On day 7 we visited Oxford and saw the Eagle & Child Pub, St. Mary's Tower, WWII Memorial Gardens, Christ Church College Gardens, Alice in Wonderland, Magdalen College, and Addison's Walk.
Our Oxford trip was the beginning of the day trips that we needed help buying our train tickets. Therefore, to get cheaper rates we had to arrive and leave the towns later than we originally planned. Even though the train times were not ideal, our day trips were some of my favorite days in England.
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| Apparently people like to bike in Oxford |
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| Ashmolean Museum...one of the first museums ever! Be still my museum nerd heart. |
First we headed to the Eagle & Child Pub. This pub is where C.S. Lewis and J.R. Tolkien would eat and have discussion/debates about Christianity and other topics. We reached the pub before it opened so we didn't get to explore the inside. There was a menu posted on the outside of the building and it was the exact same menu served at The White Swan pub we visited in London two days earlier. Apparently someone owns several of the historic pubs in England and serves the same food at all of them lol.
Next we headed toward the Radcliffe Camera which is a round building that serves as a study room for university students. However, you have to be a student at Oxford to go inside. Since the Vaults & Garden restaurant was across the road we had lunch there. A friend of mine who studied at Oxford suggested it prior to our trip and boy was she right! It was the best food I had in England! Plus you can eat outside in the beautiful garden.
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| Sweet potato curry, rice, salad, and bread. Hands down the tastiest meal we had on our entire trip. Delicious!! |
After lunch we decided to climb the 127 extremely narrow steps of St. Mary's Church Tower to see amazing views of Oxford. I am not exaggerating when I say that there wasn't enough room for people to pass each other on the winding stairwell. Also, the ledge at the top of the building was narrow as well. You could pass by people on the ledge but you were going to get up close and personal with complete strangers when you did. However, it was entirely worth it for the incredible views!
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| Radcliffe Camera |
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| Clock at the top of the tower |
Next we went shopping down a super cute street, and we had our first English tea at Patisserie Valerie. This is where we discovered clotted cream. Where has this been all of my life?!?! Clotted cream is like butter but on steroids. It is amazing!
Regenerated by our tea, we visited Alice's Shop. Lewis Carrol, author of Alice in Wonderland, was a math professor at Oxford. He modeled Alice after his Dean's daughter. The store that is now Alice's Shop was a sweet shop that the real Alice liked to visit. If you need any Alice in Wonderland souvenirs, this is the place to go.
Then we walked through the WWII Gardens, which are very pretty. We tried to visit Christ Church College but when we got there the building was closed to visitors. However, the gate to the garden was open. We looked inside and discovered a group of people playing croquet to the right and a hidden garden path to the left. There wasn't a sign saying no visitors...so we went in and explored. The gardens are so pretty!! There are several paths to explore. One of them led next to the building where a choir was practicing and it sounded magical.
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| WWII Gardens |
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| WWII Gardens |
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| Christ Church College |
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| Christ Church College Gardens |
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| Where the choir was practicing. |
When we finished exploring the gardens the gate was locked and we were contemplating whether or not to go through the building to find a way out. That's when an annoyed croquet playing Englishman (apparently they were having an alumni game) appeared and demanded to know how we got in. He rudely demanded to know where we were from and did we read English. I calmly told him we were from the United States, yes we do read English, the gate was open, and there was not a sign saying no visitors allowed.
I think he was secretly amused by me subtly calling him out on his rudeness. Instead of having us leave through the garden gate, he took us through the building and told us, "Well you're in here so you might as well have a look around." So we had a quick look around the outer rooms and courtyard and then we left him to finish his croquet game.
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| People punting down a river |
Our last stop of the day was visiting Addison's Walk. It wasn't on our map, but thanks to some helpful locals we discovered you can access it by going through Magdalen College (there is a small fee). The college and the walk were gorgeous! The architecture on campus was incredible and it has cultivated yet beautiful gardens.
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| Magdalen College |
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| Addison's Walk |
Addison's Walk is another place where C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien would hang out. In fact, C.S. Lewis became a Christian on this walk. The walk felt like you were in the country with the canopy of trees overhead and huge fields on either side of the path (one field had dozens of deer and fawns in it). We only explored a small portion of the walk because we didn't want to miss our train. The Oxford train station has a small grocery store in it so we bought some sandwiches and ate dinner on our ride back. Overall, Oxford was a fun and leisurely day trip from the ever bustling London.
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