South Gloucestershire

It was an early start to the day. James and I hit the Underground early to go and grab our rental cars while the girls and Hudsy finished packing up the apartment. Jo and I scored a little bright blue Vauxhall Corsa. We cruised back tot he apartment, grabbed the girls and H, and hit the road. Our first destination was Windsor Castle, just a 30 minute drive from Earl’s Court.

Windsor Castle had to be one of my personal favourites of the the trip so far. Because it’s still used today, everything was so immaculately kept and the whole castle was just incredible. We wandered the outside parts briefly before heading into St Georges Chapel for a Sunday service. It’s closed to the public on Sunday unless you attend a service, and we were very keen to check out the inside of this spectacular building. So we attend the service. It was so interesting to witness how such an old and respected chapel conducts it’s service. Everything is very scripted and you can follow along in a little booklet they give you. We listened to the choir sing, the lesson of the the day and also sang hymns from a remarkably similar green hymn book accompanied by a very epic pipe organ.

We sat through the hour long service, managed to snap some sneaky photos of the incredible interior, and left feeling little weird after just experiencing something remarkably different to our own memorial services but also kind of similar in a way.

We explored the rest of the outside of the castle and then headed into the State Apartments section. This is the part of the castle where Queen Lizzy often entertains guests and hosts dinner parties. It is also a museum of the rooms of King George IV… or V…. Or III? I can’t remember! There were so many King Georges.

The interior of this Castle was something to behold. Everything was so extravagant and so lavish it was kind of hard to comprehend. So much was covered in gold, from floor to ceiling, the walls were lined with priceless artworks, and I can only imagine the price of the ornaments and gifts which sat in the corridors and immense rooms.

This place was so interesting and so large we ended up spending most of the day here. We didn’t left eh actual castle until about 2:30pm. We hadn’t even explored Windsor at all. J & J ended up getting quite ahead of us and left for there BnB in the country side well before us.

From the castle Jo & I wanders the beautiful streets of Windsor, shadowed but he huge castle overlooking it. I grabbed a delicious Cornish pasty while Jo scored some incredible Italian pizza from an authentic Italian street food vendor. We sat and ate our late lunch before hitting the road, destination, Dyrham Park, our country side cottage for the evening.

We arrived well after dark at 5:30pm and felt instantly relaxed as we entered our cosy little farm cottage. It was an old barn, converted into a rustic B&B. The original stone flooring was chilly underfoot but the whole place had such a cosy feel to it. We spent the evening watching TV and just simply relaxing before crashing out in the huge king bed quite early, ready for another day of exploring tomorrow.

Asher ☺️Read more