Adventures Across the Pond: How Are Those People Swimming Right Now?

The alarm at 6:45 am definitely came WAY too early on Saturday. Since we didn't get to bed till about 1 am the night before because of the bike tour, being woken up that early the next morning was not very pleasant. We dragged ourselves out of bed and got ready though. We quickly ate breakfast at the hotel and hurried out the door because we had to be at the Victoria Coach Station at 8:10 in order to catch our bus for the day. It was about 30 minutes away by train and walking and we actually left early enough or so I thought. We got to the Victoria Tube station at about 8 and the Coach Station was supposed to be really close to it...not the case. We walked around for about 10 minutes trying to find the stupid thing and then started running to it in fear of being left. I bet so many people have gotten good laughs out of us while here because sometimes we can just not get our sense of directions right. The good news is though is that we made it in plenty of time and actually got pretty good seats on the bus. Our bus day-trip was going to Lead's Castle, Dover, Canterbury, and Greenwich so we had a long day ahead of us for sure.

After we all finally loaded on the bus, we started to make our way out of London to Lead's. This castle is a very old castle just like every other one in England and it was literally in the middle of nowhere. I think it dates back to the 12th century but I'm not 100% sure because I was really tired that morning to information retention was a little hard haha. We got there at about 11 and we all got off and started our tour of the caste. It was really cool and really pretty but compared to the Windsor Castle, I was kind of underwhelmed. They have a lot of weddings there and I can see why because it was gorgeous but unless you want to pay 100 GBP per head, I would suggest looking somewhere else haha. They were having 3 weddings on the day we were there though so they were racking in the money for sure. We spent about an hour and a half at Leads and then loaded up the bus again to make our way to the cliffs of Dover. Here are a couple shots of the castle though just to give y'all an idea...

View of the entire castle from the bus

Main part of the castle from inside the walls

I was in and out of sleeping in between Leads and Dover so I can't really tell y'all much about that haha. We got to Dover around lunch time and the tour company offered a set lunch for 11 GBP at a hotel there...none of the options looked good or worth 11 GBP so we opted out of that option. While everyone was eating, we just hung out and explored Dover. There was a "beach" there was was really pretty but it wasn't really a beach. The area leading up to the water was completely filled with stones so it was not very comfortable for the feet and to our shock there were people swimming! I was sitting on the shore with a short-sleeved t-shirt, a sweater, pants, flats, and a scarf and I was freezing so I have no idea how these people were swimming. The water must have been freezing so clearly I thought they were crazy but whatever. After spending about an hour in Dover we got on the bus again to head to Canterbury. We got to see the white cliffs on our way out and they were really pretty. Here's just a glimpse...

Cliffs and a view of the "beach"

View of the cliffs from the bus

It was about another hour till we got to Canterbury and this was probably my favorite part of the whole trip. The town was really cute and it reminded me of Bath and Oxford a lot. There was a lot of shopping and of course people but I really like it! We headed to the Canterbury Cathedral first and it was awesome! It is a Gothic style church and it was beautiful! The ceilings were huge and the detail work was awesome to look at. I have seen a lot of churches on this trip though so I have to say that they are kind of all starting to look the same. This church is the seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury which was pretty cool too. We walked around there for a little bit and then went to quickly grab lunch before we got back on the coach. Here are a couple shots of the church...

Outside shot of the Cathedral

Ceilings of the Cathedral

Our last stop on our long day trip was the borough of Greenwich. We got dropped off by the bus here and that was his last stop on the trip because we were going to ride a ferry back to the center of London. We walked around a park to the Royal Observatory and the Prime Meridian. We didn't get to actually see the PRime Meridian line because it was inside the 10 GBP Royal Observatory but we did stand directly below it outside so we were technically in 2 hemispheres at one time haha. We then boarded a ferry on the Thames and got our free muffin and sparkling wine that came with the tour. After we got to our finishing point, we walked to Trafalgar Square and wandered around there for a bit. From there, we walked to Picadilly Circus and up to Oxford Street. All the attractions in London close down early so walking around is basically the only thing we can do at night. We went into Hamley's which is a huge 5 story toy store that has been open for 250 years! There were so many toys and stuffed animals so it was fun to feel like a kid again. I also showed my parents Liberty of London which is my favorite department store here.

After wandering around and pushing through the masses of people, we decided to go get dinner but as usual we couldn't decide where to go. We finally decided on Gourmet Burger Kitchen which is the same place I got my burger from on the 4th of July. It was so so good and my parents really enjoyed it as well. We went back to the hotel after this because we were dead tired from the long day so we all were definitely ready to go to bed. Here are a couple other random shots from the day.