LITERARY
ENGLAND SOUTH
4 days / 3 nights - Saturday to Tuesday
 You read the book - now have it come alive!
This is a feast for the bookworm, the literary-minded and simply those who enjoy seeing and learning about a country, not just 'photographing the sites' from a bus window. Here's the plot. Our knowledgeable and entertaining guide takes you, and just 10 or so others, through some of the UK's prettiest landscapes, visiting author's homes, literary museums, towns and villages where stories are set, and places that obviously inspired the artist's muse.
Naturally, as it is a Back-Roads Touring Co. tour, you'll be seeing sites the regular tourists miss, in parts of the country often neglected by the standard tour itineraries. And, even more importantly, you'll be meeting the locals.
We hope that by the end of our four days you'll not only have had your favourite stories leap off the page, and understand their authors and backgrounds better, but also have been introduced to a few new classic writers who might have escaped your attention. This will be a tour with a tail as well as a tale if it leaves you with some future reading pleasure.
This tour may be combined with the three-day Literary North to make a 7 day holiday. This tour can also be run for groups on any dates of tour choosing.
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DEPARTURE DATES & PRICES FOR YEAR 2009
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Tour
Code
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Depart
London
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Return
London
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SLIT
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Saturday
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Tuesday
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SLIT 01
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16 May
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19 May
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SLIT 02
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30 May
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02 Jun
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SLIT 03
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13 Jun
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16 Jun
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SLIT 04
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27 Jun
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30 Jun
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SLIT 05
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11 Jul
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14 Jul
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SLIT 06
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25 Jul
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28 Jul
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SLIT 07
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08 Aug
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11 Aug
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SLIT 08
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22 Aug
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25 Aug
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SLIT 09
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05 Sep
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08 Sep
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SLIT 10
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19 Sep
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22 Sep
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SLIT 11
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03 Oct
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06 Oct
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SLIT 12
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17 Oct
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30 Oct
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Price person: £495 Twin share / £480 Single room
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This tour departs from / returns to the following central London hotels.
We can assist with pre-tour reservations, transfers, sightseeing and other services.
The Royal National, Bedford Way
The Corus Hotel, Hyde Park
The Grosvenor Thistle, Victoria Station
The Holiday Inn Forum
The Chiswick Hotel, Chiswick
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08.15 (underground Russell Square)
08.25 (underground Lancaster Gate)
08.30 (underground Victoria Station)
08.40 (underground Gloucester Road)
09.00 (underground Turnham Green) |
- Clients should wait by the concierge desk.
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What
your tour price includes
- Your
accommodation for 3 nights while on the tour is included
in your tour price, and this includes both full breakfasts
and dinners
- Your
price also includes all entrance fees to attractions,
transportation, services of driver/guide-companion
and all taxes and tips other than those you may wish
to give your guide
- Airport transfers and accommodation pre and post tour is not included but can be reserved at a specially discounted price.
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TENTATIVE
ITINERARY
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NIGHTSTOP |
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DAY
ONE - Saturday
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Our
route from London follows the river, first through Deptford.
This was the suburb of Samuel Pepys and where Elizabethan playwright,
Christopher Marlow, was murdered in a pub. It's a rare opportunity
of seeing an 'old' London and a 'real' high street and one can
still easily imagine we're aboard a stagecoach from Charles
Dickens time heading with Mr Pickwick to Rochester.
Fittingly, it is Dickens's Rochester
that provides our next stop. This gem of a city, with its cathedral
and Norman castle, overflows with Dickens's sites. There are
plaques on the places mentioned in his books, Mrs Haversham's
house is still here, and Dickens's himself lived here.
Our third major site of the day
is Knole. This interesting and grand house, the birth place
of Vita Sackville West, was her inspiration for 'The Edwardian'.
It was also the setting for Virginia Wolf's novel 'Orlando'.
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Kent |
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DAY
TWO - Sunday
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We'll
start our day exploring more of Kent and East Sussex's rich
literary heritage. We can choose from a range of sites and properties
according to the interest of tour participants. In the Ashdown
Forest we find the home of Winnie the Pooh and creator A A Milne.
There'll be time for a game of 'pooh sticks' on the original
bridge. Fans of Arthur Conan Doyle and his timeless creation,
'Sherlock Holmes', will not be disappointed as we find a number
of related sites. And if there are Kipling fans aboard, we can
find the time to view his home of Batemans nearby Burwash.
Leaving east Sussex we take a
scenic cross country route to Jane Austen country, with her
home at Chawton being our destination. It was in this quaint
village that she wrote most of her works and once inside the
house, we are in her world. Time, and group interest permitting,
we may also see the Selbourne home of Gilbert White, the first
great naturalist.
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Hampshire |
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DAY
THREE - Monday
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Today
is our day to be totally immersed in that world, far from the
madding crowd, of Thomas Hardy. We'll visit places where some
of the most memorable scenes from his novels were set, like
the prehistoric temple at Stonehenge. We'll visit towns and
villages that are easily recognisable as the source of inspiration,
like Winchester, Shaftesbury and Dorchester. We particularly
seek out those smaller villages with a timeless Dorsetshire
air to them.
Perhaps, unsurprisingly,
the area is used as a location for many period films and TV
series. One such will be Nether Wallop. This beautiful Hampshire
village is the setting for Agatha Christie's 'Miss Marple' films.
Also in the
area is the 'Cloud's Hill' home of T E Lawrence, better known
as Lawrence of Arabia.
All in all,
this is yet another perfect day.
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as
above |
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DAY
FOUR - Tuesday
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We'll
depart our Hampshire base and take the short drive north to
the neighbouring counties of Royal Berkshire and Buckinghamshire,
through the Chiltern Hills to Oxford. En route, there are simply
dozens of sites and attractions with a literary significance.
We can discover Thomas Grey tomb and original churchyard of
his 'Elegy' fame. Nearby there's John Milton's 17th century
cottage where 'Paradise Lost' was completed. In Beaconsfield,
G K Chesterton conceived 'Father Brown', and in the Thames riverside
village of Marlow Mary Shelly somehow 'discovered' ' Frankenstein,
and a hundred years or so later Jerome K Jerome pitcher his
'Three Men in a Boat'. Our drive through this literary landscape
will bring many legendary characters springing alive from the
page.
Our drive brings
us to the 'city of the dreaming spires', Oxford. This is the
jewel in the literary crown. Inevitably, the university colleges
feature, having either been where the great studied, or taught.
The Dean of Mathematics at Christchurch College was one Charles
Dodgson, better known as Lewis Carroll and one finds 'Alice'
everywhere. At an ancient pub in the town centre, C S Lewis
and Tolkein, amongst others, met to talk and drink. And, of
course, contemporary literature is represented by Colin Dexter
and his detective 'Morse'. A walking tour of the city will introduce
you to these sites and to many, many others.
Tour ends upon arrival in London at one of our central base hotels. We can assist with post-tour accommodation and services.
This tour links
with our 3-day Northern Literary Tour tour for those who would enjoy the ultimate British literary experience by catching the 4 p.m. train to Manchester.
>> Go to other tours departing from London
>> Go to tours departing from Manchester
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Returns London |
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