England...the real one...across the ocean

The long awaited time is here, and we've come across the pond to England!  The purpose of our trip is to visit our kids who live in Aberdeen, Scotland, but first we stopped in to see our dear friends James and Cheryl Meinders who live NE of London in the village of Mildenhall.  So...we got on a behemoth airplane

that was allegedly going to fly across the ocean.  I guess that thing called the Stromboli Effect is pretty powerful to lift this huge sausage and keep it in the air.  By the way, I know its Bernoulli, but I like Stromboli better.  British Airways treated us very well, with cute cans of soda and a gluten free meal for me.  Sue got something better.

The Stromboli did its job, as did the 747, so we arrived safely with no problems.  We found the rental car place and got our car, and I drew the short straw so I got to drive first...on the "other" side of both the car and the road.  Sue is a great co-pilot and navigator, constantly reminding me "turn left stay left" or "turn right stay left", and we developed a whole chorus for the roundabouts!

British drivers are very polite, which I greatly appreciate.  We hopped on a highway and got ourselves the 2+ hours to Mildenhall where the Meinders live.  They have a lovely new house that looks old.

Not to let the moss grow under us, they whisked us off to Ely to see the cathedral there and enjoy an Evensong service.  We sat in the cathedral choir seats for the service.

We even stopped for a moment to see Oliver Cromwell's house.  He's an important old British guy.  I don't think he was at home.

(that's not him in the picture, that's Miles, a mini-Meinders.)  Along with the lasagna Cheryl baked and the wonderful company and the really comfortable bed, we had a great first day in England!