York, England, United Kingdom
This morning begins the official Insight Vacation Tour. At 7:30AM this morning we met our tour
director Cam Wilson and the rest of our travelling companions. This is the largest tour group we have ever
had on Insight Vacations with 37 people.
Our previous tours have been about 28-32 people. We sort of expected this as the UK is
especially popular for first time tourists.
The group seems about typical with a general mix of people around our
age. There is one younger girl that
seems to be traveling with her parents, and three people who have some mobility
problems and use a cane. But otherwise it
looks like a fun tour ahead.
We started this morning with our first stop being Stratford
Upon Avon, the birthplace of William Shakespeare. One thing when we got on the bus that was
odd, is that while they moved the driver’s position to the right hand side to
accommodate driving on the wrong side of the road in England, they also moved
the front passenger door to the left side of the bus, but the rear side exit
door was left on the right side of the bus making it unusable in most
cases. So now we have the largest number
of passengers on the bus with 37, and all of us having to enter and exit out
the front door.
After a quick rest stop along the way, we arrived at
Stratford Upon Avon at about 11:30AM.
After a quick orientation, Cam took us the the entrance of the
Shakespeare Centre, which contains the actual boyhood home of William
Shakespeare, where he grew up and where his father earned a living as a
glovemaker.
Evidently, glove making was a
thing back in the 16th century, with gloves being not only a
necessity, but also a status symbol. The
peasants were only allowed to wear mittens, with fingered gloves limited to the
nobility. If you were a peasant and were
caught wearing fingered gloves, it would be assumed that you had stolen them
and you would be arrested. Fingered
gloves could cost as much as 2 pounds which is equivalent to 2000 pounds today
with fancy embroidered men’s gloves costing as much as 5 pounds or the
equivalent of 10,000 pounds today.
The original house was small and consisted of basically two
rooms, but there was an addition of a workshop, and after Shakespeare’s
father’s death, the house was sold and expanded into an inn. In 1846, it was purchased by the Shakespeare
Trust and was restored to its current condition. The house is staffed by guides in period
correct costumes telling us about the history and use of the cottage over the
years. When the Shakespeare’s birthplace
tour was completed, we headed out into Stratford Upon Avon for a little
exploration.
Stratfor Upon Avon is a
lovely little market town of about 31,000 people. It has a pedestrian main street with lots of
tiny shops with souvenir and local vendors.
While I was able to score a Shakespeare t-shirt, Jody was
unable to find a good one, but she did manage to find a really interesting
sketch book with an embossed hand on the cover and a claw latch. By now it was time to get back on the bus and
head for our hotel and ultimate destination in York. After another couple of hours with a stop
along the way for lunch, we arrived at the York Hilton Hotel. Looking out the front door of the hotel, we
are right at the base of Clifford’s Tower, a 13th century castle
keep, formally used as a prison.
After checking into our room, we met back down in the lobby
with Cam for a tour of the town. York has a very medieval look with many
buildings dating back to the 14th century. It’s main tourist thoroughfare is a street
called “The Shambles” supposedly named for the many butcher shops that were
located on this street and that the street would flow with blood due to all the
butcher shops. Modern day York has
replaced the butcher shops with Harry Potter themed souvenir shops that look
like they just stepped out of a Harry Potter novel. Passing through the Shambles, we arrived at
the center square and an elevated platform where all the public executions were
held. There was very little in the way
of entertainment in medieval times, so
public executions were the Netflix of its day.
At the end of the tour we arrived at York Minster Cathedral,
original started in the 13th century and completed in the 14th
century and is the largest cathedral in North England. Originally a Catholic Cathedral, it was
recommissioned during the Protestant Reformation and all the statues of the
saints were removed as it remains today as a Anglican Church. Unfortunately, the church was closed for the
day when we arrived, so we were only able to see the outside and it is huge!
From York Minister Cathedral, Cam left us on our own to
explore the rest of the town before dinner.
We began by climbing to the top
of the York City Walls. Originally a
walled city, York still has several miles of the original 13th
century walls and gates. We were hoping
for better city views, but we were able to see some of the city from the top of
the walls. For the rest of the
afternoon, we continued exploring the shops along the Shambles and Jody was
even able to find a Shambles t-shirt!
As we approached the hotel, we thought we would check out
Clifford’s Tower. It was almost 5:30,
and the sign said it closed at 6:00, and we climbed the steps to the top, the
girl said if we wanted to get in, we’d better hurry, because she was closing
the door to entry at 5:30. We hurried up
the rest of the steps, and paid our admission as the girl closed the door
behind us. There really wasn’t a lot to
see, but we did explore around, and climbed to the top of the tower to take
some pictures. As we were beginning to
climb the spiral staircase to the observation platform, someone called down to
climb the staircase on the other side as there were about 30 school children
just coming down where we were heading up.
We changes staircase and by the time we made it to the top, we had the
entire observation platform to ourselves.
Thirty minutes was plenty to see all that Clifford’s Tower
had to offer, so we finished our pictures and headed down to the hotel to rest
and det ready for dinner. The dinner
was delicious, and we met a nice couple, Bob and Nancy from Indianapolis. Bob is a retired Army data analyst and we
had a great dinner conversation.
Tomorrow, we leave for two days in Edinburgh, Scotland. I’ve been there once about 25 years ago, but
it was only a business trip, now Jody and I both get to visit as tourists. It should be great!
2025-05-22