Blogs from Charlbury, Oxfordshire, England, United Kingdom, Europe

So, we fly out tomorrow. Everything's pretty much packed: the travel armchair, portable lampshades, pop-up fireplace, the pedallo and of course the garden badminton set. I think i'll leave the microfleece and malaria tablets at home to save space. Did I mention we're flying out in business class? On our gap year. So um... yep, that's somehow happening.... read more

The day after we went to Stratford, we had a halfday trip to Broughton Castle. Which was really just a fancy old house that is called a castle because there are walls around it and a moat. It didn't look like a castle. Anyway, it was still really cool. I sat down on a day bed and got in trouble, haha. Anyway. It was a pretty cool day. Holy, the English country side is so beautiful. I'm sad I can't stay there forever. It's so gorgeous. (Broughton castle was in Shakespeare in Love. So cool.) After that, Peter and Kay took us out to lunch, which was really nice. And the food was yummy. The next day classes started again. Our Jane Austen prof is little scary and seems to expect too much, but everything will ... read more

HOLLA This weekend was pretty sweet. We had Drama practice on Friday. We sat around and read various parts of a version of Pride and Prejudice adapted for the stage. We haven't received our parts yet but we should soon. After we did drama, my team made lunch for the group. I put the salad in a bowl... Whereas Hannah made pasta along with garlic cream sauce from scratch. Go Hannah. It was yummy. Then we were going to go into Oxford and go shopping, but the attendent wasn't at the train station and we were afraid of the ticket machines. So, instead we jumped a fence into a field with sheep and took pictures. There were also angry looking horses. They we took some picture on the cute bridge. Next we went back to the ... read more

The little village, Charlbury, on the west outskirts of Oxford has a 7.5 mile circular walking course which goes around Cornbury House and Park. The starting point of the train is 200 metres west from the railway station. You will find the signpost for Walcott. The trail will take you to the grassland containing uphill and downhill paths and uneven surfaces, as well as being parallel with the cycle track. The grassland is home to wildflowers and walkers can see orange poppies, pink roses, and blue geraniums in summer. The grassland trail ends up at the two-way road near the junction. After crossing over the junction, keep straight on down the avenue flanked by trees. It may not be as exciting as the nature trail to walk with a small volume of traffic. The tree leads ... read more

This is a one week tour of the Cotswolds for young families based at a camp site in Charlbury from the 14th to 21st of August 2010. Sunday 15th A 28 mile ride to Woodstock and a visit to Blenheim Palace parklands. It was a warm sunny day for visiting the park. The palace would have been nice but time did not allow it. The roads were generally not too busy and we returned out of Woodstock on a NCN route through woods and fields, which was very pleasant. We found that the old Blenheim Sawmill at Combe was open today and it was making its annual running of its steam engine. This was an opportunity not to be missed for any vintage nut so off we went to enjoy seeing all the old equipment working ... read more