20240519 Sunday May 19, 2024; Disembarkation in Southampton, Windsor Castle and Oxford
We had our last buffet breakfast and disembarked without trouble. We booked a Princess airport transfer to get us to Heathrow Airport where we would then have our car rental company (Arnold Clark) pick us up. That worked out pretty well but only because Ben had purchased the UK SIM card earlier in Portland/Weymouth so he could make the phone call for the airport pick up. We noticed that London’s Heathrow airport charges everyone a £5 toll to use any of the pick up and drop off lanes at the airport. They use automated license plate readers so there’s no sneaking around it unless you remove your license plates.
The Arnold Clark office was understaffed, with just a single agent because someone had called in sick. Despite this, the agent was professional and courteous. Their procedures could use some streamlining because it take about 10 minutes per customer to process all the information they want (drivers licenses, cell phone and home numbers, passports, etc). After we got the car, which was a Skoda Octavia, it took a while to get it programmed for our destinations and configured with cell phone cables, phone and GoPro windshield mounts and everything stowed in the boot (trunk).
The Skoda is a nice car- roomy and well appointed. And all our suitcases fit in the trunk, completely concealed from outside view. It appears to be about the same size as a BMW 5 series sedan or Ford Fusion- about a big as passenger sedans get in Britain. It’s a good thing it wasn’t any bigger because the streets and parking spaces in Britain are designed for Mini-Cooper and Fiat 500 sized cars.
Our first stop was Windsor Castle, which was a relatively short drive from Heathrow airport. The parking garage was remarkably crowded and extremely tight for the Skoda Octavia. There couldn’t have been more than 2” of clearance between the driver front corner of the car and wall, and the passenger side rear door and hand railing at the corners at each floor of the garage’s 4 floors. The Skoda has proximity parking sensors that were screaming out alerts and warning of imminent collision at every corner, and while doing a 8 point back in turn to get into an extremely tight parking space.
We had perfect weather with a light breeze, scattered clouds and temperatures the mid 60’s for our visit to Windsor Castle. We did a guided tour of the grounds highlighting the history and architectural aspects of the Castle and castle grounds. Then we did a self guided tour of the inside of the State Apartments. These contained grand halls filled with priceless artworks, China, gold, and heraldic suits of armor, swords and other weaponry. There was also a hall displaying gifts from all over the former British Empire and other nations. The State Apartments did contain a canopied King’s bed in an elaborate bedroom, but people don’t sleep in the State Apartments. They don't allow any photography inside any of the State Apartments, but we didn't realize that until after we had taken a few pictures.
Janet spent a long time looking for the portrait of Arthur Wellesley, the 1st Duke of Wellington that she had heard so much about, but we did eventually locate it, despite an official staffer looking the painting up in his references and saying he didn’t think was on display at Windsor. Well, we did find it the second time through that gallery and then pointed it out to that staffer so he could help anyone else desperately looking for.
We did see the location where the fire that burned down a portion of Windsor Castle started. Apparently, a halogen lamp got too close to a 19’ tall drapery, which caught fire. Unfortunately, there were no fire extinguishers that could spray water 19’ up onto the wall and ceiling, so things got out of hand very quickly. It is amazing that they were able to save all but 3 items from the royal collections by removing them and piling them in the courtyard like a giant royal yard sale.
One of the most unique items on display, and for which there was a line nearly as long as those at the Tower of London to view the Crown Jewels, was a doll house that was about 15’ x 12’ x 8’ high filled with miniature furniture, landscaping plant facsimiles, automobiles and other items including a Hoover vacuum cleaner, Singer sewing machine, musical instruments and a full garage full of automobiles. The lights and plumbing all work, and even the miniature books in the libraries were real miniature books written by renowned authors specifically for this tiny library. There was even a working tiny Victrola record player.
Windsor Castle was certainly posh and filled with all sorts of royal treasure- a pirate's dream plunder. Leagues beyond the US Whitehouse, but perhaps not in the same class as Catherine's Palace in St. Petersburg. But then again, the Russians got rid of their Tsars ostensibly due to their royalty living so high on the hog on the backs of the laborers and peasants.
We were next hoping to do a walk about the town of Marlow, which was a film location for the Midsomer Murders BBC TV series. This is a picturesque village on the Thames which was home to Mary Shelly, author of Frankenstein, and TS Eliot of Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats (the basis of the musical Cats). There is also a bridge in the center of town designed by William Tierney Clark, who subsequently scaled it up as the Széchenyi Chain Bridge across the Danube River in Budapest.
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We drove over this miniaturized original, and it is a very tight fit for today’s cars. The bridge is only barely one lane wide at each of the towers. Unfortunately for us, there is a “Pub in the Park” going on and there was not one single parking space in any of the city’s pay parking lots, and no other parking anywhere within a reasonable walking distance, so we had to content ourselves with a tour of the municipal parking lots and a trip across the Marlow Bridge.
We then headed up to Oxford, which was our scheduled destination for the night. The main motorways are Britain’s equivalent to our interstate freeways, and those are very nice to drive on- separated traffic, full sized lanes, clear signage and no traffic roundabouts.
The Voco Oxford Spires hotel is a very nice hotel set in a wooded setting a very short walk from the Thames where the Oxford rowing clubs have a series of club houses and boat houses.
We got to see men’s, women’s and mixed rowing shells working out on the river. There was a pathway from the hotel leading into Oxford’s town center along the Thames, which was very scenic, but also very busy.
The rowing coaches zip along the same pathway on their bicycles, creating potential hazards for mere pedestrians on a stroll. An interesting phenomenon was the presence of boats tied up along the shore. Some were prototypical narrow canal boats, while others were fiberglass wrecks and some were actually sunken. There appeared to be a lot of otherwise unhoused people living on these. We wonder if they are the equivalent of the unhoused people living out of dilapidated RV’s in some of Seattle’s neighborhoods.
Oxford is very much a young college town with lots of Gothic buildings and brownstones. There is definitely a lot more involvement of religion in these colleges than the predominantly secular universities and colleges we have in the US. We did run across a large encampment of students in tents protesting the Gaza war in front of one of the main buildings on the Oxford campus. But there was nothing violent going on.
We had dinner at a pub in Oxford, splitting a pint of pale ale and trying both the fish and chips and a steak and ale pie. Both were quite good, but Ben had to spend a long time on the phone getting security freezes lifted from our credit cards which got shut down after our initial flurry of activity in London. It was particularly frustrating because our financial institutions now insist on two factor authentication mostly reliant on cell phone text messages, but when traveling abroad many people get local SIM card with local numbers, and these financial institutions can’t send texts to international numbers. So in order to deal with these security related issues, we have to reactivate our US carrier’s service with international roaming of over $10 per day. Hopefully, now that they are aware that we are in Europe, we won’t have further issues with our credit cards and can leave our US SIM’s deactivated for the remainder of this trip.
Tomorrow we are slated to drive from Oxford up to England’s Peak District which includes the villages of Matlock Bath (Little Switzerland) and Bakewell, the home of the Bakewell Tart. There is the Chatsworth House, which was the film location for the 2005 Pride and Prejudice. Then we continue on to York where we will spend two nights.
