UK Roadtrip Part 2 - The Cotswolds

Day 4 Oct 13 – The Drive to the Cotswolds

We were all very excited about visiting the Cotswolds, and we were all a little bit less excited about getting in the car and driving there. But my dad did a great job with the help of my fearless hubby. We left the Bay House after breakfast and said goodbye to our lovely hosts. The drive was about 4 hours, but it flew by and shortly after 12 we arrived at our next stop: The Colesbourne Inn http://www.thecolesbourneinn.co.uk/

The Inn was located on the A435 halfway between Cheltenham and Cirencester. I chose this Inn for its location as it was also very close to Brockworth, Gloucester. The pub attached was excellent, complete with roaring fire, good bartender and great food. We settled into our basic rooms (£75 per room a night) and headed off to Cirencester, 8 miles away.

Cirencester is an old Roman town with a beautiful Cathedral (which was also closed by the time we wanted to go inside…sense a pattern here??). We wandered along the shopping streets and stopped here and there for a pint and a pasty for lunch. I really love the beautiful colour of the Cotswold stone used to build all the buildings in this area. They seem to just glow. As the afternoon wore on we decided to find the large park in town as it was suppose to be beautiful…but alas, by the time we made it there is was closed!!! Hahaha…no problem, we jumped back in the car and headed home to the Inn.

Dinner that night, and every night, was in our pub. And the steak and ale pie was definitely the winner. Delicious. The food was excellent. I really do love all the pubs along the roads in the Cotswolds.

Day 5 Oct 14 – The Cheese Hill and Memories

My dad moved from Manchester to Brockworth when he was a young boy and he had only been back once since leaving in 1957 so he was really looking forward to this part of the trip. We gave him the whole day to decide what he wanted to do. So we piled back into the car and I took my turn navigating through the roundabouts and roads to Brockworth, a few miles away. The first stop was the Cross Hands.

The Cross Hands is an intersection, or better still, a roundabout around the corner from where my dad’s house was. It is also the location of a pub my grandfather frequented call the Cross Hands. As we drove along towards it my dad could not believe how small everything was. Having left as a boy everything had seemed so big in his memory. And of course there were changes…a big Shell gas station on one corner…and the Cross Hands pub has now been renamed The Toby Carvery and is under new management. But it still looked much like he remembered.

We parked in the pub parking lot and wandered down the street to his road. It was great to see this with my dad as I could now see where all his stories took place. His house had a fantastic view of Coopers Hill, where the big cheese run is done every year. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brockworth . We spent an hour or so walking around his old street, the park behind it and his old school…trying not to look like we were scoping the joint! Back at the Cross Hands pub we had a pint so my dad could absorb what he had seen and then headed out again to find his old church down Green Road. As it turned out, the old church was gone, so we headed up the hill on a tiny, steep road to see Cooper’s Hill up close. We made it around one steep turn and then decided to park and walk the remaining way! It was great to see and I know my dad enjoyed it.

Back in the car we headed to Gloucester for lunch. We stopped at The New Inn, on old beautiful coaching inn, and had a burger. I have to say, Gloucester was not my favourite town. It was quite down and out looking, with lots of stores closed down.

We did see the Beatrix Potter store, and Gloucester Cathedral, which was beautiful. The cloisters are amazing, they look like lace. The cathedral is huge and well worth a visit if you are in town.

We headed back to our inn but decided to stop at the Air Balloon pub on the way as my dad remembered it from his youth and had always wanted to go inside. I should point out that my dad is not a big drinker, and only had a half pint or less when we went in for drinks.

This is where it all went wrong. Thinking I knew how to get home, we didn’t turn on Tracy, our faithful Sat Nav, and I guided my dad through the wrong exit in the first roundabout. This got us both flustered, and started up the backseat drivers (we had had a firm NO BACKSEAT DRIVING rule in place since day 1). My dad entered a roundabout, got flustered AND STOPPED!!! Finally we got out of the roundabout, my mom nearly in tears, and turned on the Sat Nav to get home. Poor mom was completely freaked out, my dad was upset, and it was time for bed.

Day 6 Oct 15 – A tour of the small villages

We started our day with our usual Full English and got into the car. My dad did a great job maneuvering around the inn and turning into the correct (left hand) lane…until he saw the other car coming at him in the right hand lane and instincts took over…our car wildly swirved into the right hand lane in front of said oncoming car at which point we all screamed!! Thank goodness he regained his senses immediately and got back into our lane…have I mentioned how happy I was to drop off the car at the end of the week???

