In England, getting whacked doesn't have quite the same meaning as it does here in the States. To the English, as opposed to being rubbed out by a Joe Pesci-type somewhere in the Jersey hills, being whacked is being exhausted, drained, dog tired. After our nine-night journey through England from 26 June through 5 July, 2009--including 3 nights in Bath, 2 nights in The Cotswolds, a day trip to Stonehenge & Lacock, and 4 nights in London Town during a record-breaking heat wave, sans air conditioning--we were, well...whacked.What a way to get rubbed out.
What follows are some observations, a bit of history, a few meaningful quotations, and a brief report on our first trip to England, followed by a link to the specifics of our nine-night itinerary, including hotels, restaurants, sights visited, ground transport, costs, etc.
Cheers!
Gio
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BATH SPA
The River Avon in Bath is beautiful, especially from the Parade Park, but its name--Avon--is not so unique. In fact, England has many rivers called Avon, since Avon is the Celtic word for "river," and the Romans, not realizing this, adopted the name Avon for many bodies of water, in effect, naming all of them "River River." The locals must have gotten a good laugh at that back in the 1st Century.
Pulteney Bridge has shops lining both sides of the street, and thus has been compared to Ponte Vecchio in Florence; however, it's not as old, not as big, not as interesting, not as historic, and not as beautiful as Ponte Vecchio...otherwise it's a valid comparison.
"What a remarkably small world Britain is. That is its glory: it manages at once to be intimate and small scale, and at the same time packed to bursting with incident and interest. Can there anywhere on earth be, in such a modest span, a landscape more packed with busy, productive attainment?" Bill Bryson, "Notes from a Small Island" (1997). Hard to argue with Bryson here. Small geographically, but England just lives BIG.
Bath Abbey at dusk on a summer night is comforting somehow; one just feels connected to people and places and events that came before, things that really matter. Nicknamed "Lantern of the West" for the bright light that pours through its beautiful stained glass, here, in 973 A.D., Saints Dunstan and 
Oswald crowned Edgar as the first King of all England. The Abbey square is located between the Abbey and the captivating ruins of the Ancient and Medieval baths, and is a beautiful place to sit at dusk eating gelato and listening to street musicians, as the city center grows quiet and darkness falls.
My Breakfast Faus Pas: we stayed at a wonderful guest house in Bath, the Three Abbey Green, right in the city center...welcoming, beautiful, ideal location, and a good price, too. But next time, I have to remember these family-owned guest houses take great pride in their service--and in their food. Got up very early one morning, before Dana--and long before our breakfast service started at the Three Abbey Green--and went to Starbucks for a latte and to edit some photos on my laptop. All good, at this point. But then I thought I'd be a thoughtful husband, and bring Dana a Tall Mocha, her addiction of choice, and with it, a little taste of home. Upon my return to the guest house, I entered the charming little breakfast room on the lower level carrying two take-away cups of Starbucks coffee--and with one step inside instantly drew every eye in the room directly on me, like the super trooper beam Abba sings about. I had instantly insulted our fair host (and her daughter, too) and drew a number of knowing "Ugly American" nods from fellow guests from around the world. "Do you not like our coffee?" the owner asked. "We make it fresh and select the beans so carefully. Would you mind very much pouring those into the coffee cups on your table, and letting me take the rubbish away?"
We made a friend from Norway in Bath, Irene, on a long-delayed bus from Heathrow to Bath Spa, and had
dinner a few times, including Italian at Martini's Restaurant. We hope to visit Irene's native Norway someday! The people in England--the English and visitors on holiday like Noreen--were so friendly, so welcoming, more than many other places we've been. Was also surprised at how many wonderful Italian restaurants we found in England, including Martini's and Vito's (a family from Puglia owns Vito's, recommended by our River Avon cruiser captain). Vito's, a gem filled more with locals than tourists, can be accessed on Pulteney Bridge (head down the steep stairs).
In April of 1942, Bath, York and Canterbury were bombed in a blitz by the German Luftwaffe. 400 lives were lost and 19,000 buildings destroyed. In Bath, houses in the Royal Crescent, Circus and Paragon were burnt out, along with the Assembly Rooms, while the south side of Queen Square was destroyed. All have since been reconstructed.
