drive to our favourite kicking off spot, the Camping and Caravan Club site at Folkestone. It was a beautiful sunny evening down there with clear views across the Channel to France. ... read more

05 - 07 April 2009 We had two nights with Ruth during which I had a lovely walk with her dog and we had a very enjoyable iChat video talk with her son James and his wife Bobbie who live in the USA and were on holiday in the Bahamas. On the way home we stayed overnight with Emma, Sam and the boys who were trying out there new tent at Brean just north of Burnham on Sea. I think they found camping at this time of the year quite cold, particularly with the wind blowing off the Bristol Channel. This very enjoyable week has shown us that there is an awful lot of the U.K. that we need to make time to see. ... read more

03 April 2009 One of the main reasons for the trip was to see Stonehenge somewhere neither of had been to before. The site is managed by English Heritage and if you go during normal opening hours you are only allowed to walk along a perimeter path something which would be hopeless for Wendy with her poor eyesight. However I discovered before we left that you can book an out of hours one hour visit limited to 26 people when you are allowed full access. Consequently we made an early start today for the 12 mile drive to Stonehenge and our 8am slot. It turned out that only six people (two American, one Canadian and three English) had booked this time and the weather was dull and misty which made our hour there an eerie, magical ... read more

01 April 2009 We were planning to have left by now on a two month trip with the van to Greece. Unfortunately while we were away skiing in January Wendy fell over a snowy kerb while crossing a road carrying her skis and broke her leg. Thankfully the damage is now nearly healed and we hope to undertake a seven week tour around Germany starting at the end of April. The delay in departure has meant we have enjoyed at home the unseasonably warm and sunny early spring weather and the host of daffodils and blossom. It has also enabled us to use the van to visit Wiltshire, an area of England we have driven through before but never explored. We were blessed with fine weather for the trip. The mornings were generally dull but the ... read more