New Years

Today is New Years Eve. We really aren't going to do anything today. Probably just going to hang out. Auntie Julie is making a huge dinner, kind of like our Christmas dinner. All we've done today is play Xbox Kinect and packed our things up. We're leaving tomorrow, and we have to be up at 7 to catch our flight. Nothing today, though. After we celebrate, I'll edit this blog and tell you what we did to celebrate!

I'm going to bed soon, it's past midnight. Richard, Nana, James, and Jay came over to celebrate New Years. We watched the countdown in front of Big Ben on the TV, and sang an old, traditional English song. Then, we went outside and watched as people tied candles in decorated paper bags, like a mini hot air balloon. The paper bags floated up into the sky. It was very pretty. Tonight is one of the rare clear nights, so you could see the stars and floating candles perfectly against the moon. We had a very nice dinner, it was a lot like what we had for Christmas dinner. This has been a fantastic trip, in every way amazing. I haven't my family here in four years, and I haven't been to England in seven years. I'm so sad to be leaving this amazing place, even if it was snowy, rainy, and foggy. I'll be counting the days until we can come back, and keeping in touch with everybody.

Here are some pictures to remember the times!

Nana and Richard!

Jay posing for the picture

Richard and James

Daddy and Andie on the subway

Richard and Auntie Julie

Becky and Andie

Freddie and Angel

Royal Air Force Museum

Today we went to the Royal Air Force Museum. The museum is dedicated to the history of aviation and the British Royal Air Force. In the museum, there are lots of amazing types of airplanes, some that are the only one of that kind left. The Vickers Wellingtons and Avro Lancaster S-Suger are one of two surviving planes of that kind in the world. Some of the sections in the museum are Milestones of Flight, that part of the museum has many of the first airplanes that were used in war. The Bomber Hall, obviously, has huge airplanes that were used for dropping bombs and warfare. Historic Hangars have some of the planes that most helped and made a difference in the war. The other three sections are The Grahame-White Factory, Battle of Britain Hall and a section that show's all different kinds of engines.

The museum was incredible. It may seem like it was just a museum with bombers and big airplanes, but it was also very historical. It talked about the war and everything that was going on in those wars. It was great being able to explore and sit in the cockpit. It was almost like being back in the war! The museum was a series of hangers. There were huge airplanes, there were small, compact airplanes. My dad, my mom, Andie, Ben and I went. There are many amazing sights to see in England, Royal Air Force museum is definitely a sight to see.

Warwick Castle

Today we went to Warwick Castle. Warwick Castle is a medieval castle in the town of Warwickshire. The castle was built by William the Conqueror in 1068. It has obviously been standing for a very long time! The castle made it through wars and sieges. There is a moat circling the castle but it is empty. You have to cross a bride to make it into the castle and cross the moat. The castle was actually rebuilt because it was made of wood. It was basically the typical, stereotype castle. It had a moat, a dungeon where prisoners were chained to the wall, towers, a huge courtyard, a grand dining hall, there was a "fair lady" (I guess you could call her) that had an entire section of the castle for herself. They showed us Kings and Queens, battle armour, different weapons and even had people rein-act the lives of historical characters! The castle was surrounded by rolling hills and trees, not by Mcdonalds and gas stations.

 It took us a while to get there, but Andie didn't throw up this time so that was much better! We couldn't find any where to park, so that was a problem, but eventually we found somewhere. We walked through a huge arch way to get into into the admissions for the castle. It was kind of wet, but it added a nice affect to the verdant walls. Admissions wasn't very interesting. Just waiting in line. Once we crossed the bridge into the courtyard, we first went to the towers. The towers were obviously very, very tall. The stairs were narrow, small, wet and the ceiling was low. We would climb, stop and look at the view, and start climbing again. We did that until we made it to the top. There were spaces in the wall so an archer could shoot during battle, and spaces in the floor so the towers wouldn't flood in case it rained.

We then went down to the dungeons. These weren't the real dungeons though, these were where the soldiers would have slept. It was kind of disturbing because they had people act it out. It was like an interactive play, set during the plague. When we got to the part where they talked about ripping the organs out and did an example on a very realistic dummy, I proceeded to pass out for a brief couple of seconds, wake up, and vomit. It was very dark, stuffy, claustrophobic and dank. I got out of the dungeons and just sat out. I missed the torture room (so unfortunate), and my mom, Andie and I just wandered around. We went to the dining hall were they were staging a party. The party was hosted by one of the countess', Daisy. They had people announce your name and show you around. People were dressed up and everything! It was very fun and realistic. After that me met up with Ben and my dad and just walked around the grounds. They had different interactive games, my dad even won a coconut!

