This blog covers the last two days, because I didn’t take my
laptop with me to London. Despite feeling as though I was missing an arm, I
coped. I said goodbye to Mum and Marnie early in the morning and caught a
three-hour train to London from Weymouth and the Jurrasic Coast (also, the
other day we drove past Chesil Beach and I nerded out because Ian McEwan,
though I still haven’t actually read that book). I read The Guernsey Literary
and Potato Peel Pie Society most of the way there and tried not to blub too
much in front of a carriage full of strangers. Excellent book. I’m so glad I
had time to reread before we hit Guernsey! London was warm, sunny, and busy. I
almost felt culture-shocked after spending so much time in quiet little
villages and towns, though the sense of familiarity and nostalgia was
intoxicating. I love this city. Even the crowded Tube felt wonderful. After
locating my hostel, I walked up the Thames (totally spotted a monument to the
SOE, and excited my little history/writing nerd heart) and took the Tube to the
British Museum. I’ve never been before, and I’ve
heard it’s London’s most visited attraction. Had a quick lunch and hot
chocolate, and had a quick look inside the beautiful, absolutely enormous, FREE
museum. I only saw a fraction of it (the medieval Europe rooms mostly), but it
gives a really striking impression, even just walking into the big foyer bit at
the start.
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| London |
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| SOE monument |
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| British Museum |
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| British Museum |
Afterwards I went to
Green Park,
which had deck chairs spread all over the grass beneath the brilliant sunshine.
I bought an icypole and finished my Guernsey novel, and managed not to catnap.
Then I made my way to the fame
d Charing Cross Rd,
one of my favourite streets in London due to the large amount of bookshops
located there, and went shopping. The beautiful Foyle’s bookshop, Blackwell’s,
all the little second hand places…I could have spent all day there, but I’m
glad I chose not to in this case. I exercised great self-restraint over all.
(By the way, I also saw
Will Poulter walking down the street. The same Will Poulter I saw two
years ago at the Colosseum).
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| Green Park |
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| Green Park |
I met up with Matt in Leicester
Square and we went to dinner with his folks, who are also on holiday in the UK.
It was great to catch up – good food and company all around. I went back to my
hostel afterwards and two of the girls in my dorm were from Weymouth! I had a
pretty patchy night’s sleep, but it wasn’t a bad hostel, just noisy. Woke up
nice and early and got to Waterloo station in plenty of time for my train!
The train only took an hour to get
to Winchester, and I met Mum and Marnie outside the Cathedral. I could not get
over the immense size of it. We saw the Winchester Bible, the Holy Hole, the monument to the diver who saved the cathedral, and an effigy of Stephen Gardiner, whose name I recognised because of
research for my current manuscript. We also saw (and its not the first examples
we’ve seen on this trip), a number of reliquaries and relics. They seem to go
in for that a lot here. But the reason I was there primarily, was to see the
final resting place of Jane Austen. I didn’t realise how emotional I would
actually feel, but I felt a bit teary seeing the little exhibition and her
gravestone. It was beautiful. There was also a market in Winchester that we
walked through on the way to the car. Mum and Marnie bought more things, but so
far we’ve managed to fit everything in…
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| Winchester Cathedral |
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| Winchester Cathedral |
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| Winchester Cathedral |
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| Holy Hole at Winchester Cathedral |
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| Winchester Cathedral |
Then we drove to Chawton!! The village where
Jane Austen spent her final years is presided over by the very grand Chawton
House, but it was in a small cottage where the woman herself lived with her
sister and her mother, and where she wrote some of her most famous works. That
cottage is now the Jane Austen’s House Museum, and it is absolutely essential for fans of her work. You
can see jewellery, needlework, and household furnishings that belonged to Jane
and her family, including her writing desk and a patchwork quilt she made. The
house and garden has been so lovingly preserved and comes with a killer gift
shop, which I could have spend hundreds of pounds in (but didn’t). We had lunch
in Cassandra’s Cup, the tea-shop named after Jane’s beloved sister, then walked
up to Chawton House itself, which was owned by Jane’s brother, Edward Austen
Knight. The grounds of Chawton are something to behold on their own, but we
took a guided tour through the house that was terribly interesting as well. The
different centuries have been preserved well throughout the house, and lovingly
restored by a woman called Sandy Lerner, who has made the house into a library that celebrates
women writers. You can make an appointment in the reading room (you don’t need
to be a student or scholar, it’s open to the public), and arrange to view any
material from the collection that you’re interested in. Obviously I will be
going back there. Interestingly, Marnie and I have heard Sandy Lerner speak
back home, at the Jane Austen Society of Melbourne meetings, and it was
wonderful to actually see the house and library that she was describing. Also
at JASM, we have met Caroline Knight and her parents, who were the last Knight’s
to live at Chawton. Her father, Jeremy, runs the guided tours through the
house, but sadly he wasn’t available today. It would have been amazing to
experience the tour through the eyes of someone who grew up there, and is an
actual relative of Jane’s, but there is always next time! And our guide was
lovely anyway. I really would highly recommend Chawton to any Jane Austen
enthusiast.
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