The East Midlands

1. Nottingham
2. Northern Nottinghamshire
3. Southwell
4. Newark
5. Leicester
6. Leicestershire
7. Rutland
8. Northampton
9. Northamptonshire
10. Lincoln
11. The Lincolnshire Wolds and the coast
12. The Lincolnshire Fens
13. Stamford and around

Many tourists bypass the East Midlands’ four major counties – Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire and Lincolnshire – on their way to more obvious destinations, an understandable mistake given that the region seems, at first sight, to be short of star attractions. Nevertheless, though the county towns of Nottingham, Leicester and Northampton are at heart industrial – sometimes post-industrial – cities, they each have enough sights and character to give them appeal, while Lincoln, with its superb cathedral, is in parts a fine old city. What’s more, the countryside hereabouts is sprinkled with historic market towns, pretty villages and prestigious country homes.

Of the county towns, Nottingham has perhaps the most to offer, not least an enjoyable castle and a cutting-edge art gallery, while the rest of Nottinghamshire holds Byron’s Newstead Abbey, the pleasing Harley Gallery and, even better, Elizabethan Hardwick Hall (just over the border in Derbyshire, but covered in this chapter). Nottinghamshire is also home to Southwell, with its splendid minster, and the market town of Newark, which played a prominent role in the Civil War. To the south, Leicester boasts an excellent art gallery and its county – Leicestershire – offers Market Bosworth, an amiable country town famous as the site of the Battle of Bosworth Field, and a particularly intriguing church at Breedon-on-the-Hill. Leicestershire also lies adjacent to the easy countryside of Rutland, where you’ll find another pleasant county town, Oakham. Rutland and Northamptonshire benefit from the use of limestone as the traditional building material and rural Northamptonshire is studded with handsome stone villages and towns – most notably Fotheringhay – as well as a battery of country estates.

Lincolnshire is very different in character from the rest of the region, an agricultural hidey-hole that remains surprisingly remote, its wide-skied landscapes at their prettiest in the band of rolling hills that comprise the Lincolnshire Wolds. Locals sometimes call it the “forgotten county”, but this was not always the case: throughout medieval times the county flourished as a centre of the wool trade with Flanders, its merchants and landowners becoming some of the wealthiest in England. Reminders of the high times are legion, beginning with the majestic cathedral that rises above Lincoln; equally enticing is the splendidly intact stone town of Stamford. Out in the sticks, the county’s most distinctive feature is the Lincolnshire Fens, whose pancake-flat fields, filling out much of the south of the county and extending deep into Cambridgeshire, have been reclaimed from the marshes and the sea. Fenland villages are generally short of charm, but their parish churches, whose spires regularly interrupt the wide-skied landscape, are simply stunning; Gedney and Long Sutton have two of the finest.

Very different again is the Lincolnshire coast, whose long sandy beach extends, with a few marshy interruptions, from Mablethorpe to Skegness, the region’s main resort. The coast has long attracted holiday-makers from the big cities of the East Midlands and Yorkshire, hence its trail of bungalows, campsites and caravan parks, though significant chunks of the seashore are now protected as nature reserves, with the Gibraltar Point National Nature Reserve being the pick.

Getting around: The East Midlands

By train and bus Travelling between the cities of the East Midlands by train or bus is simple and most of the larger towns have good regional links, too. Things are very different in the country, however, where bus services are distinctly patchy, nowhere more so than in Lincolnshire.

By plane The region’s international airport, East Midlands (eastmidlandsairport.com), is located just off the M1 between Derby, Nottingham and Leicester. There are buses from the airport to these three major cities – the operator is currently Trentbarton (trentbarton.co.uk/skylink247).

lincoln cathedral

Highlights

1 Newstead Abbey One-time hidey-hole of Lord Byron, this intriguing old mansion has superb period rooms, with lots of Byron memorabilia, plus delightful gardens.

2 Hardwick Hall A beautifully preserved Elizabethan mansion that was home to the formidable Bess of Hardwick, one of the leading figures of her age. The gardens and surrounding parkland are charming, too.

3 Lincoln Cathedral One of the finest medieval cathedrals in the land, dominating this fine old city and seen to best advantage on a guided tour.

