TOURING NOTES, SUGGESTIONS
Essentials before you go:
Tell your credit card issuer where you will be.
Do not forget your passport!!
Washcloths not always provided by hotels.
Medicines in official containers.
Get an adapter for your computer (Best Buy); do not bring heat-producing appliances—they fry.
Keep photocopies of passport and credit cards at home
THIS IS NOT A REGIMENTED TOUR
I believe that the Shakespeare material holds it together nicely and provides an intellectual center, but I want you to do the things you want to do on your own time—and there is a lot of it. I will have an agenda for each day and you are welcome to come with me, but you will enjoy this trip more if you take charge of your days. In general, I ask that you do a church, a museum, and a castle in each city.
TRAVEL TIPS
Travel light, lite, lyght, leit—one bag plus your carry-on if possible (I also stow a collapsible bag for the return—for all the loot)
Bring food and drink with you in your carry-on
Bring a sleep-aid if you need it—an antihistamine?? You must try for 3 hours of sleep on the flight so that you can adjust to British time.
Bring two fun reads for the plane (a great sleep aid), and share them if possible
Bring a sweater and some rain protection—just in case
KNOW THE NAME OF YOUR HOTEL—carry a hotel card or matchbook
Arrival—We usually arrive early at the hotels (they are forewarned) and they may not be able to get into rooms immediately (could be a couple of hours). We can check our bags and look around. I will have a meeting to orient everyone.
Extras—Leaving the hotels—always check to see and pay for any extras you may have charged to the room—late night beers are a favorite, available after hours to patrons of the hotels, from the night porter. The hotels’ prices may be heavy.
THE COURSE
We will see six plays and I ask you to review five of them. Sample reviews are on this site. One need not know a play before seeing it—Shakespeare’s audience obviously didn’t—but I ask you to read, say, three plays before we leave, to get some feel for them.
NUMBERS
The British put the day first in numerical dates—we leave 31/7/16
Lots of places use a 24 hour clock, trains especially
There is a 5 hr time difference between Indy and Britain—noon here is 5 pm there (Chicago—6 hrs)
The British use centigrade temperatures for the weather—double the temp and add 30: 20 degrees is about 70 for us (68 actually, but the formula is close)
PHONES
Check with your cell provider; I-phones may charge you outlandish roaming charges. Land lines–from the US—do not dial 1–dial 011-44 and the hotel number WITHOUT THE FIRST 0. It is very expensive to use the British hotel phones for outside calls—DON’T DO IT. There are credit card phones in the lobbies or nearby and it is worth it. Best to have people call you at the hotel at prearranged times. US phone charges are probably a third of theirs. From the UK, dial 001 plus area code and number.
MONEY
You might bring some British pounds—most banks can do this for you. Still when we arrive, my first move is to hit an ATM. A debit card is ideal, but even they charge a service charge ($3.00 last year) per transaction. You can use a credit card at an ATM or clerks inside the bank can give you a cash advance at no charge (the last time I did it). Get, say, £100, for walk around money so you don’t do too many transactions—the charge is the same no matter how much you get. My ATM now also charges a percentage for foreign transactions—total rip-off. Best deal I know is Capital One—no surcharges.
SURVIVAL
Breakfast in the hotels—included in Bath and Stratford –eat hearty, even if the food is a little unfamiliar. The breakfast rooms usually close at 10, so don’t be late. Some people like to skip lunch to save money. The London flats have kitchens–so . . . .
Many pubs are not bad places for food, often traditional stuff like meat pasties. What they call bar snacks will often make a dinner. In pubs you ordinarily have to order at the bar, where there is a chalkboard with the menu.
Pubs are no longer required to close at 10:30 and I have no idea of what that means for the nightlife. There used to be expensive private clubs open after hours. Ask the young people at the hotels where the action is. Don’t go anywhere alone—take care of each other!!! Don’t overdo!!! Call me if you need help!!!
LONDON
Tube pass: I ask everyone to purchase a one-week tube pass (the subway). It is about $40 for a pass for Zone 1, which includes just about everything you will do.
You will ride the tube everywhere and it is pretty easy to learn. The biggest trick is to make sure you know the direction you are going (east, west, etc.). Also be sure that the destination on the front of the train (or on the info board) denotes it as the train you want—some lines which go different directions use the same tracks for some distance. ALSO GOOD ON THE BUSES.
Laundry: There is are laundry facilities in the London flats This should cut your baggage in half.
