Wolvercote

It's a sunny Monday morning here in Oxford and we are feeling like we need a rest from our weekend forays into the English countryside!

Yesterday we walked the Oxford Canal footpath up to the outlying northern suburb of Wolvercote from our apartment in southeast Oxford. Philip calculated that we covered about eight miles... and our feet could testify to that! But the walk was easy and the sights interesting, so we did not suffer-- it is only this morning that our weary feet are begging us for a rest.

We began at the Hythe Street Bridge in Oxford and enjoyed seeing all the barges moored to the side-- each painted uniquely and often full of pots of flowers and herbs. Some appeared to be lived in full-time, some looked to be used as weekend getaways, and others are clearly used only as party venues...


We enjoyed greeting the residents along the way, many who were using the beautiful Sunday afternoon to spruce up their boats-- painting, scrubbing, working on their engines. One barge of Sunday boaters followed us up the canal several miles, never going more than 3-4 miles per hour. We parted ways at the Wovercote lock, after watching them navigate through it. We had never seen a self-service single boat lock before, and it was fun watching them jump out and move the levers that caused the water levels to change.


We left the canal path at the Wolvercote Lock, walked past the Port Meadow into the village itself. The two notable places in Wolvercote are the ruins of the 12th century Godstow Nunnery and the Trout Inn-- a pub on the banks of the Thames.



The Trout Inn is famous in this area for having peacocks which roam the grounds and for being the place where scenes from the Inspector Morse BBC TV show were filmed. However, it was recently refurbished and locals complained that they ruined it by making it too upscale to enjoy any longer. We did not stop, but did take a photo of it from the bridge.



When we returned to the apartment (by bus, I might add), we watched the final championship game of the European Cup soccer -- with Spain beating out Germany. Philip had been watching all the matches leading up to it, so he had learned which players were the ones to watch. It was also particularly interesting to us, since they were playing in Vienna. A fine weekend, indeed.
--Deb