Highclere Castle, the real setting of Downton Abbey, was an exciting start to our trip. Luckily I booked our entrance tickets last April as the whole summer booked out quickly. We cruised up the grand driveway at a snail's pace, prolonging the daydream that we were great persons of importance to whom Lord Grantham would surely be on hand to welcome us to stay. The safety-vested parking attendants rather burst that bubble as they waved us on to the far corner of the lot, but nothing could deter from the stunning impression of the building.
Highclere is very much still a family home, as the many current photographs spaced about in each room as well as the obvious bedside clobber in the Earl's & Countess's bedroom attest. We saw most rooms on the first 2 floors, and they handily had info cards in those rooms that were used by the Downton production. Sheila thought she could easily live there, I thought the heating bill might a bit high!
Next up was Avebury. We had a choice of either Stonehenge or Avebury, as they are both Neolithic stone circles but as Stonehenge is touristy, with restricted access and lots of people (and I've already been), Sheila chose the latter. Avebury is kinda special as it's the largest stone circle in the world, and the only with a village plumb in the center. It's massive and free, you just park and walk at will amongst history.
Unbeknownst to me, mum had seen the BBC program on the restoration of the nearby National Trust manor house and she was quite excited to visit it. Flashing our membership cards at the gate, we strolled into a fantastic estate that I'd highly recommend anyone to see. Originally built in the 1500's, it had fallen into disrepair by the 1990's so in 2011 BBC partnered with NT to make a show on its transformation into a unique 'hands-on' interpretive tourist venue. Each room was designed to reflect a different era in the manor's history and the furnishings were to be touchable, sit-able, useable by the guests. The gardens had been neglected, the grounds had in the recent past been made into a medieval theme park - all lovingly returned to beautiful slendour. This house, yes, I could live in for sure.
Lastly, we drove west to Lacock, a NT-owned quaint little 14-18th C. village that's been the film set for tons of period pieces, ie. Cranford, Pride & Prejudice, and, most importantly, Harry Potter. :-)
We'd visited before back in 2010 but we weren't able to visit Lacock Abbey, whose cloisters and a bit of the interior were used for different HP movies. Luck was with us today as we squeaked in 15 mins before closing and had a quick boo inside. There's so much more history to the Abbey than I thought - founded in 1229, it housed a copy of the 2nd Manga Carta till the 1940's, it was sacked by Henry VIII but was resurrected as a private manor, and lastly owned by the guy who invented photographic negatives!
That was our television-inspired day. Day 2 of jet lag set in about 5pm so we headed off to our nice little B&B set in the Wiltshire countryside for some views, drinks, pâté and sleep. In any order...
