Trip of a Lifetime - England, Wales and Scotland! Part 1

On May 14, Tom and I took off for an adventure of a life time. We were headed to the United Kingdom for a whirlwind trip that took us to Bath, Stratford-Upon-Avon, Chester, England; Wales; Glasgow, Greenock, and Edinburgh, Scotland; back to England to York and wrapping up in London, with a day trip to Cambridge.  There are far too many pictures to include them all here (over 1000!)  but I'm going to include a few.  

One of the highlights, and part of the reason for the trip, was to get in touch with my ancestry.  Through DNA, Dad, and subsequently the rest of us, confirmed that William McKeith was in fact his biological father.  So I really wanted to go visit where he was born, so I could get a better understanding of what drove his father, Daniel, to emigrate to the States.  Reading the history of Greenock, Glasgow and Edinburgh, and we did come away with a better understanding of the hardships they endured, which is what likely led them to the United States.  It was very sobering. We didn't get to the town where Daniel was from - Creiff, Perthshire which was a bit to far to get to on this trip. It's north of Edinburgh, about 60 miles, and since we didn't have a car (and weren't about to attempt driving on the other side of the road from the other side of the car!), we couldn't make it this time.  But that just means we have to go back. Both of us fell in love with Scotland, even if we were rained out in both Glasgow and Edinburgh!  

Anyhow, I did get to Greenock, where William was born.  There was a lovely museum/historical institute - the Watt Institute - named after the inventor James Watt, who also was born in Greenock.  The town has a history in that it was a major ship building center for Scotland and still is fiercely proud of that heritage. 

But before we even got to Greenock, we had a wonderful time exploring the other towns.  Bath was beautiful, home not only to the Roman Baths, but also to Jane Austen.  We stayed in a lovely B&B, a Victorian home covered with wisteria and had tea two or maybe three times there, including at the Jane Austen House, where we had Mr. Darcey's Tea!

Stratford-Upon-Avon is of course home to The Bard - William Shakespeare.  And yes, it was very touristy, but we had to visit! It is a lovely town though and the weather was amazing while we were there.  

Chester is a very cool village with one of the oldest continuous Roman Walls. It goes around the city center for 2-ish miles, and yes, we did walk it with only one detour to visit the amazing Chester Cathedral.  They had a really cool Lego model of the Cathedral, which definitely caught Tom's eye! 

Day trip to Wales, which is an amazingly, hauntingly beautiful country. I loved that they are keeping the ancient language alive. We went over the highest aqueduct - the Poncysyllte Aqueduct, which part of the Llangollen Canal, over the River Dee.  I would love someday to take a narrow boat cruise on the canals of England/Scotland/Wales - not all obviously - that would take forever, but at least one of them!  

But before we got there, we visited the town of Conwy and the Conwy Castle - ancient and impressive! 

From Wales, we headed to Glasgow.  That's where we finally hit the weather that Scotland is known for! Rain - lots and lots of rain.  The day we spent in Greenock was nice, but Glasgow itself was sopping wet!  It was our anniversary, so we didn't let the rain deter us and had a fantastic dinner where we were treated very well.  The Glasgow cathedral is, much like every other cathedral, very impressive with impressive architecture, and soaring stained glass windows. 

This post is long enough, so I'll do part two later - Edinburgh, York, London and Cambridge!