Sunday, August 18, 2013

Erin's Euro Adventure of 2013 Part I

     When Sam and I found out we were moving to England back in 2011 we had an entire year to prepare for that move, which is very unheard of when it comes to a PCS (permanent change of station) usually you just have months or weeks to get ready for a move, which would be hard with an overseas moves so I am glad that we had a whole year to prepare. Over the year leading up to our move we got married, moved to two separate training bases, and made many visits to friends and family spending as much time as possible with the people we love. During that time, as people learned about our awesome assignment, many said they wanted to come visit. Now, we know first hand that a trip across the pond isn't cheap so we would never expect everyone who said they would visit to actually come. However, during our first summer here with back to back visitors our friends and family proved that they really were serious about visiting and we couldn't be any happier or feel more loved that we had back to back to back visitors this summer! Our first visitor was my sweet friend, Erin, who arrived on July 9th. I think the easiest way to explain her world wind European trip is to do it diary style:

So excited to see Erin! And so blessed to have great friends willing to fly 4,398 miles and travel for over 24 hours to see me!

Tuesday: July 9th
      Erin's flight was suppose to arrive at 5:55 am, but unfortunately she was delayed in Chicago, which turned out to be a God thing since her flight from Springfield was delayed, so had her Chicago flight not been delayed she might have missed it. I got stuck in traffic though so a 1.5 hour drive turned into about a 3 hour drive, but it was worth it. I luckily made it in time to wait by the arrivals door and anxiously awaited her smiling face to come through customs. I had heard from my friends here that the best thing to do with visitors is keep them awake, so I had planned to take Erin to Dover. I plugged "Dover Castle" into my GPS and it said we would be there in an hour, so off we went in our American spec car. Unfortunately, there is a Dover Castle pub in central London and it was too late to turn around once I noticed this mistake. So Erin got to experience some London driving and I learned that I am capable of driving through Central London, which gave my driving confidence a boost since I was wary of the driving here when we first move, my how I have grown over the past 11 months! After 2.5 hours of driving we finally made it to Dover, England and had lunch at a cafe, poor Erin did fall asleep in the car but I don't blame her, I didn't keep her moving enough. After lunch we spent a few hours hiking through the White Cliffs of Dover, soaking up the sun and Erin enjoyed her first visit to the English Channel. We headed to Chippenham, with the evening rush hour traffic which made it another three hour drive home instead of two...so if you are a numbers person I did about nine hours total of driving that day and I was tired by the end. I showed Erin our cottage and we got busy making dinner for us and Sam. After dinner we took Hercules for a walk through our village and then we crashed at about 10:00 pm. Erin did great for her first day in England and with jet lag.

Erin is alert for having been up for 24 hours

The White Cliffs are much prettier in the sunlight

Panoramic settings on the camera are fun 

This weather was much better than when Sam and I went on a cold rainy day last October 

Lovely English Channel 

More White Cliffs and green grass

The Lighthouse we hiked to

So happy together 

Erin trying not to fall

England looks good on her

More panorama fun 


Pretty

We walked down to the rocky beach 


Crazy white cliffs






The rocky beach
Wednesday: July 10th
     Erin is training for a half marathon so she couldn't afford to take off any training days. She woke up early to take off running and she said it was a bit disorienting to have cars driving at her on the wrong side of the road. After Erin's run I took her to the base so that we could get money and to get her a base pass. Turns out if you have a passport then you can get a pass for six months, who knew??!! After we got her a base pass we went La Hogue and had lunch with my friend Meleah. After lunch we headed to Cambridge with the best tour guide around, my friend Meleah. She actually knows the names and purpose of all the buildings in Cambridge, it is great! We went and had tea and scones at Harriet's, which Erin loved and then we took a punting tour. Meleah and her husband Luke joined us for dinner after our Cambridge day, I made a crock-pot chicken casserole, which was delicious. I really enjoyed introducing Erin to Meleah, who has become a dear friend of mine over these past few months.

Punting and lunch at La Hogue

Tea and Scones plus Cambridge...yes I stole these pictures from Erin's Facebook....I didn't take a lot of pictures since I go to Cambridge often

Punting

Now that I have been punting three times, I can pretty much recite the tour on my own. The original manuscripts for Winnie the Pooh are stored in here....but I don't remember the name of the college so maybe I am not tour guide ready....yet

