Stratford, the home of Shakespeare, is a 2 hour train ride from London into the countryside. It is a great little town, although it does get very touristy on the weekends. We arrived yesterday while the town was pretty quiet which was a nice break from the busyness of London.
First we dropped our bags off at our bed and breakfast accommodations. I did not get a picture of the specific place I stayed but pretty much all the buildings looked like the pictures below. A very sweet woman ran the B&B that four other girls and I stayed along with our Shakespeare teacher, Jean. She had a dog named Amy and cooked us a very nice breakfast this morning. The beds and room were much nicer than our flat so the night was a welcome break for all of us.
After we got settled in the group headed to the Holy Trinity Church. Shakespeare and his wife, Anne Hathaway, along with several other relatives of his are buried here. The church is not only Shakespeare's final resting place, he grew up in Stratford and was baptized at Holy Trinity and regularly attended services throughout his childhood. The church itself has been around since 1210!
The town also includes Shakespeare's birthplace, his home, and Anne Hathaway's home.
We first visited New Place, Shakespeare's adult home in Stratford. He did not live in Stratford throughout his whole career. He began selling plays in London and later moved back to Stratford. Today his house is gone, a man who's name escapes me bought it after Shakespeare died and after having some unpleasant dealings with the townsfolk demolished the building in part out of spite. The site is now being excavated for the second time. As our tour guide put it, the previous archeologists were more like, "enthusiastic historians" who did not excavate properly so now they are trying to sort through the rubble and re-dig the site properly.
We had some spare time yesterday afternoon so Claire and I went down to Avon in the park to just be calm for a while. We sat on a dock on the water and enjoyed the view and the vast number of swans.
Some of whom were very bold.
Yesterday evening we attended a performance of A Winter's Tale at The Courtyard Theatre. I can't say that I enjoyed the first act but the second was entertaining and the actors were very talented. The theatre boasts having had some very famous and accomplished actors perform on their stage including Patrick Stewart, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, and many others.
After the show we planned on going to The Black Swan, aka the Dirty Duck, where many of the actors go after the performances. The place has pictures of all the really famous actors and actresses who have been patrons there. It ended up being packed so we just went to another pub and Claire, Mandi and I went back for lunch today. It wasn't anything too special but it was fun to see all the photos on the walls.
This morning, after our hot breakfast at the B&B, we toured Anne Hathaway's cottage. It is much bigger today than it was when she lived there; her relatives, to whom the house was passed down through 13 generations, built on quite a bit. In Anne's day the house consisted of a hallway and two rooms.
While there I learned that tables were called boards which is where we get many of our terms referring to boards... board games, board room, etc. The man of the house would sit at the head of the table and from that we get "chairman of the board". When visitors would come, the board would be removed from the legs of the table and placed on the floor for the guest to sleep on which leads us to boarders and boarding houses. I also learned that "goodnight, sleep tight" referred to the ropes supporting your mattress being tied tight so that your mattress wouldn't fall to the floor in the middle of the night. Just a few interesting tidbits.
Finally, we went to Shakespeare's birthplace and childhood home.
All in all I really enjoyed my stay in Stratford and I have decided that if I ever live in the UK I will live in London for a couple years to really experience the city life and then move to a small country town just an hour out of London, preferably along Avon.
ps: The Harvard House (as in the Harvard family who founded Harvard University)
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