Day One, The Tour Begins, Windsor

We had a refreshing Aperol Spritz and enjoyed the nice weather.

Our itinerary summed up Day one like this:

Your tour departs at 2 pm from your Windsor Hotel.  Venture to see the splendors of Windsor Castle, a residence of the King, and the oldest and largest inhabited castle in the world.  Then take a walking tour arouind the medieval town of Windsor with a local guide.  Enjoy a welcome drink with your group, and dine and explore as you wish this evening.  Our welcome drink was scheduled for 6 pm.

Walk this way.  There are no inside photo's permitted, but it was awesome to see it.  Wish I could share with you; but it's a BIG no no.  There are security checks as you enter so travel light and leave backpacks in the hotel or in our case the tour coach..

Trying to snap photo's as we walked with our guide wasn't super easy.  You have to keep up.  

Queen Victoria on High Street as you make your way to the entrance.  As you can see lots of rehab work is going on.  The tour guide said it's perpetual.  The bronze statue was to commemorate her Golden Jubilee (50th year).   At that time, she was the longest serving Monarch.

The State Entrance.  Just outside this gate was wear The Queen was often seen with her dogs, and or riding her horse.  She was quite popular and friendly according to our tour guide who saw her multiple times.

Turning the opposite direction from The State Entrance puts you in line with The Long Walk.  A beautiful place to walk, run etc.  It's 2.64 miles to the end where a horse statue resides on Snow Hill.  This was created during the reign of Charles II.

Our local guide pointing out items of interest.  Note the restaurant behind her, The Prince Harry.  After our tour and welcome drink, we attempted to go there for dinner.  They were not busy, but the wait staff and bartender just looked at us and walked away.  We waited a few minutes more and then walked out.  Guess they didn't want our business.  We did note pictures of Harry and Meghan on the walls.

Tried my best to get a picture without people, but as you can see, wasn't quite successful.  Windsor is full of tourists.  The shambles built in 1718.  Look how crocked it is.  Remember you can click on any picture to see things larger.

While this old plaque isn't readable.  It marks the location of Nell Gwynn's residence, and now tea room.

And Chinese Restaurant.  The date on the building is 1648.  She was a stage actress and one of King Charles's mistresses.

You'll recall dinner was not included, which is very weird.  I've never done a tour that didn't have a welcome dinner.  It gives the group a chance to get to know each other, and many people have just arrived that day and are tired.  To have to search out somewhere to eat isn't a particularly good way to start the tour.  So after our welcome drink, and a foiled attempt to eat at the pub right across the street from our hotel, The Prince Harry; we ended up at Meejana, 1 Church Lane in a very cute Lebanese restaurant.  My dish was an eggplant something and was delicious.  Don't remember what Jane had, but she was very pleased with it.  **edited to add my friend remembered what I had, it was Mousakaa.

See what a cute little super clean place it was.  Would highly recommend it.  We were seated at an open window area, and they had outside eating as well.

Marching orders.  Most days we had something like this posted to indicate what was next.  So breakfast at 7am, luggage out by your door by 7 am, be on the coach at 8 am for departure.  Dinner tomorrow at 6:30 in our hotel, our first group dinner.  

PLEASE leave me a comment when you come visit, so I know you were here. Your visits and comments are very special to me. AND remember, leave your name and url and not your profile link. Name and url takes me right to your blog post so I can reciprocate the visit.

ARRIVAL DAY WINDSOR, Thames River Cruise

 We arrived at Castle Hotel Windsor too early to check in, but they held our luggage for us and when the appropriate time came would deliver our luggage to our room.  This is not a picture I took, but one from their website.  Our room was not in this section of the building, but in a building behind it.  The 2nd building is a much newer portion.  We spent 2 nights here.

Just out the door were lots of shops, and yes...Windsor Castle is right there!

We stopped for a drink to pass some time, right across the street from The Thames River.

A nice outside patio with views of The River.

We had booked a 2 hour river cruise which was very relaxing after our over night flight and gave us a view of the castle.  We scheduled with French Brothers .  We had rain off and on, but still found the cruise enjoyable.  We went through Boveney Lock.  I understood the basic concept of going through a dock when water levels changed; but have never done it and found it very interesting.  We had views of Eton College as well as the castle.