4 Gibraltar Point National Nature Reserve Escape the crowds and enjoy the wonderful birdlife at this first-class coastal nature reserve.

5 Stamford Lincolnshire’s prettiest town, with its cobbled lanes, lovely old churches, and ancient limestone buildings, well deserves an overnight stay.

Highlights are marked on The East Midlands map

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Nottingham

With a population of around 320,000, NOTTINGHAM is one of England’s big cities. A one-time lace manufacturing and pharmaceutical centre (the Boots chain began here), today it’s famous for its association with Robin Hood, the legendary thirteenth-century outlaw. Hood’s bitter enemy was, of course, the Sheriff of Nottingham, but unfortunately his home and lair – the city’s imposing medieval castle – is long gone, replaced by a handsome Palladian mansion that is still called, somewhat confusingly, Nottingham Castle. Nowadays, Nottingham is at its most diverting in and around both the castle and the handsome Market Square, which is also the centre of a heaving, teeming weekend nightlife scene. Within easy striking distance of the city is the former coal-mining village of Eastwood, home to the D.H. Lawrence Birthplace Museum.

Brief history

Controlling an important crossing point over the River Trent, the Saxon town of Nottingham was built on one of a pair of sandstone hills whose 130ft cliffs looked out over the river valley. In 1068, William the Conqueror built a castle on the other hill, and the Saxons and Normans traded on the low ground in between, the Market Square. The castle was a military stronghold and royal palace, the equal of the great castles of Windsor and Dover, and every medieval king of England paid regular visits. In August 1642, Charles I stayed here too, riding out of the castle to raise his standard and start the Civil War – not that the locals were overly sympathetic. Hardly anyone joined up, even though the king had the ceremony repeated on the next three days.

After the Civil War, the Parliamentarians slighted the castle and, in the 1670s, the ruins were cleared by the Duke of Newcastle to make way for a palace, whose continental – and, in English terms, novel – design he chose from a pattern book, probably by Rubens. Beneath the castle lay a handsome, well-kept market town until the second half of the eighteenth century, when the city was transformed by the expansion of the lace and hosiery industries. Within the space of fifty years, Nottingham’s population increased from ten thousand to fifty thousand, the resulting slums becoming a hotbed of radicalism.

The worst of the slums were cleared in the early twentieth century, when the city centre assumed its present structure, with the main commercial area ringed by alternating industrial and residential districts. Thereafter, crass postwar development, adding tower blocks, shopping centres and a ring road, ensconced and embalmed the remnants of the city’s past.

The Market Square

One of the best-looking central squares in England, Nottingham’s Market Square remains the heart of the city, an airy open plaza whose shops, offices and fountains are overseen and overlooked by the grand neo-Baroque Council House, completed as part of a make-work scheme in 1928. Just off the square there’s also a statue honouring one of the city’s heroes, the former manager of Nottingham Forest FC, Brian Clough (1935–2004), shown in his characteristic trainers and tracksuit. Clough won two European cups with Forest, a remarkable achievement by any standards, but his popularity came just as much from his forthright personality and idiosyncratic utterances. One quote will suffice to show the mettle of the man – “I wouldn’t say I was the best manager in the business, but I was in the top one.”

Nottingham Castle

Castle Place, NG1 6EJ • Mid-Feb to mid-Nov daily 10am–5pm; mid-Nov to mid-Feb Wed–Sun 10am–3pm; last entry 1hr before closing • £8 • Cave tours Noon, 1pm, 2pm & 3pm: mid-Feb to mid-Nov daily; mid-Nov to mid-Feb Wed–Sun; 45min • £5 • 0115 876 1400, nottinghamcastle.org.uk

From the Market Square, it’s a five-minute walk to Nottingham Castle, whose heavily restored medieval gateway edges the immaculately maintained gardens, whose lawns, flower borders and trees slope up to the squat, seventeenth-century ducal palace. Parts of the castle will be closed during major renovation works (2018–20), but the end result should feature a gallery exploring the city’s radical, rebellious past – from its support for Parliament against the king through to its espousal of Chartism. There is also likely to be a display of the small but exquisite medieval alabaster carvings for which Nottingham once had an international reputation and, on the top floor, the capacious and handsome picture gallery will undoubtedly survive – and continue to display its enjoyable collection of mostly English nineteenth- and early twentieth-century paintings.

