It's no secret how much I love travel and when we took this assignment I had dreams of making my way through as many European countries as possible during our time here. Unfortunately, between the extended unexpected plant outage which was immediately followed by the four month covid lockdown, all my plans were laid to waste. Over the course of the year I planned and canceled a fall Baltic cruise that covered Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Russia, Finland, and Sweden, a Christmas trip to Portugal, a winter break in London, and an Easter trip to Belgium and France. My dream of a stamp-filled passport has fizzled!
But! My travel loving spirit would not be deterred! Once we were granted access to the world beyond the four walls of our home, I booked a trip! We were allowed to leave our homes, but not the UK, so I focused my efforts on all that Great Britain had to offer. While I had originally hoped to do London, it had not fully reopened and still had it's fair share of the covid related restrictions. Instead, I decided what better place to socially distance than in the English countryside!
I've stated on this blog before that our family is not a fan of road trips. I much prefer planes and cruising. However, in an abundance of caution we decided to limit our exposure and drive across the country. We split the trip into segments, both going and coming, and stopped off at attractions along the journey. We left Edinburgh mid-morning and drove through south Scotland and into England. Scotland is beautiful! It's like driving through a Thomas Kinkade painting. The little villages are nestled into the base of the rolling green hills with streams and wildflowers scattered about. The further south you go the terrain changes and England doesn't have that same fairytale type feel.
Five hours into our drive, we reached our first stop at Liverpool, home of the Beatles. We stayed right alongside Albert Docks and were blessed with some amazing weather that allowed us to really enjoy all the shops and activities during our time there. We took in some shopping at Liverpool One, which was exciting in itself since we hadn't done it in so long. We enjoyed lunch out (that I didn't have to cook!), frantically raced to beat an Alice in Puzzleland escape room, and enjoyed dessert (and even breakfast the next morning) at Heavenly Desserts. Liverpool was an interesting town to see and provided a great kicked off for our time away.
We continued south through England for another five hours before reaching the next stop, the beautiful Four Seasons Hampshire, which would serve as our home base over the next few days. After answering a comprehensive list of travel questions, a quick temperature check for everyone, and both us as well as our luggage being doused in sanitizing spray, we were all checked in.
Hampshire is the home of Jane Austen and it seems fitting to quote Pride and Prejudice: "You must learn some of my philosophy. Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure." I'm certain that I will indeed think back on our time here with great pleasure. It was wonderful to get out and explore the grounds of the resort. The estate sits on 500 acres in Dogsmerfield Park and the Georgian manor house was originally built in 1728. King Henry VIII met Catherine of Aragon here and she would become the first of his six wives. The house has been put to a variety of uses over the years, from a school for girls to a home for Catholic priests, until Four Seasons took over the estate in 2005.
After another long day of driving, we spent our first afternoon getting settled in. We had some sweet treats waiting for us in our room courtesy of our travel agent and the hotel. We had an early dinner and then spent some time walking the main grounds and gardens.
The next morning we were up bright and early for a tour of Stonehenge. We drove out to Wilshire and arrived at the Stonehenge Visitor Center to get checked in for our day. Under normal circumstances you would board a charter bus that would take you out to the site. However, in this covid-era only those with disabilities were bussed. We got to make the 2.6 mile roundtrip hike out to Stonehenge, but we were fortunate enough to have spectacular weather yet again.
The historic site spans more than 2,100 acres and includes numerous burial mounds that encircle Stonehenge. The rocks themselves are roughly 13 feet high, 7 feet wide, and weigh around 25 tons each. Many people say that they find Stonehenge to be a very spiritual experience. I certainly didn't see the spirituality of it, and generally walked away not feeling as satisfied as I would have liked. I intently listened to the all the commentary about the history and facts surrounding Stonehenge, which was very interesting, but found most of it to be only theory and conjecture. They don't actually know when the stone were placed there, who placed them there, or for what purpose. It was impressive to see, but still felt like one big open-ended question!
On the way home we stopped off at an English pub called The Exchequer for a late lunch. You really haven't experienced Britain in it's true nature unless you've spent time in a pub. It's shocking how ingrained the pub culture is to the nation. I even found myself devastated when our local pub, Kinleith Mill, closed during lockdown. The pub's daylight hours are really meant to be family oriented. We walk down often for either lunch with a friend or dinner as a family. When Brenna is away for the night with friends, Jacob and I always have dinner there. I know most of the people that work there and they know me. The food is excellent and it almost feels like an extension of home in that it's so comfortable and laidback. All that said, when you visit a pub that's not "yours" it's obvious that you're a tourist. But, we had a lovely lunch at The Exchequer despite some less than flattering discussion of our President at the table next to us, lol!
