Blogs from Berkshire, England, United Kingdom, Europe - page 13

With a break in the rain forecast, we thought it best to make a trip to Legoland while the sun shone. We were up and out nice and early - not much chance of sleeping in with Lego in Little Cocky’s sights! Before too long, we were all happily immersed in the land of the little plastic brick. Cocky and I liked the Lego miniatures the best, of which there were plenty to look at all around the park. The miniature village, featuring landmarks from all over the world was a special highlight. If asked to choose a favourite part, Little Cocky would be hard pressed to name just one thing, but would likely list the train ride and driving school high on his list. Margery had very kindly packed us a picnic lunch, which we ... read more

Hi! And we're back - not entirely as expected, but with a new name, and some more ideas... We're now contemplating the Silk Road for the next in the Gray Railway Journeys series. As to how we approach it, that's a different matter - currently it's a similar approach to the trans-siberian. When do we want to go? Which places are critical? Is the route even viable? in answer to those questions: 1) slightly later thatn the Trans-Siberian - we think - weather to be further investigated! most likely late spring 2) Samarkand seems to be the most critical - so far.... 3) the route is viable, but at this point a little variable....further investigations required here too! and not via Iran currently - although my personal preference would be, given time, to take in locations ... read more

Geo: 51.48, -0.605995We arrived in England after a very long flight from Sydney. It was 8 hours from Sydney to Singapore and then another 13 hours from there to London. We were quite happy to get off that plane. We picked up our rental a car and it was off to Windsor Castle. Windsor Castle is the oldest and largest occupied castle in the world. We really enjoyed our tour of the castle. It was interesting to see the state rooms, St.George's Chapel and the lovely grounds. The Queen was in residence while we were there, as it was Ascot Weekend. Ascot is the famous horserace. It is a very prestigious event. We saw lots of people dressed in their best finery for the event.Later that day we visited Winchester which is a lovely country town ... read more

Recently, we were lucky enough to house-sit a converted barn which dates back to the 17th century. Ish. I dunno, it’s old. So old, in fact, that it’s sideways. I kid you not, it’s on an angle, as you’ll see in the photos. The house came with a couple of dogs, much to Mon’s delight. We were, thus, put in charge of a huge house with an equally massive garden, complete with fountains shaped as nubile ladies. Little did I know I would be cruelly pulled away from this bucolic fantasy by a recruiter. Called on Monday, started on Tuesday. Sort of a Craig David song, but not quite. It was a bit of a shame, really, as we were having some great weather which meant there was a lot of sunbathing to be done. But ... read more

Both Kevin and I had a single flight each to use before the middle of April so were able to fix up a short visit back to the UK to see family and friends and to celebrate Hilary’s father’s birthday. We both had to travel on different flights and arrived in England 24 hours apart, at least we knew we were going to be returning back to Brisbane together! We were able to catch up the news from Jon and Lou and spend some time with Isabel in Windsor before meeting up with the Sheila and Eddie, Annette, David and Nicola after a delayed start having got hopelessly lost in Staines! It was a lovely lunch where we were able to catch up on every ones news and meet Nicola’s boyfriend too. Unfortunately we were ... read more