Belated Anniversary Celebration: A Visit to Portsmouth

Since we were not able to do anything special ON our anniversary, we decided to take an overnight trip and stay in a bed and breakfast in Portsmouth, England at the end of October. Portsmouth is on the southern coast of England and is southwest of London. Bill was very excited to visit because the British navy is HQ'd here.

The coast is quite beautiful (though very windy and chilly!).

One of the main attractions in Porthsmouth is the Spinnaker tower, completed in 2005. It is 557 feet tall and was built in a maritime theme to reflect the city's nautical heritage. It is the tallest accessible tower in all of England.


We took the elevator to the top of the Spinnaker Tower and this is the view from the top.


The most interesting feature in the tower is this see through floor to the ground!

Now, I am not the biggest fan of heights so I had a VERY hard time walking across the floor. There is a railing that goes along the length of the floor and I held on to it for dear life!!


I agreed to pose for this picture for .5 seconds and Bill caught it!!

Bill does a little better with heights than I do.


Posing by the window.
Next we ventured over to the Historic Dockyards. Below is the HMS Warrior, a ship from the 1860s.


HMS Victory, the oldest commissioned ship in the world built in 1759.
A view of the ship's stern.

Admiral Nelson died on the deck of the HMS Victory during the Battle of Trafalger in 1805.

Since Bill and I have been married, we have toured several old ships. This whole dockyard area of Portsmouth has several different maritime museums and is a great place to bring future visitors.

ROADTRIP!! Stonehenge and Bath

In late October 2010, Bill and I decided to take our first day road trip. He missed the Navy Ball the previous weekend so on his 4 days off in the middle of the week we decided to get out and make up for it.

One great thing about England being a relatively small country, is that it is easy to travel to see the amazing sights it has to offer.

We were very excited to visit Stonehenge. The drive to get there from our house is about 3 hours.

The guided tour uses little phones that you listen to as you move around the monument. The placement of the stones is thought to have occurred around 2500 B.C. There are about 20 different types of stones in the construction of Stonehenge. One type used, blue stone, is found in the country of Wales from an area about 160 miles away. These stones weigh several tons each and were placed in pre-dug holes in the ground to give the stones a standing appearance.

There are several theories about how Stonehenge was built and its various uses throughout history, but the gist of what the tour said is that they really do not know.

I say Aliens built it.


Following our Stonehenge tour, we hopped back in the car and drove about an hour to our next stop, Bath.
This region of the country (the southwest) looks very different than the "East of England" where we live. Near Bath the landscape is dominated by dramatic hills and an emerald countryside.


As we drove into the city, we descended into the Avon Valley from the south and had the most breathtaking view of the city as it climbs up the opposite side of the valley.


Bath was first established as a spa resort and built in 43 A.D. by the Romans. Bath was one of the farthest reaching outposts of the Roman Empire and this area was used as a spa because of the natural hot springs located here.

The city experienced a period of great expansion in the 1600s when the Georgian style was popular. Many of the buildings in the city are this style and made of stone from the surrounding region.

This is a shot from inside the Roman Bath museum with a view to the cathedral outside.
This museum also included an audio tour and had many great artifacts from the Roman period.


This city is currently popular for spa getaway weekends and has some amazing festivals in the summer months.
We learned the hard way about afternoon traffic and country roads. It took us 5 hours to get the 179 miles back home! This is a city I definitely plan to visit again.

Navy Ball 2010

Navy Ball for our command here in England was back on October 16, 2010. Coincidentally this was also my and Bill's first wedding anniversary. The picture above is of the Chief's Mess for RAF Molesworth. Notice Bill is missing.

SHOCKINGLY, Bill had to work this night so he not only missed the ball, but our first anniversary as well.

Not being the kind of girl to stay at home and miss a good party, I went to the Ball stag and had a great time!!

A few of the ladies: Karey, Casey, me, and Esther.

Navy Ball is a lot like a prom or formal (for you fraternity/sorority types). The event started with a cocktail hour. We then took our seats for dinner and a special ceremony celebrating the Navy was presented to us. After dinner, the DJ took over and everyone danced until dawn!

A few more spouses and not just Navy. All branches of the military stationed at Molesworth are invited to our Ball as well.
Me, Karey, Meredith, Shelly, Shavon, Katie, and Nichole. Everyone goes all out with their dresses and get their hair and makeup done. Lots of gorgeous ladies!


Here is me being a third wheel again.
I'm really looking forward to Navy Ball this fall 2011 because I'm pretty sure I'll have a date!!

