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Lovely, and popular, beach on Dorset's Jurassic Coast. Â National Trust car park.
HMS M.33 was built as a Royal Navy monitor in 1915 and is one of just three surviving Royal Navy ships from the First World War. She served at Gallipoli and Salonika, and in 1919 was sent to northern Russia to support the anti-Bolshevik forces. In the 1920s, she was renamed 'Minerva' and given a mine-laying role and during the Second World War was a fuelling hulk renamed 'Hulk C23'. She has been restored and as of 2017 was moored next to HMS Victory in Portsmouth's Historic Dockyard as a visitor attraction.
HM Naval Base
Portsmouth
HMS Warrior was world’s first armour-plated, iron-hulled warship, a 40-gun steam-powered frigate, albeit with sails too, launched in London in 1860. She rendered every other naval ship obsolete at the time, but was herself out of date by 1871. Warrior was rescued from use as an oil jetty and restored in Hartlepool to her 1860 condition over an 8 year period. She has been berthed in Portsmouth and open to the public since 1987.
HM Naval Base
Portsmouth
The legend is that while King David I was hunting in the area he had a vision of a stag with a cross glowing between its antlers. Interpreting this as an act of God, the King declared that an abbey should be built on the same spot, and the Augustinian Abbey of the Holy Rood was accordingly founded in 1128. Holy Rood means ‘Holy Cross’, a fragment of which had allegedly been brought to Scotland by David’s mother, St Margaret, and kept at the Abbey until the 14th century.
Holyrood Abbey is part of the Palace of Holyroodhouse and can only be visited as part of a visit to the Palace.
The Royal Mile,
Edinburgh
The The Hospital of St Cross and Almshouse of Noble Poverty was founded as a hospital for the poor between 1132 and 1136 by Henry of Blois, Bishop of Winchester, grandson of William the Conqueror and younger brother of King Stephen. Endowments enabled it to prosper and provide. In 1445, another powerful Bishop of Winchester, Cardinal Henry Beaufort, created the Order of Noble Poverty, and added the almshouses to the existing Hospital buildings. It continues to provide homes to twenty five brothers, who wear distinctive black or claret coloured robes. Visitors are able to see the Norman style church, Master’s Garden – and there is a teahouse and shop. The Hospital of St Cross is famous for the Wayfarer’s Dole - a horn of beer or ale with a piece of white bread given to any traveller that asks for it.
By far the best way to visit the Hospital of St Cross is on foot from Winchester Cathedral Close, through ancient gateways, past No 8 College Street, where author Jane Austen finished ‘Persuasion’, and died, turning right by Winchester College to the water meadows alongside the River Itchen. The path is wide, well trodden and wonderful. Keats enjoyed the same walk – it apparently inspired the ode ‘To Autumn’, written in 1819. To the right are the immaculate playing fields of Winchester College, founded in 1382 by William of Wykeham, Henry Beaufort’s predecessor as Bishop of Winchester. Its pupils are known as Wykehamists and the college motto is 'Manners Makyth Man' – the same as New College, Oxford, which was also founded by Wykeham. To the left are the water meadows, cattle-grazed and seeming to lap against the contours of St Catherine’s Hill, site of an ancient univallate Iron Age hillfort and medieval chapel. It is an immensely peaceful pathway, steeped in history and, somehow, very English. On a still, warm, June day, with the rich earthy scent of the riverbank wafting upward and the water sparkling and lapping nearby, it is almost heavenly. And, eventually, you will glimpse the hospital, like a scene from the past across a field.
Winchester
The Houses of Parliament is the home of the UK Parliament and consists of two 'houses' - the Commons (elected) and Lords (unelected). It is possible to take a tour, even take tea, or watch a debate. Information about visiting can be found on the UK Parliament's website - link below.
The Houses of Parliament is situated on the site of Edward the Confessor's 11th century palace and is still known as 'the Palace of Westminster'. It has been the traditional home of the English parliament since medieval times and much of the UK's parliamentary democracy developed here. However, most of the current building dates from the 19th century and was designed by Charles Barry, following a disastrous fire in 1834 that destroyed most of the old palace. The oldest building on the site is the magnificent Westminster Hall, which has witnessed 900 years of British history.
Hyde Abbey was founded in 1110 to replace the New Minster at Winchester, which had been supplanted by the new Norman Cathedral. So the Benedictine monks moved their library, relics - and the bodies of King Alfred, his wife Alswitha and son, Edward the Elder to the newly built abbey. The abbey was badly damaged during the Anarchy, but was rebuilt, became a place of pilgrimage and survived until 1539, when it was surrendered to Henry VIII’s commissioners. Most of the buildings were destroyed, its treasures dispersed and the monks pensioned off. In the 18th century, a prison was built on part of the site. That too has gone now and all that remains of the once-great abbey is a an impressive, though pigeon-infested, stone gateway, an arch that used to span the abbey millstream and St Bartholomew’s church opposite, which had been built for the pilgrims and lay-brothers. Most of the site of the abbey is now covered with housing. Just down the road along King Alfred Place is Hyde Abbey Garden, where the site of the high altar and the graves of King Alfred & Co are thought to have been.
Hyde
Winchester
Hyde Abbey Garden marks the site of the vanished abbey church of Hyde Abbey, specifically the east end and the site of destroyed royal burials. Flint paths trace the lines of walls, yew hedges outline the north and south chapels, three great ledger stones lie above the burial pit, each carved with a simple cross. Holly bushes in burnished steel frames mark the site of pillars. At the far end, a bridge crosses the ditch and leads onto the playing fields. Heading into the garden is a simple, but stunning, engraved glass panel giving an impression of what the church might have looked like. A must-see for anyone on the trail of King Alfred the Great.
Managed by Friends of Hyde Abbey Garden.
Hyde
Winchester
One of the Royal Parks. Hyde Park borders Mayfair and Park Lane, with the Wellington Arch and Hyde Park Corner in the south and Marble Arch, close to where the Tyburn Tree once stood, to the north. Hyde Park often plays hosts to concerts and is famous for Speakers’ Corner – a traditional place where anyone can spout about anything they like (provided it’s legal); Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and George Orwell are all known to have used the area to demonstrate free speech. At its southern end, you’ll find the Diana Princess of Wales Fountain. You can go horse riding in Hyde Park – and you’ll sometimes see the Household Cavalry exercising its horses there.
Post code is approximate.
Ightham Mote is a picturesque medieval-Tudor moated manor house, once a much-loved family home, wonderfully preserved and restored, with charming gardens and located in a lovely part of Kent. Ightham Mote also boasts Britain’s only Grade I listed dog kennel. And you probably need to know that Ightham is pronounced 'item'.
Ivy Hatch
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