Back to witches and wizards and magical beasts

Previously: Sara and I went to Stonehenge and Bath, and had an incredibly nutritious lunch of scones and chips. 

Warning: this post is reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally photo-heavy. But it's worth it. Trust me.

The day after we went to Bath somehow turned into a nothing day. We both woke up late, and decided that we should finish watching North and South before we did anything else. Eventually, we figured that we should do SOMETHING besides sit on the sofa all day, so we drove into town and had a late lunch before wandering around the shops for a while. I'd been planning on getting a new between-seasons coat while I was in England, so technically we were on the look out for that. Me being me, I came home with a pair of raspberry patent heels. FAR more important than a stupid coat!

I mean, seriously. 

We headed home via the supermarket to procure pizza and cider, and had dinner in front of Doctor Who before spending the night watching Prisoner of Azkaban. It was low key and relaxing and fabulous to not be running around all over the place for a change.

The next morning, we were up bright and early and on the road before 10am. Frankly, I'd been excited about our final destination for this particular day since about JULY, and it didn't disappoint. We started off with a trip to Windsor, because if we were going to spend all that damned time on the M25, you can bet your arse we were going to break up the trip.

Parking was a monumental bitch, as you can imagine if you've ever been to Windsor, but finally we found a parking spot and headed into the castle. After parting with a small fortune, we headed inside. And honestly? The public areas were a lot smaller than I remembered them being when I was a kid. It didn't help that the chapel was closed because it was Sunday, but I remember there being far more to see and do than just the state rooms and Queen Mary's doll house. *shrugs*

I'd also forgotten about the almost-constant low flying planes en route to land at Heathrow, which must be nice and relaxing for the queen!!

Once we'd exhausted the possibilities at the castle and decided that we didn't need a stuffed toy corgi from the gift shop, we wandered back into town for a spot of lunch before stopping at a supermarket to procure some snacks. Then we hit the road and basically flailed our way up the M25 to our final destination: The Harry Potter studio tour.

It.

Was.

AMAZING.

I mean, I thought I'd died and gone to Heaven when I went to Wizarding World of Harry Potter. And sure, this didn't have awesome rides. But it WAS non-stop amazingness from basically the moment we walked in the door. The very first thing you see (besides giant photos of the cast, and half a Ford Anglia coming out of the wall) is the Cupboard Under the Stairs.

From there, they show you a short film, and then you head into the Great Hall. If you're planning on going, I'd highly recommend going on your birthday, because of reasons.

I could happily have stayed in the Great Hall for another 20 minutes or so because it's so amazingly detailed, but there was tons more to see.

The first half of the tour is smaller sets, like the Gryffindor Common Room and Dumbledore's office, lots of costumes, and a ton of fun props, like the Horcruxes, Hermione's Timeturner, quidditch supplies, and the Triwizard Cup.

DanRad is tiny. Seriously. 

It took us at least an hour to get through it all, and it was marvellous. It's astonishing how much detail was created for props that get a couple of seconds of screen time.

Then you head outside to some of the exterior sets - Number 4 Privet Drive, the bridge at Hogwarts, and the Potter's cottage from Godric's Hollow. There's also the Knight Bus, which is pretty fabulous, and some more of the big chess pieces.

You can also get butter beer, which is pretty delicious in small quantities but is quite likely to make you feel sick if you drink more than a few sips.

The second half of the tour is all about the animatronics and the models that they used, and it's pretty damned fascinating.

From there, you get to walk up Diagon Alley, which felt oddly like returning to Wizarding World of Harry Potter (even though when I was there, it was only Hogsmeade...):

And then it was onto the last major stop, which was my absolute favourite - the scale model of Hogwarts that they used for all the exterior shots. It's absolutely ENORMOUS.

See those people over there on the right? Yeah. ENORMOUS. 

I could happily have stood there staring at it all day, because it's utterly astonishing. The lighting slowly changes from day to night, and all the lights in the castle come on.

How could we not take a terrible selfie?! 

Eventually, we dragged ourselves away from the magnificence that is Hogwarts and headed towards the gift shop. The last room you pass through is filled with wand boxes. There are over two thousand of them, and they bear the names of all the cast and crew, which is pretty fabulous.

