Robin Hood and Remembrance

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Geo: 51.9063, -1.22521

Tuesday morning we left Helen's house after a leisurely morning making use of their WiFi and comfortable house. Once on the road we set the GPS for Nottingham. We had programmed our SatNav to eliminate Motorways so we went the smaller roads. We stopped in Bawtry about 1pm and found a modern Italian restaurant to have lunch. At Ziniz we had a great meal of Seafood Risotto for Fletcher and Pappardella with rabbit ragout for me

We drove on arriving in Nottingham about.3-30pm. We had booked on line a local hotel, The Stage, for only 50 pounds for the night with breakfast. This was a 1 star hotel at best but the room had all we needed albeit up two very steep staircases. After we checked in we walked into the city centre, up and then down the hill. Nottingham proved to be an interesting town. We walked into the main square where the huge Neo-Classical Town Hall dominates. The surrounding streets were elective with some full of cafes and bars and others more given to shops and retail establishments. We eventually found our way to the precinct where Nottingham castle was the dominant factor. The remains of the castle are melded into the sandstone structures and we could see the statue of Robin Hood through the gates. There is a project to restore it to former glory over the next few years.
We stopped at Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem pub, the oldest Inn in England having been established in 1189. We had a couple of pints of ale here and had conversations with two groups of Americans. We passed a couple of hours in pleasant company. then we walked through the town and found a great new restaurant, the Copper City Café which had only been opened for 6 days. This was across the road from the Theatre Royal which appeared to be a great venue. We had a lovely meal here with fresh, modern food and good wine for not a huge price. Finally we took a taxi back to the hotel where we rested for the night.

On Wednesday morning we took our time and found we missed breakfast by 20 minutes. We then set out to drive to the National Memorial Arboretum which I had first seen on Antiques Roadshow and was anxious to explore. It took 30 minutes to drive there and it is situated in the town of Alrewas. . The site is huge and is filled with over 300 memorials. We had a coffee and some breakfast when we arrived and then set out to explore.

There is a train that takes passengers around the site to orientate visitors to the many interesting memorials . We bought our tickets and found this was indeed a great way to understand what this place is all about. The circuit takes about 50 minutes to complete and there is a running commentary pointing out the varied and interesting monuments. Much thought has gone into the choice of plinth, trees around the site and inscriptions. The Arboretum is now twenty years old so trees are becoming mature and framing the memorials splendidly. A couple of interesting ones were the Paratroopers with a statue of Bellerophon riding Pegasus on top and the signallers which had Mercury as their symbol though he is called Jimmy by them. Fletcher liked the Fleet Air Arm's granite model of an aircraft carrier and the Tank brigade had a model of the first tank produced in WW1 The train finally stopped at a huge monument on a hilltop which has the names of all those from Britain who have died in conflicts since WW2 finished. This has been designed so that a thin ray of sunlight will come through an opening in the wall and light up the central wreath at 11am on Nov. 11th. This has two magnificent stone tableaus honouring all those names and it is sad, but necessary, to see that there is plenty of blank wall to add more.

We then walked back to the most eastern point of the site to see the memorial which had touched me so much on Antiques Roadshow. This is called Shot at Dawn and commemorates all those who were shot for desertion or cowardice during WW1 In 2006 the British Government pardoned them all. They mnw understand what Pot Traumatic Stress Disorder is all about. The memorial consists of over 300 posts, each one bearing the name of a soldier, surrounding a white statue of one of them, Herbert Burdon, depicted as he would have been at death, stripped of all military regalia including dog tags, who at 17 was shot for cowardice. He is blindfolded and the statue seems to huddle and shiver as a young terrified boy faces a firing squad. It brought me to tears.

Strolling back we went past the Polish Monument commemorating all those Poles who played a part resisting the Nazis in WW2. We also saw the Gallipoli memorial, recently installed which has a centre piece of a glass panel depicting an impressionistic map of the peninsula. Another unusual and artistic one was the British Navy memorial. This consisted of multi coloured glass panels ranging from yellow at one end(dawn) to orange at the other(sunset). A figure of a sailor standing at ease with his hat in hand behind his back shows a reverence for the fallen.

We then had lunch in the Pavilion lunch room. A roll each and some cake Then we took a last look at the section where most Airforce and Navy memorials are situated. It is not only military personnel commemorated here. There is a stone depiction of the Twin Towers to acknowledge all those who died in that attack, especially 64 British citizens who lost their lives and the firemen and rescuers who tried to help. Back to the Gift Shop where I bought the T-shirt and a pair of beautiful red poppy earrings.

We left there admiring the concept and the execution of this wonderful memorial and highly recommend a visit. We then set out to drive towards London with no real idea of our destination except we wanted to be near enough to have a short drive back to Heathrow in the morning to drop off the car. We decided Oxford was a good target and we looked for places to stay. About 12 Miles from Oxford we spotted a Best Western Hotel, an old building called The Jersey Arms in a small village called Middleton Stoney and enquired there. So far we have stayed in very downmarket but inexpensive places. The lady quoted us 95 pounds and when I asked about stairs (we have had to climb up and down very narrow staircases in the last couple of places) she gave us The Langtry Suite for no extra cost. This consisted of a lounge room downstairs and a beautiful bathroom and bedroom upstairs. There was also a four-poster bed!! We were very happy with that. We were able to bring in all suitcases to repack ready for London and the ship.

We went for a short walk before dinner to a nearby park in which there is a Norman Church surrounded by a very old graveyard. Within the cemetery are some Commonwealth War Graves of airmen killed during WW2 from Canada, and NZ as well as Britain. The church is rather small and attractive and all the time I expected to see Father Brown or Inspector Barnaby come round the corner to investigate a murder!! We had dinner at the hotel This was good. We went the whole hog, with entrees of Garlic Prawns for Fletcher and Pate for me followed by Grilled Salmon for me and Salmon and Coriander fish cakes for Fletch. We shared a delicious cheese platter while chatting to the owner and enjoying a Chilean Cab Sauv. A pleasant evening overall.

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