Finally in England

I'm finally here! I've been having a lovely time with our family friends Geoff and Margaret Scard in the two days I've been here so far.

I love their garden - it's so beautiful and full of flowers and trees and hedges. It reminds me of Mary Contrary's garden (except for the cockle shells all in a row). They have a small family tortoise named Josephine who they guess is over one hundred years old! She has a little hut outside and they feed her tomatoes and lettuce.

Today we went to the city of Winchester, formerly the capital of Wessex and then England from the late 9th century until it was moved to London later. We saw the ruins of Wolvesey Castle (the Bishops' palace), the Norman Cathedral and the High St. and we also walked past the house where Jane Austen lived for a short time until she died in 1817. It was being repainted and was covered in scaffolding unfortunately. After having some cream teas for afternoon-tea, we walked up the High Street to the Great Hall, which was all that's left of the Winchester castle and saw King Arthur's Round Table mounted on the wall. It's not really Arthur's table of course but it has all of his knights' names written around the edge and was from much later on in the 13th century.

It's been raining on and off all day and is a bit cold (around 12 degrees) but there are times where the sun shines brilliantly through the clouds and it warms up.

Kim xo

Apple trees in the Scard's back garden

Margaret at the Wolvesey Castle ruins

Thatched cottages near the village

Winchester Cathedral. It doesn't look big in this photo but it is huge.
Jane Austen is buried there, but we didn't go in. 

I wandered lonely as a cloud...

The bluebells are all in bloom!

King Arthur's Round Table

View from the Scard's kitchen