It's half term so I took the kids back to Windsor, the last time we were here was laying flowers when the Queen passed away, this time we wanted to go into Windsor Castle itself and now visit the resting place of the late Queen.
I love the cosiness of Windsor with the castle nestled at its centre. The original castle was built shortly after the Norman invasion for William the conquerer to protect the Western approach to London. Henry II replaced all bar one area of the Castle with stone and Hennry III continued to build into a bigger castle. However, it was Edward III that turned Windsor from a military fortification into the palace that it is today and subsequently since then each monarch adding buildings and restoring spaces thereon in.
Also in the grounds is St Georges Chapel where you will find the final resting place of eleven of our monarchs: Edward IV, Henry VI, Henry VIII, Charles I, George III, George IV, William IV, Edward VII, George V, George VI and the one we wanted to most pay our respects to; Elizabeth II.
The state rooms are also lavishly decorated and the arms rooms quite spectacular. Also so much art and pieces collected or gifted to the Monarch over the years with wonderful views of the palace gardens and the nearby hunting grounds, which is now Windsor Great Deer Park.
We were lucky enough to also see the changing of the guard with a military band procession, playing some quite funky modern songs.
After lunch we decided to get out in the sunshine and walk the royal mile at the back of the palace, however we noticed that this path went on for longer to a statue at the end of a man on a horse so we had to go and see. This then turned in to us doing the famous Long Walk.
The walk takes you away from the castle and into the Deer Park where you can see stags roaming amongst the trees. This park also is home to some of the oldest Oak trees in England. We also saw winter geese visiting us for this season. At the end of the walk is a statue of George III on horseback. Its hugely impressive and is known as the Copper Horse.
We sat here for a bit admiring the view of Windsor Castle whilst the boys were climing on the rocks at the base of the statue. Before taking the Long Walk back to Windsor.
We made a full day of it by popping into a nearby pub for refreshments before purising the shops before our dinner reservation at Meimo, where we had some lovely Morrocan food for dinner.
