#PARENTS ON TOUR - GRAND CANYON EDITION

The Grand Canyon. I really don't think I'm going to be able to put into words just how majestic this place was. We had two days to explore it and the nearby town of Williams, but I feel like we could have spent weeks at the canyon and still not seen all there was to see. I have to admit it does look slightly fake at first, just because you can barely take in the sheer size and scale of it. 

The first day we were there we started off at the visitors centre of the South Rim and walked along the canyon rim trail. We didn't go as far as we had anticipated but there was a lot of stopping to take photos and the icy conditions made you a little more cautious, especially as there wasn't a lot between you and the edge of the canyon!  

Day two we did more of the Canyon, but from the other end of the South rim, so that we could see the Desert watchtower. Then we spent the rest of the day in Williams looking round the famous route 66 town. There wasn't a lot to do there as most of it was shut up for the winter so we didn't spend long there. We did eat (for the second time) at an amazing little Italian bistro which had a brewery attached. The food was insanely good. 

And of course no trip would be complete without a bear...

There you have it, the Grand Canyon in one blog post. If you ever get the chance to visit it you really should. It's breathtaking. 
H 

#PARENTS ON TOUR - HOOVER DAM EDITION

Whilst my parents were here we undertook a rather long road trip, about 7 hours to be precise. Our destination was the Grand Canyon in Arizona but on the way there we decided to take a detour via the Hoover Dam. The dam itself is built on the border between Nevada and Arizona so it was an excellent way to ensure Mum and Dad properly visited the two states. 

The Hoover Dam was built in the 1930s and is one of the largest concrete structures ever. As my Dad is a civil engineer by trade, and a rather big fan of concrete  we assumed this would be a good stop off. I was expecting him to be rather excited but to be somewhat underwhelmed myself as funnily enough I've never been that impressed by concrete! I couldn't have been more wrong. 

We arrived at the the dam having driven past Las Vegas and we drove over the top of the dam to park on the Arizona side.We then walked back across the dam so that we could see it from all sides and angles. 

Dad and Andrew decided to take a tour of the power plant, however Mum and I were not so sure about it as there were signs warning you not to go on the tour if you were worried about small spaces. Not wanting to chance it we had ice cream in the sun, whilst the boys went about their geekery!

I love those photos, they make me think of those government adverts where you see people in their work place talking about pensions or how the new working wage is helping them. Sorry, my brain thinks weirdly!

Once we had seen everything it was time to hit the road again for another 4ish hours until we arrived at our final destination; the Grand Canyon. 
H 

#PETER ON TOUR - THE LA EDITION

Andrew's eldest brother, Peter, recently came to stay with us for the middle part of his epic trip around America. When he last came in March of this year we didn't manage to get to see too much of LA and our local area, so this time we crammed in everything we possibly could. 

There are two major things in LA we did that I want to show you about. The first is the Huntington Library and gardens. We had never been to Huntington so it was a new experience for us too. Pasadena is a beautiful place (with some lovely shops!) but the library and gardens was amazing. There were lots of buildings spread out across the grounds with different exhibits in them such as European art and books. Then scattered around were different themed gardens such as Chinese or Australian. 

Our personal favourites were the Japanese and Chinese gardens. They were beautiful and so detailed. I think I could have spent all day in there just sitting and admiring it all. 

The second place I want to show you is the Getty Villa in Malibu. We have been to the Getty Center (see this post) before but never to the villa so that was fun. The villa houses the Getty's early collections and was really fascinating. Its a lot smaller than the the Center but we enjoyed our look round. 

So that's the LA edition of what we did. Get ready for the sport's edition next!

H

DUNSTABLE PART II

We hung out with my family at Wrest Park whilst back in the UK. Wrest park is a National Trust property in near Luton. This provided another opportunity to top up on our historic buildings as we visited friends and family. 

Once through the opulent gate houses, and down the long stretch of drive we pulled up to the carpark. Through the gift shop we strolled through the walled gardens towards the house just as the sun broke through the clouds. It looked incredible. The french style architecture looked beautiful in the autumn sun, glowing with the leaves around just turning.

Entering the house via the exotic conservatory (containing many plants from the Americas!), we were given a brief history of the house and then left to ourselves to explore the newly restored rooms.

As is often the case with national trust properties, Hannah and I wandered around the house collecting inspiration to use on our imaginary house. They had a copy of the architect's original letters describing the house and the work he did which provided a fascinating insight into the design and embellishments. I was amazed by the lightness of the rooms, definitely some ideas for our future ‘Manor House’.

We then strolled round the gardens passing the many statues, pergolas and verandas, just enjoying the autumnal hues at a peaceful pace.

Obviously this all wasn't without food or drink, making sure everyone was well fed and watered we enjoyed time to take on tea, scone and other provisions.

Here is a lovely photo of the family (minus Matt who was working unfortunately) outside the old cricket pavilion. 

A

HOME TO LINCOLN

After the first week of our trip in Dunstable we hit the road and went to our old city of Lincoln. We left super early and managed to get there in time for church which was great. We got to see so many people there and it was lovely to spend the time back with our home church. The rest of our time in Lincoln was split between visiting old haunts, eating and drinking way too much, catching up with our friends, doing a spot of shopping and just being tourists in our amazing city. We spent almost four years in that city so we truly love it. 

Here's a selection of photos from the few days we spent there. 

First things first I had to have my belated birthday cookie from Tim. That's a small tradition that started out of nowhere but he's kept up every year, despite the distance!

Just a small sample of the amazing food we ate. This is from Cafe Portico, our favourite place to eat ever! It was really nice to be back there and have a chat with the owner again. We frequented it that much when we were living there that he knows who we are!! 

One of the coolest things we did when we were there was to visit Lincoln Castle. It had been under renovations for a while and opened since we moved away. We went to the Magna Carta exhibit which was really impressive, sadly you couldn't take photos. I really wanted too because that little scrap of paper was impressively older than the entire United States and I thought it'd impress some of our American friends. 

We also got to take a walk through their Victorian prison which they actually used in the TV drama, Downton Abbey. 

There were some costumes to dress up in, I assume aimed at children. Obviously we had a go! It made a few people laugh who wandered by and poked their head in. 

They had loads of kids activities around the place. We even had a go putting some pottery back together. Not sure I can quite remember the purpose of pottery in a prison but it was fun attempting it. We didn't get very far!

The visit to the castle was finished off with a walk round the walls. It was lovely to look out and see the amazing city of Lincoln. Just a shame I had to go with these two!

Thankfully the views more than made up for it. Our amazing cathedral. 

And that's about all the good photos we got. We unfortunately never thought to get photos taken with the people we caught up with, too busy eating or talking! But we did get one of our breakfast on the day we left. Can't beat a good English breakfast. 

Next stop back to Dunstable! 
H