Bridge of Sighs....there are three in the world....Oxford, Cambridge and of course the real one in Italy...or maybe there were four locations, I guess I need to go punting again to jog my memory 
Thursday: July 11th
      On Thursday Erin and I headed to the gym on base for a workout with Meleah. Then we had lunch at Webbs, which is a local yet delicious sandwich shop in Mildenhall. After lunch we showered and got cleaned up and Meleah took us to Ely. Another place that she is an expert at! We showed Erin the Cathedral and then Erin and I took a train to London King's Cross. For any of my readers who are Harry Potter fans that station may sound familiar, yes we did find platform 9 and 3/4 but no we did not stand in line to take a picture. I impressed Erin with my schools of navigating the public transport in London and we found our hotel near the O2 Shepherds Bush Arena. It just so happened to be around 90 degrees that day in London and of course our hotel didn't have any AC since that doesn't exist in England so the first thing Erin and I did upon reaching our hotel room was strip off our jeans to try and cool off. After changing into our concert attire we headed to Pizza Express for dinner. Erin told me a story about how when her and her family traveled to Europe a few years ago they ordered a pizza at a restaurant to share between the four of them but it was a personal sized pizza, so we made sure we didn't make the same mistake! After dinner we headed over the the O2 Shepherd Bush Arena for the Rascal Flatts concert my dear husband bought for my birthday back in February. This is a smaller venue, so the acoustics weren't great, and we were on the top floor (3rd floor) sitting on basically a church bench, which wasn't super comfortable and with no AC it was also super hot....but none of that mattered when my boys walked out on stage! They rocked the house as usual and it was really awesome to be in a sold out show for country music where the British people were singing all of the words to every song! It was an amazing concert and I am so thankful that my husband bought us tickets, he is the best!

Ely Cathedral

Ely Cathedral 

Harry Potter nerds...I mean fans 

Waiting at the overground station 

Waiting for RF to come out...notice how sweaty we both are?

Ah! My boys! "I'm gonna stand on a rooftop, climb up a mountaintop baby scream and shout" 

"Summer nights everybody feeling sexy...holler if your ready for some summer nights"

"My wish for you is that your life becomes all that you want it to your dreams stay big, your worries stay small, you never need to carry more than you can hold and while your out there gettin' where your gettin' to I hope you know somebody loves you and wants the same things too, yeah this is my wish." 

Friday: July 12th
     Erin and I had a lovely breakfast at the hotel and the checked out. We headed to Borough Market, which is an outdoor market where we were able to walk around and buy food as we saw, so we bought bread, cheese, olives, chicken sandwiches, and had a delicious lunch. It is a really neat atmosphere. After our time at Borough Market we headed to the Heathrow airport to catch our flight to Paris. Once we landed in Paris I received a text from my sister that there was a fire in a plane at Heathrow and a derailed train in Paris and she needed to know that I was alive and safe. I told her that I was and we had just landed in Paris. After asking around and buying tickets for the metro we started our journey to the hotel...which was only suppose to take about thirty minutes from the airport. We navigated well and everything was going great until we got to the metro (their underground) which was crazy busy because it was the end of a work day on Friday. We also had a big rolling suitcase we were carrying around with us, at one point I got stuck with the suitcase in the turnstile...backing it up. Luckily, there was a nice Frenchman behind me who helped get me through. Once we made it to the platform the next problem we had, probably because of the derailed train, was getting onto one of the trains. They were so full people were literally jumping on and strangers would hug them to pull them into the cart so the doors would shut. Talk about claustrophobia and pick pocketers heaven. We let about four trains pass through, since we had a giant suitcase, before were finally able to get on one. It was a miracle that we both made it on! And I have never had so many guys look down my shirt at one time...but at least we weren't pick pocketed. Once we got off the metro we had a ten minute walk, but google maps led us astray and we got lost. We landed in Paris at 6:00 pm and arrived at our hotel, a trip that should've only taken 30 minutes, at 10:00 pm. Needless to say we were exhausted and starving by the time we got to our hotel. We didn't want to walk very far so we stopped at a local restaurant, where no one spoke English and literally they just pointed at meals other people were having and brought them to us. Luckily, Erin speaks french....which was a life saver....and we still have no idea what we ate that night, but it was delicious.

Erin in the tube station 

Riding the tube

Borough Market

Our lunch at the market

Board on the plane...Air France is nice

Excited for Paris

The meal we have no idea what it was...some chicken or something....but it was super delicious!

Stay tuned for the final part to Erin's trip: our adventures in Paris, Nice and Monaco!


Love,
Amanda

Let's go on a Trip: Might as Wales!

     July Madness, it doesn't quite have the same ring to it as March Madness, but that word sums up the month of July for the Holbrook household in a nutshell. As with every July, the month started out with celebrations of our great country. Living abroad during the fourth of July made me miss America even more, especially since we didn't have any firework shows to attend. Though we didn't have any fireworks we did have a wonderful fourth of July spent with sweet friends. Unfortunately, it was a bitter sweet day as we were saying goodbye to The West's, who are responsible for getting us involved in their Bible study and have become wonderful friends to us over the past 8 months. We had a great cookout, eating burgers, brats and hot dogs with delicious side dishes and desserts too. Though there weren't any fireworks, since we live in England and the Air Force made budget cuts which included the big firework show, we still had a blast and celebrated America in style.

I attempted to make a red, white and blue jello salad. It didn't look very good but it tasted yummy

Sam's fourth of July shirt from Great Yarmouth 

Erin's decorations 

More cute decorations 

We love America!

Sweet girl 

Darla and Chary...yes it gets warm enough to wear shorts in England 

Some of the cute Bible study babies

The mommies from Bible study with their sweet girls in their matching outfits, so cute!