Bus tours: Lots of hop-on, hop-off buses tour the city and help you get the lay of the land, but they are a little pricey ($20 or more) and often get bogged down in traffic. Tickets good for 24 hours, get on and off at will.
PALACES/MONUMENTS
Tower of London (go early and right to the crown jewels display at the top of the hill)
Buckingham Palace (many have already booked)
Greenwich (now the famous observatory), a neat trip. The Millennium starts here, they claimed.
Hampton Court, Windsor—great day trips via train. I may do Windsor.
Houses of Parliament—(always worth doing)
CHURCHES
St Paul’s Cathedral (go up to the dome if you want and look out over the city; Donne’s effigy and tomb) (the Brits say sinpauls)
Westminster Abbey—A must see; take the tour, see poets’ corner (adjacent to Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, river trips pier).
MUSEUMS
National Gallery (one of the world’s great collections, faces Trafalgar Square; National
Portrait Gallery on a corner, St Martin’s in the Fields on another corner–18th century music at its best, Thurs., Sat. eves)
Tate Gallery (another great collection, mostly 19th century—Turner, Pre-Raphaelites)
Tate Modern (more than you ever wanted to see in modern art—depends on the current exhibit)
British Museum (fantastic collection of artifacts from Egypt to Athens and Africa)
Victoria and Albert (mostly artifacts and crafts)
Somerset House and Courtauld Gallery (recently opened to the public—great Impressionists)
SHOPPING AND . . .
Oxford Street, Harrods, Covent Garden, various street markets. Portobello Road in Notting Hill every Saturday am—a must do for me.
Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square—neat tourist spots, great first day fun
Required: Three plays, meet before and after—see below. (You need do only five reviews of the six plays.)
Coach departure times are on the itinerary. The Stonehenge stop is on the way from London to Bath, or vice versa some years.
BATH
This city is just for fun on the tour.
I recommend the city bus tour and the Jane Austen walking tour, but the heart of the place is the Roman Baths. Have a late cream tea in the Pump Room (a hang-out in Austen novels) and do the Baths tour at dusk, lit by torches. There is lots of tourist stuff, museums, etc. Look it up on the web.
STRATFORD-UPON-AVON
Lunches—good “take-away” sandwich shops at a reasonable price (try Jester’s); “salad” means you want lettuce and tomato on it. Or buy bread, cheese, wine (pack a cork screw in your checked luggage) at the grocery store and picnic in the park by the river. Grocery stores also sell prepared sandwiches, sometimes salads and entrees. Bountiful in London.
Dinner—It has always been a problem finding value-for-money food in Stratford, so everyone exchange success stories. I often do pub food and fish and chips take-away—or at the hotel on the terrace. 2013: dinners included at the hotel. Café Rouge is great but semi-expensive–try the lunch specials. Lots of places serve a very nice afternoon tea.
Drink–The Black Swan (better known as the Dirty Duck) is straight down the river past the theater. It is a hangout for the actors who are usually congenial at being recognized—and sometimes the actors do their post-show drinking at the Thistle Hotel across from the Swan. If you don’t feel comfortable in a pub, keep looking.
Required–The plays: we will find a place to meet for an hour beforehand and afterward—to speculate about what the play can do and then to discuss what it actually did so that you can feel confident about your reviews (we will disagree about any show’s degree of success—we are all different).
See the Shakespeare sites—2013: if you can, buy passes, good except at Holy Trinity church (£2 to get back to the grave site); we are too many to go as one group to the various spots, so get a few people together and tour them at your own pace. Lots of souvenir opportunities, of course. The birthplace and the church are especially cool. Two major sites are out of town. It is cheap to take the hop-on, hop-off tour bus to Mary Arden’s house (Shake’s mom) and it is not bad—they keep birds of prey and fly them for us, and to Anne Hathaway’s cottage (Shake’s wife, not the other one). We are near the train station and there is a cheap ticket to Mary Arden’s house—and a cool pub for lunch down the street. Great sandwiches on home baked bread.
STUFF TO DO
Not a bad place to shop—lots of stores all in one place; a cool antique arcade.
You can get to Warwick Castle on Sunday (bus probably £5). The castle has lots of shows, like jousting if you are lucky. Optional—a little amusement parky.
Possible day trips: Easy to visit to Cotswold villages—check out train/bus tours; Guide Friday office is by the American fountain; we are not far from Birmingham (Cadbury chocolate factory–really).
The UK is not a third world country!!!!!!! If you forget something, it can be bought. Drugs, medical care easily available. Remember you are a guest in the UK—act like it!