DAY 8: Canterbury (Hampton by Hilton Canterbury)

You won't be surprised to hear, Barb, that we went to an Italian restaurant last night for dinner - although perhaps that's allowable in the UK. It was called 'Il Posticino' and was very good. (Actually, this morning we were talking to an Italian staff member at the hotel and she recommended it as one of the three best Italian restaurants in Canterbury, so we struck lucky.) We weren't particularly hungry after our lunch on the ferry, so we shared a baked polenta entree and then each had pici with a pork ragu for mains. Nice and al dente!

We had an 'interesting' night in our hotel. We realised it is sandwiched between two nightclubs that play loud music until the small hours. (Jim booked it without reading any reviews. A big mistake!) The only good thing is they're only open late on Fridays and Saturdays, so we should be fine for the rest of our stay. Jim also realised that he booked an 'accessible room' - which explains the disability supports in the bathroom.

Breakfast was pretty ordinary. Not terrible, but not great. Compared to what we've been used to in France, it was a great disappointment. The English cannot do good bread.

This morning we went on a walking tour of Canterbury. Our guide was an older woman who was obviously passionate about Canterbury and its history. It was perfect for me! She talked all about the Romans and then the early British kings who were responsible for building the Cathedral. Obviously, she dwelt on Henry II and Thomas Beckett, but there was so much interesting historical detail. Every second building had some story - like Elizabeth I visited here or Christopher Marlowe was born there. Although half of the historic buildings seem to belong to the notoriously expensive private school - Kings College. My absolute favourite thing though was the war horse model made by creative arts students from the local university - as a memorial to the eight million horses who died during WWI.

The weather was pretty miserable during the tour - on again/off again drizzle and totally overcast - true English winter weather. We felt we needed somewhere warm to sit and something good to eat when we were done. So, of course, we found another Italian restaurant recommended by our friend from the hotel - called 'Posillipo'. 

The food was really good. We had eggplant parmigiana and baccala croquettes for starters, and then I had pappardelle with veal and mushrooms and Jim had pappardelle with a wild boar ragu. We think we'll go back to this restaurant tomorrow.

We then wove through the streets back to the hotel for a rest and recovery (and for Jim to watch the Qatar Grand Prix on TV).