Day 1: Oxford
Ever since we moved to the UK, we’ve been using my birthday weekend in September as a getaway weekend. Not exactly sure why it started, but I love it. The first year was Tenby. Last year we visited Cambridge. This year, I chose Oxford.
As with any time that I am given a choice for where to eat in a city, we started the trip off with tacos in Gloucester. We packed up and left just a couple hours after school on the Friday and Gloucester is about halfway between Hay and Oxford. We also happened to know that there was an incredible taco place at the Food Docks in Gloucester. So we hit Elote Tacos again and it was not a mistake.
We ordered 4 taco plates for the table and each tried the ones we wanted. We all ended up having different favorites! I adore tacos and as we have no Mexican restaurants in or around Hay, I’m always looking for one when we visit other places.
We stayed at an AirBnB a little outside of Oxford, so we got up early Saturday, drove to a bus stop and rode the bus into the city center. First stop off the bus Mark noticed this Books sign. So we started there of course.
And then the girls and I visited the Alice in Wonderland shop next door.
We took a little walk around the grounds of Christ Church Cathedral. The colors were just starting to change in a few spots, especially this gorgeous ivy.
I’ve been to Oxford about 20 years ago. It is a lovely place with a unique feel. It was interesting to see what things sparked a memory for me. I also semi-recently read Pullman’s His Dark Materials series which begins in Oxford and parts of those literary scenes kept coming to mind.
We did an epic walk around the city, seeing as many sights as we could. I had really hoped to get a tour of the Bodleian Old Library, but tickets book up much farther in advance than I had tried, so we’ll go another time for that. I also wondered if the girls would want to do a Harry Potter tour of sights, but no. They were happy to just traipse along to the random spots I had selected.
We got to a lot of the spots before they were too overrun with tourists, and the weather was fantastic for us.
Mark found a great shop of everyday objects designed well. And I had bookmarked several bookshops to hit.
Blackwells was certainly the largest and just went on for ages up and down and back in these buildings. A really crazy and unique use of space in old buildings.
The Norrington Room was a gasp-worthy turn of corners for me. I had already been up the many flights and checked out the rare books area, the children’s section and the classics. So going down the stairs and around a corner to this view, was something else.
I was in search of one specific title, and I ended up needing help finding it in such a sprawling space.
I still had several small bookshops I wanted to visit, but the rest of the family was quite content in Blackwells. So I left Mark in the rare books section and the girls happily reading in the children’s department and I headed out in Oxford on my own for a couple hours.
I had thought they would get hungry and come find me first, but no. My family knows how to live in bookshops. I stopped in three more bookshops and acquired several secondhand or discounted books, then I went back to pick up the crew and find some lunch because I was hungry.
We went to the indoor market and all found something we wanted. Genevieve was most excited about the hot dogs.
We wandered more and found some funky shops to peek in. Joanna attempted to browse in an epic thrift shop I had read about, but it was so crammed with stuff only a couple people could fit in at a time. She gave a good effort, but came out overwhelmed and empty-handed.
When we needed some energy and a seat for a bit, we went to a doughnut place which I was super excited to find had several gluten free options as well. I tried the red velvet one which was good, but super dense and more like a brownie.
I had researched and made a list of shops as well as places to see, but it was really fun the little things we just stumbled upon like this Story Museum intricately decorated for little mice.
There were some adorable, very eager little girls trying to see every inch as well, so it was charming to listen to their oohs and ahs as we all looked around them.
A colorful mural on a side street.
A few final stops on our list to see included this bridge Mark had read about. And then we had to walk super fast to find the entrance to Christ Church Cathedral in time for their Evensong.
It was super packed and we had to split up to find any seats. But it was lovely and I think we all stayed awake enough!
There was a bit of a queue for the toilets afterwards, but we enjoyed waiting in this courtyard with a beautiful olive tree and ornate baptismal. I recently made a linocut of an olive tree based on a psalm so this one was especially fun to see in person. I also love spotting funky little details in the building like this angel.
We ended the evening with dinner at Rosa’s Thai which hit the spot for all of us.
I wanted to be adventurous and try something new, but you just can’t beat Pad Thai and it was really great.
Back to our AirBnB for a cosy night and rest before an epic second day in Oxfordshire.
And for those curious, here are the books I found in Oxford. All but 2 secondhand!
Part 2 coming soon.