We slept in late today, until about 9:45am, since we did not have a breakfast to go to. I made some tea and had a store bought apple pie for breakfast. We then frantically packed up our things in order to vacate the room by the 10:30am check out time. Davin didn’t have time to eat anything.
We then headed toward Dover castle and discovered there was a special event in progress (siege of the castle). We first toured the WWII secret tunnels. I thought it was a pretty neat experience because the tunnels were still furnished, and the tour guide simply led you through as a soundtrack played that simulated the conversations of people living and working underground during the war. A surgeon was performing an operation in the hospital ward when the lights went out briefly. It was a fun, imaginative, audio experience.
Back outside, we headed toward the main castle keep and saw the outside of the Chapel (it was closed for Sunday services), and the remains of a Roman lighthouse (pretty well preserved for being 2 millennia old). Inside the keep, we read about the rise and fall of King Henry II’s Angevin Empire. One of his three squabbling sons was the famed King Richard, the Lion Hearted, who features so prominently in Robin Hood stories and films. Interestingly, we read that the real King Richard hardly ever visited England during his brief reign, and barely spoke a word of English. In fact, King Henry II and all his sons were French. It’s pretty amusing how interrelated all the royal families of Europe are. Anyway, Dover castle was built by Henry II to show the people of England how strong and great he was.
Next, we headed into the great tower where we saw actors perform a reenactment of events from 1216 when the French invaded and attacked Dover castle during the First Baron’s War. A captured French knight was being interrogated by the castle’s nobles. The actors were actually all very good, especially the Frenchman who was going to have his eyes put out if he refused to speak. He was screaming in protest in a most convincing way. It gave me chills! I felt that in the USA they wouldn’t perform something so graphic in the presence of so many children. Interesting cultural differences! I enjoyed the performance a lot, and have to say that English children are quite bloodthirsty, at least when it comes to poking out the eyes of Frenchmen.
We climbed up to the roof and enjoyed the view. The keep was a lot bigger inside than it appeared from the outside! Then we headed down into the Medieval tunnels which really weren’t that impressive. That completed our visit to Dover castle.
Back at the car, Davin expressed a desire to eat our remaining cinnamon roll. I grabbed it immediately when he asked and slid it to him over the rooftop of the car. Apparently he didn’t see it, because when we arrived at Leeds castle he asked for it again. So apparently this miscommunication resulted in a cinnamon roll being left on the top of the car and lost! Davin ate the remaining small apple pie instead, which was the first thing he had eaten all day. We paid to see Leeds castle, which was very expensive, 32 pounds! This price gains you entry to the castle and grounds for an entire year! A great deal for the English, and a great way to rip off the tourists! This is a favorite tactic of many worthwhile places to visit in England.
The ground surrounding the castle were very beautiful. We saw several black swans which are the castle’s mascot animal. The castle itself was nice. It is situated on an island in the middle of a big lake. It’s quite beautiful from the outside. The inside is nice as well, but not as impressive as many other castle’s I’ve seen.
Next we drove toward Heathrow airport to drop off our rental car. We stopped at a roadside respite/“rest bite” and got a 2 for 10 pounds deal of Bangars and Mash and a chicken sandwich. While not an outrageous price for the area, it was still at least twice as expensive as a similar meal would be in the U.S. and we didn’t even buy any drinks! (Restaurants are extremely expensive in Britain, with prices in pounds being as much or more than in dollars, and, with the current exchange rate, each pound is worth $1.50+!)
We continued on to Heathrow and discovered that Thrifty was not actually on site at the airport. We then had no idea where to go, so we were forced to pay 2.50 pounds to park so I could run in and get some information. I couldn’t find anyone to help me but managed to get on the internet (for an additional pound!), and found out that the Thrifty was located inside the Sherraton hotel and figured out how to get there. We filled up the gas tank at Texaco, had a little more trouble finding the drop off place (passed by another Sherraton, but it was the wrong one), but finally headed in the other direction and found the right place.
We dropped off the car with only the minor damage to the hub cap from where it ran into the curb being noticed by the Thrifty employee. However, we will probably be charged a ridiculous amount for what is very minor damage that was barely noticeable and wouldn’t even be worth fixing for the private individual. No mention was made of speeding tickets, but it’s probably too soon for Thrifty to be made aware of any. It will cost us 95 pounds for each one, if we did get any, and with over 6,000 cameras on their road systems, it seems unlikely we made it through the week without at least one speeding ticket!We took the shuttle back to the airport and the driver was very helpful in telling us how to get to the metro. We loaded up all our baggage on a couple of carts and headed down to the subway station. While I waited with our bags, Davin bought us 2 oyster cards for a 3 pound deposit plus put 10 pounds each on them, a total of 26Ppounds. The oyster cards let you use the metro for a cheaper fare, and will save us money when we come back to London for a week in September.
We swiped our cards and got on the metro. It was a long ride into the city, about an hour (maybe a little less?), to St. Pancras station. We got outside and a helpful police man pointed us in the direction of Argyle street. We walked around a bit before finding our hotel because it was actually on Argyle square, not street, which was the next road over. Then we lugged our bags up to the 4th floor (called the 3rd here), which was HELL. Finally, we repacked our black bag so it was “full to the point of being on the verge of bursting” and Davin estimates it weighs in at an estimated 75 lbs+. We then dragged it back down stairs (more like controlled sliding) to wait in the downstairs office for when we leave tomorrow.
I briefly used the internet to contact our Stepmom to let her know our arrival details for tomorrow, and then made the remaining meat and cheese into sandwiches. Meanwhile Davin went in the shower. I ate and went to bed. Davin ate his sandwich and baked beans while writing bullet points for today’s summary and copying DVDs/Voyagers between our two computers (moving them from his computer to my laptop which can be used on a train) so that we’ll have something fun to entertain us while we’re on the train for 10 hours tomorrow! Unfortunately, due to arriving very late at the hotel, we won’t be getting much sleep for tomorrow, which will be a grueling day.
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