Euro Excursion 2012 - Self planned trip - Day 2
4:49 PMAs salam.. On day 2, like I've mentioned, as soon as Ikram arrived, we made our move to Bath city center. Ikram came with his ...
4:49 PM
As salam..
On day 2, like I've mentioned, as soon as Ikram arrived, we made our move to Bath city center. Ikram came with his car so we made a quick stop at University of Bath to parked his car and then he joined us in our rented car. His wife was a post-graduate in University of Bath and had to attend to a lab so she couldn't join us that morning. Anyway, we're going to meet her before we left Bath.
{ At University of Bath parking area. Anyway, meet our rented ride for 4 days. Nickname : Cik Akii :) }
Bath city from our hotel was very near. Merely took us 20 minutes or so to arrived. Since the city was very small, it was very hard to get a parking inside, instead you had to park at designated parking and take a short walk into city. Lucky for us, we had "local" guiding us that day so finding the nearest parking is a breeze. And ohhh did I mentioned that Ikram used to be part time wedding photographer? He was practically became our unpaid tour guide and photographer ha ha ha so most of the picture in this post, at Bath especially was taken by him. My girls and I just love taking photo, errrr actually we loves our photo to be taken and coincidentally, we had professional photographer tour-guiding us. Perfect combo! Thank you Ikram, of course we owed you a debt of gratitude. Come to Kuwait faster so we can repay your kindness :)
{ Higher point of Bath outskirt. Behind us was road heading to Bath City Centre }
Okay.. so once arrived and after few family photos, the first stop we made was to this mobile and service provider center called CarPhone. Apparently, this shop was quite famous chain shop all around Europe you can find them almost everywhere. This is where we subscribed our sim card with internet connection. We just paid for the simcard price since once you bought a prepaid card, you'll entitled to 3000 minutes free airtime and free unlimited internet connection. Also, calling UK number to UK number is free too. That's a lot of minutes we're taking about. Till the very end of our trip, we didn't even have to top-up our prepaid and I believed we didn't even finished utilizing our 3000 minutes given. I can't helped but liking UK very very much on the very first day I arrived but with this addition of simcard thingy, I think I've fallen in love with the country I have yet to discover.
{ So, this is us in Carphone shop, getting our photo taken by our "official photographer" while waiting for our simcard ready he he he }
After we got our prepaid, it's just a stroll and sightseeing around Bath City Centre. To my opinion, Bath is very pretty old city with it's own attraction. Since it was weekdays, the crowd was bearable. The weather was nice, cool and chill and gotten a bit sunny in the middle of the day. The city itself was very clean, just like the rest of the country. Locals were very polite to us. People are taking their time strolling around the pavement, buying fresh flowers and seasonal fruits. Elders was leisurely out and about the city too, buying groceries on their special ride. Street performers was everywhere doing what they did best, entertaining by-passers who will spare their times sitting around and appreciating the performance. I just super love the ambiance and the atmosphere here.
