King John and The Bard

Worcester Cathedral

We decided to hang out a little this morning (we've been riding the whirlwind so far) and try to catch up a little on the blogs (we're about four days behind!).  So we didn't leave the B&B until about 11:00, but not before having a very interesting conversation with Kerry, our host at the B&B.  Besides giving us some tips on what to do (we thought we had already gone through Cotswold, but in reality had only skirted it), we talked about things that made us feel right at home.  How she was concerned with immigration, how young people just getting started couldn't afford to get into homes because the prices had gone up so much and mortgages were hard to find,  how teaching (she had several relatives that were teachers) had become so much mired in paperwork, teenagers with bad attitudes, it was amazing how her concerns were so similar to ours.  Walt Disney was right, it's a small, small world after all.

So we finally left to look at the local Worcester cathedral.  Once again some interesting architecture that we hadn't seen before, what we decided to call flying buttress squared, as it was one on top of another.

Plus a tomb with a double row of carved figures

Plus the required goofy shot, which we titled, "There there my child"

And for those of you who have seen "The Lion in Winter", or are just English history buffs, King John is buried here.

King John is the spoiled brat son of Henry II (I'm quite sure that "The Lion in Winter" is historically accurate, I mean Hollywood wouldn't lie to use, would they?).  Of more note is that he was the English King that was forced by his barons to sign the Magna Carta.

Stratford-upon-Avon

After lunch it was off to Stratford-upon-Avon.  After searching high and low we finally found a parking lot (or car park as they're called over here) with an empty spot (a recurring theme in this trip so far) and then took a walk through the town.  We decided to get tickets for the hop on hop off sightseeing bus, as we wanted to get to some of the sights that weren't in the town proper, and there was no way I was going to lose my hard won parking spot!  The first stop was Anne Hathaway's cottage where Shakespeare's wife grew up.  Susan had been looking for a place to take pictures of thatched roofs, but we were always on a twisty turny one lane road where I couldn't pull over to stop.   Here we had an unrestricted view.

This one reminded me of a face.

The pattern along the roof line is the "signature" of the thatcher that did the roof.  Every thatcher will have his own unique pattern that he uses.  Sort of like free advertising. 

There was a guide that took us through the house and provided all sorts of interesting information.  For example, back in Shakespeare's day if you had a sore throat, they would hang a frog over your open mouth and let the frog's saliva drip into your mouth.  They've recently discovered that frog saliva does has some antiseptic quality (no, don't try this at home).  And that is where the phrase "frog in your throat" comes from.

Or the fact that bread was cooked on the bare floor of the bread oven, so the bottom was burned and dirty and went to the hired help, but the top parts went to the well to do, or the upper crust.

Then we went to Shakespeare's mother's, Mary Arden's, house.  What made it really interesting was that it was set up as a living museum, with people living and working there as they had in Shakespeare's time.  Here's one of the workers creating wooden staves for use in a fence.

And here's his apprentice trying not to cut off his own thumbs.

Then we found the maid, carrying water from the pump to fill up the goose pond.

And of course there had to be livestock, in this case goats, chickens and geese.  When we went in the house we saw a basket with very small eggs, and the maid said that they did actually eat them.  They had baked bread earlier in the day and made a pear tart that everyone had for lunch.

Then there was the mistress of the house, who wasn't nearly as friendly as the maid, but did allow a picture.

There was a falconry with all types of raptors (this one doesn't look that frightening, does he?).

There was going to be an exhibition, but it was getting late and we wanted to make it back into town in time to see Shakespeare's birthplace.  So we cut our trip short, got back into town, and it was too late and the house was closed.  But at least we got some pictures of the outside.

Then it was off to dinner and then to a play.  The Swan theater, the main theater of the Royal Shakespeare company, is undergoing a massive renovation, so the play we were going to see, "Taming of the Shrew", was showing in the Courtyard Theater.  On the way there we saw this hand pulled ferry, plus these rowboats, each named after a female character in a Shakespeare play.

The play was excellent, even though a little politically incorrect these days.  Since it's Shakespeare, I only understood about 3/4 of the dialogue.  Susan only understood about half, but that was enough to make it a very enjoyable evening.