England, Part One (First Class)

I finally got around to editing some photos.
I have lost 3 of the 6 pounds.
This is slow going!
Once my body eats garbage, it craves garbage, and also, it is Cadbury Mini-Eggs season.
Really, it is a miracle that I have lost any weight at all.
Anyway...our adventure always begins flying stand-by.

The flights looked better routing through Boston to Heathrow, than from JFK to Heathrow.
The first leg of the flight we were back with the rest of the cattle in coach.
I occupied my time kicking butt at in-flight trivia.

I don't mean to brag here, but I am super good at in-flight trivia.
I always go by the name "MOM." So if you are ever on a flight with me--watch it.
I am going to SCHOOL YOU.
We did not get fed anything but peanuts and luke-warm beverages in coach, so when we landed in Boston, the kids were starving.
Not first class.
We had a couple hour lay-over, so we had to feed them.
What do you feed a small orphanage?
On a budget.
In the airport.
Here is an insider tip.
Go to SBarro's pizza. Order a whole pizza. It is not on their menu, but if you ask a manager, they will sell you a whole cheese for $17.00.
Normally it is like five bucks a SLICE.

 

Our next flight from Boston to Heathrow landed us in first class.

Keep in mind, the only reason we have become flying snobs is because my husband works for an airline. We would never, ever fly first class if we didn't get it as a perk.

Come to think of it, if we didn't have flight perks we probably wouldn't leave the house.

Whenever we come across anything remotely "fancy" in our family, we always have to hold our pinkie fingers up. 

Hence the pinkies in the photos.

Business Elite had lay-flat seats. This means that the seats fold all the way horizontal, like a cot, so you can sleep. I am not sure why I didn't get photos. Oh yeah, cause I was the first one to zonk out.

The closest I got was this one of Brendan, you can see where his legs would extend into the hole under the console thing. Also out on my workspace area, you can see my SMASH book scrapbook of the trip I was working on. More about that later.

When you sit down, they bring you orange juice or champagne.

They also bring you a hot towel- they hand it to you crimped in metal tongs.

And then they bring you a fancy bowl of pre-flight warm nuts.

"Would you like some warmed nuts, sir?"

You can giggle if you want.

We always do. And trust me, we have invented 101 jokes about "warm nuts."

We are super classy like that.

In first class, they fed us well.

We had an appetizer course, then the entree:

And a delicious dessert.

I took pictures of everything, but I am sure you don't care all that much about my Creme Brulee Cheesecake.

(It is still attached to my thighs.)

We all slept, played games and watched movies.

Then they served breakfast, and then we landed.

In ENGLAND!!

This was the first thing we saw, coming off the plane.

Now I am sure we were a little giddy, and silly, and perhaps a bit sleepy, but it made us laugh.

Of course we all had to read it with our new British accents that we suddenly acquired stepping off the plane.

We went straight to the Underground to catch a tube into Epping Station where we were meeting the friends we would be touring and staying with.

Getting on the tube with seven people, all with larger-sized bags was quite the experience. There was a station we switched lines at where the people were packed onto the train like sardines. The poor people by the door of the car had to curve their backs for the doors to shut over them.

Sam and I thought we might lose a kid.

This was not first class.

We (embarrassingly) did the rude American thing- boxed people out, and crammed on.

I wasn't sure how else to do it with all the kids, and the luggage.

Sorry, mates.

By the time the tube made it out to Epping station, it thinned out a ton, and we eventually had the whole car to ourselves.

We arrived in Epping Station.

We were quite amused by the Underground, and the "Mind the Gap" reminders.

Some of the stations had sizable "gaps" to mind.

To be honest, one of the things I wanted to do most in England was run around on the Underground.

I was pretty excited about it.

I was a child of the (New Wave/Alternative) 80's.

A lot of my favorite bands came from England.

Lots of 80's references to the Underground. 

I fully expected to run into Martin L. Gore, or HoJo on the Underground.

"Hey guys, what's goin' on? You wanna go to a pub and Wang-Chung tonight?"

