Bury St. Edmunds C

Our last major stop was the Greene King Brewery. We had just missed the final tour of the day so we just walked through their museum. It was a quick tour, because we wanted to get back to Mildenhall before dark.

On our bus ride back to Mildenhall we passed several "pig farms". They are setup different than what I know of in the USA. One farm had the pigs in a huge open dirt field where some pigs were rooting and others sunning. Another farm had small metal covers (kind of like dog houses) in a field of grass with the pigs just roaming. We decided they must be "free range pigs" (that means they can get higher prices for the meat).

Tomorrow we plan on going in to London . We will leave here about 6:30am and hope to return about 7:00pm. Then on Saturday we will have about the same time frame, but go to York. Sunday is still undecided, but I have a feeling it might be a very slow calm day.

I hope I haven't bored anyone too much. I need to get to bed.

Bury St. Edmunds B

Next stop was St. Edmundsbury Cathedral. There was a nice flower garden and several buildings. Some of the ceiling had recently been redone and an exceptional ceiling was installed in the tall tower. We could go directly underneath and take pictures, but were told that in a few months when the alter area is completed, that area will no longer be open to tourists.

The next stop was St. Mary's Church which was smaller, but still impressive with stained glass windows and old (well worn flags).

Bury St. Edmunds A

I am having trouble with picture placement so I will do several posts in order to get the pictures in the right places.

Today we toured Bury St. Edmunds. It is a medium sized town/village.

Our first stop was "The Nut Shell". According to a lady at the bus station - "It is the smallest/tinest pub". She said that her husband used to play darts there and he had to stand outside the door to throw at the dart board. It is a VERY narrow building. We of course went to and had a beer. A few other people came in (about 4) plus the 4 of us and the bartender and it was crowded.

We walked on down to some shops and decided to eat lunch at the West Cornwall Pasty Company. We had pasty (that is how they spelled it) filled with various ingredients. It was very good.

2nd Mildenhall Quarters

I hope to learn how to use this within the next 2 weeks.

Thought you miight like to see where we are staying.

First the outside of the building.


Next we have the living room.


Then we have the kitchen.


Then we have the kitchen showing the washer & dryer in the closet.


Last night when I tried this the photos got switched around so if they are in the wrong order, try to figure it out.

Mildenhall Quarters

England

Shannon got us to the airport in fine form and I had hoped to use wireless there, but there was a fee and I refused to pay it for 2 hours of potential internet access. The plane was totally full (still getting people back home after being delated due to the volcano in Iceland).

Well, we made it to England without any major problems or delays, buttt once we got here my sister & her husband couldn't get on the bus with us to come to Mildenhall so they had to find commercial tranportation (bus). I told her we would pick them up at the bus stop in Mildenhall Village. The drive from the airport was typical most places (lots of traffic and construction), but no major delays. There are fields of yellow flowers (they extract canola oil from them) and lots of green fields. After we got to Mildenhall AFB, checked in and dropped all the luggage (we kept my sister's luggage so they wouldn't have to mess with it) in the rooms and found a cab to go to the Village. We found out they probably caught a bus leaving Heathrow at 12:10 and were to arrive in the Village at 2:40pm. A bus came in at 3:00pm and they weren't on it and I begin to second guess where they might have gone or what could have happened. At 3:10pm a bus pulled in and I saw them so that was a relief. It turns out their bus broke down and delayed them about 30 minutes. We caught a cab and came back to the base, signed them in so we could get guest passes for them and then came to the rooms. By this time, I was pretty hungry so we went to the BX (not very English of me, but hey it was convenient and available) and got fast food (pizza). Tomorrow we will drink beer.

I found out (after we got here) that US military retirees that visit England are not allowed (according to UK rules) to purchase things (even with an ID card) at the BX or Commissary (there goes that plan).

Tomorrow I think we will check with the Base Ticket office and gather information and then get a cab to take us to the train and we'll head to London for a couple of hours. After that who knows. I'll try to keep this blog up with exciting information.

The suitcases are finally out and partially packed. I'm not quite in the panic mode, but I have been contemplating should I take this or that as I think of things that might come in handy. We have weighed the big suitcase and it appears to be under 50 pounds so I think we are in good shape.

The cameras have been checked and prepared for vacation. I have the passports, airline info, hotel info, rental car info, etc. I'm sure I'll think of more tomorrow.

Well, here we are about 30 hours before leaving home for the airport. We are scheduled to leave DFW on Tuesday (27 April 2010) at 4:45pm and arrive in London at 7:50am Wednesday (28 April 2010). My sister and her husband are leaving DC (Dulles) Tuesday (27 April 2010) in the morning and arrive in London late Tuesday evening.

Planning stage:

This is where I will be posting our trip to the UK (27 April 2010 thru 12 May 2010). I hope this will at least be entertaining to some of you.

This trip is in celebration of our 40th Anniversary (18 April 2010). Some days it seems like it wasn't that long ago in Rileyville, VA that we exchanged those vows. As some/most of you know, we were married in the Baptist Church that I was raised in. Our ceremony was a bit out of the ordinary in that we had a Catholic Priest perform the ceremony with the assistance of a Christian Pastor (a family friend). If I remember correctly, this was a first in Virgina for a Catholic Priest to perform the ceremony outside of a Catholic Church. My have things changed.

My sister (Bertha Dale) and her husband (Ollie) will be accompanying us on this adventure.

That's all for now.