Just outside the main entrance, two sets of steps lead down into the maze of ancient caves that honeycomb the sandstone cliff below – one set being King David’s Dungeon, the other Mortimer’s Hole. Both are open for tours, but Mortimer’s Hole is the more atmospheric, a 300ft shaft along which, so the story goes, the young Edward III and his accomplices crept in 1330 to capture his mother, Isabella, and her lover, Roger Mortimer. The two had staged a coup four years earlier in which Edward’s hapless father, Edward II, was murdered, but they were unable to keep a firm hold on power, with Edward III proving too shrewd for them. Edward had his revenge on Mortimer, who came to a grisly end, but the remarkable Isabella was allowed to simply step back from politics, living out her days in comfort (and probably acute boredom).

The Lace Market

Once key to the city’s fortunes, Nottingham’s lace industry boomed in the nineteenth century, its assorted warehouses and factories flanking the narrow streets of a compact area known as the Lace Market, beginning just to the east of the Market Square. The lace industry has pretty much disappeared but the buildings haven’t, with Stoney Street the most architecturally striking, its star turn being the Adams Building, whose handsome stone-and-brick facade combines both neo-Georgian and neo-Renaissance features. Take a peek also at neighbouring Broadway, where a line of impressive red-brick buildings perform a neat swerve halfway along the street. The district grew up round a much older structure, the church of St Mary’s (daily 9am–5pm; free; stmarysnottingham.org), an imposing, medieval Gothic building with Saxon origins. The church interior is fairly routine, but there is a particularly interesting memorial on the wall of the nave to a Lieutenant James Still, who died of yellow fever while serving in a British anti-slaving squadron off Sierra Leone in 1821 – and the memorial’s rant against slavery cheers the soul.

National Justice Museum

High Pavement, NG1 1HN • Daily 10am–5.30pm • £11 • 0115 952 0555, nationaljusticemuseum.org.uk

The Lace Market abuts High Pavement, the administrative centre of Nottingham in Georgian times, and it’s here that you’ll find Shire Hall, whose Neoclassical columns, pilasters and dome date from the 1770s. Shire Hall now houses the National Justice Museum, which explores and explains the workings of the law by means of semi-interactive displays. The building is perhaps more interesting than the hoopla, incorporating two superbly preserved Victorian courtrooms, an Edwardian police station, some spectacularly unpleasant old cells and a prisoners’ exercise yard.

Nottingham Contemporary

Weekday Cross, NG1 2GB • Tues–Sat 10am–6pm, Sun 11am–5pm; bank hols 10am–5pm • Free • 0115 948 9750, nottinghamcontemporary.org

In a handy, central location, Nottingham Contemporary is the city’s premier art gallery, though from the outside it looks like something assembled from an IKEA flat pack. The gallery’s temporary exhibitions are consistently strong; hit shows have included the early paintings of David Hockney, a wonderful, all-encompassing display on Haitian voodoo, and a solo exhibition by Wu Tsang.

D.H. Lawrence Birthplace Museum

8a Victoria St, Eastwood, NG16 3AW, off Nottingham Rd • Tours Tues–Sat 10am–4pm (4 daily) • £6.90 • 0115 917 3824 • Buses link Nottingham’s Victoria bus station with Eastwood (every 20min; 30min; 01773 712265, trentbarton.co.uk)

D.H. Lawrence (1885–1930) was born in the pit village of Eastwood, about seven miles northwest of Nottingham. The mines hereabouts closed years ago, and Eastwood is, to be frank, something of a post-industrial eyesore, but Lawrence’s earliest home has survived, a tiny, red-brick terraced house refurbished as the D.H. Lawrence Birthplace Museum. None of the furnishings and fittings are Lawrence originals, which isn’t too surprising given that the family moved out when he was two, but it’s an appealing evocation of the period, interlaced with biographical insights into the author’s life. Afterwards, enthusiasts can follow the three-mile Blue Line Trail round those parts of Eastwood with Lawrence associations: the walk takes an hour or so, and a brochure is available at the museum. Interestingly, few locals thought well of Lawrence – and the sexual scandals hardly helped. Famously, he ran off with Frieda, the wife of a Nottingham professor, and then there was the Lady Chatterley’s Lover obscenity trial, but much of his local unpopularity was caused by the author’s move to the political right until, eventually, he espoused a cranky and unpleasant form of (Nietzschean) elitism.

