Monday, April 16, 2007

Hampton Court Palace

Steph and Fraser accompanied us on the slow boat down the Thames to the beautiful Hampton Court Palace. The boys won the race through the maze by a whopping 7 minutes (we are both accountants so we had to measure) but the pub the river was the winner on the day.

Two hot wheels

Hi all,

I am please to introduce you to my new wheels - faster than a speeding tube he has propelled me around London to discover some new sights:

The NZ War Memorial at Hyde Park corner:
And to City Airport and the Thames Flood barrier:

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Easter lambs, daffodils and stone walls

We were very fortunate with both the weather and holiday traffic to enjoy a superb Easter break in England's Peak District, just south of Manchester.
We fuelled up at the start of each day with a delicious cooked breakfast and spent the days rambling through the villages and surrounds of the District. Unlike home, England was well developed before anyone even contemplated the idea of a National Park so a lot of our walking was on "public footpaths" across farm land. Given that the spring lambs are just popping out, it was quite surprising that there seemed to be no limits to public access, and at times the foot traffic seemed like a Friday night on Oxford Street. A few shots of the trip below:
Due to the very hot weather we stayed hydrated at every opportunity:

Views across the valley above Castleton:
Gabrielle at Millwall. Absolutely everything is built from stone in these parts.
I managed to get stuck on top of this cliff on the Dovedale valley walk and took a good half hour to come down on my bum. It was fun though.
"Public footpaths" near Ilam:

No need for such a long face. The grounds of Chatsworth were fantastic fun.