Hell, even the gift shop was magical. I spent rather more than I'd planned, but came out with a Ravenclaw t-shirt for myself, and a wand for Little Miss A (Totally worth it).

Eventually, our wallets rather lighter than planned, we headed back to the car and drove back to Portsmouth. We wandered down the road to the pub for dinner, and spent the rest of the night watching Goblet of Fire. Because really, what else would we do after such a Potter-tastic day?!

Next time, we acquire a couple of small children and head to the zoo. 

K xx

I don't think I want to know this creation myth

Previously: We went to Mafra to see the amazing library, Lisbon continued to be pretty, and then I didn't blog about my trip for two months. Whoops. 

Yes, this old chestnut is back. Sure, the last time I blogged about my trip was OCTOBER, but whaaaaaatever. On the plus side for you guys, I've now forgotten a lot of the details of what we did and when, so these posts will probably end up being shorter than if I'd actually blogged during November...

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanyway.

On our third full day in Lisbon, we decided to head out to Sintra, where there's a ton of UNESCO World Heritage Listed sites. It's a 30-45 minute train trip to get out there, which gave C and I a nice chunk of reading time. When we arrived, we jumped on the local tourist bus, which had stops at the major attractions and was super cheap. It started raining really heavily as we wound our way up an enormous hill, so the bus ended up being totally packed. Eventually, we got to the Moorish Castle and hopped off the bus, seeing as hardly anyone else did.

It turned out to not be such a great decision - the fog rolled in pretty quickly, and we couldn't see a bloody thing.

Womp womp.

So we went and had a fairly disgusting lunch of soggy sandwiches from the cafeteria while we waited for the sun to clear. Then we stormed our way to the top of the castle to admire the view, which lasted about five minutes before the fog rolled in again. Still, it was worth it.

That done, we headed back to the bus and caught it up to the VERY top of the hill and the Pena National Palace. (I have no idea what it is about Portugal, but they have like 12,000 national palaces...) Pena is a really pretty building, so I was a little disappointed that big chunks of it were covered in scaffolding. Still, at least we got a good look at this incredibly baffling door frame:

IDEK, you guys.

According to Wikipedia, that's a newt and it represents the creation of the earth. I mostly think it looks like he's constipated...

The interior of the palace was surprisingly...ordinary. There was none of the huge rooms full of elaborate furniture that you come to expect after trips to Versailles and the Schönbrunn. Instead, this was more of a family retreat for the summer months. The ceilings were low, the rooms were mostly on the small side, and the most elaborate things on display were some of the walls and ceilings. There was one ornate receiving room, but on the whole it was a pleasant surprise not to have to walk through a thousand miles of corridors.

Obviously, we still played "Find the ugliest thing in the room", because it makes any visit to a museum, art gallery, or historic house worthwhile.

Our final stop for the day was the Sintra National Palace (which was like a ten minute bus trip from the Pena National Palace. See what I mean?!). The rooms there were more ornate, but as seems to be the way in Portugal, the furniture was fairly plain and basic. The ceilings, however, were a different story, and were utterly amazing:

We also stumbled across this rather bizarre portrait of a cross dressing St. John the Baptist. It was magnificent, and immediately won the ugliest thing in the room prize for all the days ever.

We wandered around the relatively small gardens for a while afterwards, then headed to a restaurant on the square for a well deserved drink. It proved to be something of a tourist trap, because the drinks - while enormous - cost us the better part of FIFTY EUROS. I ordered a lemonade, and was presented with what I'm fairly certain was straight lemon juice with a sugar cube waved over the top...

From there, we caught the train back into Lisbon, and decided to avoid yet another tourist trap experience when it came to dinner. We headed a little way off the beaten track, and found a really nice little restaurant just near the cathedral that had plenty of vegetarian options. I think, from memory, it was called The Little Paris Cafe?? Something like that, at any rate. And the food was really good, so if you're ever in Lisbon, it's worth checking out!

Next up, we head down to Belem in search of monasteries and custard tarts. 

K xx

Nothing says 'welcome' like furniture with faces

Previously: We flew to Lisbon, and found a lot of not-very-nice food. But it was super pretty so it kind of balanced out?? 

