Visiting the Queen & Other Adventures.

In all the hullabaloo that's been going on since February 14th, I completely forgot to mention my very own gift! Not to worry though - as I only received it today. On Valentines Day, Jason instructed me to keep my Saturday free for a surprise.

Unfortunately that surprise involved getting up before 7am in the morning. And did I mention that Jason is terrible at keeping surprises, well, surprises? I'd bugged him with questions and finally cracked him by guessing what we were doing. Turns out he had booked us an all day coach tour, to see Windsor Castle, Stonehenge and Bath.

A little bleary eyed, we made our way to Victoria coach station and joined our tour - where our first stop was to explore Windsor Castle. Jason used to work out this way and walked past the castle every morning to get to work, but I'd not really heard much about it. It was absolutely massive - this is only about a quarter of the site.

The British flag was flying from the roof too, meaning that the Queen was in residence there over the weekend, and I was fairly chuffed. How often can you say that you've been within a short space of royalty? Apparently a couple of the Queen's corgis were taken out here to have a royal wee not long after we left this spot.

After we explored the castle state rooms and grounds, we saw the changing of the guards and went for a walk along the main streets in Windsor. It was utterly freezing today, but still sunny so made for perfect sightseeing weather.

Our next stop was Stonehenge; something I'd wanted to see for years! Last time we were in England, we both said we would leave the trip until the end, but ended up so exhausted after all of our travelling that we never got around to it. It took about an hour in the coach to get to the Salisbury Plain, but we finally made it.

It was pretty incredible - the stones are massive, yet still a lot smaller than I pictured they would be. Apparently over the years, many of them have disappeared, which is sad. It would have been amazing to see them all laid out in their prime.

After a hot chocolate and almond pastry, we had another long drive to Bath - a gorgeous town, with all of the buildings carved out of the same tan limestone. The terrace houses were beautiful, the Avon river was beautiful, and the weather was beautiful - except for the fact that it was so cold, I thought my hands would fall off. We looked around the town centre, before heading into the famous Roman baths.. in Bath. Ha!

I loved hearing the historical aspect of them, but find it very sad that you can't actually use the baths. Not the Roman ones of course, which are there for display only, but you'd think with a natural geothermal hot spring underneath the (very cold) town, that someone would be making use of it aka Rotorua in New Zealand? I wonder if there's a reason for it? Either way, the Roman baths are really interesting.

At the end of our visit here, I decided to do the mandatory toilet stop - and Jason took the camera off me, making fun of the fact that I was about to take it into the bathroom with me. That turned out to be a big mistake though, as each toilet stall had a glass window overlooking one of the outer baths - a perfect tourist free photographic opportunity. Despite the sign reminding its female patrons that the glass was one-way only, it was a wee bit disconcerting dropping my trousers in front of a window!

The drive back to London took over two hours, but was well worth it. We spent just enough time in each landmark, saw heaps, and I loved it to bits. Thanks Jason, for a perfect (if a little belated) Valentines Day present. I love you!