England Experiences - Number 2 - Filming Locations

I have to admit, a lot of my favourite TV shows and movies are British.  Pride & Prejudice (BBC version), Emma (BBC version), the Cranford series, As Time Goes By and Downton Abbey are a few that come to mind. It was very exciting to see some of the places these were filmed when I was in England!

Our first stop was Bath. Very Jane Austen-ish looking and generally beautiful.  A lot of Persuasion is set in Bath & they used some of the streets in the 1995 version.  I think the street in the second picture is where Anne & Captain Wentworth got engaged.

Not far outside Bath is the little village of Lacock which has been used in a number of period pieces.  Memorable ones for me were Pride & Prejudice, Emma and Cranford.  As a National Trust village Lacock remains historical and beautiful!  We walked around the streets pointing out familiar buildings from films and taking pictures of everything!

Any guesses which film this location was used for?

If you know Downton Abbey at all that shot pretty much gives it away (it's our take-off on the DVD cover).  We took a tour from London that visited the village that was used for places like the hospital, the Crawley cottage and the church, as well as Highclere Castle that plays Downton Abbey so well.  The tour was great fun!  While we traveled around on the coach we watched episdoes of the show and it was an easy, stress-free way to see two locations in one day.  Photography wasn't allowed inside but many of the rooms looked very similar to how they look in the film.  Especially the library, the staircase & great room and the dining room.  The outside bits are very distinctive as well.  Here's the courtyard (with film props stored in the arches) and the tree that is such a lovely shape.  You can just make out my sister & I sitting on the bench underneath.  I'm not sure what that last thing is called but I remember seeing it in the film.

The last location is not nearly as well known.  This farm, Bank Ground, was used for the 1977 film of Swallows & Amazons.  I'm a great fan of the books but hadn't seen the film till this trip (we borrowed a copy from the farm owners) as I haven't been able to find it in the correct format for Canada.

One day we took a steam ship down the lake and caught a glimpse of Wild Cat Island.

This sail boat is not at all like the ones in the book but we enjoyed watching it anyways.

How about you; are there any favourite filming locations you've seen or want to visit?

England Experiences - Number 1 - Tea

I haven't mentioned here that I was in England for 3 weeks!  It was a great trip with my mum & my sister.  We have all been before and went back to visit some favourite places as well as discover some new ones.  Now that I've had a week to catch up with life at home there's time to blog and share some of my England experiences with you!

One of the quintessential English things is having tea.  Tea at breakfast, tea in the afternoon, tea in the evening, at the hotel, at restaurants, with friends.  As a non coffee drinker I love that hotel rooms provide a tea kettle rather than a coffee maker!  Adding some biscuits, scones or another treat makes tea even sweeter.  I'm not sure how many cups of tea we drank over 21 days but we enjoyed every one.

This picture sums up how we ended a lot of nights.  Tea in our hotel room supplemented with a selection of biscuits from Marks & Spencer.

In Bath we had tea at the Pump Room as people have been doing since the 1700s.  In London we had tea at Buckingham Palace!  Not, alas, an official garden tea party with the Queen in attendance, but out of a paper cup in the cafe set up in the garden after touring the State Rooms.

I ended up blending in with the decor very well!

At the end of the trip we bought some tea to bring home with us so we can continue to enjoy!  I think scone making should be in the near future too!