Day 17: Harlaxton, United Kingdom

June 20, 2013

I showed Clayton where I studied in Austria near the beginning of this trip and today I got to see where he studied almost three years ago.

We found Platform 9 3/4 in Kings Cross Station! (From Harry Potter)

We woke up at 6:30 so we would be sure to catch our train at 9:08 across the city. We rode a train for a little over an hour and arrived in Grantham, the closest town to Harlaxton. We waited outside the station for a bus that would take us to Harlaxton, but it didn't come so we walked on to the bus station to see if we could catch a different one. We could, but we had to wait an hour so we walked around part of the town to the grocery Clayton used to shop at.

These yellow fields dotted the English countryside as we rode towards Harlaxton

There was one beside the manor house so we saw that they were flowers

It was a short bus ride out to Harlaxton. The manor house was easy to spot because it sticks out like a sore thumb. The manor house was donated to the University of Evansville in 1986 and WKU has a partnership with them to send some WKU students. We walked up the long (about 1/2 mile) driveway to the manor house and went to the reception lady. We had no idea if we would be allowed to go inside or not. The people couldn't have been nicer though and let us go in and spend as much time as we wanted. I was able to see all the main areas, a few rooms where he had classes, and the gardens. It was a crazy house and I still can't imagine living and going to class there. We had a picnic lunch of sandwiches and chips in the garden overlooking the castle.

The outside of the manor house where Clayton had classes

The great hall where there were dances and receptions

Clayton had history class in this room...no big deal

The greenhouse part of the garden. They just sat in here and did homework like it was the norm.

The grand staircase which was probably my favorite part. This doesn't begin to do it justice.

The view from a bench in the garden where we ate lunch

 As we were leaving the grounds we walked by the carriage house where Clayton lived and we ran into one of Clayton's professors. He remembered Clayton and seemed shocked that he had a wife which Clayton and I found amusing.  He told me I had "a good lad". Clayton said that it felt like a dream being back there and that he never thought he would see the place again. For me seeing it made all his stories so much more real because I could see where they happened. It was also a different spin for him to be showing me around somewhere knowing exactly where he was going and me being lost since I am the one who is always the navigator. It was cute to see him get so excited about showing me around too.

The carriage house where Clayton's room was

After we left the manor we walked through the community of Harlaxton which was just a small community instead of a town like I had imagined it. Harlaxton is probably comparable in size to Wheatley or New Liberty. After seeing the old style English community we walked (buses stopped running at 3pm) back to Grantham 3.5 miles through the English countryside. As it often does in England it steadily rained on us most of the way. By the time we got to The Goose (a pub) in downtown Grantham we were quite tired and quite wet.

Typical Old English house: weather red brick and a legit garden

An average looking backyard in the Harlaxton neighborhood

I like that England tries to keep nostalgic items around like the red telephone booths

Two very large and fuzzy English sheep

We finally made it to The Goose!

The pub was a place many Harlaxton students went in Grantham although Clayton had only been there once. We had some English cider, some supper and some hot chocolate as we rested there for almost three hours since our train didn't leave until 8:38pm. The sports channel was playing on TV which showed Cricket, Rugby and Soccer highlights; it was very different from American sports channels. We caught our train back in to London which was a bit delayed due to someone committing suicide by jumping in front of a train. We got into London a little after 10pm and made our way to our hostel by the tube (subway).
It has been a very exciting, but tiresome day!

The Goose's hot chocolate was one of the best I have ever had

Kings Cross Station is a really neat looking station