Canterbury Tales (Ridgeway Version)

 

St. Augustine Abbey

 

We also visited (briefly) the City of Canterbury (home of Chaucer) on the way home from Dover. It's a neat little city similar to Cambridge. Awesome Cathedral in the center of town. And of course, the St. Augustine Abbey.  Unfortunately, everything was closed by the time we stopped by, so we couldn't see the inside of anything. Definitely plan to return soon.

Canterbury Cathedral

Some ruins by the Cathedral. And some people in a tour group who think we're taking a picture of them for some random reason. Um, don't flatter yourselves.

Dover

 

 

 

 

We went to Dover this past weekend to see the castle and the cliffs. We were all sick, so it could have been a little bit more pleasant--but it was still a great trip. Dover's about 2 hours from where we live on the coast of the English Channel. It's where the Chunnel begins.

 

 

Dover Castle

Judah and me--freezing our buns off at the entrance to the castle.

 

City of Dover from the view of the Castle. That's the English Channel. 

Chapel on the grounds of the castle. It still holds services for local military (Royal Navy Fleet is stationed here on the grounds as well.)

Glory

Blaise and Jim at the very top of the tower.

Catapult

 

Blaise using his replica of a broadsword as a spade. 

White Cliffs of Dover--Jim was actually the only one who saw this in person from this view. The rest of us were coughing up lungs in the car by that time.

Lighthouse from 1 A.D. That's no misprint. The first century.

A. MA.ZING. Look at the crazy people on the edge there. No fence.

Ely, Cambridgeshire

We visited Ely a few weeks ago. It's a city located about 30 minutes away from us and is home to one of the "top cathedrals to see" in the UK. The Ely Cathedral is definitely worth seeing. Gorgeous Anglican church which was originally founded by St. Etheldreda (who went through two marriages and remained a virgin until death--go figure) in c.673. We also visited Oliver Cromwell's house, but weren't able to spend much time there due to it being naptime. :)

Here are a few pictures.

At the very top there is a stained glass representation of Jesus, which Blaise called to everyone's attention when he screamed at the top of his lungs, "Oh my goodness! It's De-zus!" He's in possession of some good eyesight. We could barely make it out ourselves. Blaise then proceeded to point out every picture of Jesus he saw. We saw lots of Jesus.

Some pretty awesome stained glass art can be seen in this cathedral. There's actually a stained glass museum here, as well.

There were tombs all over the cathedral with likeness statues on top of them. For some reason, the sculptors chose to design many of the statues in funny positions, such as this one.

Pipe organ/Choir Area

Huge. Made for good echo practice for Blaise. 

Christus.

Blaise wearing a replica of a helmet Cromwell would have worn.

Blaise writing in the style of Oliver Cromwell. Or maybe just drawing circles.

Blaise hugging the statue of one of Cromwell's children.