Old Blighty. Oxford and Stow on the Wold.

St Martin's Tower, also called Carfax tower Oxford

 

         My plans from the start was to backpack around the UK. London, Oxford, Stow on the Wold, Lincoln, York, Edinburgh, Iona, Cumbria, Ireland, Liverpool, Wales, Cornwall and back to London. I love history and ancient history and I've always wanted to see a suit of armour and walk the battlements of a real castle. I also intended to walk at least part of Hadrian's wall.
      

26–27 Cornmarket Street. Oxford. Dates from the fifteenth century

 

I got the bus from London to Oxford and the next day got up early before all the other tourist were about and had a good look at the place. I walked around the famous parts of town, the Bodleian Library and the Bridge of Sighs

 

Bodleian Library Oxford

The Bridge of Sighs

 

Then I walked to the Radcliffe Camera and explored the university precinct.

 

Queens Lane Oxford

 

 

 

The Radcliffe Camera

 

       When I was a small lad I saw a Victorian illustration of Empress Matilda escaping from a castle tower window. Imagine my delight when I found myself in that exact room in the tower in Oxford

Castle she escaped from. It was a big Norman Castle that incorporated the original Saxon walls and towers. The Parliamentary forces during the English civil war demolished nearly all of it excepted some of the original Saxon towers.

The tower in Oxford Castle Empress Matilda escaped from in 1142

 

The castle was converted into a prison and was in use into the 1990,s. It didn't get electricity till the 1960,s. And right up till it closed the prisoners had to use a bucket for a toilet.

Oxford Castle prison cell

St Michael at the North Gate. Another one of the surviving Saxon towers

 

Oxford canal and a narrow boat

 

My next stop was Stow on the Wold. The church there has two ancient yew trees growing on each side of the church door. Thought to be the bases behind The doors of Moria in Tolkien,s Lord of the Rings. When I got to Stow on the Wold I had no idea where the church might be. For all I knew it could have been 10 miles out of town, but it was right in the middle of the town, easy to find and there was nobody else around.

 

Yours truly in front of those famous doors

 

Yours truly not in front of those famous doors

 

Another view of St Edwards church. Stow on the Wold

 

A typical house in Stow on the Wold.

 

This time the weather let me down, and it rained all day. A bummer lots of crapy photos.