Bev’s Visit to Janet and Bills in Gloucestershire.


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September 8th 2012
Published: September 8th 2012
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Sunday 2nd September

We set off about 8.00 p.m. from the Hotel in London and arrived in Gloucester about 10.30 later that evening. Tired and went to bed.

Monday 3rd September

We went into Gloucester to visit the Cathedral. We saw the tombs of the founder of the church and of King Edward 11, the great East Window and the Whispering Gallery. There was an exhibition explaining the details of the stained glass in this window, which is one of the oldest in Europe. It includes the oldest record of a golfer. We tried out the whispering gallery and it works!

We then walked in the city and saw an old set of chiming bells above and old Bakers jewellery shop and then went into a modern Mall and saw another clock with moving models representing the Taylor of Gloucester story.

Tuesday 4th September

On Tuesday morning Janet and I walked around the neighbourhood where Janet and Bill live and saw Robert and Emma’s primary school. Saw some interesting plants in the garden displays and took some photos. Bill went into the city and found that my camera was not repairable at a reasonable cost so we are using his for this part of the trip.

In the afternoon we went on a drive around the Cotswold area. We went first to Cooper’s Hill and went to the bottom of the steep slope where people run down chasing a Gloucester Cheese ( round like a small wheel).

We drove on to Painswick about 10 minutes away, which is pretty village with an old church with 99 yew trees in the churchyard (legend has it that the 100th won't grow). We had a cup of coffee at a place Janet knew.

We continued our car journey passing by the town of Stroud to Minchinhampton Common a large open area a recreation area for walkers and golfers, 580 acres (2.3 km2) of which is managed by the National Trust. The Common is also used as grazing land for the cows of local farmers in the summer. I took some photographs of the horses, cows and the donkey! The commoners have the right to keep cattle on the areas.

Afterwards we went to the village of Minchinhampton is an ancient market town, located on a hilltop 4 miles (6.4 km) south-south-east of Stroud in the Cotswolds. Janet brought some cheese from a shop in the town.

We travelled on to Tetbury, which is where Janet’s Mum and Gran lived for some time and where she grew up before travelling to New Zealand. In the Middle Ages, Tetbury became an important market for Cotswold wool and yarn. The Woolsack Races commemorates the link with the wool trade in which competitors must carry a 60 pound sack of wool up and down a steep hill is contested annually.

We saw the Market House, built in 1655. Much of the rest of the town centre dates from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The Market House is a fine example of a Cotswold pillared market house and is still in use as a meeting place and market. Prince Charles has a house and Hygrove estate nearby and has a shop called “Hygrove” in the town. We went in it, lovely things but expensive! Bought a card.

Before we left we walked down the Chipping Steps. A pretty flight of steep steps in an attractive part of the town,

In the evening we met Holly and Robert and had a look around their house in Little Gotherington just North of Gloucester and Cheltenham near a village called Bishop’s Cleeve. We had a meal at the Old Farmers Arms about 400 metres away. Robert and Bill had faggots, I had fish and chips and had Spotted Dick for a sweet.

Wednesday 5th September

We spent the day in Stratford upon Avon in Warwickshire. We visited Anne Hathaway’s Cottage with its timber frame and Thatched roof, where Shakespeare’s wife lived before they married. Then we went to Mary Arden’s Farm in Shottery. There is a whole set of farm buildings and lots of farm animals there as well as two farmhouses. We saw a bit of a falconry display and at Palmer’s farmhouse the workers there had a medieval meal with food of the period and explained the customs of that time. They wore authentic looking clothes and acted the part.

Both places are about 5k outside the town but about 5k apart It was not very busy so we did not have to queue and the weather was good, (as it has been all week so far)

Then we went to the town centre and had some lunch. In the town we visited the William Shakespeare’s birthplace. We finished up our Shakespeare tour at Nash’s House and the site of New Place where Shakespeare owned and where he died. These were in the town. New Place was demolished many years ago but there was an archaeological dig going on. It was interesting to see the results, which are clearly explained.

After that we went to see the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and the riverside, saw the swans on the riverside and also the Lock linking the River Avon and the Stratford Canal.

Thursday 6th September

Today we went to Tewkesbury to see the town and the Old Abbey Church where Emma and Craig were married and where Holly and Robert will get married later this month. The Church was former Abbey, which has become the town’s Parish Church after Henry VIII dissolution of the monasteries. This is built of stone but much of the town is timber framed.

We walked down to the Abbey Mill on the nearby River Severn and then down the main street seeing the narrow side alleys off the main streets. We saw a very old Baptist chapel and a tomb stone to possibly one of Shakespeare’s descendants! Janet explained about the floods, which hit the town in 2007, and her part in the team that helped people at that time.

In the evening Bill and Sue came around from next door for a meal and we had a very enjoyable evening talking and joking until late. Lots of wine and beer was drunk !!!

Friday 7th September

Today we went to Minsterworth about 10k south of Gloucester to see the church where Janet and Bill were married and then we walked the short distance to have a look at the River Severn and read about the Severn Bore. It is a natural phenomenon on this part of the river, in which the leading edge of the incoming tide forms a wave of water that travels up a river against the direction of the river current. When it is at its highest it is 2m high and people surf on the leading edge. We did not see one as the big waves occur mainly in the Spring and late Autumn.

After that we went to Westbury on Severn Water Gardens which are owned by the National Trust. It was originally laid out between 1696 and 1705, this is the only restored Dutch style water garden in the country.. We explored the canals, clipped hedges and working 17th-century vegetable plots and discover many old varieties of fruit trees. A lovely garden and maintained by volunteers..

Then we went on to the next village Newham on Severn where we stopped and had a coffee. We had a picnic lunch at Lydney Docks, which is a former working dock on the banks of the Severn and is now a pleasant area with lots of small pleasure boats moored up. It had information boards explaining what the dock was like in its commercial times in the 1900’s. While walking around I was amazed at seeing so many blackberry bushes so we got a container from our picnic lunch and picked a lot to have with our breakfast. Yummy.

We travelled onwards down the road to cross the River Wye into Wales (for about 5k!) We saw Chepstow Castle, which was started in 1067,very soon after William the Conqueror won the Battle of Hastings. We did not have time to stop on this trip.

Next we crossed back to England on the Severn Bridge, a suspension bridge built in the 1960’s I think. The River Severn is very wide at this point. We managed to get a photograph approaching the bridge. Because the bridge has a design problem they have built a second bridge across the Severn which we saw in the distance as we crossed our bridge.

We changed motorways and travelled north up the eastern side of the Severn Valley to have a cup of tea with Janet’s friend Christine and John at a Cotswold village called Leonard Stanley. As we were a bit early for them so we diverted to a pretty village called Frampton on Severn where we had an ice cream and walked around part of the village green. The locals were preparing for the village fete on Sunday.

We then travelled the short distance to Christine and John’s house where we had that cup of tea and looked around the garden and Bill thew a toy for their dog Smudge.

Back in Gloucester we organised ourselves to go out in the evening to see Emma and Craig then we went to their house in Tewkesbury and had a look around their house and garden. We then went out for a meal with them at a local restaurant, The Gupshill Manor on the way into Tewkesbury. I had Fish and Chips again!

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