Going to Warwick Castle was amazing. It was kind of sad because of how commercialized it had become though. I'm not saying the were advertising things everywhere, but it was more like an amusement park. It was better than just walking around at looking at things, though. I thought it was kind of weird the way they did the real dungeon and the fake dungeon, though. The real dungeon was very small, and you read about how people would be chained to the wall or locked in cages to be attacked by crows or turkey vultures. I also didn't like throwing up in the fake dungeon. That wasn't very fun. Overall, it was a great experience. If you ever go to England, I would highly recommend going to Warwick Castle. It is an experience everybody would enjoy!

Bletchley Park

Today we went to Bletchley Park. Bletchley Park is a war museum from World War II that shows how England intercepted messages from the Germans. It was called the Enigma cipher machine. It was based on a series of dials and you would enter a certain code. Then you would type a letter from the message and gears in the machine would choose numbers according to the code. The message would come out encrypted and and they would use Morse code to send the numbers to the another person who had an Enigma machine. Those numbers would be the new code, and when you typed in the letters from the message, it would come out the message in English. The Germans thought their code could never be broken. They thought there was a spy among them. The Enigma machine made it possible for England to find out the locations of the Germans next attack and stop them.

There were many other things in the museum other than just that, though. They had rooms showing what to do if you were gassed, bombed, or attacked. There were signs everywhere from the war. They showed what a house might look like and the rations they would get. Eggs would come in a powder! They had rooms showing what living quarters would be like for the soldiers and rooms showing the worlds first programmable electronic computer. Another building was dedicated to Winston Churchill. He was the Prime Minister of England during the war. It had pictures, quotes, statues, figure heads, badges and just about anything relating to Churchill. Another building was the house where Churchill had lived. It was a huge mansion that had a ballroom, living room, dining room, main room and so many other rooms.

Getting to the park itself was an adventure. Andie gets carsick very easily, and of course we were on a windy road, and of course she was looking down. She then said, "I don't feel very good" and vomited five seconds later. Luckily it had just snowed so we washed the car out with napkins and snow. Since we had no extra clothes, we had to go shopping. That was definitely very interesting. Andie was fine for the rest of the day, though. When we got back we didn't do anything interesting. Just hung out. It was very interesting seeing all of the ways England found out the German messages and what the war was like. My Nana was a child during World War II and had actually come home, finding nothing because of bombings. It was very interesting learning what it was like and tomorrow should be another interesting day!

Dunstable Downs and the Priory

Today we went to Priory Church of St. Peter Dunstable. We went with Nana, my mom, my dad, me, Andie and James. The Priory used to be a lot bigger but part of it burnt down 300 years ago. It was built in the 12th century and founded by King Henry the First. The church was obviously old. The door had bullet holes in it from the War of the Roses in the 1600's. The architecture was amazing, kind of like in St. Albans. The ceiling had pictures carved into it and big pillars with designs and patterns on them. The church itself was actually very, very small though. We walked around the sanctuary, which was actually locked but we were let in by a labourer of the church. There was a graveyard from people who died in the 1200's. There weren't very many statues but there were pews and names of benefactors written in the wall. There were lot's of things written on the wall, Pastors and people who had died, Kings and Queens, anybody who had done anything to be remembered really.

Then we headed to Dunstable Downs. We couldn't really see anything because of all of the fog. So we went into the nature center. Dunstable Downs is a park. The big thing they do there is hang glide and fly kites. There is actually hang glide airport there! It's also a great place to watch birds, though. Dunstable Downs is a lot like a nature preserve. There were very dramatic hills. There would be a hill, then a 200 foot drop, then another hill, and another drop. Since we had Andie with us we couldn't really stay that long since she would complain and have to be carried and then get cold, then hungry. I'm sure it's a very nice park, but since we couldn't really see and we were cold, it wasn't amazing. In the summer I bet it's very pretty, though, and hang gliding must be fun!

When we got home I went to Tesco with my cousin, Becky. We just bought presents for friends, and some groceries. Tesco is walking distance from my aunt's home. It's like a combination of Target and Kroger. Not that interesting. It wasn't a very nice day today. It was rainy and dark all day. It's normally rainy or foggy in England, we'd been lucky for the past couple of days, but now it was getting bad. The snow was melting and turning black from car pollution. It was very cold and dark outside. A typical day in England. Today was a fun day, despite the weather and tomorrow should be fun too!

