Getting to England

Well...as many of you know Mike and I got to England safely and are getting settled in. I haven;t updated the blog because we didn't have computer access until 25 September and then I was just too busy unpacking the mountain of stuff that we have. To get you up to date I will quickly run through all the things we have done since getting here. Our first weekend in England we went to Bath. Bath is a city in the ceremonial county of Somerset in the south west of England. It is situated 97 miles (156 km) west of London and 13 miles (21 km) south-east of Bristol. The city was first established as a spa resort with the Latin name, Aquae Sulis ("the waters of Sulis") by the Romans in AD 43 although verbal tradition suggests that Bath was known before then. They built baths and a temple on the surrounding hills of Bath in the valley of the River Avon around hot springs, which are the only ones naturally occurring in the United Kingdom. Much later, it became popular as a spa resort during the Georgian era, which led to a major expansion that left a heritage of exemplary Georgian architecture crafted from Bath Stone. Bath became the leading centre of fashionable life in England during the 18th century. Bath was so beautiful and I thought at the time I had found my favorite city in the country on my first weekend out. We walked around the whole city in one day, it was great and the food was even better.

Around this time we met a couple named Barry and Kristen who we have become great friends with, they enjoy touring and seeing all there is to see here. We went to Dover Castle, the secret war tunnels and Walmer Castle the weekend after with our friends. Dover Castle is situated at Dover, Kent and has been described as the "Key to England" due to its defensive significance throughout history. During the Napoleonic wars, there was a need for barracks and storerooms for the additional troops and their equipment. The solution was to create a complex of barracks tunnels about 15 metres below the cliff top and the first troops were accommodated in 1803. At the height of the Napoleonic Wars, the tunnels housed more than 2000 men and to date are the only underground barracks ever built in Britain. At the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the tunnels were partly converted and used by the Coast Blockade Service to combat smuggling. This was a short term endeavour though and in 1826 the headquarters were moved closer to shore. The tunnels then remained abandoned for more than a century. The outbreak of the Second World War in 1939 saw the tunnels converted first into an air-raid shelter and then later into a military command centre and underground hospital.

The same day we went to Walmer Castle wheich is only about 20 minutes away from Dover castle. Walmer Castle was built by Henry VIII in 1539–1540 as an artillery fortress to counter the threat of invasion from Catholic France and Spain. It was part of his programme to create a chain of coastal defences along England's coast known as the Device Forts or as Henrician Castles. It was one of three forts constructed to defend the Downs, an area of safe anchorage protected by the Goodwin Sands, in Kent, south east England. The other forts were at Deal and Sandown. This castle was really cool because it has been remodeled the inside so that it is modern. The Queens Mother was the most recent inhabitant.