London, February 22

 Thursday was our second excursion outside of London. We had watched the weather forecast, and a storm was blowing through England, strong enough that they actually named it--Louie. 

We walked to the Victoria Coach Station and boarded the bus for Windsor Castle, our first stop. Windsor is about 40 minutes outside of London.

I had to take this photo for Charlotte.

We arrived early and stood in line for awhile before we were allowed to enter the castle grounds.

Our tour guide talked extensively about how beautiful St. George's Chapel was--one of the most beautiful chapels in England. And it certainly was beautiful. However, there were no photos allowed of the inside of the chapel, so Google to the rescue.

We were not allowed to take photos of the rooms we saw inside the castle, so thanks again, Google, even though they are a little grainy.

I guess I never really thought about it, but Windsor is an actual town. As we walked to the entrance to the interior rooms, we passed this school and it was nice listening to the kids playing outside at recess.

After our brief tour, we headed to Stonehenge. The bad weather arrived before we did: strong winds, stinging rain, and very cold temperatures.

These stones have been here for over 2000 years. We took our obligatory photos and headed back to the bus. 

Our next stop was Bath. Our tour did not include entrance to the famed Roman Bath, and our tour guide told us it was mostly because our stop in Bath was fairly brief and he didn't feel we could devote adequate time to touring the Roman Bath. However...I thought to myself, I'm going to be very disappointed to have come all this way and not see the bath, however briefly it might be. Aaron had already seen it but I knew I wanted to see it as well. It was so worthwhile!

We had a bit of time to wander around the town. Bath was another misconception I had, thinking that it consisted of the Roman Bath. It is actually a beautiful town with a population close to 95,000! 

Just as we boarded the bus, the sun shone on this beautiful cathedral.

Our dinner destination was in a little village called Lacock. Because the entire village is part of the National Trust, no one who lives here can own their own home. 

On the walk to our dinner destination, we passed this large house, which apparently has been in one or two of the Harry Potter movies. It does indeed look very Harry Potter-ish. 

We had dinner at The George Inn, another old pub, dating back to 1361.

The town was very quiet and dark as we walked back to the bus.

We had a two-hour bus ride back to London, and ended the long day with a stop at a neighborhood pub.