South East England 2025 - Pics & Wheels

We left Perth early evening on the direct QF 9 to London which was nice and smooth. It was long too but we got to watch quite a few movies. We got to Heathrow about 30 min early (after slowing down, otherwise it would have been one hour!). We landed at 4:30AM, then had to wait to get the rental car as Europcar only opened at 6AM. But this meant that we had to focus on staying awake for the day ahead of us, which definitely helped with jet lag.

Nutfield Priory Hotel in Surrey is a nice place to stay or just to have tea and admire the old, majestic rooms and furniture. I particularly liked the gum boot display at the entrance, possibly ready to be used by their potential room guests.

At Nuttfield Priory farm shop they sell lots of nice things including stuff from Diddly Squat Farm.

Sheffield Park had beautiful autumn colours on and it was very relaxing to walk through even in the rain.

Windsor Castle was spectacular at some point in its life. When we visted, there were quite a few homeless people sleeping around it, and up to the gates. We thought of Windsor as a British icon, but despite that there weren’t that many English restaurants around, and not even the traditional Red-phone-booth and Paddington-bear containing souvenir shops. It was very noisy as well, with planes that were going to land at Heathrow flying quite low above it pretty much every couple of minutes. Inside, there were interesting artefacts but not only outdated, also old and poorly maintained. Queen Mary’s doll house was the most interesting thing and we also got to see Queen Elizabeth II’s tomb in the chapel (but weren’t allowed to take any photos). I hope they polished the silver and dusted the furniture for their American guests a couple of weeks later.

We stopped in Great Missenden to visit Roald Dahl’s museum but it was closed, so we had a baguette and a cup of tea at Kissa cafe (that had just closed but reopened for us) and then got going again.

In Oxford we stayed at Newton House, just on the outskirts of the energy efficiency zone, which was quite handy as it had parking in a city where to the centre is limited to bikes and public transport vehicles.

We walked past lots of beautiful old buildings, across Folly Bridge and past the Head of the River pub every day during our stay.

We noticed quite a few people living in their boats on the river in conditions that did not seem very flash. The River is Thames, the same one that eventually reaches London.

We visited Weston Library where they had an interesting exhibition about treasures, their meanings and how they are different across cultures.

The Radcliffe Camera, part of the Bodleian Library, is the focal point of the University of Oxford, but it is not open to the public, it can only be seen from the outside.

The Sheldonian Theatre is where the graduation ceremonies are held and it can be visited outside these times.

Most colleges can only be seen from the outside and are not open to tourists.

The conference lectures were in the Examination schools with their grandiose, sombrely decorated rooms.

Luckily we were able to visit the Bodleian library which is one of the oldest in Europe. It dates back to 1488, when it started with about 30 books, and this increased to about 200 volumes a few years later, donated by Duke Humfrey. The books were initially stored horizontal on desks and were chained down to prevent them being stolen. Many of them were Catholic books, so they were destroyed during the Reformation. The concept of book shelves was only introduced in the late 1600s and the books were initially stored with the fore-edge facing the room to accommodate the chains (and a number that linked each tome to a catalogue).

The library was damaged by fire a couple of times and even today, when entering Duke Humfrey’s Library, an oath still has to be taken not to bring anything that could kindle a fire.

We also visited the Divinity School, where students used to debate their exams in front of an audience. It was what the name suggests since religion was the main subject studied back in those days;

the Convocation House is where the English government retreated during the Great Plague in 1665; and the Chancellor’s Court is where university members and students used to be tried allegedly to avoid lenience by civil courts but the punishments were often much milder. This is where Oscar Wilde was tried for debt and found guilty.

The tour of Christ Church College & Cathedral was quite informative. We learned about the colleges and university structure. Christ Church College is one of the oldest colleges, set up during the reign of Henry VIII by his Catholic Cardinal Woley, and was initially named Cardinal College. It was taken over by the king once the cardinal got disgraced. Tom’s Square was cleared to be the biggest square, with Great Tom Bell housed in Tom Tower above Tom Gate.

They only accepted their first female student in the 1980s. We learned that Cambridge University was setup in the 1200s, when a group of Oxford academics left due to disagreement and ongoing conflict with the town people. Teaching was happening in Oxford in 1096 but was limited and mainly on religious topics. This changed and the number of students increased in 1200s when Henry II banned English students from studying in France after his quarrel with Thomas Beckett. We also found out some trivia – like the fact that Oxford time is 5 min past GMT because academics at the time did not agree with the government when they introduced time zones / median times in the 19th century. Christ Church College remains a royal property and stronghold and there is a chair inside the chapel where King Charles I sat and no other royal has sat there since due to superstition about losing their head (literally).

Many of the Harry Potter movies were filmed around Christ Church College and if you’re a fan there are special tours following the location of each movie.

Einstein delivered lectures here in 1931 in German and nobody understood a thing as they hadn’t thought that English might not be his language! Queen Elizabeth I used to come here and debate with academics even though she would have never been accepted as a student. There is a shelf housing a sculpture of the current king or queen and which is empty at the moment. They expect / hope that King Charles III will visit them soon and unveil his.

