Hertford. The heart of friendship.

The best thing about England is you find pockets of gorgeousness in what seems the most unlikely places. This is one of those places. You'd never know there was town called Hertford tucked away in Hertfordshire sat all pretty round the bend if you didn't take the bend or didn't have friends who invited you to share in its beauty. 

After I knocked on the little red door a little too early, we went on a walk about town. The Two helpfully filling me in on history and important sights while I happily clicked away on my camera. 

The Hart of Hertford

The oldest building in town

Various buildings in the town

The buildings are old and quite a delight to look at (if you're anything like me and love old buildings). They have so much character. I like to wonder sometimes just what they would have seen and heard throughout the years. What stories they could tell if they were able to talk!

The Wallace House seen here was the home of Alfred Russell Wallace who proposed a theory of natural selection at the same time as Charles Darwin.

Flowers in the marketplace

Why is it that flowers always look so bright and stunning in the UK? Is it because they've awakened from a long sleep and live only a few months before waning to wait for another year that they must make the most of the short life they have? What do you reckon?

  

The Canal

It went on forever, this canal. I'm told that it starts in London, goes a long way north and you can walk/bike along it the entire way. I bumped into this canal again in Milton Keynes a week later!

Coots... which I thought were ducks initially

Ducks! Ducks! That's what I shouted. Only they weren't ducks apparently. They are coots. I had no idea such a creature existed in this world. We learn something new every day.

Look what I found growing all over the place in England!

I LOVE blackberries! What a pleasant surprise to find that they grow all over the place in summer. One of the Two very kindly picked these 2 perfect berries for me to eat. Pity they were sour. This was the start of my berry craze. More about that in another post.

The Castle that's not quite a Castle. Ahem...

So. One of the Two doesn't think this is a REAL castle at all. Considering it has been rebuilt and only if you look very carefully can you see the difference in bricks between the old and new parts of the building, I suppose it isn't quite a castle after all? It's certainly not in league with the Windsors' of the world, but perhaps we can be forgiving and call it a 'mini' castle.

We walked back to the red door after that, picked up No. 4 and sat down to a scrumptious dindins. We talked until the cows came home. Then very slowly, No. 4 and I made our way back to our hotels. No. 4 and I will never forget what a long drive we had that night thanks to Tomtom. 

Oh well... all's well that ends well.

Scrumptious dindins

The lovely strawberry cake which I insisted on having baked for me. :-)