Stephanie: We were bummed about missing our Prague trip, so to cheer ourselves up we went to Salisbury for a day. It was still very cold, with snow on the ground, so that made for a most picturesque visit. First, we visited the Salisbury museum which has a wonderful Stonehenge exhibit (still need to go there) and a large collection of artifacts donated by General Pitt Rivers, the 'father of British archeology.' Pitt River was born Augustus Henry Lane Fox but changed his name in order to inherit a large fortune from his great uncle--not a bad deal!
Next we visited the famous Salisbury Cathedral (although it wasn't famous enough to have an annoying pop song written about it like Winchester Cathedral, was it?). A few facts about Salisbury Cathedral:
it is one of the leading examples of Early English architecture, the main body took 38 years to complete, it has the tallest church spire in the UK at 404 feet, it has the largest cloister and largest cathedral close in Britain, and the world's oldest clock (from AD 1386). It also has one of the four surviving original copies of the Magna Carta.
We took a tour of the tower where we got to see the ancient wood scaffolding in the interior of the hollow spire. The views of the city were beautiful. Russell and I were the only two people on the tour, so it was very personal. Our guide was great and let us stop for lots of pictures!
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