The Cathedral is quite interesting to visit. Its ceiling originally had colour paintings, but this changed during / after Reformation. The Thomas Beckett window depicts his murder by the French knights, but the window was likely moved around and Beckett’s head was changed to normal glass (painted brown in 1980s) during Reformation, at the same time when many of the Catholic statues were decapited. St Frideswide, the patron saint of Oxford, has a shrine and an window in which one of the scenes includes a toilet seat since the stained glass was done by a young painter the same year that Thomas Crapper invented the toilet, so it must have been “the talk of the town”.

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll, was a professor of mathematics at Oxford and his Alice in Wonderland stories came to life while he was looking after Dean Henry Liddell’s daughter, Alice. There is a real door in the courtyard of Christ Church College that inspired the one that Alice went through in her magical journey.

The Mini factory is in Oxford and they organise some very interesting tours – no photos allowed inside the factory, only in the museum.

We visited New College (new in 1379 when it opened…). We walked around the grounds, saw the tree that features in Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire which was filmed here. The gardens are perfect to relax and immerse in nature, and there is an Aztec pyramid-like mound in the middle (for which there are two possible explanations – since it was constructed in the early 1640s, around the time of the English Civil War, some think it was intended as a symbolic viewpoint for the Royalist cause; another possible symbolism is that it might have been intended as a “Mount Parnassus”, a reference to the home of the Muses in Greek mythology).

The Chapel of Harris Manchester College is small but interesting, featuring a lot of wood on the ceilings and walls as well, and has an interestingly painted organ. This is the only section of Harris Manchester College that is open to visitors.

We visited the Science Museum to see Einstein’s black board but also other interesting pieces around the history of science, including how many protests there were when the typhoid vaccine was introduced. The anti-vaccination League is not something new either.

As we left Oxford, we drove past Sir James Murray’s Post Box at 78 Banbury Rd, Oxford. It was installed by the Royal Mail outside his house in 1885 to cope with the vast amount of correspondence he was sending as he compiled the Oxford English Dictionary.

We spent two days around the Cotswolds – not enough, we’d definitely have to come back.

We started with Bourton-on-the-Water. The village is really pretty – it straddles the river Windrush, has low stone bridges and traditional stone houses with colourful little shops.

We then drove through Slaughter Upper and then Lower which were even smaller and very pretty; Stow-on-the-world is also nice, and Moreton-in-Marsh was our next stop for a short sightseeing walk.

Next we went to Bourton-on-the-hill, Chipping Campden with its stone cottages and an old church, St James Church, where an old lady and her dog had volunteered to be there while tourists were visiting. We had an icecream here, visited some shops, then continued our journey.

We drove through Snowshill, Broadway, Stanton, Stanway and we stopped in Winchcombe where we went to see Hailes Abbey, which was destroyed when Henry VIII ordered all Catholic monasteries to be disbanded; there is a Church next to it which survived, as it was a parish church.

There are lots of Neolithic sites around this part of England. We went to see Bellas Knap Long Barrow, a Neolithic burial site. The walk to get there is quite scenic as well, offering beautiful views towards the surrounding countryside.

We went to Jeremy Clarkson’s farm shop, Diddly Squat Farm, and bought some juices and biltong after about a half an hour wait to get in. We drove through Chipping Norton and intended to have dinner at his Farmer’s Dog pub but changed our mind when we saw how busy the carpark was.

Burford is a historic market town that is right on the main road between Oxford and Cheltenham (or the West Country, as that part of England used to be called). We went for a stroll along Sheep Street, to see some beautiful cottages and gardens.

We left the Costwolds with the promise to ourselves to come back another time and wander around these villages that seem lost in time. There is a short video with bits of our drive here.

Next destination was Cheltenham, where King George III allegedly used to come to drink its medicinal waters. It is quite a big town with (of course) Georgian-style buildings. We just drove through, didn’t stop.

Painswick was our next stop – a former wool town with nice rococo gardens that we strolled through.

Cirencester is a very nice and vibrant place but we didn’t spend a lot of time here. We visited Corinium museum, which is about the local history but mainly the Roman times, and has on display lots of mosaics that they found in the area.

Our final destination for the day was Bath, where we went to the Thermae Baths which offer amazing views from the top pool towards the University on the hill and west towards the city.

The view back towards the city from a view point near the golf course is quite spectacular as well.

Heading back towards Surrey we drove past Stonehenge but decided to skip the crowds this time around.

Reigate is a small and not terribly famous place. There used to be a castle here where the Barons met before asking King John to sign the Magna Carta back in the 1200s – the cave where they allegedly met is rarely opened to the public. The park has a pyramid in the middle where we admired some beautiful sunset colours.

We drove to Dover to see the white cliffs. We chose a beautiful sunny day when we were able to see all the way to Calais. We enjoyed watching the various size ships going in and out of harbour. The walk to the lighthouse and back is quite nice, with beautiful views towards the English Channel. There is a cafe serving proper English tea near the lighthouse – a nice stop to power up for our return journey.