The amazing parents from our Bible study

Emily, the one crying, is my favorite part of this picture

I love that Alayna is touching Adam's head....and Emily is still crying...yet this picture is still adorable 

Selfies with this sweet girl....sad that she had to move back to America

Going away presents for Shawn and Darla

Love her smile

Fun selfies 

More selfies 

Entertained with the selfies 

And again....

More...

This child is just too cute not to photograph 

And one more! I miss her!
     After the Fourth of July party Sam, Hercules and I took off on our family road trip to Wales. It is a four hour drive and we didn't even leave the house until 6:00 pm! We rented a cottage in the middle of the beautiful mountains of Wales. Where sheep roamed free, literally we were driving and had to stop for sheep crossing in the road. It was hard since it was dark and very hilly, but no sheep were harmed in our crossing.  However, we did get lost and of course there was no cell reception where we were at so Google maps was hopeless. We finally arrived at midnight and decided to go straight to bed. Which was great since Sam and I were exhausted, however, Hercules wasn't cool with being taken to a strange place and then left downstairs so he whined all night causing me not to sleep very well. Poor pup!

Hercules is excited for the road trip

Family road trip!
     We woke up to a beautiful morning in Wales. The view from our cottage was breathtaking and without any cell phone reception it was nice to be cut off from the world, with the love of my life. We decided to go to Snowdonia mountain and take Hercules hiking. However, after getting lost again we didn't arrive to the mountain until after lunch time and decided not to take the eight hour hike. Instead, we spent time in a cute town and took a shorter hike up the waterfall. Hercules loved hiking on the waterfall and he even touched the water which is something he hates. For dinner we headed to a cute little village close to our cottage, Llangernyw, which is the home to Wales oldest tree. The tree is 4,000 to 5,000 years old! Sam took a twig from the tree as a memento. After dinner we walked around the village our cottage was located, Pandy Tudor.

View from our cottage


Breakfast outside

Our breakfast view

And Again

Wales has beautiful mountains








The town we spent the day in on Friday

Hercules enjoying our stop for lunch




Horse











Hiking



The waterfall

Hiking
















He crashed after the day of walking and hiking





Yes, this is a two way road...





A 4,000 year old tree...no big deal









Hercules loved being outside at the cottage...he even escaped once
      On Saturday we ditched the dog and headed to Conwy. While in Conwy we explored a magnificent castle and enjoyed the town centre. We even stumbled upon the worlds smallest house that a man who once stood 7 feet tall lived in. Conwy is on the coast, so we had great views of the ocean. It was a beautiful, busy city filled with lots of tourists and good shopping. We had a great time exploring and even enjoyed some tea and scones outside the castle. After our day in Conwy we headed back to the cottage to check on the beast and then went to another cute village around for a dinner at a nice pub. Luckily, the land lady of our cottage left some great suggestions of places to eat.

Conwy Castle



View from the Castle


Sam using the toilet

















A Welsh Harry




There is a wall around the entire city which we walked




The worlds smallest house




Less than the size of Sam's wingspan

Our drive

More from our drive
     On Sunday morning we cleaned our cottage and headed to Caernarfon. It was a beautiful city on the coast of the Atlantic ocean. We waved to our friends and family over in America. Caernarfon was also a very lively city, even for a Sunday. We saw another castle, but since Hercules isn't a trained guide dog we weren't able to go inside, but that is okay...castles all start looking the same after awhile. We had a picnic lunch and took Hercules down to walk along the beach. Hercules doesn't really like water, especially baths, but he seemed to enjoy the ocean...he got in up to his belly! He even drank the water, which we thought was gross. After introducing Hercules to the big pond he flew across we did some souvenir shopping and then headed home. Since Sam drove us to Wales, it was my turn to drive us home. It was a 4.5 hour drive and driving in Britain is not like taking a road trip in the States, when you can't just turn on cruise control because your never on a straight highway for long enough. Thus, you are unable to just space out and drive, leaving you even more tired by the time you arrive home. We ordered take away Indian food and made it to the house around 6:00 pm!

Caernarfon Castle 



Hercules and Sam walking along the beach

He is unsure about this water...



But he tried it anyway



Hercules checking out his first castle




Sam read my book out loud to me while I drove...my human book on tape, but sometimes it made him very sleepy!
       I had a one day turn around until my friend Erin came to visit so I spent Monday cleaning the house. My friend Taryn even came over and cleaned our guest bathroom for me, what a sweetheart! We also got to try a new restaurant out and spend one more meal with our good friends, The West's, before they moved back to the states. In our Air Force career meeting/making new friends is an amazing, fun and exciting part of the journey. However, the flip side of that is constantly saying goodbye to sweet people who become a part of your daily life and my heart already aches for our future children as I know that constantly saying goodbye to their friends will be one of the hardest things they have to endure during childhood. Heck, as an adult it is hard, but we know that we aren't saying goodbye but rather see ya later!


Sweet Alayna 


She is precious

We enjoyed seeing the West's off one more time

Love this picture! Sam and Alayna are cute, we miss the West's

     Sam, Hercules and I enjoyed our trip to Wales! It was a great family getaway before our July madness kicked off and we became too busy for family time. Wales is absolutely beautiful and we hope to visit it again someday.


Thanks for Reading!

Amanda