Winchester

 Saturday we hopped on a train (or two) and headed down to the town of Winchester. The weather was spectacular and we had a fantastic day. Too bad everyone else in London (it seemed) also thought it would be a good idea to head down there. The trains were packed so we had to stand or sit on the floor the whole ride. It was crazy! Winchester used to be the capital of London.

We started out at the Great Hall. It was part of a greater castle built for William the Conqueror in 1067! Most of the castle was demolished so ti wouldn't pose a threat to the English throne, but the Great Hall is still standing and amazingly preserved. It was built in the Arthurian style since the kings who lived there admired the legend of King Arthur and until recently (in the past 50 years) it was thought to be where Camelot was.

 A ruin of the castle just outside the Great Hall

A statue of Queen Victoria made for her diamond jubilee is in the Great Hall.

  These wrought steel gates were installed in 1983 to commemorate the wedding of the Prince of Wales and Lady Diana Spencer. If you look closely you can see their initials and 1981 on the top of the gates. On the wall around those gates is a sort of ruling family tree with names of the English rulers throughout the years.

There was a lovely little garden outside that the girls loved to run around in.

 Close-up of one of the stained glass windows. Each panel depicted a different monarch.

 

 In front of the Great Hall.

 There was so much history and neat architecture throughout the city.

 

 

 The Winchester Museum had a bunch of kid dress up clothes. Here's Grace modeling them. Ruby was busy coloring and not interested in dressing up for pictures :)

 Winchester Cathedral

 Jane Austen lived the last few months in Winchester after she got sick. She is buried in one of the aisles of the Cathedral. I was horrified when Rob told me to look down and I realized I was standing on her grave! When she died she was unknown and so has a very simple grave marker that doesn't mention her writing. Years later after her writing had gained popularity, this brass window was put in the Cathedral near her grave.

 Walking through the alleys near the cathedral we found this random archaeological (burial?) site and a really beautiful little secret garden.

 Winchester was so charming!

Jane Austen's residence. It's a private house, so we couldn't go in, but it was neat to see!

The longest ice cream truck wait e.v.e.r. The guy made each cone like a work of art, putting some soft serve on then looking at it and adding some, then dipping in sprinkles just right and adding the chocolate flake just right. Seriously each cone took him at least 2 minutes. From the time this picture was taken it was 1/2 hour before the girlies had ice cream cones in their sticky hands.

Grace and Colton are buddies!

England has had some massive flooding recently due to the wettest winter in 250 years! Thankfully the weather has been nice so it's been drying up a bit, but as you can see the towpath here was still closed due to flooding up onto the walk. The restaurant we were going to eat at was closed because of the flooding too.

  

Grace and the Hampshire Hog. There were hogs everywhere in Winchester.

We loved Winchester and had a fab day exploring it!

At dinner all the kids got balloons on sticks and Ben was the happiest kid alive. We didn't get the camera out in time to capture the first stages of balloon rapture, but let me tell you, he was so happy!!