Tudor Monastery Farm...Here I come! Alternate Title: Day 6

Greeting from Londres,

Today was a great day! We woke up to the sun shining, even though it was a little cold. we were happy to see the sun. We had to be out of the house early enough to catch our 9:37 train to Chichester. I planned for us to visit Weald & Downland Open Air Museum. This is where they filmed portions of the Tudor Monastery Farm (TMF)! If you are interested in Tudor history it is a must and it is my favourite show.

It was going to be a bit of a gong show to get there. You see we had to catch the Portsmouth to Chichester train. When we arrived in Chichester, we had to catch the #60 bus going to Midhusrt. We then had to hop off at the Groom's yard in Singleton, and walk 1 km to Weald & Downland. It could have gone so horribly wrong, but thankfully I had planned it like crazy! I was so excited to go there. Mel and Dave raved about it!

Another bonus, is that if you came on the stagecoach, you got 20% off your entrance fee! YAY! So off we go for a lot of walking. If you plan on visiting, just remember that their map makes everything look really far away, it isn't...lol. I forgot how close everything is on a map here.

The Market place

I was so excited to see the view above, they used this in TMF! I was giddy like a school girl meeting One Direction! See....?

IT's SO FLUFFY!!! (not really but...lol)

Well Ok maybe not, but I was super excited. so we travelled around the site, amazed at the thatched roofs and how thick they were. So all of the homes and buildings here were taken from other locations around England. They basically dismantle them to save them. Some come into their hands in very poor condition, but the historians try and work out how this building may have looked. We travelled up to the Brewer's cottage, which was really interesting since there was an interpreter actually making ale. Now this ale would not have been carbonated, he was in the process of heating the copper bowl over a fire. In a special "stove".

The Brewer adding faggots to the fire and getting it going.

His worktable, with the barley and hops.

He stated the problem with this set up was that they didn't add the proper holes in the brick so that the heat could go around the copper bowl, as it was it would only heat from the bottom. He encouraged us to come back a little later to see the cooking process.

We then moved to the other buildings and found the cheese room! Woo hoo!

The cheese room

The porous tile floor

window screens

We then moved along to the Tudor kitchen where they were in fact doing some cooking of bread, fritters and making butter. The room has no chimney, so it was very smokey. All I wanted to do was get dressed and go and play with them. :( That right there is my ideal job. 

Making butter with a small amount of cream. Right in a bowl with her fingers.

The open hearth

The bread oven

A different angle

My dream job! She's putting on bread.

It was really interesting to try what they were making, the flat bread was cooked most likely at the end of the day since they didn't want to heat up the bread oven. It was cooked on the metal griddle in the fire. The pot next to it contained oil, that is what they fried the fritters in. The mixture for the fritters was flour, beer, spinach and onions that had been fried sweet. it was then mixed together and formed into balls (but not as neat, more of a dumpling shape) and put into the oil till cooked. It was delicious. They flat bread with the home-made butter was great too. Definitely whole wheat. This was one of my favourite parts!

After the kitchen, I wanted to check out the house they used in TMF, and it was right next door.

The front of the home (actually build in 1405)

A really nice side angle of the home.

 This is the main hall of the building. The windows have large shutters to open and close depending on the weather. The back wall has a painted wall hanging and a table set for a meal. It is a very large room.

The main hall

What is interesting here, is that the fire is in the centre of the room, it was only used for heat, not cooking. The clay pot in this picture was to keep the embers hot overnight, so that they could start the fire in the morning. All the cooking of food was done in a separate cooking house, to try and eliminate the possibility of a fire burning down the house.

One of the upstairs bedrooms (panorama)

There were 2 bedrooms in this home, each with their own staircase. Most likely the masters room and the children's rooms.

After visiting all the Tudor buildings, we decided to head back to see what the brewer was up to. When we arrived he had put in the barley and hops into the copper bowl over the fire. It was just starting to smell the yeasty smell of cooking barley sugars (like the smell you get near a Molson plant in Montreal).

Hops (small bag) and Barley (large bag)

When we saw them in cheesecloth bags, we were surprised. I didn't even think about how they would do this, but the copper bowl could not be removed, so for cleaning it made more sense to keep all the ingredients in linen. Here you can also see the ratio needed for making ale. It had a wonderful smell. 

