We took a cave tour. And at first I was rather disappointed – the beginning of a tour looked like a kids activity – a little “underground adventure”, not too deep beyond the surface. But gradually as we were going down into the caves, as the story becomes more of a romantic legend, as the underground scenery, carved out by the mysterious River Axe, lightened up with dramatic lighting effects, my scepticism dissolved into the thick air of the underworld.
There are 25 chambers in Wookey Hole. 9 of them are opened to visitors. The rest are hidden under the water of the underground river, which could be as deep as 3 meters and the speed of her stream hasn’t changed for a thousands of years. The views of stalactites were amazing. The scale of some of those chambers unspeakable – imagine huge crack in the rocks – about 8-9 meters high, with the deep river running on the bottom and a narrow bridge where visitors can walk to wander. Archaeologists’ finds indicate man has lived in and around the caves for 50,000 years. Overall it happened to be quite an interesting experience. Pity that it was too dark to take the good pictures. Trust me - the sights were gorgeous! I’ll show you one of the Cathedral Chamber - this is as good as it gets on a picture:
Oh, there is also a papermill on Wookey Hole site, where paper has been handmade (and still is) since the 17th century! We saw the whole process in action – educating.
Our way to the Wookey Hole was through the cutiest city in England – the city of Wells. Cute is the word that comes to mind when I walked its tiny streets so quiet and peaceful early Sunday morning. It is said to be the smallest city in England. A very picturesque market town steeped in English history. And for such a tiny city it’s got very big attractions: first of all - the great Gothic Cathedral. The magnificence of the building impossible to describe. And it has the 600 years old clock, which still in service!
Another beautiful place is the moated and walled Bishop's Palace with the gardens – extraordinary views of the moat and swans in it. And finally, another one of the most interesting features in Wells, the Vicars' Close, said to be one of the most perfectly preserved medieval streets in Europe. It was built as the quarters of the vicars of Wells. It is a street of 14th Century terrace houses each with a small front garden. The appearance of the houses remains exactly as it has for centuries. A distinctive feature of the street is that the vicars, for whom it was built, are still accommodated there.
When we looked for the route on a map before driving, we thought, we shall just drive through this small Somerset city, but we made an unplanned stop in Wells, as it was too cute to be missed.
Finally we were able to leave Somerset that day, having seen main attractions, but far from all! On our way back home, we managed to see something different – a State House of Bowood – home of Marquess of Lansdowne family. It is a remarkable house with impressive collection of art and books. And the gardens designed by Capability Brown – the same landscaper that created Churchill’s gardens in Blenheim. So you can easy guess what I enjoyed most of all in Bowood ;- ). However I will show you the picture not of the gorgeous gardens, but of the house and little front park, rather unusually stylish with the tipsy trees :-)
If you make it to here, there are only two more places left to mention of our weekend adventure. The Cherchill White Horse – huge figure of a horse cut high into a very steep slope on a hill. It made from very fine compacted chalk in somewhere in 17th century and it can be seen from way afar.
Well, we did pop to Avebury on our way as well. I won’t post more pictures, as there is an entry on Avebury somewhere back in this journal. I’ll just add that there is a certain charm to visit ancient stones in a sunset time. Most of the tourists are gone, peaceful tranquillity spread around…it was quiet and relaxing and it made an appropriate ending to our crazy weekend…