Driving on the Wrong Side

It is no secret that one of the things I was most nervous about when I found out we were moving to England was the driving. We made the decision to move my Nissan Murano with us rather than the Jeep (insert Bill's tears) since I am crap at driving stick.


So I'm driving on the American side of the car on the left side of the road. I guess I considered it a compromise since I'm only switching one thing rather than two.

It has been a struggle to say the least, learning to drive on these tiny British back roads that are about 1 1/2 lanes wide with my giant American vehicle.

Yes people, they expect traffic to go in both directions on this road.


Roundabouts still confuse me at times. You need to know exactly where you are going when you approach them so you are in the correct lane. The smaller ones, no problem, but the 4+ lane ones with 5 exits give me white knuckles every time! I'm getting better, but I have definitely not mastered them yet (right Bill :-) ?)

Okay, so this may be a bit of an exaggeration but craziness like this does exsist!!


My final gripe with the Brits on this topic is their limited ability of labeling their streets or motorway exit signs. Rather than exiting at a specific street, you are told what towns are in a certain direction. Thank goodness for the invention of the GPS. I don't know how I'd get anywhere around here without it!!

Bubblin' in Dublin

Back in early October, I met up with my friend Lisa in Dublin. She came over for a week long bus tour around the country and spent several days at the end of her trip in Dublin before heading home. We used to work together at my first job in San Diego back in 2002. She is an awesome friend and since she moved to Seattle a few years back I have not seen her much so I jumped at the chance to spend a few days with her.


Here we are at a pub in Temple Bar enjoying live Irish music and the first of SEVERAL pints of Guinness we had that weekend.


We bought 2 day passes for a hop on hop off bus that travels around the city with stops at the major sights. If you ever go to Dublin I recommend this bus. It is a great way to get around the city because the main attractions are very spread out.

One of my favorite tours was the Guinness Brewery. Growing up in Milwaukee, I am no stranger to breweries. I've been on a tour or two in my time. This one blew the other ones away.

As the tour progresses you move up higher and higher in the building. At the very top there is a bar with panoramic views. Unfortunately, I do not have any photos from up there because the bar was PACKED and I could not even get to a window.



Lisa and I spent a lot of time just walking around the city exploring the streets. We came upon this cute farmer's market. I naturally gravitated to the baked goods table.



And the flowers :-)
Many buildings are built in the Georgian style with this specific styling to the doors.


As part of our tour bus passes, we were able to take a half day trip about 30 mins outside the city to Malahide Castle. The same family lived in this castle for over 800 years before they had to sell it.


We had a great time exploring the city and even made a few friends along the way!! :-)

Labor Day in Amsterdam

Over Labor Day weekend we decided to join a base sponsored trip to Amsterdam. It was very convenient since we were picked up right from the front gate of the base. We drove to Harwich and our bus drove right on to the ferry boat. The ferry took 6.5 hours to get to Hoek von Holland, Netherlands and then it was a short ride over to Amsterdam.


We has excellent weather over the weekend and had plenty of time to walk around sightseeing on our own.

Amsterdam is very clean and beautiful city. There are canals everywhere and many people travel around the city via boat. There are several homes like the one above that are actually on the canals which was very interesting to see.

Amsterdam is very well known for it's Red Light District. A very interesting area to say the least. There are many "novelty shops" as one would expect, and there are actually windows where women are on display who are available for purchase. Very strange to see so openly. Drugs and prostitution are legal here and despite this, the city runs beautifully.


Below is the city of Delft, famous for it's very beautiful and pricey pottery. We had a tour of one of the 3 official Delft pottery factories and were able to purchase the real deal at a wholesale price. I purchased a little something for my mother and a lovely bud vase for our home.


They city of Delft was very quaint and beautiful and had great souvenir shops that sold everything from pottery to wooden shoes.

Bill didn't keep his, but I got a great pair of slippers that look like wooden shoes. Very cute and super cozy!! We loved Amsterdam and would visit again for sure!

Hunstanton Beach

Back in August, Bill and I took a trip to the beach since it was such a gorgeous day!! We were recommended to check out Hunstanton Beach which is in the East of England region of the country on the northern coast. It is only a little over 60 miles away from where we live, but as we quickly learned, it takes forever to drive anywhere around here. Because it was the weekend and a sunny day, traffic was pretty crazy and I think it took us 2.5 hours to get up there.

We were pretty hungry after our longer than anticipated drive so we plopped down and had our first meal of fish and chips with a view of the sea.


After lunch, we walked around the the area to check out the very rocky beach. There was an area with a midway and arcade games along the boardwalk.


The town has lots of cute little shops and ice cream parlors. A major tourist trap, but an enjoyable little spot!