Driving through the English countryside

Roll-mops, cockles, jellied eels, welks and pork & pickle pies. These are some of the English foods Auntie Deb served us for lunch in Folkestone. I (James) quite liked the roll-mops, which are a kind of cold fish wrapped around some pickle. Theresa preferred the pork pies. We had a good day and night in Folkestone, walking along the seaside and catching up with family. Thanks to Auntie Deb and Rob for taking us in for the night and showing us around.

From Folkestone we picked up a hire car in Dover and drove to Bath via Stonehenge. After a slight delay when we discovered the hire car company we had booked through had since gone bust, and a minor detour where we drove for about half an hour in the wrong direction, we made it safely to Bath where we checked into an old fashioned B & B with ornate paintings on the wall and a bathroom under the staircase.

Bath is a beautiful town full of tall Georgian terrace houses that fan out in neat rows along the hillsides. We took a dip in a rooftop pool fed by the natural hot spring waters and overlooking the rooftops of the old city centre after being pampered with an Indian head massage and herbal tea in the relaxation lounge. Next, we went to the sauna room on the lower floor with four separate chambers infused with frankincense, eucalyptus to clear those sinuses, mint and lavender. In the middle of the room was a large showerhead with cool flowing waters, which was nice to stand under between chambers, and little foot baths that you could use around the surrounding walls. I (Theresa) really enjoyed Bath.

Auntie Judy and Uncle Bob took us to a very pretty Cottswold village. The Cottswolds is a hilly area west of London where the houses are all built from the local yellow-coloured stone. This gives the villages a unique, and very quaint, look. Many of the buildings have purple whisteria covering their walls.

We went for a day trip with Judy and Bob into Wales where we passed through mountainous countryside and visited an old aqueduct, which is a canal bridge allowing boats to travel over the top of a river, We had never seen an aqueduct before so it was bizarre to see water on a bridge going across water! We walked across the aqueduct, which was built on tall arches high above the fast-flowing river below, making for some dramatic views.

We visited my (James’) parent’s friends Madeline and Brian for dinner one night where I was re-united with my old playmate from when I was a toddler, Zoe, as well as her younger sister and their partners. Theresa got to see some old photos of me and we both got to visit a “true local” Black Country pub. No sawdust on the floor, but the beer was pretty rough!