Portland Hotel Hull Coventry

With time rapidly dwindling I went down to Banbury way this afternoon to visit my brother et famille before I leave, taking the opportunity to say goobye to two young nephews - one of whom was able to appreciate some of the implications of what I am doing, "But what if you get sick?" he asked. :-)

Back up to Stoke in the late evening. Last day of preparations tomorrow.

... were ready the 8 of us piled into the car and began on our days' journey. Our first stop was one of mum's old houses when she had lived in Coventry. Once mum had had a look around we headed to our second destination of the day, another one of mum's cousin's houses. Catherine greeted us at the door and we went inside to meet Catherine's mother who mum refers to as Aunty Jean. Mum was exceptionally excited to be able to catch up with Aunty Jean while we (the 5 of us ...

... but enough words were similar and there were so many english speaking people around, it never was a problem. Anyway ive wittered on enough now....best get back to looking for a job...which is proving very difficult...might just have to forget it and go open a restaurant on Caye Caulker! Bye for now folks..... PS please keep in touch... Oh yeah and check out our pics at www.homepage.mac.com/auntyames/TheAmeri cas....still working on em tho!

... br>



Took us a couple of hours and we got the audio tour included in the price which made it very interesting. It is a ruined castle and huge. It used to have a moat and lake around it. The Norman Keep is huge and walls were 8' thick. We saw the kitchen with huge fireplaces and bread ovens. Robert ...

... and we had a great view of course over fields and little villages.













We did heaps of mud and stiles and Stephen entertained us with two face plants. We eventually found our way to the village of Weston-sub-Edge. It had a 13th ...

... come home.






We walked around Holy Trinity Church looking for Shakespeare's grave. Didn’t find it, but had fun reading the headstones. Found out later that it is inside the church. Bought some duck food for 50p ($1.15) and fed all the swans, ducks and geese.






Then into the info centre and booked our ...

... we were quite damp. It was fun though and pretty walking across fields with stone walls and through forests.













Of course, there was a lot of slippery mud. Stephen's shoes didn’t have a lot of grip so there were always expletives coming from ...

Stephen dropped us to Warwick Castle – a 10 min. drive away and we had a wonderful time exploring over it for the next 4 hours. Entry was 26 pounds 95 including a 3 pound guide book ($64). Lunch cost us 9 pounds ($21).









It is set in 60 acres of beautiful grounds and is up high overlooking the town on one ...

... a jacket potato with tuna 3 pounds 95. While we were there it hailed, rained and then had big fluffy heavy snowflakes, but it melted. We finished lunch and went walking and did a nice circuit walk on public footpaths through fields, little lanes, through lots of mud and past some lovely homes.









Next we drove ...

Well weve been here a week now and are both very home sick. It is freezing here and there are heaps of little things that are different. This is exciting but also makes us realise just how great it is in Australia and how much we miss it. Just not what we are used to thats all.... we are way out of our comfort zone. We have had ...