We're going to England!!!!

[fenchurch]

There is not enough squee in the world to describe how I'm feeling right now!

We finally bought our plane tickets a few hours ago and it's starting to hit. It's real. It's really real! Squeeeeeeee!!!

So people! Friends of mine! I ask you...

What should we do while we're in England? We fly out of Seattle on October 4th and arrive in London on the morning of October 5th... and fly back home on October 18th. Two full weeks to fill!

So far, our very loose plans include exploring the London area for about a week. Our plane tickets came with a free Royal Pass apiece, which gets us in to see the Tower of London, Hampton Court and Kensington Palace. Of course, we're also planning on going to the British Museum (hey, they have the Rosetta Stone! And Giles used to work there! ;-), visiting my namesake (Fenchurch Street Station) and at some point I'll be having my picture taken while sitting on my own in a small cafe in Rickmansworth (there are some things which simply MUST be done).

We've already picked up a copy of the book Where Was Wonderland? A Traveler's Guide to the Settings of Classic Children's Books on babyotto's recommendation and will be trying to visit some of the places mentioned there. At some point, on queenofthorns's recommendation, we're also going to be heading over to Greenwich -- what could be worth more geek coolness points than visiting the Prime Meridian!!!

After that, we'll be renting a car (and yes, I'll probably wimp out and make rackham do all the driving again, like I did in Australia... while I sit in the passenger seat and say "left side!" from time to time) and heading north to Lancashire. Whalley, in particular. Rackham's ancestors came from there, and it still boasts the bulk of the people in the world with our last name. And if you take a look at this page, the second image down is a photo of the choir stalls carved by Rackham's ancestors back in the early 1400's... it's something Rackham's always wanted to see (and I'm just a little psyched about getting to see them, as well).

Then we're thinking of taking the ferry out of Heysham over to see the Isle of Man -- all those photos curiouswombat keeps posting have made us really want to see it in person! Afterward, we'll head back into London for another day or so before flying home.

I know a lot of you have already been to England or live over in that part of the world or want to go and have some fantastic ideas of what would be neat to see! Now the question is, what else should we do while we're there?

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/opalescence_/]

Oh gosh, I am sooooooooo jealous! That is so great!!!!

[fenchurche.livejournal.com]

I never thought this would happen... we've been talking about pretty much since we first got married, though it's only been in the last five years or so that we even had a hope of affording it. And then our plans kept falling through, over and over, for various reasons. It still almost doesn't feel real!