Sunday, September 29, 2013 Three Little Mice Went to Oxford

Sunday, September 29, 2013  Three Little Mice Went to Oxford

This morning when everyone was up and at em, several people decided to stay at home in Bourton on the Water instead of going to Oxford.  They had a relaxing day and walked to a tea room for lunch.  Only three of us – me, Sue, Sarah – went on.  I felt kind of like a little mouse in a running wheel cause it seemed we walked and walked and walked.  Then we walked some more.  Sarah is a walking machine, but Sue and I are not.  I just had to stop and sit down a few times in order to keep going.

We drove to the Pear Tree Park and Ride on the outskirts of Oxford and took the bus into town.  This worked very nicely.  We got off the bus and walked miles to the railway station where the hop on, hop off tour began.  Actually, it wasn’t all that far but it was several blocks.  We got on the bus – on the top of the bus actually – and had a great view of everything.  And we were battered by the wind, the chilly wind.  

 It was a good tour and the earphones worked well.  I now understand all about how Oxford is a University that is made up of lots of colleges – never did understand that before.  It sounds like a great place to attend college – it also sounds difficult. 

We got about 2/3 of the way around the city when the tour pointed out the Eagle and the Child – a pub where JRR Tolkien, Lewis Carroll and other met to eat, drink, and read some of their latest writings to the others.   

We decided to have lunch there.  So we hopped off the bus and walked and walked (a few blocks) back to the pub.  It was crowded but we found a table and had a nice lunch.  We had a hamburger, a beef rib pie (with the beef rib sticking out of the top of it, and a Sunday beef roast with Yorkshire pudding.   

It was all good.  After lunch, we walked and walked (a few blocks) back to the bus stop.  We did stop at a small bookshop and I bought Dr. Seuss book – He attended Oxford.  I didn’t know that when I bought it.

A bus came along in a little while and we continued back to the railway station to begin the trip around again.  We got off at Christ Church College and walked down to Alice’s Shop first – this was the shop that the real Alice of Alice in Wonderland shopped in to buy sweets. 

 I bought a really pretty Alice in Wonderful book there – I think I’ll read it.  I never have read it but I loved the movie.  Then we crossed the street to Christ Church College.

Before I go on, I’ll tell you the story of Alice.  Lewis Carroll, not his real name, was a teacher at Christ Church and he often had dinner with the Dean of the College and his family.  The Dean’s daughter was named Alice and Carroll often watched her playing on the big green field beside the college where the men often played croquet.  There was also a large tree here and one day Alice’s cat climbed up it.  Does any of this sound familiar to the Alice in Wonderland story?  It should. 

We went into the College (thankfully it was now open – it wasn’t the first time we went around because it was lunch time and no tourists are allowed during that time)  and saw lots of wondrous things.  One of the best things in my opinion was the actual stairway where Professor McGonagall welcomed the new students to Hogwarts in the first movie.  The ACTUAL stairs!!  

 Then we went into the Dining Hall which is the one on which the film set was inspired.  

There were many beautiful stained glass windows in the Dining Hall.  Here is my favorite part of the whole trip.  One set of the windows is based on Alice in Wonderland.  Some people say the windows contain the Cheshire Cat but it may have winked out when I took the photos.  

 

If you are able to enlarge the photos and look carefully, especially along the bottom, you can see some of the characters from the Alice in Wonderful book.

I just had to include at least one photo of a ceiling.  I'm amazed at the intricate work done even on the ceilings.  Wow.

We continued on to the quadrangle which is a large expanse of grass surrounded by the buildings.  The clock tower was one of those buildings and the bell chimed while we were there – it was a very deep bell.  Christ Church is 5 minutes behind everyone else because they are 5 minutes latitude from Greenwich!!! 

We also went into the Cathedral - it is the about the smallest cathedral in England but has one of the largest number of parishioners.  It was beautiful.  So much beauty to admire.

We went on to the gift shop (and bought stuff, of course) before heading for the exit.  We had to walk a LONG way to the exit and again, I had to sit down for a little while before I could keep going.  I think we went out at the lesser used exit but it was a good thing we did.  We accidentally found the Bear Pub which is supposed to not contain any right angles – I didn’t really look, cause I was so tired, so I’m not sure.   

Think about it.  The Bear Pub has been there since 1242 - that's a LONG time!!

We did seem a large frame holding the bottoms of many of the neckties they have cut off people cause they are not a fancy place and don’t want people wearing ties there!!!!  We walked on and finally came out on the main road and low and behold, there was a hop on, hop off bus!!!!  Thank goodness.  We sat downstairs this time because we had seen it all before and it was just too windy up there.  We rode around again to the railway station (third time there) and then to the bus station where we got off.  We found the correct place to stand for the Park and Ride bus.  Seemed like it took a long time before it arrived but it was probably just because I was tired.  Before we left the city centre, the bus was full and people were standing up.  Sure am glad I was not one of those people. 

We got back to the parking lot, got in our car and headed home.  Things went well until we got to one of the roundabouts and the police had closed the road we needed due to an accident.  We followed the rest of the people being detoured onto a small road and gee, all the traffic was blocked.  I turned around and we headed on toward who knows where? Myrtle kept trying to turn us around and send us back to the closed road so we had to fight with her a little.  We got far enough away and reprogrammed her several times and finally she took us home.  We sure were glad to be home – sore legs and all.  Well, Sarah didn’t have sore legs – she felt like she had not yet walked enough for the day so she walked to town to get her some pizza to go for supper!!!!  Her legs must have springs in them where mine have lead weights!!

Several of us got into the car to go to the co-op (the larger grocery store) but it was closed when we got there.  So we went to the Londis (the smaller store on High Street) and got our necessary items.  We know we have to start cleaning out the fridge and all, but we do still have a few days left. After we all got home and everyone had supper, most of us starting taking showers and getting ready for the best thing of the day.  Downton Abbey comes on tonight!!!!!  We get to see the second show of the season and some of us are really excited about that.

Tomorrow we plan to go to Coventry and Stratford on Avon.  It should be a pretty easy day – I hope so.  I’m glad I’ll just have to drive and hope I don’t have to walk tooooo much.