{ The above mentioned infamous ride among elders. They even rode this inside the shop }
{ On the day we were there, there's this non profit organisation that raised ponies to help unfortunate children organizing some charity event to collect funds. You can just donate any amount you like if you wish and they'll give you sticker and you can pet the ponies. Alis loves the ponies so much but Erin decided to keep the distance. She did not scared of the poney I think but she geli with the poney's hair/fur }
{ Without Ikram, this photo and the rest of our photo will be the girls with me-without hubby or without me-with hubby }
{ Cheap yet unique way of advertising isn't it? }
{ In the heart of the Bath city center. I got lost in GAP behind us immediately after this. Very scaryyy experience! I just can't find my way out. Hubby had to come to rescue me later or errrmmm is it to rescue my wallet? I can't be sure, I'm still in trauma ha ha ha }
{ In front Roman Bath. The water inside the bath place was said to be untreated so those water was basically in their original form and substances from thousand and thousand years ago hence it is forbidden to touch the water or play with it. They even had those Bath water for sale in vial at souvenir's shop here }
{ I wasn't with them while this picture taken. My husband and Ikram took the kids for sightseeing while I'm enjoying my guilty pleasure time on my own. This is exactly the particular time I got lost in GAP }
{ Ikram's work of art }
{ Bear in Bath }
{ If we have Bear above, here we have Babes and Birds. When I said Babes, I didn't mean myself if you know what I'm sayin'. You think my husband really wanna takes our picture in this? Ha ha ha I don't think so :) }
{ Erin protesting in Clarks. Well, she'll understand someday that woman can never have too many shoes. I mean how many is too many? }
As you can see, we really took our time strolling and enjoying the beauty of Bath. Initially, we had 3 things scheduled today. Tour in Bath, visit Ikram's house for lunch, heading to Stonehenge for photo session and then proceed to Swindon for strawberry picking and lastly check in to our hotel in Oxfordshire. Anyway, when you're doing a tour on your own, no tour guide to chase and monitoring your time, you'd bound to dilly dally and before you knew it, you had pretty messed up schedule heheh.. Sure enough, by the time we realized, it's almost 2 pm and the kids were all starving. Even though we planned to had lunch at Ikram's place, we made slight changes by en route to kebab shop called Marmaris first.
Coming from middle east myself, kebab or shawarma as we called here, was treated as a light food or snacks in between meal and usually a food you had on the go. So I was thinking, we can pack few kebabs for the girls to fill them in until we reached Ikram's place. Less did I know, kebab here was a considered main meal so sit down lunch it is.
{ The gentlemans }
Considering the fact that we're way behind schedule and it's almost 4 by the time we finished our meal, we discussed our plan again and resorted to having had to pick between 2 S. Strawberry picking or Stonehenge! The vote was 30-70. The adults voted for Stonehenge but of course the kids picked Strawberry Picking. It's crucial decision since the farm we're going to had closing time, and Stonehenge doesn't so logically we had to go to Swindon farm first and then do Stonehenge afterwards. However, route wise, it is more logical to go to Stonehenge first, then go down to Swindon and straightaway to Oxfordshire else we'll ended up going back and forth and making unnecessary trip ans wasting time. Furthermore, there's no way we can go to Stonehenge and reached Swindon before 7pm unless we fly our way there. Plus, we still had to make our stop to Ikram's house since we had promised to.Although being told to don't bother or susah susah preparing anything, he and his wife went an extra mile and effort to prepare a hearty meal for us. It is just plain rude to cancel when people had put so much effort to welcome you isn't it. Putting all those factors in and the children's sake into consideration, we chose Swindon and skipped Stonehenge this time. Plus, we're going to Bicester Village tomorrow so the kids are going to have to endure mommy and papa shopping time all day long so this visit to a farm can be considered as the highlights for them so as to say. The tribe has spoken, Strawberry picking it is. We can do Stonehenge on other trip if Allah permitted :)
Kak Anis and clan made their way to Swindon first since we're going to Ikram's house for a short visit. Ohhh before that, we had to picked up Ikram's car and also his wife at University of Bath. While waiting for Ikram's wifey to come out from her lab, we had and un-official tour to some part of the university also have a good time pretending and play student moments.
{ I took this as a super early motivation for the girls. May Allah showered them with great minds and achievement in life, highest akidah and iman and lead them to be a righteous and humble Muslimahs. Amiinnnnn }
{ Student kertu tengah tunggu bas! }
{ Di hadapan rumah Ikhram. He stayed in a pretty secluded village in an Bath outskirt for a cheaper rent. Housing here was categorized into codes like A, B or C. Different code represent different rates. The nearer to campus and city center the higher the rate will be }
We spent around an hour at Ikhram's place in RODE, prayed and do our Jama', chit chatting and catching up on stories. Since we just ate, we had to declined their offer for late lunch politely and since we're in hurry, we can't stay for dinner either. Still, since we're already there, we agreed for desserts which is pengat pisang with hot tea. So goodddd I tell you.... Since Ikhram's auntie had already cooked a hefty meal beforehand, she packed the lauk pauk for us to be taken to our hotel that night and of course we are more than honoured. Yeayyyyyy and Alhamdullilah. It's been more than a year since I taste homemade-y food cooked by someone my mom's age so this is definitely a bless.
