Day 42
Sorry I have not written anything in a long time. I have been so busy with school and many other things.
We are still in England, and today we had a morning at the house doing school, building card houses (Jack, Bria, and Landon), working (Dad), bobbing for apples (Landon), researching where to go in the afternoon (Mom), reading or resting and staring into space (Bria and Elizabeth). Yesterday Mom, Jack, Bria, Landon, and I went, after a long day doing other things, to a market in the town of Swansea. Mom found there laver bread (ground up seaweed pronounced lavabread) and cockerels which are very tiny clams. So, for breakfast Mom had us try these things, the cockerels were superb, and the lava bread, hmmm that was different. I liked it and Mom loved it, but the rest of the family did not care for it at all.
After lunch Mom said, that we were heading to Goodrich Castle. After we got all dressed up in our warm cloths we headed out to Goodrich castle. When arriving we first looked through the souvenirs shop because one needed to walk through it to the backdoor which led out to the castle. The walk back to the castle was beautiful, with the fall leaves on the trees and on the ground. There was a slight breeze so they made a peaceful rustling sound as we walked.
On our audio guides stop 1 was right outside the bridge to the castle. There once was a moat around the castle but now it is planted in fresh green grass. We started our audio guides, right before the bridge. As we went along there were signs telling us what number to put into our audio guides. I really enjoyed the audio guides most places; but others, not so much. This place I did; the one main reason was that they had different voices for the different people that tell you stories and facts about the location.
One thing that I really thought was interesting was how that one cannon ended the castle. The cannon was named Roaring Meg and it is now setting right in the middle of the castle. It was the roundest and shortest cannon I have ever seen. It did not wreck the entire castle, but quite a bit. The caretakers have rebuilt a nice amount just so that they could open it up to the public.
Here is a little history about Roaring Meg and how it was used, The Parliamentary forces tried to breech the castle's defenses by mining under the walls, and by bombarding them with artillery. They used "Roaring Meg", then the largest mortar piece in England, which was specially made at a nearby foundry for the siege. Gradually the castle's defenses were broken down: cisterns were damaged and the water supply from outside was cut-off, and eventually the 'Ladies Tower' collapsed, breaching the walls. On the 31st of July, 1646, Sir Henry Lingen and his garrison of 170 surrendered, including members of some of the best-known families in Herefordshire: the Bodenhams, Vaughans, Berringtons and Wigmores. In 1647 the castle was "slighted" - deliberately damaged by Parliamentary forces to stop it being lived in or defended again.
In the castle there was a chapel that had stain glass windows in. It was right in the middle front of the castle. The stained glass windows are now plastic, because not all that long ago someone broke them, so they made replicas to put in place. For a castle to have stained glass windows is rare.
After spending a nice amount of time there we headed back to the house for the evening. That was one of my top 10 favorite castles we were at. I would like to go back sometime.