Ripley Castle

We visited our first castle today. It was a surprise for the kids, and they were really excited. 

We did a family tour, which is geared towards kids aged 5-16 (close enough, right?). We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but it was a pretty cool experience.

The castle is inhabited by the Ingleby family, who have been there for around 700 years. I won't get into the family history here, but you can check it out on Wikipedia if you're curious. How strange it must be to live in a house with such a steady stream of public visitors. 

A few highlights of the tour:

- We only saw one little area where the servants would be. But it was the hall where the bells ring, showing which room they are being summoned to. (Just like the opening of Downton Abbey, only fewer bells.)

- We got to go through two sort of hidden doors, which Miles and Lily loved. One led to the knight's chamber, which was built in the Tudor era. This hidden door contained a steep and narrow spiral staircase that was once the only access to the upper level. I can't imagine carrying anything up or down!

- Throughout the knight's chamber were artifacts related to war and conflict. There were actual pieces of armor, weapons, and medals of honor. There was also a hidey hole where Catholic priests could hide to avoid being captured and killed. Just the bits of history we learned on the kid's tour were fascinating.

- Sometimes I see little things that remind me that we're not in the US, and a few of these happened on the tour. The first was that on a tour aimed at kids as young as 5, the guide openly talked about children dying, and a man being hanged and drawn and quartered. The guide also invited us to walk up the steep and narrow staircase (at our own risk), and let the children touch the tips of sharp arrows meant to pierce chain mail armor. That seemed like a lawsuit waiting to happen if we had been in the States.

After the tour, we walked the grounds a little bit. 

In the next picture, there's a small building at the end of this part of the stone fence.

This is the sign that's on the building.

More pictures of the grounds.

Next we went to the teahouse for lunch and ice cream. 

There was a church with a cemetery across the street, so we wandered around the tombstones for a few minutes. 

It was hard to read in person, but the guy in that grave died in 1700! 

How cool to have something so old and historical basically in our backyard. We will definitely be going back.