Come with Me to the English Countryside!!!

Get ready to come on an adventure-holiday, with me! I told you I would take you with me...and into the pictures we shall go...............get ready!

my sweet, new friend from London, Rachel...offered to take us to Henley-on-Thames, which is where she grew up in the Enlgish  countryside, which I just learned is where Orlando Bloom has a house, too! It was amazing...and her hilarious and charming friend, Richard drove us out there...these two were just delightful and had us laughing all day! Me and my mom couldn't remember when we've laughed so hard! Probably in years!
(this is the Thames River)

just look at the trees in the background!

this was everything just like I had imagined it would be to walk around, like in Pride and Prejudice!

it looked like a painting everywhere you looked!

can you see the hot air balloon in the distance?

it was a "Virgin" balloon!

rachel and me, on the bridge

wouldn't it be fun to eat at this pub on the water?

it was called "The Angel"! I love it!

me and my big baby-belly...

I learned that the old buildings, like this English Tudor style one, were made out of bricks and the stone in it is actually, Flint (like the Flintstone's...ha ha ha ha), just beautiful!

the air smelled so amazing...like damp soil after the rain, leaves, and a very sweet aroma danced through the air, and was such a delight every time you breathed in, like no other fragrance I've smelled before.

we walked over this bridge at the lock, which is where they let the water height lower or raise so boats can pass through.
DID I MENTION WE DROVE BY TOAD's HALL, like the Toad's Hall in Wind and the Willows!

Me, Hello Kitty (ha ha ha) Rachel and my mum!

this picture doesn't do the color of how the sky looked, justice! It was an incredible shade of pink!

look at this house! It had a thatched roof, and with the pond, and the weeping willow tree, I felt like I had just climbed into the Wind and the Willows!

this was the entrance gate to the house that George Harrison from the Beatles lived in! His wife still lives there. Just the entrance house was amazing!

that is the tiny Pub right down the street from George Harrison's house, where he used to go.

cows in the countryside...doesn't the sky just look gentle and painting-like....? oh how I really felt like I was ready to walk through the grass, like Elizabeth Bennet to meet up with her Mr. Darcy and for him to tell her:

I will have to tell you: you have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love and love and love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on. Oh how I love that movie!

this was the most adorable, wonderful, enchanting note I've ever seen posted on a door!

this was the little store where the note was posted!

On the way here we saw the pond where in Chitty-chitty-bang-bang, poor old chitty drives into the pond!

everywhere I looked...it looked like something out of a movie...

this was a very old church, that had dates of tombs back to the 1500's...

this one said 1792...Rachel told me that all their churches have tombstones all around them...and that people think it's romantic to get married there...even with all the tombstones around! We laughed at how weird that seemed to us, how she never thought it was strange until we mentioned it! ha ha ha ha

my mom with a little car, just her size, outside the church.

this was the lantern outside the church door...we looked up Psalm 43:3 when we got back to the hotel and this is what it said: "Send forth your light and your truth, let them guide me; let them bring me to your holy mountain, to the place where you dwell". beautiful!

we then drove on a very narrow road with big hedges on either side...to a real English Pub in the hills of the countryside called, The Five Horseshoes.

look how charming this place is.....

look at all the rainboots "wellies", by the door? my favorite's were the striped ones!

it was toasty warm inside, and we sat right next to the fireplace...and the cute dog who laid, mesmerized with the fire...

the ceilings were low, the benched were covered in cozy pillows...it was just cozy and warm and delightful! Big beams crossed the ceiling and the smell of the fire burning just an arms reach or two, away, and we sat snuggly among the pillows, was like we had crawled inside the most wonderful storybook!

i loved how low and "snuggly" the ceiling felt, it felt as if you climbed in a playhouse, which we learned in Britain, is called a "Wendy House" like Wendy from Peter Pan. And I loved the glossy ceilings too!

I had a hamburger "a minced beef" or ground beef burger with "chips", which we call French Fries in America....and let me tell you, these were some tasty...and big "chips"! for starters we had Potato and Nettle soup....Stinging Nettle is what grows around there, and is was soooo delicious! Sipping our soup from giant silver spoons and dipping the warm bread that was served on a giant wooden platter....it was cozy heaven.

mom had traditional "Bangers (sausage) and Mash (mashed potatoes)

me, Richard, Rachel, and mom...in front of the fireplace...after we had dessert and tea.

they took us on a drive through London on our way back home...and we drove by Big Ben!

I even like this blurry one!

this is St. Paul's Cathedral....is is so big...can you see how miniature the little people look sitting on the steps? You can even see that little white glowing ball up in the right corner, is the full moon that was shining down on the city.

they still had "my" sign up in the lobby tonight!

And now I'm all cozy on my bed....I can't believe all the my eyes took in today! It was just incredible...a memory that I wish always cherish!

Hope you enjoyed coming with me!

huge love...your kandee