Stratford-Upon-Avon

It was a beautiful day in London, not rainy as we had been led to believe, and this morning we boarded for the first time our Trafalgar coach, our transportation for the next three weeks.  We also met our travel director, Steve Morris, and our fellow travelers.  The coach was a comfortable one and was ably maneuvered through London's busy morning traffic by our driver, Martin (to be replaced in a week's time by Karl, who would drive for the remainder of the trip); Martin handled the big flat steering wheel with one arm most of the time, deftly threading his way betwen cars, trucks, and double-decker buses with admirable nonchalance.  We were on the front row on this first day and we held our breath as Martin seemed to miss vehicles, lampposts, and signs with mere millimeters to spare, all, of course, on the still-unaccustomed "wrong" side of the road.

There were 48 of us in all:  nine Americans including us, seven Canadians, and a surprising 33 Australians.  We met Graeme and Robyn almost immediately, and Sue and Robyn – sisters-in-law traveling together – because those suffering from motion sickness were assigned seats toward the front of the bus. For most of the journey, we listening to that unique, drawling Australian accent that we had heard before only in movies and television shows.  But I suppose they found our flat, slightly Southern American accents equally unusual.

Out travel director was an absolute gem!  On the final day of the trip, he asked us to complete a survey from Trafalgar, and we gave him, our drivers, and the entire trip the highest of marks.  In addition to the survey, I wrote a personal letter telling him how much we had enjoyed traveling with him:

"We found your daily narratives to be witty, entertaining, and knowledgeable in the highest degree.  We had not expected Trafalgar to simply place us on a coach watching landscape and castles and cathedrals pass by the windows.  But neither had we expected to find a travel director like you.  For Martha and I, and indeed for most of the other travelers, you simply made the trip what it was.  We learned about British and Irish history, of course, but also about geology – how, for example, the presence of tin and copper in Cornwall made possible the Bronze Age – architecture, literature, and music.  You read us poetry.  You played music for us.  At the end of our 23-day voyage, we found that we had passed through more than just cities and countryside; we had passed through a complicated and fascinating geology and history.  And that history did not shy away from the poignancy of the Famine Graveyard, and the down-to-earth realities of The Troubles as explained to us by taxicab drivers."

We began our education with Steve on this very first day as he explained that London was perhaps the most cosmopolitan city in the world.  A survey several years ago had found that an astounding 327 different languages were spoken in the city.  At every turn of the coach, he would point out buildings, tell fascinating stories, and answer every question happily.  I asked him about the thatched cottages we were about to see in Stratford-Upon-Avon, for example, and he gave a long explanation of how difficult it was these days to find good stone masons and thatchers.  "Thatched roofs are pricey," he said, "costing perhaps £30,000.  But they will last fifty years!"  

Stratford-Upon-Avon was less than two hours from London, and we remembered that we had visited Anne Hathaway's house and William Shakespeare's birthplace 15 years ago when we had come here for a week.  We drove past the pretty Hathaway house with its flower gardens and thatched roof.

Readers of this blog will know how much I revere the Bard, and it was a moving experience to arrive at his house and to walk on perhaps the same floorboards on which he had walked.  

The rooms in these houses were small and as uncomfortable as I had expected them to be. People who lived in Britain centuries ago were not as tall as I am – they would have ranked toward the bottom of that mirror at the Hard Rock Hotel – and for the first of many times I had to constantly duck my head indoors.  Still, I managed somehow to give my head a hard thump on a beam in the Bard’s house, which I took as some kind of sign, for I have often knocked my head as well upon the hard parts of his plays.  (Why does the Queen say that Hamlet is “fat and scant of breath,” for example, at the beginning of his deadly fight with Laertes?)

I bumped my head on a beam of his house,

This giant for all the ages; 

I am but a dwarf, a comparative mouse,

Scrawling in obscure digital pages.

We always had plenty of free time on this tour, and we found plenty of time to walk down to the Avon River in search of some good pub food.  We had been told that the Black Swan was a place frequented by actors at the Royal Shakespeare Theater.

We found the Black Swan and sat in the Actors Long Bar, its walls covered with photos of famous Shakespearean actors who had dined here, none of whom I recognized for certain, but all of whom looked vaguely familiar from our long history with British television and movies.

We had been told to meet back at the coach at a certain hour, and the amount of time always seemed to be very generous; nevertheless, we found ourselves often arriving at the last minute.  “It is important not to waste any time!” I told Martin as I climbed the steps to the coach.  “There is only a minute’s difference,” he replied, “Between late and punctual.”

Then we drove through Coventry, and Sherwood Forest, Steve regaling us with stories the entire way.  He told us about Lady Godiva, for example, wife of a powerful Earl who kept raising taxes on his poor tenants in Coventry.  When she complained to him about the crippling taxes, she was told that he would lower them only if she rode naked on horseback through the center of town.  And so, she stripped off her clothes, climbed on her horse, and famously rode through the market square with only her long flowing hair to cover herself.  Before leaving, she had ordered the people of Coventry to remain inside their homes and not peek, but one man, named Tom, couldn’t resist opening his window to get an eyeful.  This man was called “Peeping Tom,” and legend has it that he was struck blind.

Our next stop was York, and Steve took us through its narrow cobbled streets and showed us the remnants of its city walls.  

The ever-observant Steve pointed out dozens of small statues of cats mounted on the walls of some of the buildings, which had never been explained to him but which he thought might be connected to the Plague, which decimated these parts of England from time to time. 

Several of the shops had small statues above their doors, which would have been signs for the illiterate of the businesses inside - Indians for tobacco, red devils for printers.

Guy Fawkes of Gunpowder Plot fame had also lived near here, and there was more than one plaque  claiming to mark his abode.  Fawkes famously guarded a store of gunpowder under the House of Lords, and Steve told us that it was said of him that he was the only man to enter Parliament with good intentions!

Then Steve took us through a narrow "close" or alley into an inner courtyard.  "Good!" he said.  "This gate is not always open!"  We gathered inside and saw a crumbling walls, the remains of one of the oldest houses in England, from the Norman era.

It had been a long day, and when we arrived in Leeds it was nearly dark.  We all followed Steve out of the coach and around the corner into the Brasserie Blanc and enjoyed a delicious dinner, getting to know more of our fellow travelers in the process.