Day Three  June 28,1998 Coventry, Birmingham, Stratford Sunday We woke up late, and it was nice to know that we would sleep in the same place that night, even if the Leamington Spa Courtyard was excruciatingly unimpressive. A 2-day stay means a one-day circle tour, so we headed into town for ‘brunch’ and to consult the maps. Leamington Spa is, indeed, the site of old health spas, and was a favorite of Queen Victoria. The town felt like a US ‘college town’ with old Tudor homes, a river with stately overhanging trees, and lots of curvy streets. I cut off a couple of cars, still learning the trick of roundabouts, but they were all good sports about it. Jesse was car sick a lot that day, but we pressed on regardless. We had a nice lunch at a pub, and used our PCD’s to send Lyn on ahead to order while I ditched the car in a confounding carpark. We tried to stop at a grocery store after brunch, but were halted at the door by a grey haired gentleman, informing us that the stored closed at 1pm on Sundays. But we had plenty of tea biscuits in our possession so we pressed on. From Leamington Spa, we drove 10 miles over to the city of Coventry. We got lost a couple of times, but worked our way downtown. Found the “Lady Godiva” statue (big deal), the home grounds for the Coventry City football club, and the “Coventry Cathedral”. The Cathedral was incredible. In the center of downtown stand the remains of an ancient Catholic Cathedral that was bombed by the Nazi’s during the 1940’s. The shell still stands, with inlaid floor tiles, burial vaults, precarious window frams, and open to the sky. It was now rededicated as a ‘peace monument’. Directly next to it was the ‘new cathedral’, a rather boorish structure of way-overstated 1960’s architecture. But that shell was so special, a very quiet place. We sat and talked with Jesse about the war, about bombers and rockets and firestorms, about children being sent by their parents to the countryside or to Canada for their own safety. You could see him understand it, in a way that no amount of reading about it would ever make sense. The whole city of Coventry was rebuilt after the devastating firestorms of the war, so most building looked very 50’s and 60’s in style. We drove on to Birmingham, just 20 miles up the motorway. Birmingham was surprisingly large. It felt to me like Cleveland or Pittsburgh. We got lost a dozen times, but found the soccer stadium for Birmingham City (the ‘Blues’). It was the original team for Trevor Francis, our all time favorite UK football player, and we did not know until later, also his current employer. After retiring as a player, Trevor is now the general manager for Birmingham City, and we stood in the very parking lot (hoo boy!). Of course, soccer season is in the fall there, so the stadiums were all empty and the players (the lucky ones) were in France playing in the World Cup. Downtown Birmingham had a neat church and courtyard. We parked the van, and just relaxed a little. Took some pictures and Jesse took some pictures of us. It was so nice just to walk, sit, and eventually lie down in the grassy little knoll and unwind (now it was starting to feel like a vacation). From Birmingham, we headed for Stratford-upon-Avon. It was 20 miles away, and on our way back to the hotel. Before leaving Birmingham, Jesse had us stop at ‘Cadbury World’ which he found on the UK mapping package and really wanted to visit. It was of course closed, being Sunday, and Lyn and I were pretty unimpressed. I had, after all, been to Hershey Pennsylvania when I was his age, but Jesse was really insistent about wanting to visit. We drove on to Stratford and I just don’t get it. We had both been to Stratford, Ontario as high-schoolers, to see the Shakespeare festivals there, and the real Stratford had the same feel. This is obvious, since the former is a cheap knock-off of the latter. The town was very small, very Elizabethan with old houses, straw roofs, and narrow streets. We were in no mood to see any plays this trip so we just drove around town for an hour or so but it was all pretty straightforward. We tried to eat dinner and really got hosed! It took 3 restaurants before we would actually stay and order at one. The first outright ignored us, implied that the kitchen would be closing soon (even though, at 8:30, we had a full one and one half hours to go). The second sat us way in a forgotten corner, then sent around the surliest waiter. The third was well lit and had a family atmosphere. For all the world, we managed to find the UK’s equivalent of Denny’s. So we got some decent food, but paid a healthy bill for it. Again, it was nice to relax and go back to our same hotel for the night. From the room we finalized our plans, sorting out which days we would be where. We made some Holiday Inn Express reservations for York & Stirling, and cancelled the double reservations we were holding for London. We tried again to get into the Marriott Regents Park, near the zoo, as it was directly on a tube station. They concierge was uncooperative, saying no rooms were available 'for points' but plenty were available for purchase. So we settled on the Heathrow Airport Marriott for day eight, nine and ten (and it worked out just fine). I also tried to dial into the work E-Mail system but got nowhere. I talked to UK tech support but finally agreed to just give it up. We never did connect for the entire trip, but you know, even though I read no E-Mail for over two weeks, the earth continued to spin on its axis. We went to bed early (for once) after Lyn took a little time to organize our suitcases for the next few days.
	Copyright, 1999, all rights reserved
	Originally Written November 1999 Original Upload January 2000 Last Update: July 22, 2001