Windsor Castle

Tuesday we joined a guided bus tour of Windsor Castle, the Roman Baths at Bath and visited Stonehenge.
Thank you to all who have emailed saying how much you are enjoying my travels though I don't want to bombard you with too much touristy images nor history.  Tomorrow we motor from London to Birmingham, hoping to stop along the way at some Patchwork Shops - so business commences tomorrow!

Windsor Castle was founded by William the Conquerer who reigned from 1066-87 and it has been the home of thirty nine monarchs, being the oldest royal residence in the British Isles to have remained in continuous use.  I found it vastly different to Buckingham Palace in style and decoration and though the Queen prefers living here to Buckingham Palace, which she refers to as her office only, I could easily live at the Palace!  No photographs were allowed inside, but we visited the State Apartments and were blown away with the pomp and ceremonial majesty of each room.  Not as ornate as the Palace's glitz but certainly awe-inspiring with its armour, military decorations, paintings and figures.  The tapestries hang magnificently adorning a huge area, equal to a full wall of the largest room in my house.   I tried to make out individual stitches, but I later read they were actually woven in Paris between 1776-1779.

Notice the gardeners slashing the grass whilst being held safely by a line from a higher point, like mountain climbers.  This main circular part of the castle was built in 1066 on a man-made hill so as it took precedence as a dominant force.














Next we marvelled at the advanced technology of the Roman Empire who chose the site of Bath in the first century AD to build the most dramatic suite of public buildings of Roman Britain.  The ancient remains and amazement of just how clever the Romans were as we wandered through the Temple of Sulis Minerva, Goddess of the thermal spring.  Here 1 million litres of water are released every day through this natural spa.
Every building in Bath has to be built from stone, nothing to be of brick.

I studied English History at school but never did I think for one moment that I would ever see for myself, one of the wonders of the world - "Stonehenge".  Smaller than I had imagined, but amazing.  Stonehenge is Britain's greatest ancient temple dating from around 3000BC.  This is to prove I was there!

On the way to Stonehenge, I snapped some farmland and though through the window of our moving bus, it showed farming is farming whereever it may be - similar to home.  I am still amazed that England has so much countryside left as I'd always thought it was more built upon than it is.  I was told today that London has a green belt surrounding it so as it cannot spread anymore and new buildings were limited to 6 floors high in many areas.

In London I noticed so many windows of buildings had been filled in.  Apparently, during the 18th Century, people were taxed upon the amount of windows they had in their building.  So, they simply did away with some to reduce their taxes.