We had a wonderful time with Richard and Tracey. We picked them up at the Southampton cruise terminal Tuesday, June 19th following their two week cruise on the Caribbean Princess. From the port we headed to Stonehenge. Our ears were glued to the audio tour handsets as we walked this awesome place. Next we headed to Blenheim Palace. No thanks to Gretel (our GPS), we stumbled onto a wonderful old 17^th century inn (The Yew Tree) for lunch and they got their first taste of fish and chips! We drove to Blenheim Palace and stayed until closing touring the palace and walking the gardens. Before heading home we stopped in Bladon and the small St Martin’s Church cemetary to pay respects at the modest grave of Sir Winston Churchill. (He was born at Blenheim Palace.) We showed them around our home and enjoyed a delicious slow roasted crock pot dinner of beef and vegetables. Before bedtime we walked to Flintknapper's to experience the ambiance of our local pub scene.

The next morning we headed to London. We checked into the Marriott and took the tube to Westminster and ooh...ed and ahh...ed over the Westminster Bridge, the Thames., Parliament, and Big Ben. We waited in line to tour Westminster Abbey. Afterwards we walked up Whitehall to Trafalgar Square, pausing at #10 Downing Street, the Churchill War Rooms, Whitehall Palace, the Horse Guards and a few other sites on the way. Our intended path through the lovely gardens of St James Park and the Mall was closed off due to Olympic preparations. We had to walk a bit out of our way to make it to Buckingham Palace. We were able to walk back through St James' Park to catch the tube back to Westminster where we crossed the bridge to the south bank and rode the London Eye. We continued walking along the south bank and stopped to eat dinner before returning to the hotel.

The next morning we headed to the Tower of London. We were nearly the first in line to see the crown jewels. Then we took the Beefeater tour and went through some of the buildings. Next stop was St Paul's Cathedral and then the British Museum with only enough time to catch the top 10 highlights.  Finally, we walked to Covent Garden and strolled through the markets and shops. We ate dinner at a pub between Covent Gardens and Leicester Square and were pretty exhausted by the time we caught the tube back to the hotel. We has a blast and covered a lot of territory in three short days!