United Kingdom ^_^


We went to Europe again!  It's definitely our favorite destination for long trips, there's just so much to see, and I never get tired of seeing all these amazing places. =)  This time, we joined Globus on a British Tour, 17 days, but with the flying in and out plus a day extension, it's a 21-day trip for us.

Day 1 - We arrived in London at around 3pm, checked-in the hotel, freshen up, then at around 6pm, out we go.  We didn't get any good sleep on the plane in our 15 hours flight but it's a waste to just go in and sleep right? =P  There's a 7 hours difference in time too so even if it's 6pm in London, it's actually 1am in Manila.  So with our head floating, we checked out the neighborhood for shops and food for dinner.

The next day is the first day of our tour, we met our tour guide, Paul Barton who is by far the best guide I've ever met in all my travels.  He is witty and funny which is why he reminds us of Mr. Bean.^^  And our coach driver, Kevin is also very nice and friendly, and as far as I can remember, I think he's the only coach driver from all our trips that actually talked to us. ;-)

Day 2 - From London, we went to visit the ornamental gardens of Henry VIII's Hampton Court Palace.  We then walked to view The Great Vine, and then to the Royal Tennis Court.  We hop on our bus again, and I guess we're quite lucky that day because we're just in time to catch the Queen's parade to Windsor Castle.  It's the first state visit of the Irish president to England that day, April 8, 2014.  Our guide allowed us to hop off the bus to watch the parade, we enjoyed watching so much that we almost got left behind. =S  Next stop is Oxford for lunch.  It's more like a University city since the whole place is full of students from the University of Oxford.  Next stop is Stratford-upon-Avon to visit Anne Hathaway's Cottage where we took our group picture.  I think it's actually a very good idea to take a group picture on the first day where everyone's still fresh looking and excited. =)  And the last place we visited for the day is Shakespeare's birthplace.  That night we had a welcome dinner in the hotel, and thank you Paul for not asking us to introduce ourselves, that's just way too awkward. ^^

Day 3 - We went to a special pre-public opening guided tour of the Warwick Castle, one of our favorite stops in this tour. ^^  I think it's because we don't actually have castles in our country that entering a real castle amazed us, lol! XD  It's like a real castle turned into a theme park, it just brings out the child in us. =)  It's just too bad that the dungeon is closed that day, they're having some electricity problems down there they said.  Next stop is York, where a great cathedral called the York Minster stands.  We also get to walk through a maze of quaint streets including the narrow Shambles.

Day 4 is when we leave for Scotland! ^_^


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