Weald & Downland have the most amazing views, the homes that are beside the museum are just spectacular. It would be so easy to pretend to be in Tudor or Medieval times in a place like this. Oh yes and the pigs were enormous!

The view

piggies!

We made our way back to the shop, to see if there was anything I wanted. They had lots of fine pottery, but nothing I couldn't get back home from our pottery throwers. BUT...there was a book, a very expensive book that I had to have. It only came out in December last year...so brand new! I have already read 3 chapters. It is amazing. He worked at Hampton Court and he also has a medieval version of this book. I am in heaven, but it is a huge book!

After paying for my purchases, we walked the km back to the bus stop and made our way back to Chichester. Next time we are in England we will go there, it has a beautiful Cathedral we didn't have time to go into, as well as a beautiful main street. we got back to the bus station, and then made our way to the train station. We were arriving at Victoria Station. That was a crazy place at 6pm on a Monday. There were so many police armed with automatic weapons and hand guns...never seen it before. There were dog sniffers and regular police...crazy! The amount of people was intense too. We were glad to make it back to Rob's place for dinner.

So today we are off to Westminster and a museum and possibly SOHO.

~Erin

A Gale in Portsmouth - Alternate Title: Day 5

Greetings from London,

Sorry I didn't post yesterday, but we ended up having a great night with our Airbnb host Dan in Portsmouth...but more on that shortly.

So on Monday morning, we made our way to Waterloo station to start our trip to Portsmouth. I was excited because I have never been anywhere south of London.

They don't pull any punches in London....lol

I was excited to check out the Mary Rose Museum because of the 16th century artefacts they found when the raised the ship from it watery grave.  It was a good train ride (about and hour and a half) for us to arrive in Portsmouth.

The very tasty chicken, bacon and cucumber sandwich
from M&S (Marks & Spenser!)

When we left London it was a beautiful sunny day, but as we got closer to Portsmouth it got cloudy and very windy. There were gale wind warnings! Now I bought the discounted tickets to the whole Portsmouth Dockyards, which included a few museums, the ability to go on a bunch of really neat ships and the Mary Rose Museum.

Portsmouth Harbour - Low tide

It is really windy!

So on our way to the Mary Rose Museum, we get to go by the HMS Victory. It is dry docked, but still has a full crew and captain! It was Nelson's flagship during the battle of Trafalgar.

Walking towards the ship.

Behind it on the way to the Mary Rose.

CANNONS!

So we get to the museum....and man there is quite a bit there. I have lots of pictures of artefacts, but I think the coolest info was about the ship itself. When they raised it out of the water, they needed a method to keep the wood intact, as the water had saturated all the cells of the wood, and if it evaporated the wood would fall apart. So for 30 years (yes 30!) they sprayed the ship with a water/wax solution. This solution would replace just the water and the wax would keep the cell structure when it dried. Preserving the ship for years to come. They finished spraying the ship in 2013, so it now begins its 4 year drying period. It will be ready in 2017.

The black tubes are pushing air to dry the ship.

Once this has been completed, the building that houses the ship, is really neat. It was built with the whole purpose of having all the walls surrounding the ship, get to be removed. So it will be open to view by the public, nothing obstructing the view of it. So cool!

There were museum staff around showing different reproduction artefacts for people to handle and I found one thing I want...it is a Tudor pepper mill...did they have it in the shop...nope. :( Sadness...they used to sell them, so the shop staff recommend looking on eBay!

The Tudor pepper-mill!

After the Mary Rose, we decided to do a Harbour tour. We love these as you always learn cool tidbits. Here we are waiting...it was really windy.

Yes, it was windy!

Despite the wind, we decided to sit above deck as it had the best view. We found out that this was a very busy week for ships in the docks for repair. Plus they were dismantling all the America's Cup buildings from the weekend. What we didn't know is that the dockyards are a fully functioning Ministry of Defence site, so there were some restrictions.

Waiting above deck...all the life boats were here! ;)

in for repairs

 To finish our day we headed back to the HMS Victory for a tour. It was really fascinating on how cramped it was for the men to get in and out of. Also some of the ceilings I needed to duck to get under, I can't imagine how gown men could move around there quickly.