Arrival and information: Nottingham

By train Nottingham train station is on the south side of the city centre, a 10min walk (just follow the signs), or a tram ride, from Market Square.

Destinations Birmingham (every 30min; 1hr 20min); Leicester (every 30min; 20min); Lincoln (hourly; 1hr); London (every 30min; 1hr 45min); Newark (every 30min; 30min); Oakham (hourly; 1hr 15min, change at Leicester).

By bus Most long-distance buses arrive at the Broad Marsh bus station, down the street from the train station, but some – including services to north Nottinghamshire (see opposite) – pull in at the Victoria bus station, a 5min walk north of Market Square.

Tourist office Market Square, on the ground floor of the Council House, 1 Smithy Row (Mon–Sat 9.30am–5.30pm, plus selected Sun 11am–5pm; 0844 477 5678, experiencenottinghamshire.com).

Accommodation

Harts Hotel Standard Hill, Park Row, NG1 6GN 0115 988 1900, hartsnottingham.co.uk; map. Nottingham may be short of good places to stay, but this chic hotel does much to fill the gap. The thirty-odd stylish guest rooms have ultra­modern fixtures and fittings, Egyptian-cotton bed linen and contemporary paintings on the wall. Completed in 2002, the hotel’s inventive use of space – from the inviting reception area onwards – is its special hallmark. Handy location, plus a smashing restaurant next door (see below). £140

The Walton Hotel 2 North Road, The Park, NG7 1AG 0115 947 5215, thewaltonhotel.com; map. Garners mixed reviews, but this 28-room hotel does occupy a good-looking, nineteenth-century building and its annexe on the edge of the city centre – a 15min walk from Market Square, beside Derby Road. The rooms vary considerably, though the best are cheered by a smattering of period furnishings and fittings. £125

Eating

Annie’s Burger Shack 5 Broadway, NG1 1PR 0115 684 9920, anniesburgershack.com; map. This large and extremely busy burger joint has been a real local hit, attracting a young and lively crowd, who chomp away at a wide range of top-ranking burgers, including the ”Deathray” (with jalapeños, peppers and chilli paste). Craft ales, stouts and ciders too – but come early or expect to queue. Burgers average £10. Mon–Thurs noon–10pm, Fri & Sat noon–11pm, Sun 11am–10pm.

Edin’s 15 Broad St, NG1 3AJ 0115 924 1112, edinsnottingham.co.uk; map. This city-centre café-bar has a laidback vibe, with its pocket-sized open kitchen, boho furniture and jazzy, bluesy soundtrack. The menu is short, unpretentious and inexpensive; mains cost as little as £7, but there are also snacks such as the bread and cheese board. Mon–Sat 9.30am–11.30pm, Sun 9.30am–9pm.

Harts Restaurant Standard Hill, Park Row, NG1 6GN 0115 988 1900, hartsnottingham.co.uk; map. One of the city’s most acclaimed restaurants, occupying a tastefully remodelled wing of the old general hospital and offering a creative international menu – try, for example, the sea bream bouillabaisse. Reservations recommended. Mains average £21. Daily noon–2.15pm & 6–10pm, Sun till 9pm.

Masala Junction 301 Mansfield Road, NG5 2DA 0115 962 2366, masalajunction.co.uk; map. The best Indian restaurant in Nottingham, its menu featuring canny amalgamations of different regional cooking styles. It’s in an attractively refurbished former bank, about a mile from the city centre up along Mansfield Road (buses from Lower Parliament St). Mains around £14. Mon–Thurs 5.30–10.30pm, Fri & Sat 5.30–11pm.