Never saw anyone famous.

Except for this chick:

We don't know who she was. Come to find out, the guy she was with was the famous one. We didn't know him either.

Yes, those are butt-cheeks.

The Underground was still very cool.
I had my iPod, and listened to appropriate songs.

Epping Station:

We enjoy all things first class.
We stayed with our friends Heidi and Mike.

Total first class people.
They picked us up in two cars at Epping Station. Mike drove one, and Heidi drove the other. That was just the beginning of them chauffeuring us all over the country.
It was really weird to be driving on the other side of the road.
I about had a heart attack the first hill we crested that had a car headed straight for us, like a head-on collision.
I was with Heidi, she knew how to drive over there.
That was a good thing.

Steering wheel, why are you on the right?

They took us to their home in Isleham.

Me and Heidi!

Heidi's husband Mike, is a dentist.
I don't mean to brag.
Horsecrap! I am going to brag!
I told you we enjoy first class.
I had the talk with the kids before we left "if you guys have an accident while we are on vacation, make sure it is a tooth, not a bone. Mike can fix teeth."
We didn't have any accidents.
But we knew we were in good hands.
Best hosts ever!
Anyway... here is where Mike and Heidi live:

It was a Vicarage. It is right next to St. Andrews Church.
When I say "right next to" I mean, right next to.
Here is (inside) the front door of the house (which is on the side of the house, not facing the street.)

.Go through the doors, and there is a break in the hedge:

Let's peek through the hedge, shall we?

Turn a little to the left:

St. Andrew's Church, built circa 1313

Holy WOW, huh?
With an old cemetery in front and everything!

Incidentally, English Ivy, invaded everything there, like the weed they think it is.
You can see it in the above photo, growing through a headstone.
I can't keep my English Ivy plant alive in the states, even with all the tender-loving care I give it.
Maybe I should speak to it with an accent.
The next morning, it was picturesquely foggy:

View from our window.

We heard the "bong, bong, bong" of the church bells, and each morning we woke up to the huge flock of doves that would fly from the bell-tower to the trees and back.

Inside the church:

The wooden rafters:

A close-up of one of the carvings in the wooden rafters:

Saints buried upright (vertically) in the floor. Like they are standing. I have never seen that before. They also had Saints buried horizontally and slid into the walls. The floor thing was a new one for me.

Shianne and I were the only ones in the whole church. When we opened the door, we thought someone would be there, but no.
It was very quiet.
We took a few pictures and skedaddled out of there!

Back to Mike and Heidi's house.
Inside the side door, there were a line-up of bells:

There were strings attached to the bells, that fed up into the different rooms of the house. They were used to call for the servants back in the day! A couple of the bells were still in working order.
Including the one for the Loo.
Very handy I would think, if you ran out of toilet paper.
Before cell-phones.

A side note, here.
I am not sure why parents even give their children a name at birth.
Parents think long and hard, and agonize over the perfect name for their beautiful child.
What a seasoned parent knows, is that the name you choose will not be what you end up calling that kid.
They acquire nick-names.

Mikayla became Kika.
She wasn't able to pronounce her name when she was little.
She called herself "Kika."
It stuck. Kika morphed into Kika-Lou.
Then we got lazy, and just call her "Lou."
She was a little horrified to discover that in Jolly Old England, her name now meant "the shitter."
Here is Lou in her first traditional pull-string "Loo."

Not Heidi's house.

More of Heidi's house:

First Class, heated towel rack in the bathroom.
My kids are quite sure we need one of these at home now, since cold towels post-shower "shall never do."

Let's venture into the back yard, shall we?

A garden, with a gazebo.
No kidding.

Me and Sam.

Views from the master bedroom:

I'm sorry, but I would never get sick of that view!
How many people have been to England, and stayed in a Vicarage--with foot thick walls, servants quarters and a meat locker?
We have good friends.
Thanks, Heidi and Mike!
I swear we are the luckiest blokes ever.

I have more to share.
Stay tuned for part two.