Visitors!

This weekend Mom and Dad came for their first visit (other than bringing me down the first time). This time they got to do more fun things. Well for some of it. Despite getting down late on Friday, they helped me build my bed while I cooked and over the weekend they have been amazing helping me sort out my furniture. I now have a complete apartment of my own for the first time since leaving the states over a year ago. It's very exciting! And I couldn't have managed it without them!

On Saturday we went to Kew gardens. We got there later than we intended (due to the wine consumption when they got here on Friday night) and headed straight for food. And of course the one we went to was shut. So had to go to our second choice. But we got the train so not too bad.

The pagoda from the train

 After eating, we walked around and took some photos, plus took the train all the way around.

Board walk

Pretty

It was the last weekend the hive (a giant art installation) was open so they had a lot of bee related things going on. Though no one really explained what they were or why there were random people walking around dressed as bees.

Bee people

Mom and Dad in the hive

Hive from the inside

We couldn't see everything (the place is huge - they already want to go again the next time they come up).

Green house

I got very excited when I saw a lizard until I realised it wasn't real.

A fake!

Dad inspecting a very tall cactus. 

Cacti garden

Mom fell in love with this orchid

Mom was getting tired.

Dad trying to figure out his shot.

Lily house.

We intended to go out for a nice dinner but ended up getting a takeaway - we had done enough walking. 

They had to leave early afternoon today to drive back but we managed to get a Sunday lunch first. And I introduced them to my favourite wine and cheese shop. :) 

Wisley and a Taste of Autumn

I had to pick up a package from over in Woking (I've been playing catch and missing them for a few weeks) and figured to make a day of it. (Otherwise it's an hour round trip for a package). Happily Wisley garden had their Taste of Autumn fair on that day. Yay for me! I managed to drag myself out of bed and get there early (after this week - i.e week from hell - was no mean feat!). But it did mean the place was mostly empty when I got there (and got a car parking space near the front).

I love windy forest paths.

The autumn colours were lovely. Though there were also a surprisingly number of flower still out.

Loved the hippo

There is a large Japanese rock garden near the exhibit area.

View over the garden from the top of the rock garden

But my favourite part was the lane of bonsai trees. They are so cute and perfectly tiny. And they even had tree groves of mini tress.

The Taste of Autumn, in the exhibit area, had an area for apples (the gardens has orchards) with fresh pressed juice and you could try more types of apples than I knew existed. My favourite was greensleeves and forpear. Though I guess the odds of getting these again are slim. 

There are about 30 stalls around the area with all sorts of food and drink. And happily (unfortunately?) they took card and one even gave cash back.  

Gin.

Pretty

Chocolate liqueurs.

The olives were amazing!

I came away with a number of Christmas presents, plus some cheese, olives and linseed flapjacks for me. And some apples of course.

I was surprised at the number of flowers still around and not dead. Plus the sun came out in the afternoon. It's probably going to be the last time I sit outside for a while.

Chillies!

I am looking forward to having visitors next week, but that means today is going to be spent cleaning and tidying. And getting ready for my new furniture to arrive this week. Finally a complete apartment. So excited!

Natural History Museum

I have spent the past few weeks sick and waiting for deliveries (happily they happened over the same weeks I guess) so haven't really done much. The last week has been super stressful and difficult so this weekend I decided to get out of the house. However despite doing nothing, it has been an expensive month. But soon my furniture will be delivered and I will have a complete liveable apartment. All very exciting. But expensive. However the Natural history museum is free.

Dinosaur!

Skull

Horns.

Fossil

Display of hundreds of humming birds.

Dodo!!!! (Bigger than I expected)

Giant sloth (seriously giant)

They had a insect and creepy crawly exhibit. I regretted it as soon as I got in there. I have lived with cockroaches close up - I do not need to see them again. I got out of there quickly as my skin was crawling.

Giant scorpion model

Dinosaur in the main hall

Inside of a tortoise.

Snake skeleton

Croc and her skeleton 

Sea fan

Sae basket (type of star fish)

 The main hall is the mammals, with giant models everywhere.

Rhino!

Wooly mammoth (surprisingly small skull/brain)

Narwhales can have 2 tusks!!!(1 in every 500). So cool

Hall, dominated by blue whale 

Hippos - scary!!!

 They have a great dinosaur museum but it was so crowded at this point, I just could not be bothered! I zipped around. (I'll have to go back another day and see it properly.)

T-rex

More dinos.

 I got a ticket for the "behind the scenes" tour. It was more expensive than I expected but very good. Though the woman didn't speak very good english so half my questions did not get answered - but I did get answers to other questions I didn't ask, even if it took some time to understand what those questions might have been.
I really recommend the tour. You get to see the specimen rooms. Unfortunately there was not a lot of time to take any photos but it was very interesting. And they have a 8.6m long giant squid. Very cool.

The squid.

Tentaces (and the claws)

Part of the specimen room 

After the tour, it was even busier (and people were still queueing to get in) so I hit the gift shop before calling it a day. I didn't mean to buy anything, but like I said it has been a rough week. So I thought maybe something nice to treat myself. But I went all kid. And got a stuff toy and a book of pictures of baby animals. 

Well I figure if the next weeks are going to be anything like this one - a god chance of that - these will help. And if a book of baby animal pictures can't, things are really tough. Happily so far they work! Can't help but smile! :)

Treats (big kid at heart!)