{ With Ikhram and his young family }
{ With Bai's auntie who happened to be visiting them to help them settling down and caring for their son for time being. She addressed herself as Tokmi to the girls and my oh my she reminds me of my own mother }
{ Good bye Bath. We'll miss you }
We made our way to Swindon after bid farewell to Ikhram and his family. The journey to Swindon will took approximately around an hour or so. We arrived slightly late due to heavy traffic on motorway only to found out that the entrance to the farm has closed. Uh ohhhhh...
Made a call to Yuzly and found out that they still in the farm and according to them, they are still people arriving and just started picking. Since the entrance had closed, we had to find our way in. My hubby, decided to park the car by the main road, and walk our way into the farm to which I don't agree at all. I have no intention to do another brisk walk after been walking the whole day around Bath and the distant.. It's no joke man.. This is where driving experience in Kuwait came in handy ha ha ha. Been driving in Kuwait for all this years, I learned a thing or two. Pavement are not only made for pedestrians but to be share with cars too and EXIT sign can means entrance or exit or both exit and entrance. So I coerced my husband to drive into the farm through the exit way and we live up to tell the story despite my husband nagging about being uncivilized and how I made him into bad driver by not abiding to law and how I have to bear all responsibility if we get scolded blah blah blah.. Well, we didn't get scolded, we didn't commit any crime as far as I'm concerned because I told the farm owner that we came through the exit way and he was just fine with it and most importantly, I saved us all from walking!
{ Potong gaji! Bergamba lebih dari buat kerja }
{ Scarlet red }
{ The kids having a blast evening}
{ A dot of red in the sea of green. My attempt to test my artistic skill. Nice or not? }
{ We reaped what others sow, but we paid for it! Our strawberries with local produce that was on sale at the farm }
{ Goodbye Swindon }
I have to agree that our time spent at the farm was the most exciting bit through out the day as it was something different and we definitely made the right choice. It was so relaxing and the kids were having the time of the lifetime. On our way, I saw apple farm too but it was not open until August. Insya Allah, I would really like to try apple picking someday.
I think we left the farm around 8 pm. Headed straight to Oxfordshire which took another hour of driving. We stayed at Oxfordshire Inn for the night. I picked this hotel since it was the best I can find along the route. Of course there's another hotels that I favor more but most of them are out of our way. So to avoid hassle, we just settled in with this. My husband picked another modern hotel but was forced to agree to this hotel by me for it's countryside essence but honestly, it is quite disappointing.
{ This is the next day photo actually.. Belasah je lah ehhh }
Our reservation made is for four poster bed room as it is bigger but when we were there, they said they have no more four poster bed available. Apparently they thought they had informed us via email of the latest changes in our booking but obviously they didn't since we were not aware. Anyhow, it's been a long day and it's for only a night so we just asked them to give us whatever they have then. I have no more strength left nor desire to argue. Luckily, the receptionist was polite and quickly arranged another room for us immediately.
{ There's a horse barn behind our room. We had roster and duck as a neighbor while we were in Sri Lanka and now we had horse. The kids were thrilled of course and so do I but I am more attracted to the contents inside paper bag given by Ikhram's auntie earlier ha ha ha }
{ Hello horses! It is 9 pm at night when this photo was taken yet still very bright isn't it? Daytime during summer is veryy long in UK. It's fine during other month but my heart goes out to them especially during this Ramadhan month }
It have come to the end of our second day. It is indeed undeniably memorable and sweet day and I couldn't think of a way it can be any sweeter than it already had until I opened the tupperwares given by Ikhram earlier.........................................................
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SAMBAL UDANG AND AYAM MASAK LEMAK CILI API WITH KENTANG !!!!!!!!!
La Dolce Vita indeed ( What a sweet life )
Brrrppppppppppppp....
Next : Bicester Village