Samuel Pepys, 17th Century English diarist, bathed in Bath's mineral waters once, and recorded this entry in 1668: "Pretty enough, only methinks it cannot be clean to go so many bodies together in the same water."
STONEHENGE
Stonehenge literally means "hanging stones." According to Rick Steves: while England has hundreds of stone circles, Stonehenge is the only one with lintels (horizontal cross pieces) and the only one in which the stones have been made uniform and smooth. What's left today is half of the original structure, with many stones quarried for building materials over the years. Stonehenge was built sometime between 3000 and 1000 B.C. and is an accurate celestial calendar. It may have also had religious significance, but no one knows for certain. The stones weigh between 25 and 45 tons, each, and were carried over 200 years from 20 miles away (the tall monoliths and lintels) and as much as 240 miles away, in Wales (the shorter stones in the middle, called bluestones). No one can say how this was accomplished. For some perspective, consider this: Stonehenge is older than the pyramids in Egypt, the Acropolis in Greece, and the Colosseum in Rome. There was a time when tourists could rent hammers on-site and break off a piece to take home as a souvenir. Today, though, the rocks are roped off.
On the day of our visit, 28 June, a light drizzle fell for a while and the skies were overcast. This seemed, 
actually, to add to the mood of the place. Stonehenge is not the kind of thing you can stare at for hours, but it has a definite aura about it that's intriguing and kind of powerful. You know you're looking at an undertaking so important that it took many, many lifetimes to complete (reminds me of the generations it took to build some of Europe's grandest cathedrals), and that you're standing right there, where ancient peoples stood. Burial mounds surround the site, in the distance, as if the structure itself wasn't enough. Our tour guide and Dana agreed, though: one look at the job to be done here, and if the workers or volunteers were free people, they must have thought seriously about calling off sick. England's National Trust is planning a major restoration around Stonehenge over the next ten years, recreating the surrounding grasslands, moving the highway underground (eliminating its appearance and noise), and building a new visitors' center a few miles away.
THE COTSWOLDS HILLS
"A streak of ancient wisdom warns us that it is our duty to keep an eye on the old thatch [the English village] because we may have to go back there some day, if not for the sake of our bodies, perhaps for the sake of our souls." H.V. Morton, "In Search of England" (1927). "America is a land of extravagance, sweeping gestures, and vast spaces. The scale of England is different. The countryside is divided, subdivided, and divided again by hedgerows, paths, lanes, and odd-shaped fields. It is a patchwork of small squares, each with its own terrain, trees, shrubs, and wildflowers. Ancient monuments, bits of fallen wall, hidden streams, and remnants of old forests turn each square into a story written in fine print." Susan Allen Toth, "My Love Affair with England" (1992).
Our homebase in The Cotswolds, Stow-on-the-Wold, had a wonderful Market Cross, which for 500 years reminded dealers on market day that God was watching them...so they had better be honest. Stow, born before the Romans invaded Britain, later became a key market town with trade roads crossing through the village, which rests on the highest point in the area at 800 feet above sea level.
The garden at the Stow Lodge may be the most beautiful, charming, and relaxing place on the planet that is not located in Italy. Really. What a place to enjoy a glass of wine and drift away on a summer afternoon, before dinner. What heaven would be like if it was in someone's backyard.
LONDON TOWN London is an enormous, diverse city, with 9 million energetic people from England and around the world, living, working and playing in 600 square miles of neighborhoods, historic sites, pubs, churches, Thames River bridges, boats, and walking paths, black cabs, undergroud tubes, and double-decker buses. We put in four consecutive 12-hour days in London--in record-breaking heat sans air conditioning--and we barely scratched the surface of all this city has to offer in music, art, architecture, history, food, gardens, and people. A remarkable, one-of-a-kind place. English people we met in the Cotswolds suggested that London is not really "England," I presume because of its diversity and pace of life. Not sure what to make of that, but this much is true: London may just be the most interesting, lively big city in the world. We would go back in a minute...and we will return.
