Stratford Upon Avon (on the way to Scotland)

This morning, we woke up in Stratford upon Avon in the UK. Our destination for yesterday on our way to Scotland for our road trip. Visiting Shakespeare’s birthplace, a building built before 1546 was awe inspiring. Stratford is a place full of black and white tudor buildings and we got to walk along the streets, realising we were walking along the same cobblestones as those from centuries ago. Very humbling.

On the way we drove through the UK countryside, areas called The South Downs National Park, The Midlands, Oxfordshire, Jane Austin Country, and lots of farming areas with quaint names like The Brambles, and Wynd Wood. I love the living fences, and although I didn’t see any, I could picture the little animals scurrying around, just out of sight.

We made it to Scotland after a few hours driving in the rain. It is such a beautiful area of the world. Dumfries, the town where we will celebrate Pete’s 65^th birthday.

Dumfries

Our Dumfries day trip tour yesterday – Caerlaverock Castle, New Abbey Sweetheart, Southerness, Castle Douglas (a town), Kirkcudbright (which also had a castle), Dalbeattie, Stranraer drove past other random castle ruins. It was a bit of driving, some walking, and stopping to eat, take photos and look around. (When I download the photos from my phone, I will pop them in here).

We saw a pheasant walking along the road in front of us, he wasn’t bothered about us following him.

Roads here aren’t marked with speed limits, which makes working out how fast, or slow, to drive a little challenging.

We ended the day at the pub and met some lovely people. It is great to learn about life from other peoples perspectives.

The age and history of the places here. Shakespeare’s house was built before 1546, Caerlaverlock Castle was built in 1277, the sweetheart abbey around the same time, if not earlier. It is humbling and awe inspiring and and amazing opportunity to tread these same cobblestones.

So many ideas for stories.