We've been traveling once again. Our daughter, Katherine, and her husband, Matt, have been with us for a week, so some of our travel was to take them around to see some sights, and part of it was further scouting of places to take students on field trips when they arrive. This mixing of business and family will make the college accountants crazy, but I'm trying to sort it all out.
We returned to Avebury and Stonehenge. This time we actually took time to stroll through the museum at Avebury and to go in and visit Stonehenge. The GPS brought us to Stonehenge via a completely different route this time, even though we left from the same place (I have yet to fathom its mysteries), so we got to see some different countryside.
On to Bath, where we scouted some things we missed last time while Matt & Katherine did the Roman Baths. The guide for the city tour had been first rate last time, but the guy this time was absolutely terrible. We abandoned the tour after 45 minutes and did our own, but by that time we were in driving rain, so we finished back at the car soaking wet. Fortunately, our B&B hostess was willing to put our jeans in the dryer that evening, or I'm not certain they would have dried.
Mary, Katherine & Matt at Blenheim
The next day we set out across the Cotswolds. The villages are all cute, and the little shops and tea rooms do certainly appeal to the mature audience, but we had trouble seeing college students being enthralled. We decided that a brief walking tour of Stow-on-the-Wold will be sufficient. Blenheim Palace (birthplace of Winston Churchill) will be a place where students' time is better spent. It's probably the most spectacular manor house in all of England, and still home to the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough. I hope they get to enjoy it after the throngs of tourists are gone for the day!
We spent another day in York, checking out museums for which we hadn't had time before, while Matt & Katherine did the basics. Again, the city tour was inferior to what we had had previously, but not so bad that we bailed out on it in disgust as we did at Bath. Matt and I enjoyed the National Railway Museum. It may be sexist to say so, but I think locomotives must be "a guy thing," because Mary and Katherine were quite bored with it, as they had been ten years ago on a previous visit, despite the presence now of the locomotive used in the Harry Potter movies to pull the Hogwarts Express.
Shakespeare's birthplace and associated sites at Stratford-upon-Avon were good to see again. We had not visited many of the other sites previously, and they were quite worthwhile. Warwick Castle had changed drastically since our visit there a decade ago -- not the castle itself, but the Disney-esque approach to making money from it. It's no longer a historical site, just a theme park. Entertaining, but our students will see better, more authentic castles in Wales.
New to us was the Lakes District in Cumbria. Unfortunately, rain followed us once again. But the scenery is gorgeous. We were there in high tourist season, which made lodging difficult to find and high in price. We did manage one very nice long hike, as well as visits to sites associated with authors and poets. Wordsworth may have lived on a shoestring in his little cottage here, but probably never had to turn in his receipts to college accountants.
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