The Fan Bay shelter can also be visited during this walk and it also offers excellent views of Dover Castle.

In Canterbury we walked around the grounds of the Cathedral and the school next to it for a bit, then went inside. It is much bigger than we thought, with lots of side chapels. Inside it there is another sculpture by Antony Gormley (of the Lake Ballard fame), called Transport, and is made of nails from the roof of the cathedral.

Whitstable is a beautiful fishing town where we got treated to oysters and delicious fish & chips. We walked along the shore, past fishermen huts accommodation that looked pretty nice. The flocks of starlings, bare oyster beds in the low tide, and distant windmills in hues of orange from the sunset light made it a magical experience.

Chartwell was Churchill’s residence that he bought in the early 1930s. He couldn’t stay here during WWII and wanted to sell it once he lost the elections in 1945, but a group of friends bought it and donated it to the National Trust due to what they (rightfully) thought was its immense heritage value. It has beautiful gardens, Churchill’s paintings, stories and photos of how he built an extension laying bricks himself, making it easier to see the man behind the politician. Of course it also has a lot of documents and artifacts, most of them related to WW II. The last room is very interesting as it is basically a display of his manuscripts – many against the Nazis and warnings about fascism and, later on, the Iron Curtain and his famous speech. His wife’s bedroom would have been a good viewpoint to see the Luftwaffe flying to bomb London if they were there during the war. There are a few interesting items on display including some crystal bowls that he got from Stalin and his Nobel Price for Literature award. Luckily this place was not bombed during WW II as the Nazis had marked it as a future residence for one of their generals.

Hever Castle was initially the home of Anne Boleyn’s parents. Henry VIII came here to court her (while her sister was still his mistress!) and after she was decapitated, he donated this place to his 4th wife, Anne of Cleves.

In the late 1800s Hever Castle was bought by a rich American guy, William Waldorf Astor, who restored and further developed it. The gardens are beautiful with some interesting animal, bird and chess pieces-shaped hedges.

Bletchingley is a small place, home to a church built around 1000 AD / pre-Normand times.

Battle Abbey was built at the site of the Battle of Hastings after the Normand victory. As with all other English historical places, there is a very thorough and fair description of the battle and preamble from both points of view. The place where King Harold was killed is marked by a plaque.

We stayed a few days at the Royal Southern Yacht Club in Hamble-le-Rice, not far from Southampton. It is a picturesque, quiet village and the yacht club is located in a sheltered area. The tidal range is quite a few meters, and the locals with smaller boats can take advantage of the low tide to clean them.

The Hamble to Warshash ferry has a long history and it’s definitely easy to spot with its pink colour.

Calshot Castle is an artillery fort that was built during Henry VIII on Calshot Spit, to protect the waters of Southampton from a potential French invasion. The Battle of Solent happened here as well.

The day when we went was a stormy one – but not enough to deter the windsurfers or sailors! The beaches in this part of the world are not sandy at all, and the idea of beach shack is very similar to the ones in Victoria.

Eling Tide Mill has a toll bridge on top, that we crossed a couple of times to get a better glimpse at the mill, although there’s very little to see.

We caught the ferry from Southampton to East Cowes on the Isle of Wight. We got some very nice and interesting views as we went across the Solent. The Southampton International Boat Show was being setup right next to the ferry departure jetty. The Royal Pier Indian restaurant right next to the ferry departure point is an ornate eye-catching building. We saw Calshot Castle from the other side, and also the beach shacks that we knew from the day before but quite far in the distance.

We witnessed a rain cloud engulfing the Isle of Wight during our crossing, but by the time we arrived the sun was shining again.

We skipped the wallaby farm.

The first visit on the island was to Osborne House, the summer residence of Queen Victoria, Prince Albert and their kids. It is quite beautiful but kitschy at the same time, especially the dining room which is of Indian inspiration due to the Queen’s fascination with India in her later life.

We drove past the white cliffs off Compton Beach

on to the Needles where it was very, very windy.

We had a very nice and tasty lunch with beautiful views at The Hut nearby.

The ride back by ferry was very nice in the sunset light.

There is a short video here.

In Portsmouth we visited its historic dockyards – we spent pretty much a whole day here but didn’t manage to see everything. The Mary Rose was a ship built during Henry VIII that got sunk during the Battle of the Solent and was only been brought back to surface in the 80s. The museum had glass walled galleries with artefacts and stories beautifully done around it.

We saw Victory as well – Admiral Nelson’s ship where he died during the Battle of Trafalgar, and which was targeted by the Nazis during WW II in order to destroy the British spirit.

We also saw HMS M33 – one of two vessels of WWI that survived Gallipoli!

We visited the National Museum of the Royal Navy as well, where they have a huge display of figureheads from various famous ships in their Figurehead Gallery

and a few other very interesting boats.

Back at Heathrow we stayed at a hotel just a few miles from the airport but it was still a very long and slow transfer by bus to terminal 3 due to terrible traffic.

We boarded QF 10 on time, left just before a storm was coming in, and got to watch a few planes landing before we took off.