Windsor Castle

Well, sorry we could not think of a more original title for this post but, there it is.

We have got ourselves a network rail card, which means we get about 1/3 off normal ticket prices when travelling off peak so we have taken to making the occassional foray in to some of the smaller places around London.

First up, Windsor and Eton. The castle really is amazing. It dominates the whole town and is huge. As the Queen resides there on the weekends, only part of the castle was open but we enjoyed what we did see - in particular the lovely moat gardens. After our visit there, we went for a walk along the Thames path, got lost, found the track, and got lost again. But we saw some lovely little lanes and fields on the way. On our way back toward Windsor, we came through the grounds of Eton college. As it happened, their private gardens were open to the public so we strolled around and took tea there (oh how posh)! There is this little island in the stream that you can access from the side of the college and it has been landscaped into beautiful gardens.

Definitely a worthwhile visit. Next stop? Hmm, probably either Oxford or Cambridge. Watch this space! In the mean time, here are some photos.

Bonnie Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond

Well the Bank Holiday weekend in at the end of May, took us up to Scotland. As it was just before Dan's birthday, Susanna did most of the planning so some bits were a surprise! We went up to Glasgow overnight on Friday where we picked up the hire car.

We drove up in to the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National park. Loch Lomond is one of the southern most lochs and it is also the largest inland waterway in Scotland (and we think the UK). We actually stayed in a small town, Rhu, just north of Helensburgh, on the Firth of Clyde, to the west of Loch Lomond.

During the weekend, we drove around the pretty loch side village of Luss, around the little coastal hamlets on the Cowal Peninsula and on the peninsula across Gare Loch from Rhu, and visited the small town of Dunoon, which reminded us of Devonport in good ol' Auckland, New Zealand.

The highlight of the trip though was cruising on Loch Lomond from Tarbet on the Eastern side to Rowardennan on the Western side, where we walked north for 9 miles on the West Highland Way, to Inversnaid. We then cruised back to Tarbert. We had lovely weather and there was a lovely variety of landscape and terrain from thick forest, to light woodland and beaches.

On our last day, we drove back to Glasgow via Aberfoyle and Callander, which is in the Trossachs, north of Sterling. We hired bicycles and rode a few miles around the national cycle network. Very pretty. Here are some of the pics.