We woke up to a rainy morning, which seemed like a bad omen for our trip to see Stonehenge out in the countryside. Since we weren’t looking to rent a car during this trip, we decided to arrange a tour through H.I.S., a Japanese tour company. The meetup point was actually right across from where we had afternoon tea the other day, so it was still fresh in our memory and easy to find. We arrived a few minutes early and bought some juice for the bus ride, and then went to wait with about 30 Japanese tourists also going on the same trip. The tour guide, a Japanese middle aged lady, showed up and started to review the paperwork for each of the tour members. She was a little perturbed that Kuniko didn’t print out the receipt of our reservation, but Kuniko pointed to her name on the tour guide’s list, showed her ID, and everything was fine.
We climbed on to the big coach they had arranged for us, and found some comfortable seats in the middle. We had about a two hour bus ride to Stonehenge, with a break in the middle at a rest area. The first hour we sipped juice and absolutely devoured some shortbread cookies that we had bought the previous evening. While we rode on the bus, the tour guide gave a complete lecture on all the countries of the UK, and she related each of the countries to famous Hollywood stars to bring it home for the tour members. When she reached the topic of Jane Austen, the tour guide really showed a lot of enthusiasm and went on and on. Unfortunately, we couldn’t turn off the speakers on the bus and had to just get through the lecture. It was kind of cute, though.
Finally we arrived at Stonehenge, parking in a bus (coach) lot next to the new visitors’ center. This visitors’ center was completely different from the one I visited when I was here last, and I thought the design was quite nice. We assembled outside the tour group station, and the tour guide distributed audio guides to everyone. I declined mine – I have a strict “no audio guide” policy – but that kind of freaked out the tour guide. I think I was the first person to ever decline. Anyway, finally we got organized and walked to the visitor’s center, and we were loaded onto trams that took us on a 5 minute ride to Stonehenge itself. The ride was quite nice – through some beautiful fields. There was a UK National Trust trail that ran nearby, and there was also a walkway if you didn’t feel like using the tram. The sun was coming out – the clouds disappeared, and it was just a perfect day to visit.
We walked around Stonehenge and took some pictures, took in the rocks, and avoided as much as possible all the tourists buzzing around the area. Kuniko seemed to enjoy seeing it, and it brought back good memories from the last time I was here. We moved around Stonehenge at what I think was faster than average speed, and reached the line to get on the trams for the ride back to the visitor’s center. Since it was a gorgeous day and we had wrapped up our visit pretty quickly, we decided to walk along the trail and enjoy the views. We’re always looking for ways to walk and burn some calories, so it was a natural choice for us.
We ambled along the roadway, and took lots of pictures of the green fields. After the rainy morning I had expected to be under an umbrella all day. It was a very pleasant feeling. A couple of trams went by us and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the passengers – they were totally missing out on this feeling. Kuniko posed for some pictures near a picturesque gate, and I pulled out my phone to check the time and-
HOLY CRAP! We had only 15 minutes before our bus was due to leave! We started hustling down the road – walking hard. Kuniko hates to be late so she started to outdistance me and leave me behind. I hate to rush anywhere, so I kept it to a brisk walk. More trams went by and now I had completely different feelings about those passengers. Smart people – every one of them.
We made it to our bus one minute late, and we jumped on. I was expecting everyone to be there already – Japanese people tend to be very punctual – but as it turned out only about half the people were there. We sat down and caught our breath. We made it!
The tour guide was busy watching for the rest of her flock, and a couple of people came in late and said that they saw other members of our tour walking (actually walking!) instead of using the tram. The tour guide kind of freaked out about that saying that it is more than a 20 minute walk. I realized that they were talking about seeing us, though, when they mentioned that they saw “the foreign guy”. We kept our mouths shut behind them and eventually they turned around and saw that we were already there. We beat you guys!
Once everyone showed up about ten minutes later, we took a short bus ride to the town of Bath. This was another “second timer” for me, and it was very similar to how I remember it. We toured the Roman Baths, I think I took pictures from exactly the same spots, and then we walked around town a bit. Since we had some extra time we had sandwiches and beers at “The Huntsman”, a restaurant/pub right near the tour bus pick up point. Kuniko had a ham hock and chutney sandwich, and I had a brie and smoked bacon sandwich – both excellent.
Everybody was on time at the bus stop, so we made our way to the last stop of the trip, a tiny little town called “Lacock”, which was slightly famous because it was the place where the first photo ever was taken, and also because they had filmed some Harry Potter scenes there. We weren’t really interested in either of those two draws, and instead went to the store to buy a wine opener for later, and some Flake ice cream, and then to the Red Lion pub to drink some beers there. While we waited for the bus to come back we chatted a little with the tour guide. She was a little quirky but nice. You could clearly tell she loves her job. She said she only works four days a week – that’s a nice schedule!
On the bus ride back she was thankfully much quieter, and I think the whole bus except for her and the driver were asleep. Once we got back into the outskirts of London she started pointing thinks out on the microphone, but I was really glad to have a chance to get in a nap on the bus.
We left the tour behind near Harrod’s, bought some cheesy souvenirs at a cheesy souvenir shop, and then headed back to the hotel. For some reason I had a brutal headache, so I took some aspirin and lay down to wait for it to take effect. Kuniko laid down for a nap, and the next thing I knew I woke up around 10 pm. I still had a slight headache, I wasn’t really hungry, and Kuniko was completely asleep, so I made an executive decision to not go out to dinner tonight. Instead, I went right back to sleep.
