The Radcliffe Camera (camera is Italian for "room" and it is used as a reading room):
croquet game at Christ Church college:
We wandered around for about 2 hours, grabbed some Cornish pasties for lunch, and then continued our journey into the heart of the North Cotswolds. Our first stop was Upper Slaughter, where we began our Frommer's recommended hike from Upper Slaughter to Bourton-on-the-Water. Known as "The Great Cotswold Ramble," the path follows Warden's Way about 2.5 miles. It was a great walk through sheep pastures (closing the sheep gates behind you along the way) and some of the cutest villages ever. The Slaughters were our personal favorite but Bourton-on-the-Water has a lot more going on if you're looking for shops and restaurants.
Upper Slaughter:
Henry checking out the sheep:
Lower Slaughter; Old Mill:
Lower Slaughter:
Bourton-on-the-Water:
It took us about an hour to get to Bourton-on-the-Water (after a slight detour where we seemed to lose the path and ended up wandering through a town called Melville, which was lovely but not on the recommended route;) We stopped for a delicious cream tea along the river and then started our journey back.
On the way back, Henry had a little disagreement with a horse:
sizing him up....
attack!
Lower Slaughter:
one of several sheep gates:
After finishing our walk, we made our way to our hotel for the night, the Old Swan & Minster Mill in Minster Lovell. Again, it was too adorable for words. We had a great little room in the converted old grist mill, complete with dog bed and bowls for Henry, and the grounds and gardens were beautiful. We had a delicious dinner at the Inn's restaurant and even got free champagne because we had to wait a while for our meal (which really we didn't and neither of us had even noticed but hey, we'll take some free champagne.)
Minster Mill reception area:
Old Swan main building/restaurant:
The next morning after Dan had a belated birthday massage at the hotel's spa, we explored Minster Lovell. The town is literally made up of one street of thatched roof cottages and a church, but there are also ruins of a 15th century manor home, Minster Lovell Hall, which is open to the public to explore. Locals like to claim that the ruins are haunted because during the wedding of William Lovell, his new bride was lost during a game of hide and seek. Years later, a servant found her body in an old lead chest used for food storage. It is thought the lid fell shut and locked her inside where nobody could find her. The ruins are on a lovely spot along the river Windrush and were interesting to check out.
Minster Lovell Hall:
note the "opening hours" ;-)
We managed to pull ourselves away from Minster Lovell and continued on to our next stop, Stow-on-the Wold. While not the cutest of the towns we visited, Stow has a lot of history. There is even a hotel that has been continuously running since 900AD!
cute little shop selling handbags in Stow:
We then made our way to our last stop, Chipping Campden. Chipping Campden was definitely pretty high on the list of adorable villages. It seemed to us to be one of the more "posh" villages, with some larger, more elaborate cottages (with ornamental thatching, who knew such a thing existed?!) and a cute high street. We strolled through town, checked out the church, and had lunch at the local pub.
Queen Victoria era postbox:
It was a great weekend trip and so fun to have our little buddy along with us:)
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