The ship was pretty basic with plastic chairs.

Walking alone the Thames after our cruise also proved to be enjoyable.  You see lots of house boats.

The first of many Fish N Chips meals.  This was excellent.  Followed by a nice Irish Coffee

In a very nice outside patio right on the River.

Windsor is an easy place to get around with lots to see, places to eat and shop.

Back in our hotel to relax for the night we enjoyed Crown Royal Black.  Our "offical tour" was scheduled to start the following day at 2 pm.

PLEASE leave me a comment when you come visit, so I know you were here. Your visits and comments are very special to me. AND remember, leave your name and url and not your profile link. Name and url takes me right to your blog post so I can reciprocate the visit.

The UK in Fourteen Days

I am recently back from a 14 day 13 night tour of The UK with CIE Tour Company.  CIE Tour Company has it's office in Cedarknolls, NJ and has been in business for 90 years.  I've taken tours before with Insight Vacations and would rate their tours (Ireland and Scotland, and Italy) over CIE.  The accommodations and meals were substandard, IMHO.  I did a review of the tour on yelp, and wish I had seen the reviews before booking.  There are 22 reviews counting mine and the average rating is only a 2.5 out of 5.  There were 7 people who gave the company a rating of 5, and 10 people who gave it a rating of 1.  My rating was a 2.  Interestingly CIE's webpage indicates they have a 95% satisfaction rate which seems not to match the reviews on yelp.

My friend and I choose this tour, as it's one of a few that included Wales.  We choose the month of August in order to attend the Military Tattoo in Edinburgh.  We covered a lot of miles as you can see.  One of the pluses of the tour was only having a single night once, and the bulk of the time spending two consecutive nights in the same lodging.  

The tour started in Windsor, which I really enjoyed.  The tour ended in London.

We added an extra night at the front of the tour to give us time to adjust a bit to the 5 hour difference, and to give us a buffer should there be any problems with flights etc.  You really just never know.  Travel nowadays can present some difficulties.

Here I am with my Prosecco on board Delta in business class.

AND my friend, Jane.  The flight was very nice, with excellent meal service and we managed to get a few hours sleep once the meal service was over and we were able to lay our seats flat.

PLEASE leave me a comment when you come visit, so I know you were here. Your visits and comments are very special to me. AND remember, leave your name and url and not your profile link. Name and url takes me right to your blog post so I can reciprocate the visit.

Shirks Candies, Sansotta's Italian Restaurant, Cardinals (Marion Road Trip part II)

Shirks Candies!  Home made candy since 1932.  Located at 1235 South Prospect Street, Marion Ohio.  Closed on Sunday and Monday, opened 10 am til 5:30 pm Tuesday through Friday, and 9:30 am til 4 pm on Sat.  A must when you visit Marion.  You can order on line through their website.  They have a facebook page as well.

Lots of variety, you won't leave dissapointed.

An area showing family members, news articles with some history of the family.  Elwood "Bert" Shirk purchased The Carmel Crisp Shop which was in downtown Marion back in 1932.  He made his Carmel Corn often as the theaters were letting out.  The aroma tempting the movie goers to purchase.  In 1940 he owned a sandwich shop were he also sold his goodies.  In 1965 his son Dick and wife Joan took over the business and grew it.  In 1999 their son Rick took over the business.  

Me with my bag of goodies on the way out of the store.

My purchases:  Cashews, Turtles, Peanut Butter Cups, and dark chocolate and sea salt covered carmel.  All were fantastic.

Another family owned buisness to visit is Sansotta's located at 1292 Delaware Avenue, Marion Ohio.  Hours are 10:45 am til 8 pm Monday through Sat, and 10:45 am til 5pm on Sunday.  It's a small non frills restaurant with good homemade food.  Pasta Bowls, Salads, Sandwiches, and daily specials.  All very resonably priced.

Small amount of tables, but it appeared they do a large carryout business when we were there for lunch.

You order at the counter and seat yourself.  

Hubby and I had 2 Torpedoes a piece.  I had ham and cheese (pictured above) and he had  meatball Torpedoes.  

You can walk or ride around downtown Marion and see beautifully painted Cardinals.  There are 17 to find.  Ohio was the 17th state in the Union, and the Cardinal is the state bird.  Each bird is painted by local artists and represents history.  The plaques on the bottom tell you who the artists were, which businesses sponsored the Cardinal.