The echo of hurrying footfalls "has been a continuous sound for many hundreds of years, in the very centre of the city, and it may be that the perpetual steady echo of passing footsteps is the true sound of London in its transience and in its permanence." Peter Ackroyd, "London: The Biography" (2000).
Westminster Abbey's Coronation Chair has been used at every coronation since 1308. Queen Elizabeth I is entombed here, as is Geoffrey Chaucer. A fascinating church in which to wander. On the inside, where pictures are not allowed, I wouldn't say it's the most beautiful church in the world (we've seen churches in Spain and in Italy much more stunning in their beauty), but Westminster is so filled with things--from the British Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to a Poet's Corner, and from chapels, gardens and paintings, to sculptures, tombs, and cloisters--that I'm convinced one could reside in this Abbey for a year and not take all of it in.
Was strange to be in England on Independence Day, the 4th of July. I thought about this while riding the London Eye, the tallest observation wheel in the world at 450 feet, looking down on the River Thames, Big Ben, and the Houses of Parliament. While a few hundred years doesn't add up to a millisecond in geological terms, what a difference that span makes in human affairs. I couldn't help but wonder what Jefferson, Adams and Washington would say if they stood with us in our carriage, overlooking London, on 4 July, 2009. It's not rational, but Dana and I both experienced a hint of guilt at being here on the 4th. I can't even say why. Was all very strange.
London is a coral reef of humanity. Whites are now a minority in parts of the city that once symbolized white imperialism. Arabs have nearly bought out the area north of Hyde Park. Chinese takeouts outnumber fish-and-chips shops. Eastern Europeans pull pints in British pubs. Many hotels are run by people with foreign accents. London is learning--sometimes fitfully--to live as a microcosm of its formerly vast empire--Rick Steves. Definitely. Yes, we saw that, felt that.
London's remarkable Victoria Station is a 19th Century tribute to the Queen who ruled an Empire for 63 years, 7 months, and 2 days--now that's one helluva a run. We sometimes used this station to access the Tube during our four days in London, but we also used the quieter Sloane Square station, during peak hours, to avoid the mammoth crowds that swarm in and around Victoria from London, Dover, Portsmouth, Canterbury, and London's Gatwick Airport. We took the Gatwick Express from Victoria for our flight to Genova. Our hotel, The Limetree, was in Belgravia, where 
Margaret Thatcher resides, and was equidistant between Victoria and Sloane Square. A good location, really, but the neighborhood was awfully sleepy at night, especially after 9:00 PM. However, the staff at the Ebury Wine Bar next to our hotel--from Spain, the Czech Republic, and England--were wonderful. Johanna from the Czech Republic raved about the beer back home, and so I tried a bottle they had on hand. Sitting there, an American in England, drinking Czech beer in a wine bar talking to new friends from Spain and Eastern Europe about London...all of this talk about a global society means something. This is the future. It's not just talk.
Christopher Wren's masterpiece, St. Paul's Cathedral, has a cafe in the crypt, not far from where John Milton rests. So bizzare (still, I had a bottle of beer 
and we ate fresh strawberries we bought at Covent Garden Market...because we could). Princess Diana was married at St. Paul's, and Wren himself, Blake, the Duke of Wellington, and Admiral Nelson lie in the crypt. There has been a cathedral on this site for 1,400 years. This church was built between 1675 and 1710, after the Great Fire. St. Paul's is the largest church in England, combining forms from the continent: tiers of Corinthian columns, curved porches, and a dome. It's exterior is beautiful at night; we saw it walking from the Thames after seeing "As You Like It" at the Globe.
THE LAST WORD "I've thrown the question at numerous people and though most are delighted to be English they've struggled for any sort of definition of what it is to be English. Mr. Sheffield can define English only by what it isn't. 'The one thing English isn't is European,' he says. 'There's water between us, and water is water.'" Joe Bennett, "Mustn't Grumble: In Search of England and the English" (2006).
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE FULL ITINERARY FOR THIS TRIP: 9 NIGHTS IN ENGLAND, FOLLOWED BY 5 NIGHTS IN ITALIA (includes hotels, restaurants, travel times, details about key sights, and costs)
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