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Worcester and Pontypool
Mar. 20th, 2020 09:13 pmWe were due to head home from Pony Weekend on Tuesday and with the Coronavirus advice becoming increasingly serious, we realised that this would likely be the last day for a while where life would resemble normality. We still had a four hour journey ahead of us though so once we had said goodbye to our fellow ponies and left our accommodation, we decided we would stop off in the city of Worcester on the way home. We were driving past it anyway and I knew there was a rather stunning cathedral there, a place that I had not yet had the fortune to visit. I had been to Worcester once, although once there I realised that I may be confusing it with Gloucester, and as it is a place we are rarely near, we thought we would take the opportunity.
The drive from Ross-on-Wye to Worcester was only about fifty minutes and soon we were parked up in the Bridge Street Car Park, around the corner from the church. On our way there, we got to see the delightful Edgar Tower, which acts as the gatehouse at the east side of the picturesque College Green. Built in the middle of the fourteenth century, this has just undergone a five-year restoration project and is one of the few remaining gatehouses of its type from the Medieval Era. The original stone gatehouse of the twelfth century was strongly associated with King John, who I was surprised to discover is buried at the heart of Worcester Cathedral. To get into the church, we had to walk through the gatehouse and along the green for a while, turning right and entering the building halfway up.
Like with many Gothic cathedrals, the sheer capacity of the place upon entering takes your breath away, and while I was expecting a brief stay, we ended up being there for over an hour. To whet our appetite, we actually walked into the church from the pretty cloisters, fringing a square garden in typical style. It was here where we saw a number of church bells from the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, situated as they were in alcoves where the religious texts used to be. To one side through a heavy wooden door was the plain yet beautifully round Chapter House with its excellent acoustics. A small coffee shop was next to this too, but there was nobody in it, theoretically because of the virus threat. Builders were doing renovations though and there were a couple of really nice tourist guides inside the Cathedral, but aside from one or two others, we were largely left to our own devices.
The history of the Cathedral, as detailed in the Crypt, alongside details of the two saints associated with Worcester - Oswald and Wulfstan - was similarly fascinating while there was a very strong community feel denoted by the exhibition of local artists in one of the naves and the section dedicated to the military regiments of the county. Everywhere you went in this Cathedral there were things of real interest, including the towering font, like that of Babel, and the exquisite stained glass windows. In addition to King John's burial chamber, there is also that of Arthur Prince of Wales and elder brother of King Henry VII in the chantry chapel. Figures of humans above the small alter were defacted by the Commissioners during the reign of Edward VI, the son of Henry VIII, which added more richness to the Cathedral's story.
There were a number of ornate graves, often stone and featuring full-length laid down statues of those entombed. Often these were coloured with equally colourful stories to match. Behind the alter, the frieze dedicated to the memory of John Peel, a Victorian dean of the Cathedral, was equally striking on pink marble and again added to the rich tapestry of history that the Cathedral has. The two nails from the roof of Coventry Cathedral, which was destroyed in the bombings of World War Two, carried depth of meaning in their simplicity while the frequent references to composer Edward Elgar, whose statue sits on the main shopping street outside, also highlighted the importance of locality and community.
After our visit to the Cathedral, we had a pleasant half hour stroll around Worcester itself, spotting an old WH Smith sign from back in the day and also grabbing a pasty from a local bakery (we wanted local instead of Gregg's). Some of the tudor style buildings in the main drinking area tucked behind the High Street were quite beautiful, but ultimately Worcester was very much like any other city in England really. Still, it had a lot more than the small town of Pontypool, where we had visited on the Sunday morning before Pony Weekend. We had stayed in the Premier Inn off a roundabout two miles away, so before heading over to Ross-on-Wye we thought we might as well check the town out. It seemed a little rundown in all honesty, made worse by the local Welsh Assembly offices advertising the Brexit Party, while there were very few people about. There was a pleasant little park (protected by ornate wrought iron gates), through which a roaring stream ran, and where I tried in vein to find a geocache while some of the tiled murals next to the underpasses were pretty, particularly the rugby one. Alas, Pontypool was slightly ruined by having an elevated concrete road bulldozed through it and aside from a few Victorian buildings, there was little else to really see. Indeed, I managed to get round the town inside twenty minutes while Wolfie sat in the car working, so there isn't too much to report.