World Service Newdigate House, Castle Gate, NG1 6AF 0115 847 5587, worldservicerestaurant.com; map. Chic restaurant with bags of decorative flair in charming premises up near the castle, complete with a delightful terrace. A Modern British menu, including delights like rack of lamb with butternut squash, is prepared with imagin­ation and flair. In the evenings, mains start around £20, but there are great deals at lunchtimes (two-course set menu £17). Mon–Fri noon–2pm & 7–10pm, Sat noon–2pm & 6.30–10pm, Sun noon–3.30pm.

Drinking and nightlife

Central Nottingham’s pubs literally heave on the weekend and are not for the faint-hearted – and anyone over thirty years old may well feel somewhat marooned. That said, there are several particularly engaging places amid all the argy-bargy.

Boilermaker 36 Carlton St, NG1 1NN 0115 986 6333, boilermakerbar.co.uk; map. Don’t be deterred by the glum, anonymous exterior, this is Nottingham’s coolest cocktail bar, set in a large, almost shed-like space with boho decor – and it has superb cocktails. First come, first served, so come early. Mon–Fri 5pm–1am, Sat 2pm–1am, Sun 7pm–1am.

Broadway Cinema Bar Broadway Cinema, 14 Broad St, NG1 3AL 0115 952 6611, broadway.org.uk; map. Informal, fashionable (in an arty sort of way) bar serving an eclectic assortment of bottled beers to a cinema-keen clientele. Filling, inexpensive bar food too. Much to its credit, Broadway has played a key role in boosting Nottingham’s creative credentials – hence the city’s clutch of artist-led collectives. Mon–Wed 9am–11pm, Thurs 9am–midnight, Fri & Sat 9am–1am, Sun 10am–11pm.

Lincolnshire Poacher 161 Mansfield Rd, NG1 3FR 0115 941 1584, castlerockbrewery.co.uk/pubs/lincolnshire-poacher; map. Popular and relaxed pub, where the decor is pleasantly traditional and the customers take their real ales (fairly) seriously. About half a mile from the Market Square. Mon–Wed 11am–11pm, Thurs & Fri 11am–midnight, Sat 10.30am–midnight, Sun noon–11pm.

Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem Brewhouse Yard, NG1 6AD 0115 947 3171, triptojerusalem.com; map. Carved into the sandstone cliff below the castle, this ancient inn – said to be the oldest in England – may well have been a meeting point for soldiers gathering for the Third Crusade. Its cave-like bars, with their rough sandstone ceilings and antique furniture, are delightfully secretive and there’s a good range of ales too. Mon–Thurs & Sun 11am–11pm, Fri & Sat 11am–midnight.

Entertainment

Broadway Cinema 14 Broad St, NG1 3AL 0115 952 6611, broadway.org.uk; map. The best cinema in the city, featuring a mixed bag of mainstream and avant-garde films.

Motorpoint Arena & National Ice Centre Bolero Square, Lace Market, NG1 1LA 0843 373 3000, motorpointarenanottingham.com; national-ice-centre.com; map. Major performance venue that seems to change its name (and sponsor) with surprising regularity. Big-name acts perform here – from music through to shows and comedy. The Arena is inside the National Ice Centre, with its prime ice-skating facilities.

Nottingham Playhouse Wellington Circus, NG1 5AF 0115 941 9419, nottinghamplayhouse.co.uk; map. Long-established theatre offering a wide-ranging programme of plays – Shakespeare through to Ayckbourn – plus dance, music and comedy, often with a local twist or theme. There’s also a delightful piece of modern art beside the entrance – Anish Kapoor’s whopping, reflective Sky Mirror.

Theatre Royal & Royal Concert Hall Theatre Square, NG1 5ND 0115 989 5555, trch.co.uk; map. Two venues with one set of contact details: the Theatre Royal is an attractive, well-maintained Victorian theatre and the nearby Concert Hall dates from the 1980s. Many of the big names in live music, both popular and classical, play at one or the other.

Shopping

Five Leaves Bookshop 14a Long Row, NG1 2DH 0115 837 3097, fiveleavesbookshop.co.uk; map. UK bookshops may be having a bumpy ride, but this new and independent place bucks the trend, with a well-chosen selection of titles with a radical twist. Down an alley opposite the tourist office. Mon–Sat 10am–­5.30pm, Sun noon–4pm.

