Hi guys! Today Ronny and I went to the Shakespeare Houses since we had the day off from work. I have always loved Shakespeare and its been a dream to visit where he grew up in Stratford-Upon-Avon. So that one can be scratched off the list. ;)
It was a really stunning day weather wise (well most of the day-this is England after all!!!) and the first place we went to was Anne Hathaway's Cottage.
Info: Anne Hathaway's Cottage was the childhood home of Shakespeare's wife and remained occupied by decendants of the Hathaway family until 1899. The young Shakespeare would have courted Anne here and the view of the house and garden has been described as the most romantic view in England (I can agree with that!) From what I remember: It was built in the 15th century and still had some of the original furniture in the cottage, including the carved oak "Hathaway Bed". I loved it! Such a beautiful place. It was completely stunning. I was a bit nervous though because as we walked through the upstairs, you could see the downstairs through the cracks in the floor boards! LOL Crazy. The back has Shakespeare's tree garden with sculptures and things. Sorry I dont have loads of pictures but I dont have a memory card yet so didn't have much internal memory! If you would like to see bigger versions let me know.




Anne Hathaway's Cottage


































Garden in front of the cottage. That circular thing in the center is an arch way made out of a plant. Its lovely.































Ronny in front of the cottage. Sorry but we couldn't take pics inside!














Ronny and I in front of the cottage.












Ronny in Shakespeare's Tree Garden looking at one of the sculptures.












Gift shop where we got a few goodies!

























Waterfall in garden in front of the gift shop.

Ok, those are all the pictures of Anne's house. At this point we went into the center of Stratford to go to Will's birthplace. At this point the weather totally started to change and pour down rain so we had to run to the house. It was really nice as they had a center with a big exhibition about him and his parents.
Info that I remember: John Shakespeare (Will's dad) was a glover and thus lived a life of some wealth. The house was later turned into an Inn. Will's family and Anne's family knew each other from when they were children. When Will was 18 and Anne was 26 they got married when she was already 3 months pregnant. They had 3 children, a set of twins, Hamnet and Judith and a girl Susannah.









Birthplace of Will Shakespeare




















Ronny in front of house. (Once again they wouldn't let us take pics inside)
After we left here we went on to visit two more houses. One was a house Will had bought and another was the home of his daughter and her husband for a few years. They were really nice but being that they didn't play a big role in Will's life (and I had barely any memory left on my camera!) I didn't take any pics of them. We got totally drenched on the way to the car but as we left the car park, it was blue skies and complete sun once again. Very frustrating weather! On our way back to the highway we stopped just to take pics of Will's mother's (Mary Arden) childhood house. It is still a working farm.





Mary Arden's house and no its not the camera, the house is actually tilted towards the left! =)



























Had a really lovely day and hope you enjoyed the pictures! One more thing: We went to see X-Men3 with some friends last night. Very disappointed to be honest but that is just me. Anyways, hope you are all well. ; )