While Kelly and her mom were out running errands, I took the kids out to their first (of many) castle ruins today. St. Quentin's Castle is very close to our house in the town of Cowbridge. It is the remains of an early 14 century courtyard castle with a massive twin tower gate house that is still standing. Kids had a good time climbing around and exploring the ruins.
Notice the white stains on the side? Here's an interesting fact - While it may look like bird poop its actually not. Its lime coming out of the walls. In fact when we see castles in movies these days that look like standard stone walls - thats not how they would have looked - they actually would have been brilliantly white with their walls completely covered in their hey day due to the lime leaching out and down the walls. Common houses would be stone, and because only the weathly could afford lime for the grout (holds together better), castles would have been white.
