ange

My dad and I will be in Uk arriving June 12 and have a car to travel throughout england and wales and possible scotland. <BR>Any ideas on which towns/attractions we must NOT miss and what there is to see in each in rest of england, wales and scotland border? We will have 3 days in London before we retunr in July so we want to hit other towns if we can in june. <BR>PLease help us figure out what to do. <BR>Also anyone know of good B&B;s in those towns? We want to be travelers NOT tourists but what to get an idea of culture--not that musch into shopping! <BR>thanks so much!!!

Ben Haines

Fodors <BR> <BR>The stabdard tourist track is: <BR>Canterbury, Stonehenge, Bath, Oxford, the Cotswolds (Start at Moreton in Marsh), Warwick, Stratford upon Avon, the castles of North Wales, the Lake District (start at Oxenholme), Edinburgh, Stirling, Durham, York, Stamford, and Cambridge. But it really bon't matter if you fdon't see any of these. There are no "must sees", and if you never see Big Ben who cares ? <BR> <BR>So let's start again, with an eye to current and historic culture. Faversham in Kent, Lewes, Brighton, Bristol, Shrewsbury, Aberystwyth, Liverpool, Manchester, Glasgow, Berwick, Ripon, Ely, Norwich. Each has a tourist information office, and you can look each up if you use http://www.yahoo.co.uk, click on "UK only", and enter "Faversham travel", "Brighton travel", and so on. Either from there, or from "Faversham bed and breakfast" etc, you'll find lists of b and b houses. But the only source for complete lists of these is by post from the town or city's tourist information office. <BR> <BR>But there's a third approach. What do you know, what do you like, what do you want to know more about ? Dress, computers, girls, old cars, postage stamps, Mozart, heavy metal .... If you'll tell us that, I'll see whether I have anything to say about where you'll find it, or them. <BR> <BR>Welcome to Britain <BR> <BR>Ben Haines, London <BR>

frank

Scotland: <BR>http://www.scotland-inverness.co.uk/scotland.htm <BR>links to everything

Ben Haines

Fodors <BR> <BR>You write "Our main interests in visiting will be cultural events, festivals, historic sites and ancient culture type villiages as well as local cuisine and not so much museums, but more off the beaten track not so touristy spots that offer cultural insights". <BR> <BR>My problem is that I don't know when and where your festivals will be, nor even what kind of festival you like, pop or classical. Clearly, you'd establish a festival or two, and design a tour around that. My second list, headed "so let's start again" covers historic sites well while avoiding tourist traps. We have no ancient culture type villages, since Roman villages have no living successors, but England has plenty of villages recorded in Domesday Book as existing in the year 1080. Many of these now have a medieval church, and houses from the seventeenth century onwards. These lie around Kent, Lewes, Bristol, Shrewsbury, Ripon, Ely, and Norwich. You can e-mail the tourist information office of at any of these towns or cities to ask them for names of a handful of old and good-looking villages that you can visit easily by bus. <BR> <BR>Local cooking, meaning English cooking, is chiefly in pubs, and I'm attaching to this message a note I keep on disc about pub meals in London. In fact the most popular dish in rstaurants in England is now curry, and any city, most towns, and some villages, offer Indian, Chinese, Italian, Thai, Greek and other restaurants. <BR>All the towns in my list "let's start again" will give you cultural insights into the old culture. I chose the cities, Liverpool, Manchester and Glasgow to give you insights into how we live now, rich in races, cultures, and styles. <BR> <BR>Can you please tell me what kind of festivals you have in mind, remind me of your dates, and say whether you already have some festivals lined up ? Then I'll think further. <BR> <BR>Ben Haines <BR> <BR> <BR> <BR> <BR>

Sheila

And here is some stuff,pretty much at random, on the Scottish Borders. <BR> <BR>Options in the Borders:- couple of big houses and some scenery. Say Traquair Castle- which has its own brewery and some excellent history. Followed by Mellarstain House and maybe Melrose Abbey where Robert the Bruce's heart is buried. Other variations on this theme include Floors Castle, Abbotsford (home of Sir Walter Scott) Dryburgh Abbey; Hermitage Castle; Neidpath Castle- or there are lots more. <BR>lovely rolling hills <BR> <BR> Stay on the coast road and go out to St Abb’s Head, Take in Eyemouth and stop when you get to Berwick on Tweed. There’s a big sign on the Border that says “Here be Dragons” and you don’t want to go there!, Come back up to Duns- Manderston is worth a visit on the way. Go south west to Mellerstain, Floors Castle and Kelso. Come west to Dryburgh Abbey, then come down to Jedburgh <BR> <BR>Next day, do Hawick and Selkirk, Then Galashiels, , and Peebles and Neidpath Castle, and stay in Edinburgh again. <BR>The Borders are where our traditional mills are- companies like Pringle - and every town has a bunch of mill shops. Some of them may even be selling local produce. Certainly if you are going to buy wool buy it here. <BR>If you do do it in reverse order, you can logically dine at Clarissa’s at Lenoxlove on the way home. <BR>

Danna

Ange <BR>Don't pass by Galloway area of Scotland, the SW coastal area. It' beautiful, the people are great, gardens, pubs, castles etc. We loved it! We like the Gordon's Guesthouse in Kirkcudbright and the Masonic Arms pub there. It's an artist's community as well as being a medieval government center. Have a Great Time! <BR>

Ben Haines

She replied, and I wrote; <BR> <BR>The site http://www.travelengland.org.uk/home_fr.htm has a strange collection of local festivals and events in Enland. If you leave the top three boxes, for name, city and venue blank, then insetrt first 17 to 20 June abnd then 20 to 24 June you'll get a fine assortment. They tend to the retrospective, to celebrations of our old culture. With your time so short, I suggest you select among the Craft Market at Ludlow 17 to 20 June, the Cheshire County Show 19 to 20 June, and the two Shropshire events 23 to 24 June, at Bishops Castle and for medieval life at Ironbridge. These are in beautiful places, and are events where ordinary English are likely to go in family parties, and to be happy to chat with stragers. The locations are good fo bus rides to pleasant old villages, picked as I said last message by the tourist board. <BR> <BR>Which means that with your limited time it will be good to go to one or two multicultural, vigorious, cities, such as Manchester, Liverpool or Glasgow. It is in these, too, that you'll find your classical music. You'll find it also in London if at the airport you buy a weekly events magazine, "Time Out" or "What's On". You might look with special care at any lunchtime or evening music in any church in the City of London or St James Piccadilly (but not St Martin in the Fields), for a great place to rest you feet, soak up the feel of a good, moderate, Anglican, building, and even eat your sandwiches. June is a time for visiting American and other choirs: they are good. I expect you know Evensong: it is well sung in even the modern cathedrals of Liverpool and Manchester, and in several great town churches: you might look for it in Shrewsbury or Ludlow, or in Chester Cathedral. <BR> <BR>Then with three days in London, that will fill your time. I fear you can't pack in Wales, unless perhaos as a day excursion to one of the castles from Chester by train. <BR> <BR>I think I forgot to attach my note on pub meals. Sorry: I do so now. <BR> <BR>Over to you. If you'll do the reading, with a map of Britain or of England in front of you, you can design something for June on the lines of Glasgow (you can go there on a sleeper on the night train), Manchester or Liverpool, Cheshire, Chester, north Wales, and Shropshire. Then if you'd like to send me your draft tour plan I'll gladly comment. <BR> <BR>Ben Haines <BR> <BR>

gluck

Ben, you have confirmed my impression that if one threw a dart at a map of Great Britain, one would thereby find something interesting to do and something beautiful to see.... <BR> <BR>Love your part of the world!