HMS Victory

Me beside the front mast

Jeff beside the front mast

After our tour we decided to get some dinner and then head to our room with Dan our host. We milled about at Gunwarf Quay. It was a typical outlet mall. lol but interesting non the less. We then headed to where we were staying, but could we find how much the bus would cost to get there, nope. It is one of the most disorganized transit I have ever seen. Even the drivers didn't recognize where we needed to go. Thank goodness for google maps. lol

We get off the bus and stock up on some ciders before we get to our room. I have to say that Dan's place was AMAZING! It is one of the old town-houses in Southsea (a part of Portsmouth), the outside is meh, but when we walked in, he had completely remodelled it! It had a wonderful nautical theme throughout and a retro kitchen. We met Dan and his girlfriend Cat. We came in just as they were having dinner. We sat with them as they ate and we talked all night! It was too bad they had to work on Tuesday. It was really great to meet someone our age, with so much in common. The room was great, he even had breakfast available to us in the morning. I would stay there again for sure. He even recommended that we take the train to Chichester from the station near his place. What a time and money saver! I wish we had taken a picture as a group. It is a great memory!

Next Post...off to Singleton!

Visiting Friends....and an 80s Birthday Party - Alternate title: Day 3 & 4

Greetings from London again!

We have just gotten home from the Clark's home in the village of Molesworth. Wow! what a really cool place!

So after our quite late Friday night, we set the alarm to be ready to catch our 10:41am train to Potter's Bar to meet Melissa for the journey to their home. Ok it felt really early, but we got ready and made our way to Kings Cross. Back to our old stomping ground from when we were hear 5 years ago. Our old Hostel was literally across the street! It was yearly and I was hankering for a pain au chocolate (I could smell croissants in the station) so I go and get some Starbucks and a pain au chocolate. It wasn't as flaky as in Ottawa, but ok. It satisfied a need. lol

So we hop on an overland train and make our way to our first stop. Melissa rolls up just as we are exiting the station. so we get our first foray into driving on the left...takes a little getting used to in a car...a bus feels so much different. But we are excited to get to our destination. We chat for our hour long trip and we arrive at their almost period home. :) We get in and say hi to Rob, Maggie and Sam, it was so nice seeing them again, and Maggie the first time since they came over. Wow she has grown so much. Getting the tour of the house was neat, really crazy on how not level any of the floors were, but I guess buildings settle. It was so neat seeing the size of the double fireplace, even thought it was closed off. It was so much fun to catch up on some SCA fun too! Melissa told us how cool it was to watch the house next to them be thatched by hand, and I would of loved to have seen that.

The weather was sunny but cool, so we grab the kids and head out for a tour of the village (which is a horseshoe shape road). We stopped at the local church (St. Peters - which some of it is period). It is so amazing to see it how old and beautiful they are.

St. Peters - Molesworth, Cambridgeshire, UK

The more square portion at the back is the period church, the front being an addition at a post period time. There were 2 amazing frescos inside that square section. The building to me has a very Tudor feel to it. :) Melissa and Rob assured me that the house near us was in fact period 1550s ish.

Fresco in St. Peters

After our nice walk (and Jeff carrying Maggie on his shoulders), we needed to get ready for the birthday party on the hill. They had a full marquee and a DJ for this costumed 80s shindig. it was celebrating Simon and Rosie's birthday and the whole village (and some of the other villages) come out for the party. A whole hog has been roasting and catering ordered. I was so excited to have a chance at eating a roasted pig. :) We had to pick up some ciders and beer, and we were excited to have fun. It was great, we got to meet a whole bunch of people, and Jeff got to tease Peggy (from the US) all night, I have to admit it was easy to get her going. The music was excellent, and food amazing and the booze flowing. We made it back to the house around 2am. (Hence no post last night) :)

Molesworth Community Centre (it was also a very cool building)

My glowstick necklace (and floating head) lol

Being lazy and on vacation...we didn't get our of bed until 10am! oops...the kids were so quiet, we didn't even hear them! Some of us were worse off than others...lol, but we enjoyed Rob's french toast for breakfast, and boy does Maggie have and appetite. O.o  As per UK weather (I have been informed) that you get one nice day, then a rain day...so today was a rain day. Boy did it rain! I think Jeff commented that it was going sideways! So we convinced Melissa to take us and Maggie on a local church tour...hoping we could go inside them. Unfortunately they were all locked but we did see some amazing locations. Unfortunately for me, most of the tombstones were illegible. The mold rotting their surfaces off. I am sure they were really old too! :( Here are some pictures of cool churches of the area....

St. Mary's Chruch in Leighton Bromswold - and it was pouring rain....

