Viking Bay

Last week Lansing took a couple of days off and we took advantage of the rare sunny weather to fit in some day trips. We spent a day up near Ramsgate, at Viking Bay beach in Broadstairs.
We got a few decent snapshots from Lansing's phone. It was one of the warmest days we've had this summer, maybe close to 80 degrees. The water, however, was probably in the mid-fifties, but the English are undaunted by cold water and plowed right in. Maybe one day we'll acclimate enough to join them.

The kids had fun in the sand and at the mini-carnival there on the beach.

Avery has recently discovered Magnum bars; for some reason we thought it would be a good idea to give her one just as we were getting into the car. We used to have a no-eating-in-the-vehicle policy, but now it's come to this:

Could that hair be any messier?

A Magnum bar is nothing if not huge and melty, and eventually most of it slid down her arm and pooled in her lap, at which point we sluiced her down with a few baby wipes and headed for home.

The next day we made an ill-advised foray to Windsor Legoland (ill-advised because apparently most of southeast England had the same idea.) We got off on the wrong foot because in my haste to download driving directions and get on the road, I ended up printing out directions to Windsor Castle, and only realized my mistake as we were pulling up to the queen's front door. It was kind of like that Jack Handey scenario about taking the kids to a derelict warehouse and telling them Disneyland burned down. Ethan's fury mounted steadily as we proceeded to lose our way and wound up driving through Eton, at one point interrupting a wedding procession. It was not our day. But we got there eventually.

Somehow we only ended up with one photograph:

Avery germing it up in Duploland.

The kids really enjoyed it though and we didn't actually spend too much time waiting in lines; also, it did not rain on us, which always feels like a major victory here. I have to say, though, they have some of the worst food I have ever eaten, anywhere. And bear in mind that I have dined in train stations throughout eastern Europe, so that's really saying something. In the end we really had no choice but to declare it another Ice Cream for Dinner night.