English vacation (Day 2): Leeds Castle

The jet lag hit and we couldn't pry ourselves out of bed before 11am, Kent time. I got up and got ready, then Hy and the kids woke up, except Talea. We couldn't have beaten her awake. I think the room darkening shades made it particularly hard to wake up.

We had crumpets for breakfast, and they're really good.


They're sort of like a rubberyish version of English Muffins (out here, English Muffins are just muffins...they don't even have regular muffins like us). Next, Daisha packed us a lunch with sandwiches and a strange assortment of crisps (chips) and biscuits (cookies). She made peanut butter and jam sandwiches, and what's funny is that they don't like peanut butter over here, so you can only get tiny jars of it. They just came out with a huge family sized jar, and it's literally no bigger than our smallest jars of peanut butter. I was amazed! Who doesn't like peanut butter?! Edward, for one.

We headed off to Leed's Castle, which isn't very far from here. It was last owned by an English guy who married an American (who was obsessed with birds), then he died, so she ended up raising their kids at the castle and then gave it to a Trust, so it's open to the public and kept up beautifully.




We wandered the gorgeous acreage on our way to the falcon show (which we missed).



The flower garden was beautiful, even though it was the end of the season. We next went to the bird aviary and saw an incredible assortment of fancy birds. Some even put on a show for us!


If Talea was a bird, she'd be this one, because of the hair. Tilly's hair freaks out so bad in the back!


Oscar, the cockatoo that thinks its a human and usually puts on a great show, was too interested in his food to give us any entertainment.


Tilly saw this kind of McCaw on Diego, so she liked them a lot.


Even Kiersa enjoyed the birds.


This is an English Robin, with a red breast rather than a red body like an American Robin. It squeezed through the bars to steal food.


The biggest surprise, and funniest thing, about our visit to Leed's was the dog collar museum there. The only one in the world! You have to visit it just to say you've been to it.


Next we went to the hedge maze. It was actually pretty difficult for us, and even though we left cracker crumbs along the way, we had a hard time finding the end. Finally, it started to sprinkle and Kiersa was crying for a bottle, so an employee came and asked if we wanted help to find the end. We just told him to point us down the right path and we'd take it from there, and sure enough, we quickly found the end. I normally hate mazes (corn mazes), but this one was fun.


We went underground next to the grotto, and Hyatt was so terrified that he wouldn't let Daisha put him down and he had a death grip on her. This is at the end of the maze looking down into the grotto.


It was pretty creepy down in the grotto, for the kids, but they still let us take their picture in the scary face.


Break for lunch!


Next we went to the playground

and let the kids play with Hyrum, but it started raining worse, so we took shelter and felt sad about the fact that the bird show would probably be canceled. We noticed in the distance a man walking by with a bird, so we ran over to the covered area where he was and caught a show of the last bird they brought out. They had done the show after all and we had missed it!!! We'll have to go back later.


We toured the castle next, and that was really amazing. It's the first castle I've ever been to, but the guides are smart and give the kids a list of things to look for throughout the castle to keep them from getting naughty or bored.

I just love some of the signs I see around here, so I take pictures of them. They never say "exit", only "way out". Restrooms are "toilets" or "water closets", but you'll see it abbreviated as WC. Also, you have to "mind" things, like your head or the gap (the space from the sidewalk to the train step) or your step (down stairs), instead of "watch" those things. And don't let those dogs do their "foul" thing on the lawn!


When we had our fill of Leed's, we went home and relaxed. I felt like I'd adjusted to the time change, and the rest of the family seemed to be doing well with it also. Daisha and Edward picked up some fish and chips, and that was good, but it was a huge portion. I was beginning to doubt all these things I'd heard about England...tiny cars (ours are just as small, they just have a billion more hatchbacks) and small portions (my fish and chips plate could have fed half my family). The funny thing about the fish is that the skin was still on the bottom of the fish, but we just peeled it off. It was tasty though. By the way, the bottles of ketchup come in a huge size! I mean as big as the biggest economy size I've seen in the US, maybe bigger. Dakota, my nephew, practically drinks the stuff, so Daisha has to get the big ones.

Hyrum watched a little of the "The Vicar of Dibley" while I started blogging about the trip, but we were pretty exhausted and headed to bed at midnight (which is only 4pm back home). I hope my transition back to Pacific time is as smooth as the transition over here has been.