On Monday, we walked to Buckingham palace to see the changing of the guards and then took a 3 hour "hop on, hop off" narrated bus tour throughout Westminster and London city.
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| Buckingham Palace |
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| Parliament Building from water |
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| Tower Bridge from water |
On Wednesday, We did a Royal Greenwich walking tour, viewing the Cutty Sark which was built in 1869, which is the only surviving tea clipper and was the fastest sailing ship in the world when it was built.
We also saw St. Allege Church, where Henry VIII was baptized, The Queens house, National Maritime Museum and Old Naval College.
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| Cutty Sark |
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| Building at the Naval College |
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| Maritime Museum |
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| The Queens House |
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| Maritime Museum - Titanic Memorial Garden |
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| St Allege Church |
We left around 1:00 pm and it was very scenic sailing along the Thames River and through the Thames Barrier. We spent Thursday at sea.
Friday, June 29, we arrived in Edinburg Scotland, but it was so foggy our shore excursions were delayed and then cut short. We saw lots from the bus, but did not get time to shop along the Royal Mile.
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| Palace |
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| Edinburg Castle |
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| Royal Mile |
On Saturday, we went onto Orkney Islands. This is one of the windiest areas in Europe, so windy they have no trees in the countryside. We stopped at the village of Stromness along with the tour through the countryside. We also took a shuttle bus into Kirkwall, which was a really quaint town.
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| Standing Stones |
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| Ring of Brodger Momument |
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| Wild Cotton plants |
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| St Magnus Cathedral |
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| Inside of church |
Bishop and Earl's Palace
Sunday, we visited Lerwick and Shetland Islands. We really enjoyed our trip out to see the Shetland Ponies, but there are only about 1000 left on the island, all having their own passports. Of course I thought we would also see Shetland Sheepdogs, but there are very view left on the island, but they are using Border collies for herding.
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| 8-9 week old colt |
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| Tjeldsjnd Bridge - 1 1/2 foot clearance with mast down |
July 4, we visited Honningsvag, Norway, one of the most Northern ports
Mageroya Island Panoramic
Skarsvag - northernmost fishing village in the world
caribou
Church of Honningsvåg- only building left after war. Built in 1885
Sami
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| Kamoyvaer |
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| Heard of caribou |
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Skarswag Church - steeple blew off so
many times they left it off |
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| Sami home |
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Honningsvag Church - only surviving building
after World War II |
July 5, we were in Tronso Norway and took a shore excursion "Life in the Arctic". We visited the dog kennels of 300 Huskies owned by Tove Sorensen and Tore Albrigtsen, who run the 600 mile Fennmark dog sled race and the Iditarod.
Polaris Museum - Worlds northernmost aquarium of Arctic Sea Creatures:
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| Northern Norway Science Center - Planetarium |
Another day at sea on July 6 - this time we crossed the Arctic Circle during the day, so we got a picture of the marker.
July 7, we were in Molde Norway.
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| Molde Cathedral |
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| Romsdal Museum |
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| Norwegian traditional folk dance |
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| Baby Walker |
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| Aker stadium |
July 9 and 10th we were in Bergen, Norway. We went out on the 9th to see the sites in Bergen.
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| Royal family lived here |
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| Hanseatic Museum |
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| Fish is 140 years old |
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| Cable Train - Fioyen |
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| St Mary's Church |
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First Fire Station
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| Fish market |
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| Ole Bull born in yellow swan hous |
On the 10th, we disembarked the boat at 5:30 am, flew to Oslo and then onto Reyjkavik, Iceland. We stayed at the Grand Hotel of Reykjavik. It was here, that we found out how expensive Iceland is. It's a good thing that we had such great food on the cruise ship, as we ate pretty simply in Iceland. Two fish n'chips dinners in the bar along with a glass of wine and a beer was $75 US dollars.
July 11, we had an all day shore excursion, visiting the Thingvellir National Park, Geysir Hot Springs, Gulifoss Waterfall, and Kerid Crater. At every port or stop we made we were told how wonderful the weather was compared to normal, the only day of rain that we had, was today. Luckily most of the day's schedule, was spent touring in the shuttle bus.
Everywhere we went we saw Lupine that was brought from Alaska to help with soil erosion. First place we went was to the Thingvellir National Park.
Geysir Hot Springs
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Gullfoss waterfall
Hvita River drops 96 feet |
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| Kerid Crater - formed 6500 years ago |
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| Icelandic horses |
On Thursday, July 12, we were taken to the Blue Lagoon and had a couple of hours to soak.
We then had a city tour in the afternoon.
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| 1842 Church - Working Church |
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| Perlman Observatory |
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| Hallgrimskirkja Church |
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| Music Hal |
Our flight home from Iceland was June 13. It was so great to get back into the motorhome. Thanks to our friends, for letting our motorhome sit in Estacada for the time we were gone and providing airport transportation for us.
