We had a wonderful time visiting Joey's dad, Christine, Zach, and Ben in England. We left Tampa on Friday at 6:00 pm and flew to Washington DC where we hopped on the red eye and flew to Heathrow Airport in England. It was 7:30 am FL time when we arrived (12:30 pm England time). Koa did great on the plane. He didn't sleep soundly, but it was easy to put him back to sleep--and most importantly, he didn't keep any other passengers up! :)
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| Blocking the bright lights so he could sleep. |
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| Watching a movie--he actually left the headphones on! |
Great Stukeley
We made it to Great Stukeley, where Joey's dad and family live!
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| This sign is about 2 houses down from the Kaleikini's house. |
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| Kaleikini Home |
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Koa showing his Grandpa and Grandma Kaleikini his belly.
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Sunday morning we walked down to the neighborhood pub for a traditional "Full English Breakfast:" bacon (more like what we would call ham), eggs over easy, grilled mushrooms (one huge mushroom), sausage, tomatoes, and toast with tea (or in our case, coffee).
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| This picture is taken from the Kaleikini driveway |
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| Niftly high chair |
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Breakfast was delicious!
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St. Ives
As I was going to St Ives
I met a man with seven wives.
Each wife had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats,
Each cat had seven kits;
Kits, cats, sacks and wives -
How many were going to St Ives?
- anonymous.
St. Ives is a little market town with a lot of history. The first recorded settlement was in the year 986, it has one of only four bridges in England to have a chapel incorporated into its structure, and Oliver Cromwell lived there for a period of time.
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| Koa feeding the ducks and swans. |
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This is the St. Ives Bridge which crosses the River Great Ouse. You can see the chapel where travelers stopped to thank God for safe travels.
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| St. Ives |
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| The Free Church |
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| Enjoying the unusual 80 degree weather! |
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| Oliver Cromwell statue |
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We had lunch at the White Heart, a pub in St. Ives. We sat outside in the "beer garden" and Joey had his first pint at a pub!
Cambridge
We spent the day walking around Cambridge. We saw an amazing church, played in the park, and saw some of the university. Oh, and lunch at another pub!
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| Cambridge University |
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| A Research Building |
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| Library |
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| Koa really enjoyed the park! |
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| So did Dada and Grandpa! |
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| My Favorite! |
Catholic Church of Our Lady and the English Martyrs
This beautiful church was built between 1885 and 1890.
We had lunch at the Prince Regent, a pub that was across from a big park near campus.
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| We loved sitting out back in the "beer garden." The weather was so nice! |
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| Koa has started to ask to hold our hands out of the blue. It's so sweet! |
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| Koa playing at the park across the street from G & G Kaleikini's house. |
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| Dessert at the pub down the street. |
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| Koa loves remote controls! |
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| Koa and Grandpa |
London: Day One
We took the train from Huntingdon to London (about an hour ride) and then explored London using The Tube (the subway).
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| Huntingdon Train Station |
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| Train Station in London |
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| We are in London (Koa made it, too)! |
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| Koa napping on the tube. |
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| Our stop for seeing The London Eye, Westminster Abbey, Parliment, Big Ben, and Buckngham Palace. |
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| The London Eye--at the end of our sightseeing day, we went up in the Eye and were able to look around at all of the places we went throughout the day. |
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| London Aquarium |
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| Big Ben at Noon--we got to hear the chimes |
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| Parliament |
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| Oliver Cromwell Statue |
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| Westminster Abbey |
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| Westminster Abbey |
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| Buckingham Palace |
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| Heading to the park to eat our lunch. |
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| Another beautiful park! |
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| On our way up in the London Eye--Grandpa is standing by the railing. |
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| Nap time for Koa! |
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| What a view! |
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| Kind of like Times Square in New York. |
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| Street Shows |
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| We thought the architecture was really neat how it curves with the road. |
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| Trafalgar Square--Site of the 2012 Olympics |
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| Koa is getting the hang of the tube--he even wanted to hold onto the hand rails! |
Woburn Safari
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| Koa loved the monkey crawling on the car...he wanted to grab his tail! |
London: Day Two
Buckingham Palace Changing of the Guard: we made it just in tim to see the 30 minute ceremony. Lots of marching and band playing! There were so many people!
Princess Diana Memorial Walk
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| I am standing at the base of the monumet to show how huge it is! |
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| This tree was so neat...you could go inside it! |
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| Old water fountain--this one isn't working, but the one in St. Ives did! |
Notting Hill Scavenger Hunt
I told Joey that I really wanted to see some of the sights from the movie, Notting Hill. He got online and made an entire list of places for us to visit. We had a blast finding them and then watching the movie when we got home and recognizing the streets we were exploring!
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| The Travel Bookstore in the movie is really a shoe store in real life! |
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| This is the street where the dinner party for Hugh Grant's "little sister's birthday" takes place. |
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| The "oops-a-daisy" gate that Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts climb over. |
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| The travel bookstore that the movie is based on. |
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| The "blue door" where Hugh Grant lives. |
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| We had lunch at this pub and then actually saw it in the background of the movie when we watched it at home. |
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| EVERY pub we went to was advertising their Christmas menu. Apparently people book the pubs well in advance for parties. |
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| The best fish and chips we had while we were in England. |
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| This was a neat clothing store that had hundreds of old sewing machines. |
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| Some of the doors were so small! |
I happened to be reading Something Borrowed and Something Blue by Emily Griffin (thanks to Becky :) and had to see if the places mentioned in the book really existed!
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| Ethan, from the book, likes to visit Holland Park. |
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| Ha ha! |
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| Kyoto Garden in Holland Park (Ethan's favorite spot). |
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| The book mentions peacocks living in Holland Park and sure enough, there were peacocks! |
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| On our way to the Muffin Man...what a neat part of town! |
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| Favorite breakfast spot in the book. |
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| Enjoying coffee and cake. |
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| Shakespeare's Head Pub |
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| We visited a five story toy store, Hamley's. This guy is made of legos! |
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| Another pub: The Glassblower |
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| Joey was very surprised to see a burger joint from Hawaii in London. It happens to be one that his dad really likes--I'm sure he will be making a trip to this spot in the future! |
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| The Silver Cross |
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| Sherlock Holmes Pub |
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| The press conference at the end of Notting Hill takes place here at The Savoy. |
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| Tower Bridge--it was so beautiful walking around London at night! |
Huntingdon
We went to The Old Bridge Hotel for tea.
Koa on Zach's pogo stick! He practiced all week to master this skill!
We really enjoyed our visit with Grandpa and Grandma Kaleikini, Zach, and Ben! We were happy to be able to celebrate Zach's 18th birthday with them and enjoyed hearing the track meet accomplishments! Thanks for showing us around England and making this trip possible! :)
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