The following morning, we braved Lisbon's public transport system (the Myki/Oyster card equivalents are made of cardboard with a chip in them, which is both ingenious and the worst plan ever) and took the train half way across the city to a bus terminal. We managed to locate what seemed to be the appropriate platform for the buses to Mafra, but then an employee who spoke zero English appeared and when we asked in a weird combination of English, Spanish and Portuguese if we were in the right place, she said no and pointed furiously at a platform over the other side of the terminal.

There was about 15 minutes before the timetable said the bus should arrive, so we walked over there to find that the platform information said that buses to Mafra absolutely did NOT leave from that platform and that we'd been right in the first place. Maybe she thought we looked like we could use the walk... Also, we saw a cocker spaniel that looked a lot like our dead dog and briefly contemplated kidnapping it. Well. I did. I'm not sure Dad did...

The trip out to Mafra took about an hour and ten minutes. It's only about 40km, but it was a local bus, so it stopped approximately 5,000 times in the 40km. C and I took advantage of the time to catch up on some reading. because WHY LOOK OUT THE WINDOW WHEN YOU CAN READ?!

Eventually, we arrived in Mafra and made our way to the National Palace.

We got there just in time to catch the end of the church service, which was equal parts awkward and fascinating. And oddly entertaining, as one of the altar boys appeared to be wearing a Batman t-shirt underneath his robes.

From there, we headed into the palace proper to buy tickets, and discovered that they were sold out of English guides. But they had French guides, and the guide was the only thing that included a map, so for a whopping €1, C and I muddled our way through it with my high school French and his Latin/Ancient Greek. It worked moderately well, though there were many occasions on which I wished I had internet access on my phone so I could ask Clément what the hell I was reading.

Anyway, the Palace was built in the eighteenth century and its primary purpose was as a monastery following a promise from some random Portuguese king or other, and then he tacked a palace on the front. Much of the building (which is HUGE) is now used as a training academy by the Portuguese Army. The highlight of the palace is most DEFINITELY the library, and I'm not just saying that because I'm a library nerd. It's absolutely stunning.

TOLD YOU. (That first crappy phone photo really doesn't do it justice, but I had totally the wrong lens on my camera that day)

And not only is it stunning, but it's got all natural pest control and climate control. Basically, the walls and ceiling are false exteriors - there's actually a big empty space between them and the outside walls, which allows the room to warm up and cool down naturally over the course of the year. As far as pest control goes, there's a colony of bats that lives in the library. They hang out in boxes during the day, and at night they're set free to fly all over the place and eat any insects that get in. It's pretty damned nifty. (Although from a conservation perspective, it's probably a nightmare if the bats poop while they're eating insects...)

The rest of the palace was...very unpalace-like. It felt a lot more like a hunting lodge - very basic furniture, minimal decorations (except in the Queen's rooms), and a big focus on the church at the centre of the building.

"Mirror mirror on the wall, who's the fairest of them all?" "OINK."

The random head in the middle is a nice touch.

This horse has eyeball issues

Stupidly tall clock with C (who's 6'2") for scale.

"What? They were like this when I got here."

We finished at about lunchtime and found a little cafe nearby where we could grab cheese sandwiches and Magnums (because on holidays, a Magnum totally counts as lunch food!) before discovering that there wasn't a whole lot else to do in Mafra short of paying a taxi to take us the 7km out to the Palace's hunting grounds (now a national park of sorts) and wander around there in the hopes of seeing a deer. And that all seemed too much like hard work, so we caught the bus back into Lisbon and decided to head to the Castelo de Sao Jorge instead.

There wasn't a whole lot to the castle itself, which dates back to Moorish times. You can walk around the battlements, which was a lot of fun, and the views are SPECTACULAR. But it's not like you end up walking through hundreds of fancy rooms or anything. It's essentially just a shell, albeit a very imposing shell with a nifty little museum of artefacts from each era of its history attached.

Once we'd finished at the castle, it was rapidly heading towards dinner time, so we found a place nearby with the intention of having drinks there and then going somewhere else for dinner. But once we'd sat down, finding somewhere else for dinner seemed all too much like hard work. And so that's how I ended up having a vegetarian pizza for dinner. One that consisted of peas, corn, carrot, tomatoes and broccoli. It was a little weird, I have to say, but still better than anything else we'd eaten up to that point.

Except the custard tarts. Obviously.

Next time, we head to Sintra to look at more palaces. 

K xx