Spring sunshine – and a spring sunset – in Canberra.
Only days to go before I fly to China!
A Book for the Anniversary: Goodbye for Now by M.J. Hollows
On this day: British women prepare for invasion
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Tag: England
Royal Wedding
I’m no royal watcher, and have no interest whatsoever in the Harry-and-Meghan show, but I did watch the wedding of Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank on Friday night (Australian time), and loved every minute of it.
Firstly: how beautiful did everybody look! All those gorgeous jewel colours, all that sapphire blue and emerald green (and those gigantic actual emeralds in the tiara!).
Secondly: this wedding was seriously romantic. Give me the goofy groom who can’t stop crying, looks like he’s going to faint half the time, and then puts the dorkiest glasses in the world on to watch his bride come down the aisle over the other royal grooms any day!
I doubt the dorky-English-groom trope is ever going to take off in romantic fiction, but it ought to.
My other favourite royal wedding was when (Australian) Mary Donaldson married the Crown Prince of Denmark, because he cried through that one, too!
And, thirdly, this was such a royal wedding, with all the beauty and class and traditions. Windsor looked absolutely gorgeous.
And boo to the downright rude Australian journalists who devoted their entire time covering the wedding to insulting Eugenie, her sister, her parents, and comparing it to the last one! Thank God the Royal Family has an official YouTube channel, and thank God they had a gorgeous livestream, sans terrible commentators!
Chatsworth
Chatsworth House probably needs no introduction for anyone who reads historical fiction or watches period dramas.
Here are some shots from our visit two days ago.
Jane Austen Territory
I have one week left of this trip, and it is being spent in a cottage in England’s Peak District. In the village of Bradwell, with horses riding up our street, the area looks like something out of a Jane Austen adaptation.
We had lunch next to Chatsworth today, and then stopped in Bakewell, where Austen allegedly wrote Pride and Prejudice.
This is one part of England I haven’t visited before, and so far it is even prettier than I expected.
Our cottage:
The view from my bedroom:
Good Morning from York
We’re finishing up a week-long stay in York, and nature has given us a gorgeous Monday morning. Yes, it’s cold, but… it’s so pretty!
Also, here are some pictures from our trip to the enormous (and spectacular) Fountains Abbey yesterday (you can thank Henry VIII for destroying it!).
Historical Romance Fans!
When we arrived in England two days ago we were too early to get into our accommodation in York, so – naturally! – time had to be spent visiting the nearest stately home to Leeds airport: Harewood House.
This is not the first stately home I have visited, and not the first I have visited on this trip.
However, personally, when I read historical fiction I tend to forget just HOW grand the lives of these characters were. Harewood is not the biggest, but it’s the one with royal connections, and the Georgian influences are gorgeous.
On this day: Oxford Street during the Blitz
Oxford Street, London’s famous shopping boulevard, suffered heavy damage from German bombing during the Second World War.
On the night of 17-18 September, 1940, some of London’s best-known establishments were hit.
This photograph shows the destroyed façade of the Peter Robinson department store at Oxford Circus. The business was founded in 1833.
