Goodbye England & Scotland!

After 20 days, it was time to say goodbye to the UK. We had a 4 hour drive to Heathrow from York and took the time to stop at the famed Sherwood Forest to break up the journey. It was a re-education of the story of Robin Hood. Was he real? Or folklore...Our last walk in England was pleasant with the weather holding up. We stopped briefly at a local pub for our last English fish & chips, as well as sticky toffee pudding. It was then straight on to Heathrow. We were happy to report that the Hertz rental return process was quick and easy. They didn't punish us for having a 95% full tank. The shuttle to Terminal 5 also came quickly with a very friendly driver. Before we knew it, we had checked in and were enjoying food and beverage in the BA lounge.

Some reflections in no particular order:
The first one that came to mind was that although we enjoyed our trip, as a destination, it didn't quite come anywhere near the top. Perhaps this was partially influenced by the difficulty of driving a minivan through narrow country roads and finding parking in tiny villages! We also moved at a cracking rate like crazy Australians who were used to driving large distances. Perhaps if we had slowed down, the trip would have had a different feel to it.

Scotland was gorgeous, especially the Hebrides. If we had our time over again, we would have spent a little bit more time so we could have done more hikes.

Edinburgh is a cool city. Pretty and with a great vibe. Glasgow was great as an overnight stop but not worth spending more than a day.

After a while, all the tiny villages blurred together. So I would suggest picking a couple of seaside ones, a couple of inland ones and leave it at that!

The edges of Sherwood Forest that once used to cover most of the county

Hints of the story of Robin & his merry men everywhere

Time for our last walk!

The Major Oak, believed to be a place of gathering

Last pub meal!

Massive fish and chips

Great way to say goodbye to England!

Hurrah For England!

Our 13.5 hour flight to London was uneventful and even bordered on being…pleasant! The seats on the A380 were dated and old compared to the ones on the Boeing 777 to Singapore but the seats were wide and the cabin staff genuinely lovely. 

Breakfast number 3. The first on the first flight, the second at the airport and lucky last on the second flight!

Beef hor fun one of the many options for lunch

Utilising the privilege of ordering drinks made to order on the plane!

Desert always looks better when plated and not in a plastic container

Arrival in Heathrow was efficient, and it was almost a walk-through immigration, baggage pick up and customs. The snag arrived at Hertz when we had to wait for quite a while to be served. An American woman was throwing a tantrum because there were no convertibles and she had imagined herself in an open top touring the British countryside. Jeepers! Part of being a Gold Plus member was that the car was ready and parked at a convenient location ready to drive off. Unfortunately we did have to wait for the woman to finish her tirade as we wanted the free wifi device that we were entitled to...

Descet into London

Easy to get a UK sim, right outside the terminal

The Hertz vans were frequent

Gold Plus members names onboard !

Our van was ready and waiting....so frustrating not to be able to drive away

We finally got our van and thankfully the 1.5 hour drive wasn’t too bad either. We stayed at the Stonehenge Inn, chosen because it was cheap and cheery, and they had a room that fit all 5 of us in a room. For a small local Inn that was close to Stonehenge it wasn't too bad. We had our dinner at the pub attached. It was 24 degrees, the skies were...blue! All was looking good! Looking forward to finally "start" our trip tomorrow.