[Photos taken 22- 28 February 2025, posted online 21 September 2025. Have painted Anna’s room, and rearranged furniture now that she’s removed a lot of her stuff. Brother commented it looked like a mausoleum!]
We played tourists, and took the train to Rochester to walk around. We usually just go past it on our way to London, but it’s actually got a really nice main/high-street, plus an impressive cathedral and castle-ruins.
The following day we tried to do a bit of shopping, then went go-karting, before going to see my brother Anthony play with his band on jam-night for a bit. On our third day we went to the Bluewater shopping center and really shopped, before flying back to Iceland on the fourth day, sans Finnur who’d diverted to Amsterdam.
The final days of February were otherwise uneventful, as we just waited for the days to get longer…
Saturday 22 February 2025
The kids posing with Rochester Castle in the background.
Our trip began by parking the car close to the train station, and walking there.
Waiting for the train, we got lucky and one was very close when we arrived.
Twenty minutes later we were in front of the City Wall pub, where my brother Anthony often plays.
This is the last building mentioned in the works of Charles Dickens (the home of Mr. Tope). I kind of enjoyed how the guys legs are angled similar to the roof above!
Passing the very old graveyard next to the cathedral.
Organists listed by year and name. As it happened, one was practicing on the organ as we were visiting.
The organists, Anna, and Mars.
The little doorway we were standing in led to where the choir sits, but it was closed to visitors.
Standing on old remains.
A little alcove held a much smaller organ, also decorated.
That must have been a lot of work!
The pretty windows.
Prayer requests.
How much money do you have to have to get a statue of you on your casket?
Well, he was a lot of things apparently.
Surely there is a rule who gets to be interred in the walls, and the floors? Or this place would be overrun by plaques.
The actual altar in current use, I think.
The organ from the choir side.
They like their lists of people, and I applaud their dedication to record keeping!
This cathedral is seriously old!
A zodiac in a church? Surprising.
A sign pertaining to the Robes of the Dean of the Most Honorable Order of the Bath. I wonder if there’s a least honorable one?
It’s quite a lovely cathedral!
A place to touch it seems.
Making our way towards the exit…
Maintaining this huge building must take a lot of work and equipment.
We found the exit!
Walking around to get to the castle, which is almost next to the cathedral, but the cathedral exit is away from the castle.
See the leaning house?
Yup, that one. The castle is beyond the walkway.
It’s got a great name: “The Wonky House”!
The view at the end of the walkway.
A drawn map of the area.
Taking photos with the historic Rochester bridge in the background.
The other direction.
The Medway River is right there.
We decided to check out the keep itself.
More signage.
Basically, only the stones are still standing. All the wood went up in flames at some point, and was never rebuilt.
Life is tough for pigeons.
One section of the keep, there’s another one on the other side of the left wall.
A helpful timeline.
Turns out the cathedral and the castle are about the same age, but one’s been maintained and the other not so much.
They had these interesting “smell” boxes.
About mid-way up, and now looking into the other side as well.
More signage. Nice drawing, small letters.
Looking from the performance perce.
Kiddos in the impressive stairwells, found in all four corners I think.
Made it to the top.
Nice views!
The netting.
Obligatory fancy houses close to the river.
The cathedral next door.
Signage.
No castle is complete without a cesspit!
Well, that was interesting!
Kids requested boba-tea…
Coming down the high-street with their sugary concoctions.
We found the train station, and headed back the way we’d come.
The local good-food place.
Good-looking people with good-looking food!
The gang on the other side.
Get in my tummy! Yum!
Sunday 23 February 2025
The kids needed various things, so we headed to a small nearby shopping center.
Bjarki had just finished reading the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, and we kept bumping into it!
I’m always on the hunt for book recommendations.
Blood sugar always depletes quickly while we’re shopping, so we found a cafe to replenish it. This one had somewhat outrageously huge muffins.
Yum, yum!
I decided it was time to upgrade our luggage to 4-wheels, from the 2-wheels we’ve been lugging around for years… There was much speculation about what we should buy.
The evening before we’d made a booking to go karting at this recently opened facility close to home-base.
The first electric go-kart I’ve seen that’s on two floors!
In the waiting lounge before watching the obligatory safety video.
Waiting downstairs for our turn.
Helmets on!
Getting in our cars. We didn’t have anybody else on the track during our run.
Finnur was victorious!
He happily took his rightful place on the top podium!
We waited while another group finished their turn, and then we had another go. Finnur won AGAIN, but it was a much closer call, and we all improved our times.
The tree vs the pole.
That evening a few of us went to see Anthony play at the Gillingham Ship Pub. He’s a part of hosting an “open mike” jam session, where people show up to sing or play an instrument with solid backup.
The Zac Schulze Gang (Ant’s band) was already playing when we arrived.
The area is subdivided into a few areas, the band area is pretty cozy. You could see people lined up with their instruments, or drum-sticks, getting ready to join the fray.
The stage-view from the bar.
A guitar player came on to play with the gang.
Chatting out back with what sounded like the Gang’s number one fan.
Grandson, daughter, father, son.
The ship’s ship as we were heading out.
Monday 24 February 2025
Hoping to catch a glimpse of the Eurostar train, as Finnur had left earlier that morning to travel via London and the Eurostar to Amsterdam for a week of work-related meetings.
We stumbled into a specialist running shoe shop and the assistant quickly sold us shoes that fit Bjarki a whole lot better than his old shoes.
Refueling!
Who’s taller?
Always on the lookout for books…!
The Hitchhiker’s Guide at Waterstones.
The ‘intellectual’ table.
Self-checkout in clothing stores is interesting.
Dinner being made.
Almost ready!
Ant mid-story after stopping by for dinner, and goodbye hugs.
Tuesday 25 February 2025
It was the end of our winter break, as we arrived at Gatwick airport at 10 in the morning.
Goodbye selfie!
Our bag was within limits!
We found a nice place for lunch.
Emma had a hankering for a Starbucks cake-pop. Don’t ask!
Our noon-flight got delayed by a couple hours. Sigh…
The only reasonable thing to do was to order desserts!
Finally boarding shortly before 14 (2 pm).
This might be my new documenting fad, the airplane type I’m flying in?
Goodbye green grass.
Hello snowy ground.
Being left in the dust.
Found the car in the long-term parking lot.
Our new luggage fit perfectly in its designated spot!
Wednesday 26 February 2025
With Finnur still in Amsterdam, I was on cooking duty. First up: chicken soup.
Emma got tired of the randomness of one drawer, and re-sorted the whole thing. All of a sudden we had a lot of tweezers!
Thursday 27 February 2025
Day two of dinner making: fish.
Emma with some slime we’d picked up in the UK.
Such an interesting texture!
Really quite cool.
Friday 28 February 2025
My stop-doom-scrolling-knitting-project coming along nicely.
Even had some lovely flowers to keep me company, and the yarn-holder. And that was the end of February 2025!
