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This week Dr Kettle and I took a drive to Oxford to
watch the Beating of the Bounds, an annual and
ancient tradition on Ascension Day that I wrote
about in the December issue of
The Kettle.
Great
fun was had tearing here and there looking for a
rabble of people armed with long sticks and a love
of tradition. At one point in a skinny alleyway lined
with the warm Cotswolds stone of the city and not
entirely sure where we were I asked a young man
for directions:
you need to trace a tetra shape from
the end of the lane
he told us. How Oxford is that?
I could have kissed his sweet scholarly face!
Dr Kettle, in reality our computer whizzkid Raman,
(rhymes with salmon and gammon) was a first time
visitor and all day long he was wowing and oh-my-
goodnessing as one beautiful vista after another
revealed themselves to us. And Oxford is truly
beautiful and extraordinary and half the fun is
watching the tourists trying to take in what a
fantastic country this is (and watching wide-eyed
as grown men with long sticks thrash walls!) We
were in Oxford to put the final touches to our new
tour
Oxford, The Isis and Iffley
and pop in on the
various people that we work with. First stop a coffee
with Ali at the pub whose brilliant location enables our
Blue Badge Guides to begin the walking tour right in the
heart of the city which is a great saving on the legs.
Next we walked the route you will take on on this
new tour. Past Christopher Wren’s Sheldonian Theatre
(which you can see from the pub window) and straight
into the ancient courtyard of the Bodleian Library.
Wow said Dr Kettle. Wow indeed. Most times we can
take you inside one of the buildings to get a flavour of
this august institution known locally (by
gown
if not
town)
as
the Bod.
We emerged into the timeless
Radcliffe Square, at its centre the Radcliff Camera, itself
a library like the Bod and round like the Sheldonian
Theatre. It is said to be just one of the buildings that
inspired Oxford Professor of Anglo-Saxon JRR Tolkein
when writing Lord of the Rings. Great fan of Tolkein is
our Dr Kettle. We peered into the quad at Brasenose
College, a visit inside is included on our Oxford tours
but no time today as we planned to walk along the tow
path to Iffley Lock for a final reccie of one of my
absolute favourite churches in the whole of England
and believe me I have visited very, very many.
New Tour: Oxford, The Isis & Iffley