Paul Smith 20 Low Pavement, NG1 7DN 0115 968 5990, paulsmith.co.uk; map. Nottingham’s Paul Smith (b.1946) worked in a clothing factory as a young man, but only developed a passion for art and design after a bike accident left him incapacitated for six months. He opened his first small shop on Byard Lane in 1970, since when he has gone on to become one of the major success stories of contem­porary British fashion, his trademark multicoloured stripes proving popular on every continent. The Byard Lane shop closed in 2017 but the flagship store on Low Pavement is worth a visit. Both shops: Mon–Sat 10am–6pm, Sun 11am–5pm.

Rough Trade 5 Broad St, NG1 3AJ 0115 896 4012, roughtrade.com; map. To have a Rough Trade outlet here in Nottingham is a real coup – take your pick from the stacks of vinyl and selected books on the ground floor or visit the dimly lit café up above. Mon–Sat 10am–8pm, Sun 11am–7pm.

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Northern Nottinghamshire

Rural northern Nottinghamshire, with its gentle rolling landscapes and large ducal estates, was transformed in the nineteenth century by coal – deep, wide seams of the stuff that spawned dozens of collieries, and colliery towns, stretching up across the county and on into Yorkshire. Today, the mines have all gone, their passing marked only by the occasional pithead winding wheel, left, bleak and solitary, to commemorate the thousands of men who laboured here.

The suddenness of the pit closure programme imposed by Thatcher and her Conservative administration in the 1980s and 1990s knocked the stuffing out of the area, but one prop of its slow revival has been the tourist industry. The countryside in between these former mining communities holds several enjoyable attractions, the best known of which is Sherwood Forest – or at least the patchy remains of it – with one chunk of woodland preserved in the Sherwood Forest National Nature Reserve, supposedly where Robin Hood did his canoodling with Maid Marian. Byron is a pipsqueak in the celebrity stakes by comparison with Robin, but his family home – Newstead Abbey – is here too, as is Hardwick Hall, a handsome Elizabethan mansion built at the behest of one of the most powerful women of her day, Bess of Hardwick (1521–1608). Newstead Abbey and Hardwick Hall are publicly owned, but a third estate, Welbeck Abbey, remains in ducal hands and it’s here that you’ll find the excellent and enjoyable Harley Gallery.

Newstead Abbey

Ravenshead, NG15 8NA, 10 miles north of Nottingham on the A60 • House Sat, Sun & some hols noon–4pm; last entry 1hr before closing • £8 • Gardens & grounds Daily 9am–5pm or dusk • Vehicles £6; pedestrians & cyclists £1 • 01623 455900, newsteadabbey.org.uk • A regular Pronto bus (every 20min; 40min; 01773 712265, trentbarton.co.uk) leaves Nottingham’s Victoria bus station for Mansfield, and stops at the gates of Newstead Abbey

In 1539, Newstead Abbey was granted by Henry VIII to Sir John Byron, who demolished most of the church and converted the monastic buildings into a family home. Much later, in 1798, Lord Byron (1788–1824) inherited the estate, but by then it was little more than a ruin; he restored part of the complex during his six-year residence (1808–14), but most of the present structure actually dates from later renovations, which maintained much of the shape and feel of the medieval original while creating the warren-like mansion that exists today.

Inside, a string of intriguing period rooms begins with the neo-Gothic Great Hall and Byron’s bedroom (one of the few rooms to look pretty much like it did when he lived here) and then continues on into the Library, which holds a collection of the poet’s possessions, from letters and an inkstand through to his pistols and boxing gloves. A further room contains a set of satirical, cartoon-like watercolours entitled The Wonderful History of Lord Byron & His Dog by his friend Elizabeth Pigot – there’s a portrait of the self-same dog, Boatswain, in the south gallery, and a conspicuous memorial bearing an absurdly extravagant inscription to the mutt in the delightful walled garden at the back of the house. Beyond the house lie the main gardens, a secretive and subtle combination of lake, Gothic waterfalls, yew tunnels and Japanese-style rockeries, complete with idiosyncratic pagodas.

