The stately home(s) of England...

Monday 4th April 

Off to Blenheim Palace, the home of the Churchill's (i.e. Winston's parents), and a gift from Queen Anne, after the Duke of Marlborough (John Churchill),  had a victory at the Battle of Blenheim, in Bavaria.

Some gift!!! When you approach, you know you are coming on to a grand estate, but the size is amazing. The landscaping was by Capability Brown.

 

As seniors, we got cheaper entry, but it was still GBP15 each. Then, when you walk through the archway, and through to the front of the "house", it is like some huge movie set, and it is all one house and one family lived in it. (I thought I had taken a movie to give an idea of scale, but must have pushed the wrong button!)

The interior is stunning, but you can't take photo's, so we bought the obligatory book. Gardens are lovely, and include an Italian Garden, and a parterre with ponds, and the most beautiful Secret Garden. One of the lawns could house a 36 hole golf course, and it is all soooo green and lush, and beautifully maintained.

We spent some time there and had the required morning coffee, and then back to the hotel.
(By the way, our entire house would have fitted inside the entrance hall!!)

On to Nottingham tomorrow and cousin Ann...

My own personal GPS...

Getting to Oxford, (and in fact anywhere in this country or back home), is made so much easier when you have your own personal Global Positioning System. She actually does answer back, when you get things wrong, but Lee is the best navigator anyone could ever want.

There seems to be an innate sense of where we are going and that we are on the right road. Sure, we make some mistakes, but generally she is spot on.

I have no idea where we are, or should be heading, so my trust in her abilities is paramount, and we have decided to use a very simple method of communication, and that is, "CLEAR", and "WAIT!". 

We sometimes do "watch out" or "be careful", or "no, not that lane!", and very occasionally, "I think we're going the wrong way!"

Still, we got to Oxford with no real hiccups, and checked in. The first of our Premier Inn experiences, and if nothing else, you soon get to know that there are no frills and you know what to expect. Just very clean, comfortable rooms, at a good price.

They nearly all come with a restaurant attached, and the meals have been just great. The only downfall for us is the lack of a fridge in the room, they don't do tissues, and they don't do soap, (and I will never get used to body wash solutions), radio, or any channel which gets sport! 

And, only 6 coat hangers. (we are going to buy some, and carry them with us).

Good things are, they have great pillows and doonas.

Hertford Bridge

Next morning, (Sunday), we took a bus into the city and had a good day, and although it isn't as grand as I thought it would be, Oxford is worth a visit, with some lovely old buildings.

On the Monday, we went to visit Blenheim Palace... more to come

The Car Hire and "The Off"...

After breakfast in our room, we packed up and paid up, and got another cab down to the Hertz Car Hire place. It literally looks out over the airport, and you've never seen so many planes in your life. Forgot to tell you there is a take-off or landing at Heathrow every 60 seconds!!!

Greeted by a young man of Indian (?) heritage, with a thick English accent, and he's from Slough, (pronounced like plough, not rough). He pointed out there were renovations being done and directed us to the hire office, where a very efficient young man organised our car. (Having booked it back in October, it wasn't ready-and-waiting, but I was shown a couple of choices, one of which would have involved an extra 20 Pounds per day!)

Anyway we ended up with a brand new Audi A3 Sportback, and it is beautiful both in its comfort, and to drive. WARNING! All cars produced for the UK market are "european" in that the indicators/wipers etc, are on the other side of the column from what you are used to. 

So, indicate right, turns on the wipers, etc., etc.

The car is diesel, but they keep telling us it is more efficient, and we hope it is at 1 Pound 50 pence per litre (i.e. $2.38). (For the record, the hire is $3400 for 77 days, which works out at $44 per day, and if that sounds expensive, you do have the luxury of going wherever you want to)

Now came the big test (again), me driving in England. There are soooo many signs and directions, one shouldn't go wrong, but there are also soooo many other cars and vehicles too!!!

Anyway, we headed off to a place called High Wycombe, (which sounds like something out of Jane Austen), and is on the way to Oxford, and through very pretty countryside, (damn it ALL English countryside is pretty, especially in Spring!!!), and ended up finding one of the best looking nurseries we've ever seen, and it had a cafe, for our first proper coffee in England. (By the way, the coffee making has improved out of sight in the last four years!)

We were told by the manage we should go up to the Mausoleum on the top of the hill. It is a huge pile of beautifully constructed rocks, dedicated to just one family, the Dashwoods, who apparently owned (or still do), most of the land you could see in any direction!.

 

Next stop Oxford...

London, Immigration, Customs and Luggage...

