Family Visit: Stonehenge & Wells Cathedral

The following day greeted us with some of the best weather you'll find in England. Mild temps, bright sun and a crystal clear blue sky. The day's adventure included Stonehenge and a visit to Wells Cathedral.

Stonehenge was amazing and the photos don't do it justice. The visitor centre provides a few theories about who built the structure and why, but the bottom line is that no one knows for sure. But even with the buses of tourists, you can feel that there's something mysterious and serene about the place.

After a visit to the gift shop - man those visitors can shop - we headed off to Wells. Someone at work had told me it was a pretty little town with a nice Cathedral. Boy, was that an understatement. The cathedral was massive and gorgeous.

We had also wanted to visit the Bishop's gardens, but apparently the Bishop's son was getting married so the gardens were closed to visitors. We walked around the outside instead and saw some lovely views here as well.

Family Visit: Bath

After a well deserved 'lie in' as the Brits would say, we headed off to Bath for a walking tour and some traditional British pub fare.

Bath is a lovely city - full of history and gorgeous buildings. The walking tour we went on was free and provided by the Mayor's office - highly recommended. And after all that walking we stopped for a beer and a pie at a traditional British pub. It should go without saying that we ate too much and as a result, slept all the way back to Bristol with poor Brian left at the wheel.

Family Visit: Whirlwind London

After visiting Windsor, the 'boys' went back to London for the night and we stayed in an Airbnb in Cheswick. It was a bit cheaper and allowed us to stay parked the next day and take the train into London, which of course is an adventure all its own for us Yanks.

London was a whirlwind and something you can not begin to do justice with only one day, but we fortified with a large breakfast and did as much as we could fit in!

We started by waiting way too long for the Big Bus Tour to take us over to Buckingham Palace. We thought the Big Bus would allow us to get from one attraction to the other while learning a bit on the way, but in hindsight, we might have been better off taking the tube or even hailing a taxi. At least we had a nice view while waiting.

The scaffolding was just going up around Big Ben and is planned to last until 2020.

Our first adventure was Buckingham Palace. Alas, no photos, which is a real shame because the palace was amazing. Much more interesting and beautiful than I imagined it would be. And a really well designed audio tour that walks you through the rooms, paintings and exhibits. Definitely worth the price of admission.

After Buckingham, we got back on the Big Bus and headed over to the London Tower. Another great tour with a very theatrical guide. All the guides there actually work at the Tower, a position that is handed down through the family line. A very proud group of men.

And from there, we had a good view of the Tower Bridge so a family photo was in order!

Included with our Big Bus tour was a ferry ride back over the Thames, which was relaxing and gave us all a chance to rest for a bit.

And that took us to our last adventure, the London Eye and it's breathtaking views of London.

We left London to catch the train back to Cheswick to pick up the van and then the drive back to Bristol. A full day and plans to sleep in the next day!

Family Visit: Windsor Castle

Next to arrive, this time in Bristol, were my parents and their friends. After a day of rest (jet lag really stinks!) we headed off to meet my brother and partner at Windsor castle, which is about a 2 hour drive. We rented a huge van, big enough for the 6 of us and headed out.

Windsor is a cute little town. albeit full of tourist shops. And Windsor castle is very pretty and interesting. An audio guide comes with your ticket so you can get a bit of the history of the palace while you walk around.

It was a rainy day, but we were all armed with our brollies!

All the lamp posts had crowns on the top.

We weren't allowed to take any photos inside the palace, which is always so annoying to me. The main exhibit is a huge doll house replica of the palace that was a gift to Queen Elizabeth. It was really amazing.

And of course the palace is well guarded at all times!

Family Visit: Paris - Versailles

Paris has so many sites to see it can be really hard to choose, especially when you only have a few days. Visiting Versailles takes the better part of a day, but is so worth the investment. It's an amazing palace.

This is the chapel of the palace. King Louis didn't spare any expense on this place!

I'm not sure if you can tell from the photo, but this is a series of rooms pretty much identical, but in different colors. They all hold various art objects now, but were receiving rooms and parlors at the time. The wallpaper alone is impressive.

And the famous hall of mirrors. It's so hard to get a photo because the place was mobbed with people. We had buy ahead tickets and still waiting in line outside for over an hour - and we arrived relatively early. Luckily, it was a lovely sunny day and the people watching kept us entertained.

Just a random, boring staircase. 

But the real beauty of Versailles is the gardens and their fountains. A huge expanse with trees, grassy areas, walkways and lots of fountains. Just think of the engineering required at that time to pull all this off.

2017 was unfortunately a dry summer for Paris so they were rationing water, which meant only a few fountains were running and only for a very short period of time. We missed a few, but captured my favorite in the photo below.

This is one of the main and probably most well known of the fountains. Just amazing!

Family Visit: Paris - The Eiffel Tower

Our next adventure was an organized tour of the Eiffel Tower. We met our guide just outside the grounds and were able to skip the lines with our guide who provided information about Paris' most iconic monument. Did you know the Eiffel Tower was originally red? And that the citizen's of Paris hated it because it interrupted the skyline and was red?

View from the top. And we were happy to have the guide and skip the line. The place was packed with people and the lines were really long.

So long in fact that we decided to take the stairs down for the last level. And while down was probably a whole lot easier than up, our legs were shaking by the time we reached the ground.

We had some dinner and then came back so we could get some night shots. Such a beautiful structure - there is just nothing else like it.

Family Visit: Paris - Notre Dame Cathedral

Well, I didn't plan to take such a break from the blog, but sometimes life is just too fun to interrupt with blog posting. ;) I can't promise I'll be very regular, but will do my best.

Last August, we jetted off to Paris for a couple of days to meet up with my brother and his partner who were doing a big tour of Europe. We decided to meet them in Paris (ahhhh, Paris) and had a lovely time seeing some of the highlights.

Our first stop was Notre Dame Cathedral. Busy, even with an overcast and rainy day and a few sets of what looked like military police (you can see them in the background of the photo below. So sad that things have come to this.

Notre Dame is beautiful and when you travel with my brother, you end up with stunning photos like the one below. Never would have even thought to capture it like this. Thanks Kev!

The 'boys' climbed the 300+ stairs to the top and captured some nice views of the Seine.