THE COTSWOLDS Thursday, October 16, 2008

A Day with Mad Max Tours to the Cotswolds--the heart of England

When we looked outside this morning, it had rained, but the forecast was good, and we were really looking forward to our tour of the Cotswolds with Mad Max Tours. True to previous experience with youth hostels in Europe, the breakfast was delicious—we both concurred even better that the Salamander—scrambled eggs, ham, cereal, yogurt, freshly baked croissants, coffee and tea. We started off down the hill from the mansion to once again board bus 18 to the city Centre where we were to meet our tour van and Charles, our guide for the day. The weather was gorgeous but cold (16 degrees Celsius or about 50 degrees Fahrenheit) with the forecast predicting sunshine on and off with a slight possibility of rain. It sounded great for a day in the Cotswolds.

We made it down to the centre in record time but were a bit anxious when our bus driver missed our stop and, instead, insisted on dropping us off way down at the railroad station. We had all our luggage with us and, as a result, had to make a mad dash back to the town centre in hopes that we would arrive on time to meet the rest of the group. Good thing Paula has a great sense of direction because we arrived with a few minutes to spare. We first met a woman and her husband from Seattle who was here for her granddaughter's christening up in a little Cotwold village where her new mother-in-law lived. Then we met Charles, our tour guide, who explained that he was not "mad max," but that a woman but started the company about 10 years ago whose name was Maddy (the mad part) who took along with her on the tours a little dog called "Max"--thus "Mad Max Tours."

As we began the tour, Charles told us lots about the history of Bath and the Cotswolds. He said the Old English word "wold" was an undulating hill, and the "Cot" part came from a farmer named "Cot" who owned most of this area centuries ago. The area has been well known for ages for its production of wool--obvious to us as we looked out and saw all the sheep everywhere--and its spinning (usually done by women--thus we have the word "spinster") and weaving (generally done by men). We traveled extensively on Fosse Way, a road built by the Romans. He pointed out that one can tell a Roman road immediately because of how absolutely logical and straight they were. There were often ditches on either side so the soldiers who had to march extensively down the road could jump in the ditch if the enemy Celts suddenly appeared. The view was absolutely lovely.

We started out in the little 17th century village of Castle Combe. The words Castle Combe meant "castle in the valley" although there was no actual castle there. However, Charles pointed out that a man's home was considered his "castle"--whether a real one or not. This little village was where Rex Harrison's movie Dr. Doolittle was filmed.

Charles showed us where various scenes were filmed, and Paula actually recognized some of the places from the film--one of her favorites.

Charles mentioned that this is one of the most quaint and photographed villages in England.

There was a churchyard with tombstones hundreds of years old and a church we visited that dated from the 1100's.

It was called St. Andrew's

and had an amazing clock that still worked which had been moved down from the tower (where someone had to climb up every day to re-set it) to a glass case to show visitors.

Paula and I ducked into a little shop on our way back to the van and found some fun little candles.


We next drove to the village of Badminton, where the game was actually invented! At that time people were playing tennis with hard balls. When the weather got bad, the Earl of Badminton allowed his guests to play tennis indoors in his parlour. He was upset when holes started appearing in his paintings and was told that in India some British people were playing a game with a ball made of cork and feathers, and so he adopted the ball to the shuttle, and came up with Badminton. The size of the court was determined by the exact dimensions of his parlour!

We passed other towns of Stroud and Cirencester, the 2nd largest Roman town after Bath. In England, lots of towns end in "cester," which meant Roman village. Our next stop was a town called Tetbury. Charles said the towns that end in "bury" meaning "place." This is very close to Prince Charles' 300 acre summer manor house called High Grove. He even has his own shop in the town which sells organic products and garden things. We visited the shop and began looking in antique shops, where Paula loved looking at antique kitchen tables. The one pictured was her favorite--a very tempting buy until she found out how much the shipping back to the United States could be.

Here's Paula and her lovely table, Tom. You'll find out soon if it'll soon arrive.

Bibury was next. This was a lovely little village with what Charles described as some of the most photographed cottages in England.

He explained why there were so many stone fences of the type scene in the picture with Charles here:

Apparently, they were made with a top like this to keep the sheep from jumping over it to get loose on the other side--very effective! He said they are still being made in this area in the same traditional way, and people have them everywhere (which we now began to notice, of course!).

There was a trout farm there

with beautiful gardens . . .

and stream . . .



and a bed and breakfast called

The Swan with gorgeous autumnal colored vines . . .
growing all over the outside of the building.

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Stow on-the-Wold ( The word "stow" meant holy place.)

was our stop for an hour and a half where we could go off on our own and shop and find a place for lunch. We just loved going in and out of antique shops, woolen shops, clothes shops, and especially enjoyed a lovely lunch at The Cream Tea Shop

of squash soup (Linda) and a chocolate scone (Paula). We had heard about cream tea, and we got to see what that is like at lunch today. Having cream tea mean you have clotted cream (a type of butter) with scones and tea alongside. Paula found some lovely gifts for Lauren in "The Little Black Dress Shop" and, once again, we made a mad dash to make it back to the Mad Max tour van in time to leave. This is a definitely an area to return to at some time later in our lives when one can drive to each village and stay as long as one likes, but it was great to do the Cotswolds this way the first time--with someone who knows the little roads and history and stories.

Other villages we passed were North Leach and Bourton on-the-Water on the way to Upper and Lower Slaughter.

We were so curious about the name "slaughter."

He said that it simply meant "muddy," but some villages associated with the word "slaughter" did have something to do with a battle taking place there. After that great lunch and a smooth van ride that could easily lull one to sleep, we were ready for a walk. Charles dropped us off at Upper Slaughter at a gate and promised us we wouldn't get lost walking cross country over fields and through numerous other gates configured so that animals couldn't get through them. The grass was lush and the path easily marked. We felt like we were in a Jane Austen novel about to run into Mr. Darcy.

Once we met Charles at Lower Slaughter, there was a craft shop to see and as we walked back to the van, we saw a grand English horse Whisky with her English rider going across the countryside. How fitting!

We boarded the van

for the hour trip back to Bath along with many more stories from Charles, of course. Charles told us a lot about Lord Burford who owns a great deal of the Cotswolds. Here is the gate to his manor, which can be seen through the gate. The most interesting thing about this is that the manor can be seen at all. It is actually 3 miles from the gate!

We arrived back to Bath just about "rush hour" but in good time to get to the train station.

So, we decided we wanted to see the beautiful Abbey in the heart of the town.

A woman there gave us some information on the church's activity: they have strong community support with 5 separate services on Sundays. We would have loved to go up to the tower to see the bells, but we needed to get to the trainstation to begin our trip to London.

We would have loved to have another day in Bath, but onward we must go!

When we arrived at Paddington about 8:20, we need to find our way on the Tube to Earl's Court and then take about a 5 minute walk to the Quality Crown Hotel. We got settled and then arranged to meet

Colin Peters, a former student of Wally's who is studying theatre and British culture classes in London this semester until he begins 2nd term at Northeastern University in the Boston area.

We had fish and chips with Colin while we caught up on all the Eden Prairie and London news. It was a very short but fun visit--including several exchanges of memories of last year and our awesome class of 2007.