DIARIES OF AN ADVENTURER: ADVENTURES AT EASTER

For the four days of the Easter Weekend, I decided to stay local (as in the UK) and tick a few more places off my list. Mainly because it was so expenise to go anywhere else. It was nice to get out of London and spend some time seeing the British countryside. Public transport over here is so great that it is super easy to jump on a train and end up somewhere completly different in a couple of hours.

Gloucester

Gloucester is not normally a massive tourist destination, but as was one of the few places in England that I had actually heard of, thanks to the Dr Foster nursery rhyme. I decided to take a day trip to check it out and was very fortunate the it wasn't raining!

I discovered that the Beatrix Potter Museum and Shop is in Gloucester and it is inside the building Beatrix Potter chose for the setting of her story, The Tailor of Gloucester. The story was based on a local tailor, who after closing his shop at Saturday lunchtime with a waistcoat cut out but not sewn together, was surprised to discover on the Monday morning when he opened the shop again, all but one button hole in the waistcoat had been sewn together. It was a nice little tribute to a great author.

Almost every city in the UK has its own Cathedral, and Gloucester is no exception. Its Cathedral houses the bodies of Robert the Duke of Normandy (William the Conquerors Son) and King Edward II. I found it spooky that the graves are above ground enclosed in massive replicas of the people they hold within. There was also writing on the stone floor blocks, which I discovered to be horizontal tombstones. They all had names and dates written on them creating a really sombre atmosphere! I have learnt that Cathedrals are basically ancient indoor graveyards for the important people throughout history!

There were nearly 100 tombstones on the Cathedrals Cloister floors alone. These Cloisters were used as the Hogwarts Corridors for filming of the first, second and sixth Harry Potter movies. The feeling I got when walking into the cloisters was indescribable! I almost cried. It was such a surreal feeling to be standing there. I felt like I was actually in Hogwarts.

I took part in the Cathedral Bell Tower tour where we were warned at the beginning by a guide who looked about 80 or so years old himself, that if anyone has heart problems this probably isn't a good idea for them... We climbed a small spiral staircase, stopping three times to hear about the different parts of the Cathedral and Tower. At the first stop we were just above the Cathedral Roof, and we saw how they managed to get it to stay in place. We walked along beams suspended from the walls, as the guide said it wasn't safe to walk directly on the roof.

The second stop was to show us the bell which is still chiming today and is attached to an old clock. We were there to witness the bells ringing for 11am. The third stop was to show us another set of bells that are used to make music, and are also still in use. It is a very complicated process to play the bells! We then finally made it to the top with a 360 degree view of the beauitful city of Gloucester.

My last stop in Gloucester was the docks. Gloucester is one of the biggest inland ports in the UK, and it is the reason for the city existing in the first place. The docks are lined with ginormous warehouses which are now being converted into apartments. There is a huge outlet shopping centre there now too and some super fancy resturants, making it a really nice area to visit. I only spent a day in Gloucester, but I think it was long enough to see the city.

York

The next day I headed north on the train for two nights in the old walled city of York. There is only 3.4km of the walls remaining, as some of it had to be knocked down to create roads in and out of the city as it expanded. The five gateways however all remain and are so unbelievable to see. I managed to walk all the way around the walls, which were sitting on top of hills covered in daffodils, it was so pretty! To top it all off, the weather was amazing, the first time I had worn a singlet in 2015!

I visited the York Minster. This is Yorks version of a Cathedral but I am not sure why it is not called that?! It is the largest Gothic Cathedral in Northern Europe. Unfortunately they were doing repairs on the back window but there were a lot of information about the restoration of the Minster. There were a lot of graves here as well, and I had trouble trying not to walk over the top of them! I climbed the tower here too where I could see the walls going around the city and understand how much York has expanded beyond them.

I didn't spend as much time in the Castle part of town as Cliffords Tower is the only part still remaining. This tower was basically the keep of the Norman Castle that was built by William the Conquerer. There is now a museum where the dungeons and prison area of the Castle used to be. During a night time ghost stories tour the guide explained that the museums staff had seen ghosts inside it on numerous occasions. The guide was a sweet older man who added humor into the tour with lots of 'tales' of ghost sightings. He asked people where they were staying and told them ghost sightings that had taken place within their hotels! I was told a lady had hung herself on the top floor of the hostel I was staying in. It turned out that my room was her old room! I didn't sleep very well that night...

I took part in another free walking tour as these are a great way to learn about a city. This was guided by another sweet old man who worked for free. He was very interesting to listen to and was super passionate about the City of York. He showed us the King's Manor where Henry VIII, Charles I and James I have all stayed. It is now used as a part of the University. We saw some viking ruins. The vikings invaded York in 866 and many chose to settle there instead of taking their loot back home. They were disgusting and used to throw rubbish, discarded building materials, food remains and human waste into their back yards. This meant that the ground level rose by around 1cm a year. The viking ruins that we saw were walls layered on top of each other where the vikings had kept rebuilding on top of, due to the rising ground level.

I walked down the Shambles, York's famous street. This is a narrow lane that used to be home to as many as 25 butcher shops. Shsmbles means openair slaughter house and meat market, and you can still see the hooks and shelves where the butchers used to hang out their meat. Whip-Ma-Whop-Ma-Gate, the smallest street in York, runs off the Shambles. Being Easter weekend, I ended up without a seat on the five hour train ride back to London. I gave up after about half an hour and sat in the aisle, lesson learnt about buying open return tickets on a bank holiday!

"The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page." - St. Augustine

I hope this has inspired you.

LARISSAJODEE x

#solo #celebrationsandevents #travel