The process in getting off the plane is good with Japan Airlines. They simply make everyone wait in their "classes" before letting the rest off. Saves all that scramble.

Then we bid our goodbyes to the cabin crew and especially Evan, and did the long walk. It seems to go on forever and then you emerge in to the Customs/Irrigation area. Trouble is we were one of about five (5) flights all landing about the same time.

Somebody must know how many are coming in at any particular time, and they should have the staff to cope with it. There are two points at which you can line up, the first being the queue for UK Nationals and those from EU countries. 

Everyone else gets into the other queue, which by the time we'd been to loo on the way down the long walk, was very large. We were all tired, some were more cranky than others, and we were suddenly aware that this was the area through which may illegal immigrants were about to attempt to get into the UK. One guy was escorted away by three plain clothed officers, and quite a few men from areas of the sub-continent were nervously waiting their turn. 

Trouble is, they are in the same lines as the rest of us, and just when we got near to the point of being called forward, several of us were shunted down to another part of the line to await those people who would process us.

Next thing was, they forget they'd separated us, and we stood for a long time until Lee and I were called forward, and as a "family" we went through together. (You could almost sense the man's thought's when we told him we were here for three months for a holiday. He was either thinking, "lucky buggers" or "why do they bother?")

Next stop baggage. We hadn't seen our bags since Sydney and were assured they would be sent on to London. It seems they were with us all the time, but down in the bowels of the plane, getting cold. We emerged into the baggage claim area, and there they were, off to the side, tidily standing together waiting for us. 

When I said to the staff behind the counter that they were ours, she simply said take them, without even checking our claim tickets!

How excitement! This is where the trip really starts, we are here in the UK, it's all ahead of us, so let's get the taxi to the hotel, and crash!!! 

Good idea, but the taxi driver took us to the wrong hotel. It seems there are several Holiday Inns near Heathrow, and I did tell him the one we wanted, so off we went, and ended up being told they had no idea of us, and when I showed him my copy of the booking, he said that we were at the wrong one and that he would call us a cab, as the two places, (although both Holiday Inns, didn't speak to each other!!!???)

Another cab, another very helpful driver, and another 10 Pounds later, we had our room. But, we were hungry, so we went downstairs and had a very large glass of wine, and a pizza. 

And then crashed and slept like little lambs...

Tomorrow, the car hire

(PLEAS NOTE - THIS BLOG SEEMS TO BE A DAY AHEAD OF ITSELF IN THE POSTING OF OUR 'ADVENTURES', - I WILL TRY AND FIX IT TOMORROW, WHICH IS THURSDAY THE  7TH)

Narita to London - 1st April

Awoke early after a thoroughly deep sleep, and then prepared for the flight. Everyone who wants to enter Narita Airport has their Passport checked on the shuttle bus BEFORE entering the airport precinct.

After our leisurely breakfast in the Sakura Lounge, we finally boarded, to be greeted once again by those amazing cabin crew, one of whom was the only male amongst all those beautiful Japanese ladies. His name was Evan, and we later discovered he was born in northern Spain, but spoke fluent Japanese, and perfect English. He said English was the harder one to learn!

This flight was the longer one and when you look at the screen and see "Time to London - 12 hours and 5 minutes", it can put you right off. It is soooooo tedious and boring, except for the fact that Lee had the window seat, and saw (and took photos) of the scenes below. Vast sheets of ice and snow, which seemed to be breaking up, especially near the ocean. The flight goes OVER the top and across Siberia and the Barent Sea, amongst others.

However, after many hours of crossword puzzles, and looking at a small screen of where the plane is, and then watching "Casablanca" right through for the first time, you look up again and see that you are within 3 hours of your destination, and for me at least, that is great, and it seems to go much better from there on.

We descended across Finland and Norway, and then the little plane picture showed us crossing the North Sea, and we came in from the East, ready to begin our flight path down to Heathrow, only to be told that there was a traffic build-up, and we would have to circle for a while!

We finally touched down about 5.30pm London time, and I was never so glad to be on the ground again. We realised later, that we had been on the go for 22 hours, (and chasing daylight all that time by flying West),  but things were not going to get any better when we had to go through Immigration and Customs.

Stay tuned...

The Minuses - No. 1.

Very few hotels/motels in the UK have fridges in the rooms. This is a problem for us as we like to have real milk of some description in our rooms for our coffee, and perhaps an orange juice first thing.

Then there are the minute problems we seem to have had with particular rooms, like the first night in Oxford when the toilet wouldn't flush, and the 24 hour promise of a good night resulted in our calling up, and a man knocked on our door very promptly, and sort-of fixed it. But, it didn't work again, so they moved us to another room.

