Company from Kansas City

Friday the 6th Laurita arrived from Kansas City. We explored some of the sights of London on Friday. Took the tube to Leicester Square, checked out Piccadilly Circus and then Trafalgar Square. Walked down Whitehall Street past the Royal Mews (horse guards) and Downing Street, arriving at Big Ben and Parliament Square. Visited Westminster Abbey, then on to Buckingham Palace, then took the tube to Harrods’s (a must see). Then back to my place to relax and put up on aching feet. Saturday morning we had an early start to Gatwick for our flight to Inverness, Scotland. This supposedly easy journey became a little complicated due to signal failures on the northern line, so had to change our route. We did make it and arrived in Inverness to the cold and rain, we took the local bus into town to our hotel The Royal Highlands Hotel. Out we went to explore the city, then back for dinner, then out to St Mary’s for evening mass. On Sunday we ventured by city bus to Culloden, the site of the last battle between the Jacobite’s and the English government. It was a very good and informative exhibition centre. We ventured out to tour the battlefield, but not for long as it was snowing and the wind was blowing a gale, we were very, very cold. In the afternoon back in Inverness we explored the views from Inverness Castle and visited the Inverness Cathedral along with taking in the sites of the River Ness and doing some shopping. On Monday we went on a tour of Loch Ness and Urquhart Castle. It was a coach tour to Loch Ness, then a cruise by boat across Loch Ness to the Castle. No sighing of the Loch Ness monster were made! Laurita brought back a Nessie, tho. Really enjoyed the Castle was very impressive, then back on the coach to Inverness. We then checked out the Victorian Marketplace and headed back by local bus to the airport for our return flight to London. On Tuesday we did some more exploring of London, started by going to Victoria station then walked toward Big Ben, stopped to check out the Westminster Cathedral – what a wonderful church, all marble and beautiful. We actually enjoyed it much more than Westminster Abbey. We checked out the London Eye, but decided against doing it as was a cloudy rainy day. We took the tube to the Tower of London, spent a number of hours exploring the tower and grounds, we walked the south wall; saw the crown jewels and the white tower. OK enough history for now. Then walked over the Tower Bridge, stopped for dinner at a local pub, then hopped the tube to Leicester Square to finish up Laurita’s souvenir shopping. While walking thru Leicester Square, there was a red carpet movie premier of Duplicity staring Julia Roberts – we saw her going into the theatre. Pretty Cool. Then it was home to relax. Wednesday it was back to work for me, Laurita did a tour with Greyline to the Cotswolds, and on Thrusday she did one to Windsor, Stonehenge and Bath. On Friday it was off to Heathrow for her return flight to the states. We had an awesome visit and got to see lots.