Exploring London

It's Moses!

Today we went to London. England is probably most well known for London. To get to London we had to drive for about an hour to get to a subway then after we got off the subway we rode on a bus, then five more short subway rides. We got off at Kings Cross and visited 9 and 3/4. In case you didn't know what 9 and 3/4 is, it is where wizards go to get to Hogwarts. The first thing we did when we got out of the subway was to go to the Albert and Victoria Museum. I've been to a lot of museums, but this one seemed different. They had a huge collection of statues by Rodin. Rodin is the sculptor who made The Thinker. There was Greek mythology and each statue told a story. Then once you left the statue section you were in Asia. Asia had a huge selection. Things like quilts, armour, dresses, statues, carvings, silverware, swords and so many other amazing things. There were other parts of the museum like ceramics, glassware, architecture, furniture, beauty and jewellery and so many more.

After the museum we headed out to find somewhere to eat. We ended up in China Town (yes, China Town in London) where we, of course, ate Chinese. After that we hadn't really planned any more so we just walked around sight seeing. We saw the Eye of London but didn't go on it. It gets dark in England at 4:00 PM so we only had about an hour of sunlight left by this time. We decided to head for Big Ben. Big Ben is actually a giant bell tower, not a clock as most people think. The bell is called Big Ben and the tower is called St. Stephens Tower. Big Ben isn't as big as most people think it is. It's 315 feet which is pretty small compared to the 1,063 foot Eiffel Tower. It was pretty hard to get a good picture since it was already pretty dark. On our way back to the subway, we stopped by Westminster Abbey. It was closed so we couldn't go inside but we could explore the grounds and garden. Westminster Abbey is where royalty in England get married.

To get back we went on one big subway ride back and rode a bus back to the subway station. London really is amazing. It isn't like other big cities all polluted and kind of depressing, with homeless people. There were lights hanging from the buildings and there's a warm glow from all of the houses and restaurants. There were amazing fountains and statues and everybody seemed so happy ice skating and running around. We got to climb on giant lion statues and window shop. Every store had a different scent, perfume, fish and chips, old and dusty, just cleaned. As we explored, everything became more and more familiar and it was like being four again, being in England for the first time. It's so hard to capture everything about London in words. It was just so different than down town Kentucky. Everybody is so happy and helpful even if we are confused Americans.

Boxing Day

Today is Boxing Day, the day after Christmas. Boxing Day is just a bank holiday. The special thing about Boxing Day is the pantomime. A pantomime is a play, but more of a comedy than an actual play. The one that we saw was Aladdin. It was very different, though. It was set in China and all of the songs were different and the all of the characters except for Aladdin were different. The characters were Aladdin, Princess Baroobudum, Jafar, Sweep the dog puppet, Sooty the bear puppet, Soo the panda puppet, Widow Twankey (Aladdin's mom), the emperor, genie, and extras like dancers, guards and villagers. The play started off with all the villagers singing about Aladdin and Aladdin coming on singing about his life of crime. Aladdin has a friend named Sooty. Sooty is a dog puppet that goes with Aladdin everywhere. They then sing a song about "Where is Sooty?" which is about, where Sooty is. It then shows you Jafar and he talks about how he wants the magic lamp to rule the world. He sings a song, and back to Aladdin. Aladdin tells us about how he's in love with Princess Baroobudum but if anybody finds out he'll be killed.

Back in the palace Princess Baroobudum is telling her friend, Soo the panda puppet, about how she's in love with a village boy she saw. The village boy, coincidentally, being Aladdin. Jafar then finds Aladdin and tricks him into taking the lamp from a cave but traps him in the cave when Aladdin won't give him the lamp. Aladdin rubs the lamp and out comes the genie. Aladdin wishes for a magic rug and out they go flying through the sky. He wishes to be a prince so he can marry Princess Baroobudum. Before the marriage Jafar shows up and steals the lamp and kidnaps Princess Baroobudum. Sooty, Sweep,Soo and Aladdin show up to save her and steal the lamp back. Of course, they succeed and Aladdin and Princess Baroobudum get married. Of course this is only a very basic version of the plot line and there are songs and jokes and audience interaction and I didn't even mention the mom! Tomorrow we're exploring the city and going to London. I'll have more news tomorrow!