When I last wrote on February 23rd, I left with you with these words:

“In the meantime, the coming Spring means more traveling and exploring the country, so look for more frequent blog posts in the months to come!”

Well….that aged like milk, huh?

The COVID pandemic and resulting lockdown have naturally prevented us from traveling and sightseeing like we planned. Since mid-March, we have largely been staying at home, with just daily walks around the neighborhood. The girls have been attending school through e-learning, Molly having three 1-hour Zoom sessions with her teacher a day, Lizzy primarily through homework and assignments. Kyla has been going to work, naturally, while I’ve been mostly working from home. Now that I’m working for the church, I do slip up there a couple of times a week. Shhh….don’t tell Boris.

Finally, this past week, we were given permission to “drive to exercise”, which frees us up to a little more exploring. Naturally, busy tourist sites are still closed, but there’s a wealth of small “unmanned” sites throughout this country that have historical significance, but are mostly just used by the locals as walking paths.

For instance, today we discovered a place called, variously, Odiham Castle or King John’s Castle. It was built by King John (yes, the Robin Hood villain) around 1207. Apparently it was where he was staying when was forced to leave for Runnymeade to sign the Magna Carta. Only a 10 minute drive from our house.