That afternoon we borrowed bikes from the resorts Outdoors Center and explored just a portion of the estate grounds. We had originally hoped to take part in the ropes course that was on-site, but due to Covid it was closed. First we headed down to the Equestrian Center to meet some of the horses. Then we made our way across the south portion of the estate to Dogmersfield Park where Jacob entertained a gaggle of geese in the meadow. Next we took the path east of the resort to see the herd of resident Highland cows or Heilan coos as the Scots would say. These animals are the oldest breed of cattle in the world. These cattle are ridiculously cute, with their shaggy coats and just-out-of-bed hair. The fact that these things make them look adorable is just a happy bonus. These features enable the cow to survive the harsh Scottish Highland winters. Their thick woolly undercoats keep them warm, while the longer guard hairs shed snow and rain and they use their big horns to rake away snow in order to get to food. Some of the younger calfs were cautious of our presence, but "Big Bertha" paid us no attention at all and even slung some slobber our way as she partook in the water trough.
We spent the next day in Bracknell at Swinley Forest. Of course Harry Potter will forever be connected to Britain and you usually don't have to travel far to find a Harry Potter filming location, as is the case with Swinley Forest. There are actually six film location within Swinley Forest, but the most memorable scenes would be in The Deathly Hallows Part 1 when Harry, Ron, and Hermione are camping in the woods and Ron gets mad and choses to leave and when they were captured in the forest by snatcher and Hermione hit Harry in the face with a Stinging Jinx. Scenes for the Deathly Hallows Part 2 where also shot in Swinley, as the hundreds of death eaters storm down the hill through the forest toward the covered bridge that leads into Hogwarts that being guarded by Neville.
While we love a good Harry Potter story, we didn't find any death eaters there and instead enjoyed a day of forest adventure. We started out the morning on a segway tour. After some time getting the hang of the two wheel means of transport, we raced through an off-road course filled with dumps, dips, hills, and hairpin turns. Next we took a leisurely ride through the forest and was able to get the segways up to top speed on the straight stretches. The segway can travel up to 12 mph, so it made for an exhilarating tour and was our favorite part of the day. Later, we joined Go Ape for a tree-top adventure. We've done several ropes courses in the past and so we thought we'd try something more challenging. We decided to bypass the "easy" and "easy/moderate" Treetop Adventure courses and instead try the "moderate" Treetop Challenge. Challenge being the key word. It was hard and even a little scary at times. I knew I was double tied-off and secure, but when you're focused so hard on getting across and then one twist of a rope and a slip of the foot and you're suddenly unexpectedly dangling from your harness it can be unnerving. There were eight obstacles. Each one started at ground level with a climb up a rope ladder to the starting platform and finished with a zip line to ground level. It was physically the hardest course we've ever done. Jacob had it the worst, as some of the obstacles were small, tight fits and of course he had more weight to maneuver through. The highest platform was 43 ft high, which was a challenge in itself to climb the rope ladder to the platform. The longest zip was 525 ft. Unfortunately, even the zip lines were difficult, for me and Jacob at least. Brenna always landed on her feet, but both Jacob and I would come in backwards despite our best efforts and body surf across the mulch on our backs. It hurt! On my last zip they clocked me coming in at 16 mph. It was a fun but strenuous day!
You can't make a trip to the English countryside and not go horseback riding, so for our last day in Hampshire we visited the Equestrian Center for a riding lesson and a countryside hack. Other than a few short pony rides at the Houston Rodeo, this was Brenna's first time on a horse. While it wasn't my first time, it was certainly the first in many, many years. I have a very vivid childhood memory of Mahaley's horse Bandit bucking me off that has long suppressed any desire I had to get back on a horse. But, I put that aside and climbed into the English saddle of one of the farms largest gentleman, while Brenna enjoyed the company of the largest pony, that wasn't quite big enough to official be considered a horse. Our instructors were very patient and the horses were equally tame. The most we ever go up to was a trot. It was a fun experience, but not something I'd make a hobby out of, however Brenna was eager to go again the next day. Too bad our next day was a departure day and we had no time to fit it in. We left the Equestrian Center with a promise to do it again somewhere else soon, preferably in setting that I wouldn't have to join in.
The next day we started our drive back north. After another five or so hours we made way to Manchester. I had purposely left our return plans open ended, mostly for the sake of travel but also for the weather. While we had been blessed with five straight rain-free days for all our outdoor activities, the weather was starting to take a turn. We liked our previous segway tour so much that we decided to make a stop off at Delamere Forest on our way into Manchester for one last ride before the rain washed away any chance for some outdoor fun. We did endure some light showers while on the tour, but enjoyed it none the less.
I'm glad we took the opportunity that day because the rain continued for the next few days. Given the onset of less than desirable weather and what had been a very long car journey, rather than taking a rainy tour of Manchester city we opted to start the final leg of our journey back.
It was a great trip. It felt liberating to finally leave the city limits of Edinburgh! The pandemic has hindered so many things and the outlook for the rest of summer was very undetermined. We're trying our best to make the most out of the opportunities that we have.
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