Council Stone - circa 11c.

 

Walkway to the chruch

St. Mary's

St. Peter & St. Paul - Alconbury

St. Peter & St. Paul - front

St. Peter & St. Paul - back

Four Canadian Solder's Graves - WWII plane crash

Yarn Bombing in Oundle!

Yan Bombing in centre Oundle!

Even the bollards are socked!

Trees, benches, the roof on the transit shelter and the pillars across the street!

No red telephone box? No problem!

As we finished our wet tour of the area, we came home to Rob's home-made pizza (dough and all, YUM!) and I ate way too much, but it was so delicious!

We chatted as we finished dinner, then it was time for us to head back to Potter's Bar to make our way back to London! Tomorrow we head to Portsmouth and the Mary Rose museum! Woo Hoo!

Platform 9 3/4 @ Kings Cross
(we came in on platform 10 tonight)

So it is late and I need to plan for tomorrow...time to sign off.

Night, night.

~Erin

A gratuitous post of cutie Maggie wanting to take selfies! lol

selfie time...it's a little blurry. Oops... best smile though!

Museums...Rain and Asleep on the bus... Alternate Title: Day 2

Greetings from London....day 2.

So today started with lots of rain. Apparently they were calling for Southern England to get up to 50mm of rain. Boy did we get it. We were very lucky today to sleep in quite a bit (9am) and then start to get ready for our day. I love our Airbnb, we bought groceries last night and had breakfast here in the morning. (BTW 4 pints of semi-skim milk is only £1!) so we ate breakfast and headed into Central London (and not down-town...apparently that is a North American term). We decided to hit the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, lucky for us our bus went straight there, no changing or anything! Now I was planning a guerilla style attack of the gallery (especially since it was raining and where do all the tourists go? To the free gallery...sigh) OK...so Renaissance wing here we come. I got to see some of my favourite paintings.

A Lady with a Squirrel and a Starling

We ended up going through the whole gallery! I couldn't believe it, neither did my feet! lol So we decided to head for lunch and picked a place called Byron, a nice hamburger joint. The string fries were great and they had some nice cider too. Our waiter spoke like Ali G....it was strange. LOL

Old Smokey burger

So after a filling lunch we decide to head back to the apartment. Our phones were dying (still not sure why)...so we hop back on the bus and head back, except that it is hot in the bus, which makes us very sleepy...enough to miss our stop by 2 stops. Sigh...ok well we will walk back, then the heavens opened up and well it poured...Nothing would stop this...I was soaked (even with Mel's rain coat - thanks btw) and umbrellas. We were dripping. So thank goodness we were going back anyway. So we dry off, get warm, eat some dinner (yay groceries) and head back out to the National Portrait gallery. With a whole Tudor section Woo hoo! except it was a full out bust. :( They had like 20 paintings and none of the ones I wanted to see...no Elizabeth I, no Jane Grey, nada. VERY BIG SAD FACE HERE. They had a huge exhibition back in the spring and not even a book on it. :( :( :(

M&M Super store

So we wandered around a bit and saw they had a Nickelodeon shop...so we went to go see the Bubble Guppies merchandise for Olivia...we have gifties! :) Then we went to the M&M shop...that place is crazy big. Bought too much chocolate! lol All in my favourite colours...

We then went for a small snack before heading to a movie. :) It is raining, and yucky for walking around and we have no Olivia to worry about, so 9:45pm show here we come. we saw inside out at Leicester Square's Empire theatre, opening night in the UK, 3D and the biggest IMAX screen I had ever seen! It was insane. Jeff got us some wine and beer...and we watched a good movie. Yes I cried like a baby. lol

As I write this it is 1:30am...time for bed. we have an early start, catching the train to visit the Clark's. :) So have a great night everyone, and I will try an post tomorrow, but if I don't I will on Sunday. The trip is already going too fast. :P

Night!
~Erin

Moose...Beaver...Maple Leaf... Has landed??

This post is being written in Jolly Old England! We have arrived safe and sound in London. :)

We left Ottawa at 10:40pm for our red eye on Air Canada. I was surprised that it wasn't sold out and once we were in the air, very jealous of a couple who booked single seats in the row of three chairs, as they had no one bedside them at all and they spread out to sleep.

