Royalty and the ‘Upper Crust’

Alas, our run of good weather appeared over this morning, as it was drizzling when we got up. We decided to brave it and go for a walk anyway, to take some more photos of the sights Cambridge has to offer. The rain steadily got heavier, until we were almost back at the B&B, and the sun shone through – of course we were wet through by then!

The rest of the day was fine though (apart from one shower as soon as we got to Windsor, but that passed quickly), so we were able to spend lots of time at Windsor and the Windsor Castle in comfort. The Castle complex is a lot larger than we expected, although it does house a military troupe, as well as the state apartments, Queens private apartments and many offices. It is the Queens ‘home’ so our guide told us to keep an eye out for the flag to change some time in the afternoon, as she usually comes in late on a Friday afternoon to spend the weekend.

Although there were people wandering in and out of the private apartments, she didn’t arrive while we were there, so couldn’t say hello! We did tour around the dolls house – an amazing structure, complete with real china, real wine in the bottles, original paintings etc, and fully wired with electricity. Then went on to the State Apartments, which were much grander than any others we had seen, as expected I suppose. It was a beautiful day, so after spending quite a bit of time at the Castle, we headed across the river to Eton and Eton College.

Eton is a lovely little town, although you do get the feeling it is a bit snobby! Eton College had just finished for the Summer holidays, so there weren’t any students around – bit of a shame really, it would have been good to see them in their tails (yes, the uniform really is bow tie and tails with pin stripe trousers). The school is very proud of their history, and having taught many high ranking politicians, civil servants and royalty, its not really surprising. We didn’t get to see inside much of the school, it has expanded significantly, taking up a large number of the buildings at the far end of the main street and now educates around 1300 students a year – at 25000 pounds a student, they are not doing too badly. We did get to see the original school building, chapel and quadrangles though.

From here it was back to Margaret and Teds, Andrew got straight in to setting up their internet, the bits and pieces arrived while we were touring around, and soon enough it was off to bed.

(Alison)