The Cotswolds

Great Britain
Day 6 - Tuesday, 13 May 1997

Mrs. Cave made a wonderful English breakfast for us, which generally consists of eggs, toast, grilled tomatoes, mushrooms, sausage and "back bacon" which is more like ham to us. Marmalade is always offered, along with other jams. And of course, tea with cream. This was a lovely and delightful place to stay, but we had to press on.

We went back into Stow after breakfast and took turns being "locked" in the stocks and taking each other's picture. (There were no locks).

Blenheim Palace

We spent most of this day visiting Blenheim Palace which belongs to the Churchills. Winston is a relative who never lived in the palace, but was born there when his mother went into labor while attending a dinner party. They have a lot of information about Winnie, because he is probably the most famous of the Churchills. The palace was overwhelming. The current Duke still lives in one wing of this incredible place. The tourist business keeps it going.

The Slaughters

Late in the afternoon we walked between Upper Slaughter and Lower Slaughter, through a cow pasture and a sheep pasture, going through "kissing gates" and encountering hostility from four geese who really didn't want to be disturbed.

Churches here have yew trees planted in the yards or beside the door - "sacred in pagan days." The highly decorated churches usually have gargoyles on the roof resulting in a mingling of the old religion with the new.

Guiting Power Guest House

We spent the night a few miles away, in the Guiting Power Guest House (pronounced like guiding). Our charming hostess, Yvonne Sylvester, did our laundry for us! Here we learned why the English have a ground floor then the "first" floor (which we would call the second). Her home was a 400 year old farmhouse, and originally the ground floor was where the animals were kept. So the first human livable floor was one flight up. She showed us into a beautifully decorated bedroom where a teddy bear was waiting on the bed for us.