Winchester Cathedral

Tuesday 04 March 2014 – back to London.

The final post in the ‘road trip’ series.

I awoke a bit later on this morning and it seems I missed what was probably a decent sunrise – not forecasted of course, damnit! I hit breakfast as soon as it opened again and was packed and checked out by 9:00.

With nice clear skies overhead I was wondering about maybe taking another day somewhere else and decided to head back towards London via some back roads in the New Forest. I had seen things about the area and had been intrigued about it so thought it was time to check it out.

Leaving at 9:00 meant I missed the worst of the rush hour ferry trip across from Studland to Poole across the entrance to Poole Harbour. It was a nice wee trip.

I managed to get through Poole and Bournemouth relatively unscathed by traffic jams and was soon on the road heading up to Lyndhurst the central town in the New Forest.

Surprisingly there was very little ‘forest’, between Bournemouth and Lyndhurst, lots of wilderness areas and something I would like to explore, but today was not going to be the day. I had a coffee in Lyndhurst and the cloud started to roll in, which pretty much cemented my decision to carry on back to London. Around Lyndhurst there was some very nice forest areas and I think I will do some research into the area and then come down for a couple of days and do some walking and photography. It does look interesting.

On the way down on Saturday I decided I would stop at Winchester on the way back home and check out the famous cathedral there.

With a history over a thousand years old the great Cathedral that I visited was largely completed in the late sixteenth century. It is a massive building and quite beautiful inside.

There is a lot of work going on inside and out so a large number of artefacts are missing for renovation work which was a shame. I did get to see some pages of the great twelfth century Winchester Bible (no photos allowed), which is one of the key relics in the cathedral.

There were some ‘modern’ things to see, and I really liked this piece.

I guess my favourite part were these wall paintings from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, obviously much more impressive up close and personal though.

I also liked the fact that the place had been tagged a few hundred years ago, with numerous names and dates carved into the old pillars.

The cathedral was well worth the stop, and if I had not been committed on getting back to London in time to return the car I would have stayed for a walk around the town as well.

And that was it for my break, I had a really good time. Enjoyed getting out for some good walks and pleased that I was actuall taking some photos I liked again. Plus I had something to write about for a change!