Windsor Castle, Bath, and Stonehenge

In November, Amanda and I took a one day tour to see Windsor Castle, Bath, and Stonehenge. Now I'm highly against these organised tours because you have to rush through everything and you usually pay way too much! BUT Amanda was here for a limited time and wanted to see as much as possible and we got a reasonable price for the day. 

So we got up that Friday morning and were supposed to meet at the Strand Hotel for the shuttle to pick us up. Some mishaps with alarms and getting ready made it so we arrived right when the shuttle was to be picking us up...little did we know we were supposed to be there 15 minutes before our "pick up time." We missed our shuttle. I was annoyed because we had not been told to meet early. We the concierges what our options were, they hailed us a taxi (which was the most expensive part of our trip haha) and we were taken to the final pick up destination. Once we were at the final pick up destination, we calmed ourselves down. We had been rushing all morning and were tired but we made it and were sooooo excited for our day!

The nice thing about our tour was that we got to explore each area on our own, we just had to be back to the bus at a certain time, so we still had some say in what we saw at each area. 

We got on the big shuttle bus and our first destination was Windsor Castle. 

Windsor Castle is the largest and oldest castle in the world that is still in use! I was told that the Queen spends most weekends there and during Easter Court which is for the month of March. 

We walked in the main gates and listened a little to our audio guide. Everything was beautiful. You can see my pictures below and their captions. Since we were on the tour we had VERY little time here. We chose a few places we wanted to see. Mostly we wandered at first then the main place we wanted to see was St. George's chapel. It was beautiful. It compares in majesty to a lot of cathedrals I've seen. You are not supposed to take pictures inside but Amanda and I may have captured a few...

This is a panoramic outside of the main gate to enter the
Castle grounds.

Just inside the main gates. Behind and
below me is a nice garden area with fountains.

To the left of the frame is St. George's Chapel. The rest is the
square just outside of it. From where we were, there
were a bunch of guards lined up and we got to watch the changing of the guards.

This is one of the pictures from inside the chapel..shhh

After rushing back to the bus (which is a common occurrence because we like to stay at each area until the last moment)....we had a longer drive as made our way to Stonehenge. We had a lot of countryside that we covered and it was beautiful!! It rained off and on during our drives. Here are a few pictures of the country side.

We finally made it to Stonehenge and rode another little shuttle up to the site.
It was pretty cool to see. We took some pictures of the site and I just took in the fact that we were in the country and weren't surrounded by thousands of people. There wasn't that much to do...so we didn't have to spend too much time there. We made our way back to the gift shop area, looked around, had a small snack, and then went into the museum. That was pretty cool. I wish we had a little bit more time to spend in the museum. There were replicas of what it looked like in the beginning and showed how the rocks had deteriorated. If I were to go back, I would try to arrange so that I could go inside the circle of rocks...this is very hard and you have to plan way in advance though. Otherwise, I don't think that Stonehenge is a must see. If you have seen pictures, you have seen it...but it was still cool.

After Stonehenge we drove through more countryside to the village of Lacock for lunch. I, of course, had to try the fish n' chips to see where they were on the scale of amazingness...they were good but I've had better in my trials.

Lacock is a little village filled with lots of surprises!! It is kept in it's original state since it was created. So this village is featured in many movies including but not limited to Harry Potter, Pride and Prejudice, and Larkrise to Candleford. It was fun to walk around because it is like nothing else in England or the world really.

Another phone booth....just because they are everywhere

The George Inn Pub-where we ate lunch

Fish n' Chips-decent 7/10

On our way to Bath

Coming over the bridge in Bath to the
city centre. The bridge you see down the River
Avon a bit is the Pulteney Bridge. 

After eating a late lunch, we were on to Bath. We again didn't have too much time but decided to tour the Roman Baths. It was kind of surreal. We used some audio guides to tell us about different areas of the baths. They had areas inside with different artefacts as well. It is hard to tell about it over a blog because I can't do it justice.

Inside, near one of the main and largest baths

This is a view of the top of Bath Abbey
from inside the Roman Baths.

At the end of the baths in the gift shop...how can we resist
these sexy helmets?! There were swords too!

After seeing the Roman Baths, we still had some time to explore the city centre some more. We found a fudge shop and couldn't resist. We walked in and there was so much chocolate and lots of other treats as well. We each bought some fudge and I also bought some caramels, like those homemade ones that people make at Christmas time. We went back to the bridge that we drove over in the beginning on N. Parade Road overlooking the River Avon. 

Bridge overlooking River Avon, also looking
at the Pulteney Bridge

Bath ended up being my favourite part of this trip and has been my favourite place in England so far. I would like to come back and maybe spend a weekend here to explore more. It was so charming.

The entire day of exploring wore us out but we enjoyed it thoroughly!! Put these places on your to do list (maybe not Stonehenge..depends on your interests) if you are coming to England :)