August 7 – Tilbury/Cantebury/Leeds, UK

24 degrees, mostly clear

Leeds Castle

Leeds Castle is our destination today. It is about a 90 min drive from Tilbury where the boat is docked. Most of the castle is from the 19th century and is surrounded by lush, thick gardens with ponds, swans and small water falls, there's even a golf course...other than the golfing, what I think of when I picture English gardens. In total the castle is in about 500 acres...we don't see much of that.

lush grounds of Leeds Castle

Although the castle building itself is from the 19th century, much of the walls and gate outside the castle are from the 13th century. It was used by the queens of England from the 13th century.

Lunch of fish and chips was part of this excursion, beverage choice was beer or water, so I had my first full beer!! While it wasn't cider, it was quite good, it was a bitter. Not sure if I'll choose it, but...

A very short walking tour of Canterbury, followed by free time in the town was next. We wandered a bit, looked at the church (the main part was closed for Sunday service) and inundated a pub...a cheap pub. We've been paying just under 8£ for 2 pints and these 2 were 5£!!

Canterbury Cathedral

broken down bus

Back on the bus and we were off for about 5 min bigoted the bus BROKE DOWN! Seriously! Of all the places we've been in busses in the world, we break down in England. We were late leaving this morning because one of the busses broke down, I assumed we got new busses, but maybe this is the same bus. We are traveling in a pair of 2 busses and as many as can, pack into the second bus. About 20 of us wait for another bus on a grassy area on the side of the road. After about 45 minutes another bus arrives. Of course we had just been to a pub and had a pint...that means it isn't long until I need a LOO. Thankfully, there's one on the broken down bus, because there isn't one in sight otherwise...I use it TWICE.

By the time we get back it's 6:30...2 hours late...not ideal, but not the end of the world. The one bright side of this is that we missed the safety drill with the whole of the ship which usually takes about 30 minutes, and were able to do it with the small group of us in about 5 minutes.