Excursion to Chichester

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We decided to visit Chichester on 17^th May. There were frequent trains between Petersfield and Portsmouth Harbour and Havant and Brighton. From Petersfield we had to change at Havant. It took 50 minutes to Chichester.



Chichester is one of the major cities in Britain. As we walked towards the city centre, we found a wide variety of shops and restaurants – Greek Restaurant; Wagamama, Japanese restaurant.



We turned left on Canon Lane and approached the Cathedral via St Richard’s Walk. St Richard’s Walk was decorated with flower beds and led us to the cloister of the cathedral. Chichester Cathedral showed fine architecture in both the Norman and the Gothic styles. It was a free entry to the cathedral. This magnificent cathedral has stood at the heart of Chichester to more than 900 years and presents both ancient and modern features. Ancient features include Normal style nave, transept and crossing and the bell tower which was added in the 15^th century. This medieval cathedral houses world-famous contemporary artworks – tapestries by John Piper and Ursula Benker-Schirmer, stained-glass window of Marc Chagall, painting by Graham Sutherland and outside the cathedral stands a bronze statue of St Richard Chichester by Philip Jackson. The treasury was open. We were marvelled at two carved reliefs dating from the 12^th century. We also found it interesting to see the remains of a Roman mosaic pavement.



We left the cathedral and went out to West Street. On our right we saw an elaborate building, i.e. Market Cross which presents as a local landmark and is used as a meeting place.



We went to the Novium Museum, Tower Street. This modern looking building was in 2012 and both serve as the tourist information and houses over the recent years. We looked at a wide range of objects, monuments, documents and historic tools and household goods, which have been donated to the museum exhibition, in the theme of social history, archaeology and geology. We picked up the information of the city wall trail.



We had lunch at Refectory Café at Chichester Cathedral and popped in the shop.



We went to the Pallant House Gallery. This gallery houses modernist artworks; we had to pay for the admission fee, £12.50 each. It was a very nice day; we decided not to look round the gallery but walk around the city wall.



We started following the city wall trail from East Walls. The City Wall let us overlook the Priory Park, which contained two historic buildings: the Guildhall, which was used as a Franciscan Friar between 1239 and 1283 and was used as law courts and the Town Hall between 1541 and 1849; the mound where the motte-and-bailey castle once stood.



Next, we followed the North Walls Walk. We overlooked the residential area and looked out to the spire of the cathedral.



We carried on to the South Walls, walked past Bishop’s Palace Gardens and the trail led us to the site closed to St John’s Church.



We decided to stroll through Bishop’s Palace Gardens, west of the cathedral. This garden is located inside the Roman Walls and boasts a wealth of nature flora and an arboretum with rare specimen trees and the pergola walk, where loads of roses are blooming over the summer period. We enjoyed strolling through the peaceful garden and looking at stunning flowers.



We took the train back to Petersfield just after 4:30.

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