I almost can’t believe that one third of 2026 has gone already. What a month April was weather wise. I think that apart from snow, I experienced everything and that was just while being right here in the Heart of England.
Most years my main tour-guiding season starts in April and this year it really started pretty much full-on as I had 3 extended tours almost back-to-back which took up the best part of 3 weeks in the middle of the month.
However, Nigel and I did start the month by enjoying the treat of Afternoon Tea at the wonderful Coombe Abbey – all courtesy of a voucher given to me last year for my birthday by my daughters. I just had a bill of £1 to pay at the end – which made it seem even better. Seemed a bit mad though, that I had to pay with my card a like many venues they don’t accept cash anymore.
I’m often in the cathedral ruins of Coventry when I’m doing tours in the city centre, but this time, on Good Friday I went there for a special service of reflection on Good Friday. Somehow, it seemed the perfect setting, especially as it finished at the old East End altar with the charred cross and the message “Father Forgive” on the wall behind it. Whether you have any faith or none, to me that is still a really powerful message and one that the world really needs at this present time.
The rest of the Easter weekend was mostly getting ready for a busy few weeks away from home with me setting off on Easter Monday towards Derby, where the plan had been that my daughter would collect me from the station. However, local knowledge in the form of my son-in-law who is a Stoke City supporter suggested that Derby would be very busy just about the time I would be getting to the station, so I got off the stop before in Burton on Trent.
Why was I going to Derby? It was because I was going to the village of Thorpe in Dovedale to be a walk leader for HFholidays on one of their Family Walking Adventure Holidays. My daughter was coming with my 2 young granddaughters. They had never been on something like this before so there was a very excited 4 year-old and 6 year-old in the car.
Having all packed for cold and wet weather, we were a bit surprised to find that our waterproofs all stayed in our bags as we enjoyed a few days of brilliant sunshine. All the families had a great time, but I must admit I was quite tired by the time I got back home on the Friday. As were they by all accounts.
A quick turn around over the weekend before I was off once again via 3 trains and a bus to Bourton-on-the-Water in the Cotswolds.
This time not so much countryside walking, but definitely what I would describe as active sightseeing. We did have the use of transport between the various sites though, much to the relief of one of the participants who was thinking that perhaps we were expected to walk between the various gardens that we were visiting.
Yes, the first tour here was a gardens tour. One of the guests said to me “You’re a keen gardener then?” “Well, not exactly,” I replied. “I know what I’m meant to do, and I like having a nice garden. I have in the past on a couple of occasions had an allotment, but the truth is I’m not really very good at being consistent enough to be very successful. I really enjoy visiting gardens where somebody else has done the hard work and I know about gardens and the history and development of English gardens. So sort of a theoretical gardener.”
When it was time to say goodbye to those on the Garden Tour, more guests arrived on the Friday for a holiday of more mixed sightseeing around the Cotswolds. It seemed an incredibly long week, despite having a sort of ‘free’ day on the Monday. Not because the week was boring – quite the opposite but because we managed to see so much and really explore the area in detail. Some guests were very surprised by the number of steps they seemed to clock up, despite being taken from one place to another by minibus.
On the final Friday, I’d intended to get home about lunch time, but the evening before Friday, I’d had a last minute request to guide a group in the Cotswolds for a couple of hours, including finding somewhere for lunch. Turns out, that by the Cotswolds, they really meant Bourton-on-the-Water as they were on their way from Liverpool to London and they wanted a convenient lunch spot. Thankfully, the Old Manse Hotel rose to the challenge and managed to produce 21 portions of Fish, Chips and mushy peas in a very short space of time. Then they wanted an ice cream and I was asked for my favourite suggested ice cream place with unusual flavours. OK “How about this one?” I said. “My tough choice is between lemon meringue or clotted cream and blackcurrant.”
Finally got home that evening, via a bus and 3 trains. Only 6 hours later than I’d originally planned .
So, what does a tourist guide do on their day off? Go on someone else’s tour of course. I’d booked on a tour run by the Birmingham Victorian Society which was looking not at Shakespeare, but at the buildings built during the 19th and early 20th centuries when Stratford was really quite an important industrial staging post. It was great to hear from an archivist who works for the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. I hadn’t realised the breadth of the material that they hold in their archives. It’s not just all about Shakespeare.
A bit of juggling between public transport and getting my car parked in Stratford itself and I was set to watch the very last performance of Henry V at the RSC theatre in it’s current run. Of course it featured the Battle of Agincourt, and it was interesting to see how they managed to portray that on a small stage. I must admit, occasionally I wasn’t entirely sure for a few minutes if I was watching the French or the English forces as there were no weapons on stage.
Most of the last week of April was then spent getting on with the rather mundane tasks of ordinary life, including my 6-month dental check-up and my regular visit for a sports massage/osteopath appointment.
However, I also spent time practising my bassoon as I’m playing in the Coventry City of Culture Orchestra in a concert at the Warwick Arts Centre on 3rd May – more about that in next month’s newsletter.