On our way up North

After our adventures in Cornwall, we headed north for a much needed break at the Three Choirs Vineyard (the 3rd largest in Britain), near the Forest of Dean on the western side of England. It was here that the tick's head finally came out, and a few days later Rowan finished his medicine. Above, Baba reads a story to Rowan while Winnie has a snack before dinner. Rowan LOVES his books and spends much of his time reciting lines from several books at once, or repeating a sequence over and over again. By this time, his favorite books were "Chicken Little" and "The Gas We Pass" (he now likes to walk around saying "The Gas We Pass, the Story of Farts, by Shinta Cho...Fart thee weeeeeell!").

What's more, when I take him to the potty (which he's been very good about), he insists that I read him a story. Thankfully, most of them I've memorized. But this little kid will sometimes correct me if I don't use the right word or mix up the word order. Amazing memory he has!

While at Three Choirs, we took a side trip to the Forest of Dean, which reportedly has some of the oldest oak trees in England--I didn't see any that were that old. Above, bluebells, flowers that are very common in England...and nowhere else. I believe they figure into fairy lore somehow, but I don't know how exactly.

The forest is very green and very dark, sporting a variety of trees extremely common to Britain, such as this twisted rowan tree in the foreground.

We worked our way north into Scotland, stopping for a few days at Shrewsbury (pronounced "Shroesbury" after the original Anglo-Saxon name for the town) and Iron Bridge Gorge, the birthplace of the industrial revolution. Above is the iron bridge, the first such bridge built in the world and a symbol of the industrial revolution, erected in the late 1700s.

Here's Winnie and Rowan on the bridge itself. Rowan is upset about something--probably couldn't find a good rock.

Rowan looking out from the bridge onto the river below. He must have been a bit cranky that day, possibly because of the excessive amounts of traffic we encountered when the UK decided to close down one of the major roads into Shrewsbury--just way too much time in the car, I suppose.

In Shrewsbury, we stayed at a slightly refurbished Tudor-style house whose foundations were actually laid sometime in the 15th century--very creaky and uneven floors. This is about when my hay fever started acting up. We had dinner at the Corn House, pictured above, which Rowan loved (the owner was extremely nice and child-friendly, a luxury in England).

From Shrewsbury, we headed further up north, stopping to gander at Hadrian's Wall, the massive wall built by the Romans in the 2nd century to keep the resisting northern tribes of Scotland out (Rome never quite got control of the north).

We also stopped at the remains of a very large Roman fort built very near the present border of Scotland. This picture is very typical, Rowan trying desperately to escape Mama and climb all over the walls and crevices of this rather dangerous place.

Rowan munches on bunny crackers at yet another abandoned Roman fort under gray skies. This actually brings us to another story. You might notice that Rowan's nose looks a bit damaged. Well, while we stayed the night at a converted hunting lodge outside of Carlisle, Rowan fell off some steps and scraped up his nose and chin pretty bad. No need for doctors, but he looked quite put out for some days after. And his hair just keeps on growing...

Next stop, Kelso, SCOTLAND.