The other one was today, when we arrived in Nottingham, to find that our room was ready, but Goldilocks hadn't changed the sheets. I rang down, and they were most apologetic and moved us across the hall.

Little things, but we hope they don't keep happening...

Japan - First Impressions - (31st March)

We have had some experience of Japanese people from when our neighbours had an exchange student, Yoko, some years ago. We warmed to her then and also met her parents on a couple of occasions, and thoroughly enjoyed the experience(s). We even attended Yoko's "Aussie" wedding in Sydney.

But that was their time in our country, and now we were the the strangers in Japan.

I am totally entranced by their sense of calmness and patience. Whatever the history of their culture has brought out in them, it is to be admired. For a country that has undergone such a tragedy as the recent earthquake/tsunami, there was no evidence of it. Of course we don't understand Japanese, and maybe there were elements in their conversations that we couldn't be aware of, but all-in-all there is this feeling of serenity and respect for others.

When we got to the hotel, our room was confirmed, and it was quite a large space, with two of the most comfortable beds we've experienced. We were later than we thought, and had dinner in the hotel restaurant first, and decided to have something Japanese. This turned out to be a 'Tempura Set', which included miso soup, and great tempura prawns and vegetables, plus Japanese delicacies, (read pickled stuff, and seaweed), but all very pleasant and tasty, plus some sticky rice. Topped this with a bottle of white wine from Europe, (not great, but we needed a drink), and then crashed into our lovely beds.

Breakfast was not included, so we decided to chance the Sakura Lounge, which we were entitled to do with the Premium Economy tickets. As I've said before, this you have to experience if you can stretch to the more expensive fares, because everything was just so well organised and pleasant, and the choice of food would please anyone. We had a very leisurely breakfast, and then spent some quiet time in the lounge, before going to our flight to London.

One of life's pleasures, is to be able to sit back and look and admire people, and this lounge area had it all. People of all nations, but predominantly Japanese, and just lovely faces and expressions to take in. You could tell the really well heeled folk, but just as interesting were the majority of them, who, like us, were simply flying on to other parts of the world. 

I treasure that time in there, because it was quiet, and calm, and you could lose yourself in the peace of it all, and that's important before you have to get on another plane for another 12 hours or more!

Next stop London...

Taxi Drivers...

Taxi Driver No. 1

Should have mentioned the taxi driver when we first got to Sydney. We stood in line with many others, and were allocated a taxi, and only had a short trip to the Ibis Hotel Sydney Airport. 

When we got in and told the driver where we wanted to go, he was most upset and said, "It's taken me 90 minutes to get to the airport, and then I only get a $10.00 fare!" He got out of the cab and asked to taxi co-ordinator something (perhaps for a better fare), and was told he had to continue with us.

Minutes later we were there and he wasn't best pleased, so I paid him and we went inside.

JAL Sydney to Tokyo (31st March)

We've only ever done Qantas, and British Airways, but neither of them compare to the cabin crew on JAL.
They are amazing and so attentive. Not fawning or anything like that, but genuinely polite and helpful. Our seats were good and we might try to get them again, and it allowed us a lot of room in front of us. Food was good in small portions, and plenty of fluids, which we had on the first leg, but didn't quite seem to get enough of on the flight from Japan to London, and so we ended up being a little more dehydrated than perhaps we should.

There were quite a lot of empty seats, in all classes, and I assume this is because of the recent events, and people might have cancelled. We had been determined to go ahead, and our resolve was rewarded, when the Captain made an announcement, on behalf of the people of Japan, thanking all those people from other nationalities for supporting his country at this time. He especially mentioned Australians, so it made me wonder just how many people had changed their plans, when in fact they needn't have bothered.

Still, nothing can prepare you for the tedium of just sitting there for nine hours!!! You can do just so many crosswords, or watch a movie, or try to have a sleep (which I cannot do successfully on a plane).

The range of movies was good, but many of them are dark, either in theme or in their photography, that it is hard to see all the scenes well.

Narita Airport is quite amazing in it's own way, and you get off your plane and then hop on a shuttle across to the main terminal. The passage through immigration and customs was so easy, mainly because Premium Economy allows you to go through the Priority Gate, and so we were through in minutes!

Before we left the terminal for the hotel, we needed to get some local currency, so I found an ATM, and decided to withdraw 30,000 Yen, (which turned out to be about $AUS350), but it came out in three 10,000 Yen notes, and when I went to another counter to ask if the man could change it down to smaller denominations, this charming Japanese gentleman grinned, and said, "go shopping!"

So, on to the hotel shuttle bus (every 20 minutes), and free, and finally got to the Nikko Narita Airport Hotel...

First impressions...