OXFORD!
Okay I couldn’t think of a clever way to start this, but yelling Oxford seemed appropriate. It conveys excitement which is spot on in my opinion.
We only had a day in Oxford, actually more like eight hours (with travel time included), and let me tell you that wasn’t enough time. Nope, not by a long shot. Oxford is jammed packed with history and students and culture. If you plan to visit, which you should, please go for longer than a day. Now that we’ve cleared that up….
OXFORD!
What an amazing little town. Obviously it’s known for the University which is quite literally THE WHOLE PLACE. Yep, it’s everywhere. Apparently the University owns like everything (I might be exaggerating) and all the buildings represent the individual colleges within the University. But I’m not here to give you a lesson on Oxford University. I’m here to tell you what we did in that short frame of time. Well, the answer is a lot.
First off we found a cemetery right in the middle of the town so we stopped for a few pictures. Unfortunately we weren’t able to actually go into the graveyard but it still counts towards #1000cemeteries because I say so.
Next we decided to take a free two hour walking tour of Oxford with a company called Footprints. The tour covered quite a bit of ground and our guide, Tom, was extremely knowledgeable on the town’s history. It helped that he was not only born and bred in Oxford but that he also attended the University as a History student. He also happens to be a writer which is really cool because he talked a bit about J.R.R. Tolkien (more on that later).
The tour was amazing and I would highly recommend them. The two hours fly by and I was sad when it ended. Had we been there longer I’m certain we would have signed up for one of their other tours.
Before I move forward, let me back track a bit here. When we had mentioned to friends that Oxford was on our list of places we’d like to visit, we were pleasantly surprised just how many recommendations we received on things to see and do. One of those recommendations was the Ashmolean Museum – another of England’s fabulously free museums (Canada you need to take a page from their book). This museum is focused on art and archaeology – right up our alley – and was founded in 1683! Their collection is diverse and, in their own words, focuses on ‘telling human stories across cultures and across time’. Pretty amazing!
Sadly, the only downside of the Ashmolean is their hours. Having finished the tour at 4:00pm we had exactly one hour to speed walk to the museum and check out as much as we could before they closed. We ended up spending 40 minutes racing through the first two floors of the museum before having to leave. Again, not enough time! We did manage to snap a selfie outside the building – the only photo evidence that we were there.
With less than three hours before we had to catch a train back to Cirencester, we decided to find a place to sit, eat, drink and be merry. Our lovely friend Nell had recommended a charming pub called Turf Tavern. She warned us it was a bit difficult to find (they even mention this fact on their website) but worth it. We found it easily enough (surprisingly) but so had everyone else in the town. When we rounded the corner there were hoards of people lined up to get in. Hoping to sit down to eat, we decided instead to take a few pictures then hunt for another pub.
Thankfully I remembered a blog post on Oxford where the woman recommended a pub called The Eagle and Child. This is no ordinary pub, folks. Well it is BUT, it is also the very location where the famous J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis (along with several others) held their literary discussion group for nearly two decades (early 1930s – 1949). They were called the Inklings and they met every Tuesday morning.
As a writer this was a huge moment for me. To be in the very pub where the author of The Lord of the Rings used to ‘hang out’ was pretty amazing!
There is even a bunch of plaques and photos on the wall in the corner where they gathered. It just so happened a table was free in that corner. We celebrated my writer geek moment with beer and cider and a plate full of greasy goodness. I’m sure it’s what Tolkien would have recommended.
Belly full and heart happy, we spent the remainder of our time at Blackwell’s bookstore because writer *points to self*. I picked up a short story by Arthur Conan Doyle called Lot No. 249 which is about an Egyptian mummy in Oxford. How appropriate.
And that was Oxford! It’s a must-see stop in England, at least it is in my very humble opinion. đŸ™‚
Till next time,
xo Angie
Living Life Differently 