From there we had a whole day of driving planned along the small lanes in the Cotswolds. Adrenaline subsided and we continued on our way with no further mishaps that day.

We started off driving in the direction of Cheltenham and carried on by. Our goal was to get to Chipping Campden for lunch via Broadway and Stanton. We meandered through Winchecombe (super cute village I’d love to spend time in) and then made a wrong turn. No worries, we had no set path so we continued down the tiny lane and ended up smack in front of Stanmore House. This was a lovely manor house, which was unfortunately closed, but we got some beautiful pictures. We headed around through to Stanton, at which point we decided to stop and walk around. This village is adorable, and apparently used as a movie set frequently. We wandered around and met up with numerous hikers doing the Cotswolds Way. Basically the only thing in Stanton is a pub, which is at the top of a hill at the end of a lane. As we were heading up a large semi-truck (lorrie) drove up the hill and immediately got stuck. Apparently Sat Navs (GPS) are leading truck drivers down tiny lanes all over the UK and they are getting stuck as the drivers blindly follow them. Well this driver got stuck. Scott and dad spent quite a while watching the truck back slowly down this tiny lane down the hill. Mom and I quickly got to the pub and saved us a table and got us a round.

The pub was actually quite busy with hikers and locals, so we decided to continue on to Chipping Campden for lunch. No troubles getting there via Broadway and we parked and headed to find a pub. Unfortunately, it was just after 2pm and most pubs had stopped serving lunch (Scott and I were trying to rush my parents but they were busy taking pics and looking at everything) so we settle in at a pub that said they would make us some sandwiches. And they did. They were beautiful huge sandwiches and we devoured them!

After that we headed out in the direction of Bourton-on-the-Water, but upon discussion in the car we discovered that we all appreciated the non-touristy aspects of Stanton and so decided to skip Bourton and head to Lower Slaughter. Scott and I had been to Lower Slaughter in the spring on a London Walk, so we knew what to expect…and it didn’t disappoint. It is a lovely place with a small river running through and an old mill that makes delicious ice cream. My dad is an ice cream addict so he was thrilled. This village ended up being one of the highlights.

By this time it was getting close to dinner time, so we headed back to our inn. We had a 7:30pm reservation for quiz night!!!! This was our first experience with a British pub quiz and as Canadians let’s just say we did not win…not even close…in fact we scored the lowest score in the room!! We were completely ready with our UK knowledge (1066, King George 4, Queen Elizabeth 1 and so on) but alas we were not equipped with knowledge about Scottish Islands and the rules of netball. But we had a blast with the locals.

Another great day!

Day 7 Oct 16 – A trip to Roman Bath

Post breakfast we all headed back to the car to drive the 1 hour to Bath. We weaved through the lovely countryside and even managed to find a garage that had some old cars for dad (Rolls Royce and a Morgan I think). We pulled into Bath around 11:30 and of course got lost trying to find the parking lot. After a few tense moments we found one right by the Cathedral and jumped out to start exploring.

My dad is a huge roman history fan, so I knew he would love the baths as they are the best preserved in Britain (maybe even the world)! As previously mentioned, my dad likes to read EVERYTHING in these types of exhibits, so we knew we had to give him a limit…so we gave my parents 1 ¼ hours (we’d already been twice). Ensuring the ‘rents were safely inside we headed out for some shopping and a quick pint. It started out as a beautiful day but had some big scary clouds blowing across by mid-afternoon. We went back to the entry way at the agreed upon time and waited. And waited. And waited…that’s when we realized that the exit was on the other side of the baths so I went on a mission to find them. Found them safe and sound in the gift shop and we headed out for a pizza lunch. The rest of the afternoon mom and I spent shopping, and hubby and dad spent exploring.

Based on the couple nights ago misadventures, we decided to head back to our inn at 4pm to avoid driving in the dark. Along the way we stopped at the Thames Head pub for a drink and dad was able to talk to some locals to get an idea of how long it would take us to get to Manchester in the morning. We weren’t quite ready for dinner when we arrived at our inn so we headed to the nearby Green Dragon Inn…which was down a tiny lane. For some reason this lane was super busy…cars were flying at us and dad had to basically drive into the bushes to make room hahahaha…he handled it well but I think he was relieved when we arrived. We had a couple pints there (it looked like a great place to stay) and headed back for our final dinner at our inn.

Day 8 takes us North!

Pictures of The Cotswolds: