Another lovely cooked full English breakfast to start the day - this time cooked by Hester (yesterday was Edward) - both equally delicious - the breakfasts, not Edward and Hester - fear not Sean and Diane, we are not in the habit of murdering, dismembering and then consuming our hosts - well, at least not at breakfast, and not without pretty serious provocation - you know the sort of thing, towels unwashed for 3 days in a row, laundry not pressed and folded, no mint on the pillow - really heinous transgressions, fully deserving of cannibalism. I'm sure we will not have to resort to such extreme forms of retribution these holidays. Edward and Hester (and their 3 children, of similar ages to our own) are delightful and the ideal hosts for a genuine B&B experience. We almost feel a bit embarrassed at times having them attend to our needs - it's almost like staying at a friend's place and not being allowed to lift a finger to help - ah, where would one find friends like that in the real world I wonder.
Drove to Bourton-on-the-water [I wonder if the name was given euphemistically and with that delightfully English sense of irony because Mr. Bourton liked his ale or his gin etc. - Bourton-on-the-grog doesn't have quite the same ring to it], and started off at the Cotswolds model village, a 1/9th scale model of Bourton (as those of us in the know refer to it), which was built between 1936 and 1938. Bourton is a delightfully picturesque and seemingly fairly quintessential example of a typical Cotswold village, complete with ducks and, being a Saturday, a very convivial country fair atmosphere with rubber-duck racing down the stream (blew £2 on 2 lame ducks) and a petition to halt the development of some part of the town by some multinational company. The model village even had a smaller model of the village in the model village, and in that model village there was an even smaller model village - in all (counting the real village - the one where we could purchase genuine Cotswold snow-dome key-rings) there were 5 Bourtons of ever diminishing size.
Then to the model railway display - not sure what this fascination with really small scale versions of things is about. Regardless of the answer to this question, Julianne's dad would have loved this one - remarkably intricate and detailed dioramas, and buttons to push to interact with the display - even the kids seemed to enjoy it - when we gave them a chance.
Light lunch in a pleasant tea-room, and a slow stroll through the length of the village, which took all of about 10 minutes at a very slow amble. As Patrick pointed out, we should have visited the model village after we had walked through the real village, so that we could see where we had been.
Drove back in to Oxford to take the hop-on, hop-off bus tour of Oxford. Weather almost perfect (clear blue skies, slight nip in the air, but lovely in the sun). Listened to a fairly reasonable potted history of Oxford and its university colleges - similar to the one in France, but seemed a little bit more informative - a bit heavy on the musical interludes though - more commentary would have been preferred, and which we got after hopping off, climbing an old tower to get a wonderful panoramic view of the city and its spires, and then hopping back onto another bus which had a real, live lady (turns out she was 74 - don't ask me how I found out - it's too long and boring - even more than what I am writing about already) providing a continuous commentary. My advice, if you can afford to wait a bit, go for a bus with live commentary - as long as it is in a language you can fully understand - clearly this would not work as well (for us at least) in France or Germany, or indeed in any non-English speaking country.
Still finding it hard to grasp the concept of one thousand or more years of history, often writ in stone, whether it be buildings or monuments or the like, or writ in......writing, or writ in something else, a description of which escapes me currently. Even the relatively small, yet large by Australian standards, stately country manor houses tucked away on narrow back roads or nestled in one of the many little villages dotted along the way are breathtakingly beautiful - the rich, honey-golden colours of the Cotswold stone contrasting with the darker (yet equally engaging in their own right) colours from further north.
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