This morning we left London city hailed a cab to pick up our hire car. Introducing Sheila our new GPS, thanks Jo for the name what else would we call her being Aussies? 1000 and we were on our way, well nearly. Firstly where do we plug Sheila in? Where is the hand brake? Where do you stick the key? Is it a keyless start? Where is the petrol cap? And that is all before we had switched Sheila on. It took us a wee while to understand Sheila’s little foibles and like a typical women she likes you to listen to her closely or you have to do a U turn. Understanding what exit she means when there are 5 of them is not quiet as simple as it sounds. We did many U turns but all in all she did a mighty fine job. As did Spock, driving in the rain on the motorway which is up to 5 lanes in each direction,with me saying “slow down a bit” . He was rather patient. The beauty of these motorways is that you can change lanes every 3 minutes to get in front of the next car, this suits Spock’s style of driving beautifully.
We made our way to Maidstone which is home to Leeds Castle a magnificent castle which was built by one of William the Conqueror’s lords Robert de Crevecoeur. Leeds Castle passed into the royal hands in 1278 and became part of the Queen of England’s dower. Over the course of 150 years it was held by six mediaeval queens.
The castle as we saw it today is the result of over 900 years of alterations and changes. The last private owner Olive, Lady Baillie left the castle to the Leeds Castle Foundation, a private charitable trust whose aim is to preserve this wonderful castle and its grounds for the benefit of the public forever. After we ambled around this wonderful castle in all its splendor we then visited its aviary which housed many fascinating birds.The castle has the most magnificent grounds, truly spectacular.
From Leeds Castle we made our way to Canterbury cathedral which is surrounded by a huge stone wall. We were indeed blessed as there was a concert in the cathedral this evening as they were practicing whilst we were visiting. How wonderful a free concert!! This cathedral is the burial place of all the Archbishops of Canterbury whom have tombs scattered throughout the cathedral. The cathedral is huge with many alters scattered throughout. Truly an amazing site made even more special by the orchestra practicing for their concert.
Then Sheila directed us to the White Cliffs of Dover, I don’t know who sings about the white cliffs of Dover but I am thinking that it is either Danial O’Donnell or Foster and Allen, Spock thinks it is Vera Lynn, who ever it is one can see why they sung about them. The rain and mist was in full swing and whilst walking we were wondering if we would indeed see the white cliffs, but then they appeared through the mist. We can only imagine what they would look like on a beautiful day, but we can say that we have seen them and touched them. The port of Dover is massive and then we drove out programming Sheila to take us to Exeter. But oops that was 392 kms away, too far for us today in this weather and at this time. We decided to drive on to Chitchester, some 200 kms short of our planned destination but never the less on the itinerary. We planned to stay in a quaint B&B, but my bladder was in no way prepared for mucking about finding it, so quickly into the Travelodge we headed and then straight over to the pub for dinner as we had missed out on lunch. A few pints went down a treat.
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