Leeds Castle

We had heard that rains of biblical proportions were heading our way this weekend. So when we woke up on Saturday and found a beautiful blue sky we knew we had to take advantage. We decided to go to Leeds Castle, which strangely enough is not in Leeds but in Maidstone. Off we went to the train station to catch the train. A few weeks earlier we bought a family discount card which gives us a pretty good discount. As luck would have it, we just missed a train so we got sandwiches and caught the 12:18. By the time we got to our station near the Castle, it was about 1:30. Just in time to catch the 2:00 bus to the castle. If it came. Which it doesn’t - after November 1. We still have so much to learn. A local told us the castle was about 5 miles away. We knew that we would not be able to walk to the castle, tour it and then walk back without a major teenage rebellion. So we decided to walk through the little town, get some exercise, have an early dinner and then head back. Leeds Castle would have to wait for another day. As we were walking downtown, a bus passed us by and stopped on the road. The driver asked us if we were wanting to go to Leeds Castle. When we told him we did, he explained that he took people that had an all-in-one ticket (roundtrip train ticket + castle admission), which we did not but he agreed to sell us a bus ticket and take us there. Yay! Day saved. Although how would we get back. The driver showed us a road right by the castle that would take us to another train station. That station was only about 1 ½ miles from the Castle. We thought we could do that. We knew we could do it when the driver told Chizz there was a good pub down that road!

So we made it to the castle. It is pretty impressive. It actually looks like a castle, where some we have seen don't really look like what you expect a castle to look like. The grounds are very impressive. They have a duckery (every castle should have one) which included ducks, swans, geese, a beautiful pond area. The grounds also include a maze, an aviary, vineyard etc.

We toured inside the castle which is privately owned now. Its last owner was a woman whose uncle was one of the Whitney family of New York and she was a Standard Oil heiress. She married an englishman and bought Leeds castle in the 1920s. She restored quite a bit of it but also used it as her home. It was decorated for Christmas but I think I would have rather not seen it decorated. I didn't care much for the decorations, apparently money doesn't always buy taste. When she died in 1974, the castle was made part of a foundation and is still owned by the foundation today. It is used as a conference center and meeting place. It also sometimes hosts small weddings. Auntie S - want me to check availability?

After we are done touring the castle, we decide to tour the grounds a bit.
Problem -remember those biblical rains - now they come!! We brought our umbrellas but there were also gale force winds but we soldier on. We decide to forego the maze, that will have to wait for a better weather day but we do take in the aviary. Quite a few parrots, macaws that type of bird. We also went through the strangest museum I have ever seen. The Dog Collar Museum. Okay. We went in, they claim to have 400 collars. I am not sure I saw all of them or needed to see all of them. I am not sure if it had anything to do with the rain or the theme of the museum but it did smell alot like wet dog in there. We spent like 2 minutes, and I think Chizz would say it was a minute and a half too long.

By this time, it is raining pretty hard and that walk back to the train station is looking pretty bleak. But we have to get there eventually so we might as well start back when it was still a bit light out So off we go, back through the grounds heading toward the road. We did see a black swam on our way back. We have seen several black swans since we have been here and they are pretty interesting.

We slogged through the mud and pretty hard rain, struggling with our umbrellas. At about a mile or so into the trip, we came across a pub - The Windmill. We sloshed inside. Wet through and through. The waitress couldn't have been nicer. They had a big table by a huge fireplace, I am sure Kiki & Snake could have stood up in it. She took our coats and hung them up so they would dry and basically fussed over us for a few minutes. Our clothes were soaked and I didn't look, but I am sure we left puddles under that table. We ate dinner and by the second beer, we were feeling pretty good. The rain had let up by the time and we were starting to warm up quite a bit. The food was great and the atmosphere perfect. It had all the things we like in a pub, beer, big fireplace, beer, good food, beer, low beamed ceilings, beer. Well fortified,and the rain having subsided greatly, we walked the next half mile to the train station. We were in luck, we only had to wait a few minutes until the next train.

By the time we got back to London, the rain had started again - this time harder even still. We practically swam back to the flat from the tube station. There was one gust of wind that almost blew Chizz out into the street and managed to mangle 2 of our 3 umbrellas. Another day "enjoying" nature in the country. Come visit us!!