Holiday Diary - Day 55

Today we drove from Ashford to Ipswich via Dover. Yes, I know that's the long way around but we wanted to check out Dover Castle and the white cliffs.

Here are some of today's photos.

Our first view of the castle

The view from the carpark

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A couple of plugged cannons and some cannon balls

The view of the white cliffs and the port from the castle

There are a few of these around

I'm not sure how this building relates to the castle but it looks good

The view of Dover from Admirals Lookout

Admiral Bertram Ramsay

A busy little port this, that's 2 ships on their way out
and 2 more on their way in and there was one docked

The view of the cliffs from above the port

The view of the castle from above the port

We had lunch at a restaurant in the castle grounds and they had a rather large cannon on display. It was cast bronze, approximately 24' long, had a bore of about 12mm and was called "Queen Elizabeth's Pocket Pistol". It was actually a gift from the Netherlands to King Henry VIII but had been refurbished around the time of Queen Elizabeth I and the initials ER had been added which caused some confusion.

Originally we were booked to stay in Norwich for the next 3 nights but Sue has managed to get some of the bookings changed as she was just not coping with showers over baths. If we had known at the time we were booking these motels we would have booked different ones from the start. Travelodge seem to be very cooperative with changing the bookings so hopefully everything will go smoothly from now on.

Tomorrow we head north to Lowestoft where we will stay for 2 nights before heading over to Cambridge for 3 nights.

Richard.

Holiday Diary - Day 54

Today we found another toy train to ride and a battle field to explore.

The railway is the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway. Here are some of the photos we on this trip.

The engine that we started the journey with after it pulled
the train into the station

Going to the other end of the train

Our starting point for today's train journey

Stop 1

Stop 2

Stop 3

Stop 4

Stop 5

The engine that took over pulling duties being turned around
 ready for the next trip

On the way we saw a few things of interest.

An old building in the distance

We crossed a few canals

We went through the only desert in Europe

We saw a nuclear power plant

and a light house

We went around a loop 

We saw a model train set in someone's backyard

We passed a lake

and a river

After lunch we drove to Battle to check out Battle Abbey.

The gate building as seen from the car park

A watch tower overlooking the battle field

A panorama of the battle field

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The South West corner of the Dormitory

The lavitory

The walled garden

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The remains of the cathedral

Ice storage

Dairy processing and storage

The north east end on the dormitory

I'm not sure whether this is the Abbey or Manor,
 I think it was used as both over the years

The gate and court house from the inside

A suit of armour

The gate from the outside

Tomorrow we're hoping to see Dover Castle and the white cliffs before heading up to Ipswich.

Richard.

Holiday Diary - Day 53

We had another non-sightseeing day today, although we did manage to do a couple of things that we had never done before.

We went into London, to Australia House and voted. On the way we went to an International Railway Station (we don't have any of them in Australia), traveled on a high speed train (we have to wait at least 20 years to travel on one in Australia) and rode on a London bus.

We promise that we will be doing some sightseeing tomorrow so we should have some photos to show you tomorrow night.

Richard.

Holiday Diary - Day 52

Today we spent most of the day driving. We managed to leave Sue's fold-up footstool back in Amesbury so we drove 2 1/2 hours back before driving 2 1/2 hours to our next destination. Sue did manage to get a photo of a couple of bridges but I didn't think it was that good that I should show it here.

We are currently just outside of Ashford, close to a couple of steam trains and the white cliffs of Dover and we are here for 3 nights so we have a bit of time to look around.

Tomorrow we head into London to do our duty and put in our votes for next week's election.

Richard.