The drive from Ross-on-Wye to Worcester was only about fifty minutes and soon we were parked up in the Bridge Street Car Park, around the corner from the church. On our way there, we got to see the delightful Edgar Tower, which acts as the gatehouse at the east side of the picturesque College Green. Built in the middle of the fourteenth century, this has just undergone a five-year restoration project and is one of the few remaining gatehouses of its type from the Medieval Era. The original stone gatehouse of the twelfth century was strongly associated with King John, who I was surprised to discover is buried at the heart of Worcester Cathedral. To get into the church, we had to walk through the gatehouse and along the green for a while, turning right and entering the building halfway up.
Like with many Gothic cathedrals, the sheer capacity of the place upon entering takes your breath away, and while I was expecting a brief stay, we ended up being there for over an hour. To whet our appetite, we actually walked into the church from the pretty cloisters, fringing a square garden in typical style. It was here where we saw a number of church bells from the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, situated as they were in alcoves where the religious texts used to be. To one side through a heavy wooden door was the plain yet beautifully round Chapter House with its excellent acoustics. A small coffee shop was next to this too, but there was nobody in it, theoretically because of the virus threat. Builders were doing renovations though and there were a couple of really nice tourist guides inside the Cathedral, but aside from one or two others, we were largely left to our own devices.
The history of the Cathedral, as detailed in the Crypt, alongside details of the two saints associated with Worcester - Oswald and Wulfstan - was similarly fascinating while there was a very strong community feel denoted by the exhibition of local artists in one of the naves and the section dedicated to the military regiments of the county. Everywhere you went in this Cathedral there were things of real interest, including the towering font, like that of Babel, and the exquisite stained glass windows. In addition to King John's burial chamber, there is also that of Arthur Prince of Wales and elder brother of King Henry VII in the chantry chapel. Figures of humans above the small alter were defacted by the Commissioners during the reign of Edward VI, the son of Henry VIII, which added more richness to the Cathedral's story.
There were a number of ornate graves, often stone and featuring full-length laid down statues of those entombed. Often these were coloured with equally colourful stories to match. Behind the alter, the frieze dedicated to the memory of John Peel, a Victorian dean of the Cathedral, was equally striking on pink marble and again added to the rich tapestry of history that the Cathedral has. The two nails from the roof of Coventry Cathedral, which was destroyed in the bombings of World War Two, carried depth of meaning in their simplicity while the frequent references to composer Edward Elgar, whose statue sits on the main shopping street outside, also highlighted the importance of locality and community.
After our visit to the Cathedral, we had a pleasant half hour stroll around Worcester itself, spotting an old WH Smith sign from back in the day and also grabbing a pasty from a local bakery (we wanted local instead of Gregg's). Some of the tudor style buildings in the main drinking area tucked behind the High Street were quite beautiful, but ultimately Worcester was very much like any other city in England really. Still, it had a lot more than the small town of Pontypool, where we had visited on the Sunday morning before Pony Weekend. We had stayed in the Premier Inn off a roundabout two miles away, so before heading over to Ross-on-Wye we thought we might as well check the town out. It seemed a little rundown in all honesty, made worse by the local Welsh Assembly offices advertising the Brexit Party, while there were very few people about. There was a pleasant little park (protected by ornate wrought iron gates), through which a roaring stream ran, and where I tried in vein to find a geocache while some of the tiled murals next to the underpasses were pretty, particularly the rugby one. Alas, Pontypool was slightly ruined by having an elevated concrete road bulldozed through it and aside from a few Victorian buildings, there was little else to really see. Indeed, I managed to get round the town inside twenty minutes while Wolfie sat in the car working, so there isn't too much to report.
