UK Adventure: Day 4 Silverstone, Stradford-Upon-Avon, Stourbridge and Snowdonia, Wales

Day 4 started with what I had hoped would be a quick tour of Silverstone race track, and another check off my list of famous race tracks I have been to around the world. Unfortunately though, I couldn't even get past the front gate. The track was closed for a private function, and unlike Monaco, where the track is incorporated into the city streets, or Monza, where a hole in the fence was all you needed to enter, Silverstone was very corporate and very high security.
I took my pictures, bought the t-shirt and we got the hell out off there.

Next stop was Stratford-Upon-Avon, the birthplace and home of William Shakespeare.

Shakespeare's House.

The Stratford theatre and museum.

The church where Shakespeare was christened, married and buried.

And because it was it was only 42 miles down the road, we made a stop in Stourbridge, to see where my wife's fathers side of the family came from.

My wife's dad's family once owned this castle in the city centre. Now it is a school.

From here, we were supposed to head north to Chester for the night, but based on a conversation my wife had with a guy (who turned out to be a cop on the way home from London) in line for food at a burger place along the side of the highway, we changed course and headed for Snowdonia, Wales, 150 miles in the opposite direction.
Turns out it was one of the best decisions we made on our trip.
The drive there was everything you would imagine a drive in the rugged English countryside to be. Skinny two lane roads, mountains on either side, incredible beauty and of course sheep, lots and lots of sheep.
This drive was easily one of our top 10 drives of a lifetime.

 This castle, was a short walk from our hotel in Snowdonia.

UK Adventure: Day 3 Oxford

On Tuesday afternoon of Day 3, we packed our little rental car and headed off on the start of our UK adventure. The plan was to head north, up through the heart of England then skirt along the west coast through the Lake District and eventually make our way up to Scotland.
Two things became quickly apparent to us about the weather in the UK, it was a lot colder then we thought it would be, and it seemed to rain an awful lot.
At this point, I had only driven from the airport to the hotel parking lot just outside of London, about 45 miles or about an hours worth of practice driving standard with the wrong hand on the wrong side of the road. And to confuse me even more, driving speed is measured in miles per hour, not kilometers.
Even though we had a GPS with us, I had to stop and buy a road map book at a local gas station to aid us on our journey.
One thing I noticed right a way about driving in the UK, was that it was a lot different then driving in the rest of Europe; speed being the biggest factor. Their highway system is small compared to ours, and to get to a lot of the places we wanted to go, required driving along two lane English style country roads barely big enough for one car let alone two. So even though the distances between locations we would be travelling to were shorter then in past trips, driving time would actually be longer due to road conditions and traffic congestion.
Our first stop on our trip north was Oxford, a 104 mile drive from London.

Exploring the city in the rain.

The famous Jabberwocky tree that inspired Carol Lewis to write "Through the Looking Glass, And what Alice found there", the sequel to Alice's Adventure in Wonderland, is supposed be lurking about somewhere in Oxford. We think we might of found it!

The city is home to the world renowned Oxford University, the oldest in the country and apparently the English speaking world.

Radcliffe Camera, is a library and one of the most famous buildings on campus, this backdrop has also been used in many movies.

Having a pint at the oldest pub in town, the Turf Tavern.

 

Here are some other famous people who had a pint here:

The town of Oxford.