7.27.09 London

Today started out again with an early morning, followed by heading to the train station to head outside the city to the countryside.

When its 7am and your at the train station,
there's nothing better... oh hot and ready donuts. I love them.

Barely awake, we all ended up sleeping the hourish long ride we took, then hopped on a bus and made our way to the historic Wilton House.


The house has been around for centuries and has been home to the Earl of Pembroke the entire time. To lead us on our tour was our spunky, older tour guide Josie. Throughout the tour we learned quite a few new words from her, such as 'dishy' a substitute for handsome, 'dulahlee' meaning: went crazy, and we also enjoyed her use of 'poo pooed' referring to the British peoples response to the new Pride and Prejudice movie; scenes of which were filmed at Wilton House. The current Earl of Pembroke is 32 and has done alot to ensure the preservation of the house, and also lives in a portion of it himself. The house is filled with alot of original Chippendale furniture, including a peronally signed curio cabinet. One attraction to the house is the cube room; a room perfectly square measuring 30x30x30. The inside was amazing, but what sold me was the grounds outside!


The gardens and lawn are perfectly manicured and I felt like I should be seeing golf carts, tee boxes and flags in the distance it was so pristine.

Cool bridge. It was designed by the same man who
did the Rialto bridge in Venice.

We meandured around a bit and were then informed that they had pasteries and lemonade prepared for us. Gotta love the British hospitality. From the Wilton house we took a bus to the small town of Salisbury, home of the Salisbury Cathedral; which feature the UK's tallest spire.


It would be the tallest in Europe but was beat by inches by another church in Germany. Anywho, we were split up into groups each had a tour guide take us through the chapel.

Charlie greeted us into the chapel, and luckily we barely
made the height requirement for the tower tour.

It was built in 1212 and only took 38 years. While that sounds like a long time, consider that it took 40 years to build the Salt Lake Temple in 1847! So for them to do what they did in 1212 was an incredible accomplishment. Everything inside is very English Gothic, with tall pillars and high fan vaulted ceilings and buttresses.

Very modern alter and back stained glass windows.
The windows were done in the 80's.

View from the balcony

Our tour guide showed us all the interior and then dropped us off to see the Magna Carta. Salisbury Cathedral has one of the last 4 remaining original copies of the Marga Carta in existence. I knew a little about it before, but honestly forgot what its significance was. He explained that it was the document came to be after King John of England called a meeting to discuss the legal rights of citizens at the time (1215) After three days of discussing, the Magna Carta (or Great Charter) was finally agreed over and written in Latin on 9 copies. In it was the outline for their judicial system and was the great precursor to constitutional law; heavily influencing the format of our American Constitution. Snap, learn something new everyday. Sadly we couldnt take picture of it. From there we got to go on another tour up above the vaulted ceiling in the rafters, then farther up to the base of the tower. Remember, this place was built in 1212, almost 800 years ago! The interior structure is just oak beams, very roughly cut, held together with wooden pins. Its remarkable that it hasnt fallen down! The staircase...for lack of a better word were rather snug, and steep, but did the job of getting us up to some amazing views!!

Stairs. Set one of two.

Me, trying to get out of the door and past the pillar.
The shelf butt got in the way...ah snap.

View from the tower. Notice the sprawling mansion below to the
left. To the right is their pool, and above the house to the left
is their grass tennis courts and soccer field. Ah the life....

On the way down. Notice how my feet are double the
depth of the actual stair. It was treacherous.

After our tour of the church we walked accross town to some taxis awaiting us to go to Stonehedge, which was about a half hour ride out into the country side.

This neat gazebo was in the town square as we were going to the taxis.
Notice all the birds underneath it.....?


...they needed a surprise.

The drive out to Stonehenge was gorgeous! Not only is the site itself is cool, but the surroundings are amazing! There is so much intrigue and mystery to Stonehenge that's incredibly fascinating.



The stone was taken from mountains in Wales, which poses the question of how they got it down here, as well as why. The stone and surrounding site has been archeologically tested and dated back to 3100 bc!!


So, with that prehistoric mindset, lets think again about how they got these stone tabs, some of which weighing 15,000 pounds from Wales to England, then stood them upright, carved out notches and got more stone tabs to lay accross one another in a perfectly semetrical circle. Let us not forget a circle that perfectly coincides with the months and solstices of the sun.

Handstands Around the World Campaign

These unexplainable facts I'm sure are reason enough why many feel it was done by Aliens. I have more faith in the human race and think that it was just an incredible engineering feat for the time.


I found it not only really cool, but very fascinating to learn about. After our time there, the taxis took us back to the train station, followed by hour ride home, then the tube and got back here at around 9:30pm. Long day, but great day filled with incredible creations in this beautiful country.

Cheers!