Look at the details, so pretty.

This one reprents the histoic Palace Theater.

The historic Palace Theater built in 1928 has served Marion for many years from Vaudeville and Silent Films to todays concerts and other activities.

The Beautiful Palace is also available for weedings and other special events.

PLEASE leave me a comment when you come visit, so I know you were here. Your visits and comments are very special to me. AND remember, leave your name and url and not your profile link. Name and url takes me right to your blog post so I can reciprocate the visit.

President Warren G. Harding, Memorial, Home, and Library (Ohio Road Trip, Marion, Ohio...part I)

President Warren G. Harding

• Born Nov 2, 1865 Blooming Grove, Ohio
• Moved to Caledonia, Ohio
• Moved to Marion, Ohio
• Attended Village Schools
• Purchased the bankrupt Marion Star newspaper with 2 friends when 19 yrs old.
• Owened the paper he turned around for 40 years after buying out his friends.
• Married  Divorced Florence Kling DeWolfe July 8th 1891
• Became involved in politics is 1900
• Served 2 terms in the Ohio Senate
• Serveds at Lt. Governor of Ohio
• Served in The US Senate in 1914
• Won the ballot to be the Republican Presidential Candiate at the 1920 convention with Calvin Coolidge as his running mate, ran against Ohio's Democratic Governor, James Cox and FDR
• Served as President for 29 months, died in San Francisco from a heart attack
• 600,000 people came to hear him speak in his front porch campaign, which was ONLY 3 months long.
• Transistioned the country from WWI to peacetime
• Created The Veterans Bureau
• Created The Bureau of Budget, and was the first President to present a budge to congress

These 12 plagues are loaded with information about the President and is wife Florence, above are just a few of the highlights in bullet points. (I've cropped and posted each plaque separately in order so that you can read them, remember to click to enlarge the pictures to aid your efforts.)

These plagues are posted in order as you walk the circle to read them...and yes, they had raindrops on them while we were there.  The plagues are centered in the walk way down the steps from the beautiful momument.

I actually forgot to get a picture of momument while there, so this is a copy from their website.(on a non raining day, lol)

The inside of round momument.  Notice the tree to the right of the gravestones.  President Harding wanted to be buried under an open sky...thus the non inclosed memorial, and next to a tree.  When I was a child living there in Marion, there was a much larger tree that stood inside the memorial for many years.  However, it was hit by lightening and removed and replaced.

A close up of the stones.  The Memorial is located at 898 Delaware Avenue, Marion, Ohio.  There are two parking areas, and admission is free to the public.

Continuing on around the 2nd half of circle of plagues.

These words are from his March 4th, 1921 Inaugural speech, and quite interesting.  In case you can't read them from the plaque (though remember you can click any picture to enlarge):

Trump was obviously NOT the first to say American first, and Kennedy perhaps borrowed some sentiment from Hardings speech?

"In the great fulfillment, we must have a citizenship less concerned about what the government can do for it, and more anxious about what it can do for the nation."

President Harding's Home is located at 380 Delaware Avenue and is opened for tours from 9 am til 5pm, most days.  Tours start at 10:00 am and are on the top of each hour.  Tours are limited to 10 people at a time, tickets are required.  Our senior rate would have been 15.00 each, but due to our membership in The Ohio History Connection (previousl known as Ohio Historical Society), our admission was free.  This is a map of the grounds showing the Press House, Christian Home, and The Harding House.

The Christian Home

The side of the Harding Home, showing the porch which is the front of the house.  I wasn't able to get a front view as traffic on the road was too heavy to get across the street to do so.  Picture are NOT permitted inside, as most of furnishings are originals.

The Presidential Library and museum is located at 355 E. Church Street, this property is right behind the Home, and is where you check in and park.  Entrance to the library and museum is included with your ticket and well worth the time.  There is also a gift shop inside.  This is their picture from the website, another photo I forgot to snap.

The state of Ohio ones and operates the Memorial, Home and Library.  The state has owned The Memorial and Home since 1978, and the library was built in 2021.

**This is a bit long, but there was so much to see.  Stayed tuned, there will be additional posts from my Road Trip to Marion to follow.