Day 46 Wednesday 6 July 2016

A solid breakfast & on the road at 7.45am from Saltash, however, we had a few delays as someone on the tour did not get their laundry back this morning so we spent a bit of time waiting for the laundry to be delivered to the coach when we stopped down the road a bit for it. No luck so we kept going. Another pleasant drive through the countryside, again glad that we are on a coach & see over the top of the hedges along the farm fences, if we were in a car we would only see the hedges. Lots of beautiful green manicured paddocks, some freshly cut for hay, some with lots of haybales still out in the paddocks. A fair few fat sheep & contented cows with the odd small village dotted here & there. It took us a couple of hours to reach our destination of Stonehenge, another bucket list item for us. Today is our last day on the tour & only have one agenda on the list, to see Stonehenge. On the bus our minds are starting to move out of no gear zone – it is time for us to think of all the things we have to organize for next adventure. We won’t have our tour director to senior sit us after the bus stops in London. We need to organise our own dinner, car rental, confirm flights, get cousins address’/phone numbers, (we always used email & skype to keep in touch).

Stonehenge Visitor Centre is that far from Stonehenge that you need a bus to get to see the standing stones, or else walk a long way. Apparently once the road went right up to it & you could walk through the standing stones & touch them, not any more. Part of the admission price is a ticket on a shuttle bus that drives us around 2 miles along a straight road where, once we crest a hill we can see the stones in the distance. The journey by bus takes around 6 minutes, then once dropped off there is still another 200m to walk. Stonehenge is packed with tourists, there are hundreds on the walking path & hundreds more on the path & viewing platform around Stonehenge. The collection of stones is spectacular. To think that these were cut, transported in some cases 40km, others from 240km away, then stood upright, then capped with other very large stones is amazing. More so when it was 4,000 – 5,000 years ago. The stones are not all, there are lots burial mounds that date from 6,000 years ago scattered around the plains nearby plus large ditches & a very long avenue that stretches down to the River Avon 2 miles away. Archaeologists have discovered evidence that this was an important site 10,000 years ago & more is being discovered all the time.

We stick to seeing the standing stones & join the hundreds of others walking slowly around the path stopping at various strategic points to listen to the audio guides provided as part of the admission. Lots of photos of course before we start heading back, it is very impressive. I think we timed our visit well, as we head back there are 6 busloads on the road heading towards the stones & at the visitor centre there are hundreds more tourists waiting for shuttle buses, good timing. Only time for a quick look around the exhibitions then on the coach again. Off to London, more beautiful countryside along the way, including crops of poppy fields, before pulling up outside the Amba Hotel at 3.30pm. We did have a good run through London up until the last couple of miles. It took us about half an hour to travel 2 miles, the vehicles were very close at times, glad I’m not driving.

After settling in we wandered out onto Oxford Street, popped into Selfridges & looked for a pharmacy to pick up some anti histamines because Ron got a terrible hay fever out in the paddock at Stonehenge. We also got some maps for the next part of our adventure in Hungary. We picked up some sushi from Selfridges & walking back to our hotel we stopped at a nearby park that had been set up with yellow deck chairs & blankets with a large TV screen to watch the Wimbledon tennis championships on a balmy warm afternoon. We sat & ate our dinner out there with the Londoners in the park.

A great trip around England, Scotland, Ireland & Wales seeing lots of very interesting sites & beautiful sights with a group of people we had never met before & becoming friends with them. A little bit sad to think it has all finished. The last 22 days we travelled about 6000 km. we travelled a lot on the coach. Sometimes it was tiring, moving always into another hotel & hard to live out of our suit cases for 46 days now, (we have 14 more days) we also missed the family, but it was great as well, we have seen such a lot of beautiful & interesting places.