Back to Oxford

After our camping trip in Wales, we headed back to England to Bert and Adreann's house. Our last full day in England we decided to go back to Oxford for a little more Harry Potter magic and Alice in Wonderland, and there's no better place for that than Christchurch college. This time we actually went inside, yay!

The grand staircase from HP

 The Great Hall from HP.

 This particular stained glass window has Alice Liddell in it (top left window).

 Back down the stairs.

 The cloister, near the cathedral.

 Inside the cathedral. This stained glass window is of the prophet Jonah watching the city of Ninevah.

 This stained glass window has Alice's sister, Edith, in the middle (she died when she was 22 I think).

 This looks like the podium that Dumbledore spoke from in the great hall...but it's not...but maybe it inspired it ;)

 This plaque is in memorial to Henry Liddell (Alice's father) who was a dean of Christchurch, and is buried in this cathedral.

This is the Liddell coat of arms on this gate. The only reason we found this was because we asked a worker in the cathedral about the Liddells, and he showed us the plaque, the stained glass window, and then he pulled out a book from the front desk that had additional information, and in the book it talked about this gate, so we went and found it in the cloister. Very cool!

 More of Christchurch.

Oxford is such a great town to visit. Great history. Great souvenirs ;)

And then our last trip came to an end, and we had to come back home and deal with the reality of moving again :(

And so it goes.

Wales Again, Part 2

Thursday morning was my favorite because we got to go to Snowdonia National Park! We did a popular hike at the Cwm Idwal Cirque (a large amphitheater-like valley formed by glacial erosion) around the lake there (Llyn Idwal). In a 2005 poll, Cwm Idwal was ranked the 7th greatest natural wonder in Great Britain. Basically what that means is that my pictures are NOT going to do this place any justice. None. I'm so sorry, but here they are anyway.

 Getting started. We were at a higher elevation, so it was a bit chilly here, but we knew we'd warm up once we got our blood pumping. The sun played hide and seek behind the clouds the whole time, so sometimes it was pretty windy and cold, and other times it was quite warm and pleasant.

 This part of the hike was my favorite.

 We stopped at this boulder for a snack, and hid behind it because it was so windy at this point.

 There were two older ladies swimming in this lake. I can't even imagine how cold it was.

 And back where we started.

Interesting things about Snowdonia:
- I was surprised to learn that over 26,000 people live within the park, and there is a significant amount of agricultural activity in the area (that means we saw a lot more sheep there).
- The mythology of King Arthur is heavily associated with Snowdonia. Several of the lakes there claim to contain the magical Excalibur.
- Guy Ritchie's recent King Arthur movie was filmed here.
- So many wild flowers.

When we finished our hike, and found some lunch, we headed to another castle - Dolbadarn. It was a beautiful hike up to the castle.

 This was built by Llywelyn ab lorwerth in the 1220's. The round tower that remains was a luxurious addition in 1230. When he died, he had several sons vying for the throne, and then grandsons. The one who became the victor imprisoned his brother here for 22 years...just in case, ya know.

The kids were up for all kinds of photo ops ;)

There was a nice big grassy area, and the kids played around for quite some time.

 There were a couple of teenage boys who decided to climb up the outside walls, and they got themselves stuck in one of those windows. Joe and Bert were gracious enough to help them down. I hope they learned their lesson ;)

Dolbadarn Castle was kind of an accidental visit for us. We were actually aiming for Dolwyddelan, but I'm glad we got to see Dolbadarn, because it was actually a little more impressive than Dolwyddelan, which we saw the next morning. Dolwyddelan was built by the same guy around the same time.

That was the end of our wonderful trip to Wales. I can't recommend Wales enough. Beautiful. Not crowded. You should go there. Really ;)