Day 34 : Lifestyles Of The Rich and Famous (28/7/09)

Another English summer day - grey and overcast, but at least without all of yesterdays rain. We hopped in the car and drove through the scenic Cotswolds to Blenheim Palace, birthplace of Sir Winson Churchill and home to the Duke of Malborough and his family since the 16th century. We had a guided tour of the magnificent interior, then walked through another interactive display of the history and past inhabitants of the Palace, and then walked through the gardens. An episode of "The Hairy Bikers Cookbook" (sceens on SBS in Oz) was being filmed while we were there, so we will wait and see if we made it onto TV. After a quick Inn lunch we drove through a few Cotswold villages, stopping to walk through picturesque Bourton-On-Water, Upper & Lower Slaughter, and Stow-On-Wold. The towns were as quaint as their names suggest.We explored some of the local streets & shops, joining the locals who were out enjoying the rare bit of sunshine.
No stay near Stratford-On_Avon would be complete without seeing a production by the Royal Shakespeare Company there. We had managed to get Gallery seats to "As You Like It", and sacrificing dinner we made do with a Devonshire Tea at Lower Slaughter before driving back to Stratford. The show was excellent - well worth the trip in. After the short drive back to Wellesbourne we had a relatively early night ready for the final leg tomorrow.