Our plane being readied

We were also lucky as the seats ahead of us were also free, so Jeff moved up and slept there. I decided I would watch the new Cinderella live action movie. What can I say about it...well the costuming choices were interesting. Ranging from 18th century to 20th century...not sure how I felt about all those periods jumbled together in the same scenes. LOL

But I was excited to see Hayley Atwell as Ella's Mom and of course Helena Bonham Carter is always excellent. Otherwise I would give it a meh. LOL The rest of the flight was uneventful (excellent for plane travel) but I didn't get much sleep...just not too comfortable. :( The landing in London this morning was amazing!

So we managed to walk all the way from our gate to customs (I swear it was at least a kilometre walk. To wait at customs for an hour...lots of people coming into London. We picked up our SIM cards and our Oyster cards and started to make our way into London to find out Airbnb place.

We have determined that Google maps walking directions are the pits, and had us walking way longer and out of the way than necessary. But finally we found our place in the Stockwell area. We stopped at a small market and grabbed sandwiches and drinks and I found the best Kettle Chips to try... Bacon and Maple Syrup. Tastes like sweet BBQ.

mmmm...Crispy Bacon & Maple Syrup

We met Rob our host and he is fantastic! I am super happy with where we are staying. It is a very large room with a table and sitting area (in fact I think it is their living room when not being rented.) We had lots to talk about including our mutual love of Top Gear. :P

right now as I write this it is almost 5pm...we have decided to stay in today, rest up for sightseeing tomorrow. We are going to go get some groceries, have dinner and early to bed. I am tired and we walked a lot today!

We don't have many pics yet, but It has been years since I was last in Heathrow, it it amazing and I do love the people movers. :)

Well I am signing off for now, Talk to you tomorrow!

~Erin

July 20 Update

Sorry for the blog updates...it seems I didn't have the blog updating when I was updating the campaign site. Sigh...

Well so now this will be all updated for when I leave in 2 days! 2 DAYS! OMG!

I am so excited, airbnb has been booked, flights booked, travel in and around secured, visits planned and finally the basic itinerary for Hampton!

So the itinerary is like this:

July 22nd: Fly to London (red eye)
July 23rd: land - head to accomodations.
July 23rd to 25th: be london bums (lol I haven't decided which museums we will hit)
July 25-26th: visit with friends before they head back to Canada. (and an 80's bday party)
July 26-27th: back to London
July 27-28th: The Mary Rose Museum in Portsmouth and Weald & Downland Open Air Museum in Singleton (Where they filmed the Tudor Monastery Farm)
July 28-August 3rd: London.
August 3rd: Fly back to Ottawa.

Lucky me I get to go to Kew Palace on the 31st for some historical cooking and then 2 days at Hampton (August 1-2).

I am so excited. Museums I want to go to while visiting: National Portrait Gallery, London Museum, British Museum, National Gallery, Westminster Cathedral, Buckingham Palace, Hampton Court Palace, Kew Palace/Gardens, Mary Rose Museum and Weald & Downland Open Air Museum.

It will be busy, but so much fun!

My goal will be to post something everyday for you!

Hampton, here I come!

~Erin

July 11 Update

The sheath has been won! YAY! See who the winner is here:

And the winner is....

~Erin

July 6 Update

So we are now 2 weeks out from when I fly to London! :) I am so excited! I just have a couple of things I need to plan, like what sightseeing pass I need to get and money to pay for food. :) With Airbnb I have access to kitchens so I hope to eat breakfast and pack lunches as much as possible. That way if I find something really neat, I can get it! :)

Thank you everyone for the donations. I really appreciate it!

If anyone was planning on donating, please contact me offline, as now it will take too long for Paypal to get the funds in my account for me to exchange. But I can still get your donation on this site if you want.

Thank you again, I can't believe we are almost at the end for fundraising, but the beginning of the adventure!

~Erin

June 20 Update (yes this is late, lol)

Hi Everyone!

I know it has been quite quiet here, but I have been busy planning, but I wanted to let you all know that I have booked my flight and accommodations! I will be flying out of Ottawa on the 22nd with an overnight flight. Thankfully the funds you all donated helped my buy my plane ticket (and boy was it expensive!) I will be cooking on August 1st at Hampton, and meeting some of the historians on July 31st.

If anyone is still thinking about donating, your donation will go towards my accommodations that I have just booked (or my travel card when I am in London). Thank you so much for helping me get there!

I can't wait to start cooking! :) If you have any questions please email/Facebook me.

Erin