The Causeys Take Europe - Days 1-2

Hooray! We're on an adventure again! This time, not the physically demanding kind. Matt had to take a business trip to Europe, and we decided that this could be our summer holiday - the last big trip together before baby arrives. It's also the best way to afford the trip - since the business trip is mandatory for Matt, the company has paid for his air fare, car rental, hotel and all meals. That only leaves my air fare and meals for us to pay for - whoopee!

So, I'll be blogging as we go - we'll be traveling for around 10 days, and there's no way I could do it all at the end. I'll label each day, and give details and upload a photo gallery. I may make each entry a separate posting (to make it easier on the readers) but later I'll just copy it all into one long post. So, here we go!!

Day 1 - Monday, June 31: Leaving Greenock for London, England

I had everything packed and ready to go on Sunday night, so all we had to do was eat breakfast and take out the garbage before we left. Matt looked at our departure time (11:20am) and we needed to be there 2 hours early. With around a 1 hour drive, we decided to leave home at 8. Upon arival we discovered that there had been a slight misunderstanding. The check in started at 11:20 - meaning the flight didn't leave until 1:20. There's no early check in on an EasyJet flight, so we got out our reading material and communed with the airport lobby for 2 hours.

Check in went smoothly (since we were the 3rd in line!) and security was nothing. Our first destination was London Luton Airport, and since it's in the UK, we didn't have to go through customs. If you ever fly EasyJet you will want to know this. There are no assigned seats - the first people to check in are the first people to board, and you sit where ever you want. So, since we were the third in line we were in the "A" group - around the first 30ish people. Also, if you only have a carry-on (no checked baggage) you get to check in online and board before the "A" group. By the time we got on, we were able to pick seats only about 6 rows back - we didn't have to wait 20 minutes to leave the plane when we landed - sweet!

We landed and got our rental car. In England (as I'm sure you know) they drive on the left. We'd driven in Scotland, so we are pretty comfortable now. We also rented a GPS system to help us navigate. Roads and directions can be really confusing here, since the roads are so small, and many times you're on country back roads not interstates. All you do is give teh GPS your destination address, and it shown you a full color map, and gives audible directions... "After 300 yards, turn left...pause... turn left now" It is probably the coolest toy I've ever played with. It required a hefty deposit, but you get the whole thing back when it's returned, which makes it free to rent! Even cooler!

We drove about 30 miles to Bedford, England, found our hotel easily, and got checked in - it was around 5pm by now. Matt called his England team, but they were already off work and had other plans for the evening, so instead of a team dinner, we explored our part of town.

Our hotel is on the bank of the river "Great Ouse". Due to the accent, it's pronounced "Ooze" which I find pretty funny. It's a beautiful river, full of geese, ducks and swans. We have several videos over in the photo gallery. Across the river from us is a rowing club, and boats pass up and down the river all day. There are beautiful bridges crossing it, and a manual lock system for small boats to pass onto or off of the river to a smaller tributary. We were looking at the lock, and Matt pushed the gate closed. Pretty cool. A local couple stopped to explain how a lock worked. Of course, we already knew that, but they were just being kind passers-by, so we let them talk. After they left Matt tried to open the lock up again to where it had been - it didn't budge. In the 2 minutes that the people had been there, enough water flowed into the lock to completely seal the door closed. I came around and helped push, but no luck. To lift the water-tight door you need a large crank, which boat captains keep on board for such purposes... meaning there was none to be found on the site. We had no choice but to leave the gates closed and watch the water fill up. Within 20 minutes, the lock was full (very small lock). I went back today and it's still full - I guess when someone needs it, they'll have to use their handy-dandy crank first!

We had dinner at a restaurant overlooking the river, then came back and had a swim in the hotel pool. You will have to see the pictures to believe this pool. It's all stone and brick and tile inside, with a steaming hot jacuzzi and a slide that goes from the hot tub into the pool! Of course, I couldn't use the hot tub - I just let my legs dangle in. But the jets were really strong and I got a wonderful foot massage! The whole pool was really quite breathtaking, and we decided that if we ever become stinking rich, that we would have a pool just like it :-p

Day 2 - Tuesday July 1: Bedford, England

We got up early and had breakfast so Matt would be at work at 8. I fell back asleep for a while, but the housekeepers woke me up a little later and I went out. First, I explored the grounds around St. Peter's Church - the square near the hotel. As I passed the entrance, there was a sign for a concert in the church at 1pm - I made a mental note. I went into the visitor's center, and had an audio tour of the history of Bedford. You get a small device that looks a bit like a telephone. As you view the murals or display cabinets, you type in the adjoining number and push play, and hear a narration of what you're looking at. It's much more interesting than just reading a sign, because they occasionally use actors and background music. Since you hold it to your ear, you don't have to listen to anyone else's stories or wait for a large presentation to begin again.

My next stop was the Bedford Museum, just behind our hotel. It gave a more thorough history of the city, and of course had lots of artifacts. There are lots on pictures posted of interesting things I found there. By the time I was done there, it was nearly 1, and I made it back to the church just in time for the concert. It was the Hoffman School Women's String Ensemble and Women's Choir, of Germany. Apparently, Bamberg, Germany, is a sister city to Bedford. Their schools (highschool, I think) do a musical exchange - this year, the German school tours here performing, and next year the English students will go to Germany. The girls were quite talented, and it was a very nice concert. The string ensemble performed all 7 movements of Bach's Suite No. 3 in E-minor, then the choir sang 3 songs. Then a quartet performed Beethoven's String Quartet op. 18/4 - first movement, and the choir closed with 2 more songs. I recorded the String Quartet, but ran out of memory about 2 minutes before the end. I was filming from the balcony, and took a look around the beautiful church as the music played.

I had a nice lunch at a coffee shop, read a little of a book I brought, then went back to the hotel. I decided I had better slow down on my book - I only brought 2, and I'm already half way through my first one - on Day 2!! I also brought my knitting (new project of mine) so I took my partially completed sock down to the river, and sat on a bench - knitting and watching the swans and the people go by. There was a terrific breeze, and it was lovely. At another time, I would have just taken a long walk, but long walks are a bit difficult these days. I had already done enough walking for today (or so my back told me) so sitting was nice.

I met Matt back at the hotel at 6 - he was supposed to bring the guys from work to have dinner and drinks at the hotel restaurant, but it seems that no one here does anything even remotely connected with work after hours - not even have their dinner and beer bought by the guy visiting from Scotland! So, we found a place to eat, and then sat by the river for a while before going up to our room.

That brings us up to now - 11pm on Tuesday night. Tomorrow we have 1/2 a day in Bedford before flying out again. I'll have another posting in a couple of days to let you know what I've been up to! Remember to leave any comments on the blog page (not in an email) - that way everyone can read them!