Sherwood Forest

The main entrance to the Sherwood Forest National Nature Reserve is half a mile north of Edwinstowe village, about 20 miles north of Nottingham via the A614 • Daily dawn–dusk • Free, but parking £3 (April–Dec only) • 01623 823202, nottinghamshire.gov.uk • The Sherwood Arrow bus (stagecoachbus.com) links Nottingham’s Victoria bus station with Worksop via the visitor centre (hourly; 1hr)

Most of Sherwood Forest, once a vast royal woodland of oak, birch and bracken covering all of northern Nottinghamshire, was cleared in the eighteenth century. It’s difficult today to imagine the protection all the greenery provided for generations of outlaws, the most famous of whom was of course Robin Hood. There’s no “true story” of Robin’s life – the earliest reference to him, in Langland’s Piers Plowman of 1377, treats him as a fiction – but to the balladeers of fifteenth-century England, who invented most of Hood’s folklore, this was hardly the point. For them, he was a symbol of yeoman decency, a semi-mythological opponent of corrupt clergymen and evil officers of the law; in the early tales, Robin may show sympathy for the peasant, but he has rather more respect for the decent nobleman, and he’s never credited with robbing the rich to give to the poor. This and other parts of the legend, such as Maid Marian and Friar Tuck, were added later.

Robin Hood may lack historical authenticity, but it hasn’t discouraged the county council from spending thousands of pounds sustaining the Major Oak, the creaky tree where Maid Marian and Robin are supposed to have plighted their troth. The Major Oak is on a pleasant one-mile woodland walk that begins beside the visitor centre at the main entrance to Sherwood Forest National Nature Reserve, which comprises 450 acres of ancient gnarled oak and silver birch crisscrossed with footpaths.

Welbeck Abbey

Welbeck, Worksop, S80 3LW, about 25 miles north of Nottingham or 2 miles north of Cuckney • Harley Gallery Mon–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun 10am–4pm • Free • Portland Collection Daily 11am–4pm • Free • Welbeck Abbey tours Aug to early Sept 3 daily; 1hr 30min; book ahead • £18 • Welbeck Abbey extended tours Early Sept 2 daily; 2hr 30min; book ahead • £26.50 • 01909 501700, harleygallery.co.uk

Firmly in ducal hands, the picturesque stone buildings of the Welbeck Abbey estate are dotted over a large chunk of land to the northwest of Edwinstowe. Here, on the western edge of the estate, the old gasworks has been tastefully turned into the pocket-sized Harley Gallery, which hosts changing exhibitions by contemporary artists, while the adjacent Portland Collection showcases an appealing assortment of ducal knick-knacks, from portraits, cameos and rare books to silverware and paintings, all regularly rotated. Locally at least, the most famous member of the family, whose various branches are named Cavendish, Portland and Newcastle, was the Fifth Duke of Portland (1800–79), known as the “burrowing duke” for the maze of gas-lit tunnels that he built underneath his estate – they are still there, but not open to the public. Naturally enough, many thought he was bonkers, but the truth may be far more complex; Mick Jackson’s novel The Underground Man portrays the duke as shy and haunted by his obsessions. Across from the gallery, there is also a café and a first-rate farm shop, which attracts happy eaters from far and wide, and it’s also possible to visit the main house on a guided tour (extended tours also available in early Sept), which takes in several Edwardian rooms plus the rather splendid eighteenth-century Great Hall.

Hardwick Hall

Doe Lea, Chesterfield, Derbyshire, S44 5QJ • Hardwick Hall & gardens Wed–Sun: Mid-Feb to Oct 11am–5pm; mid-Nov to mid-Dec 11am–3pm • Hall & gardens £14; gardens only £7; NT • Parkland Daily 9am–6pm (or dusk if sooner) • Free, but parking £4; NT • 01246 850430, nationaltrust.org.uk/hardwick-hall • Hardwick Old Hall April–Sept Wed–Sun 10am–6pm; Oct Wed–Sun 10am–5pm; Nov–March Sat & Sun (daily in school hols) 10am–4pm • £6.50; EH • 01246 850431, www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/hardwick-old-hall • No public transport; by car via M1 (Junction 29, then signposted from roundabout at the top of the slip road)

Born the daughter of a minor Derbyshire squire, Elizabeth, Countess of Shrewsbury (1527–1608) – aka Bess of Hardwick – became one of the leading figures of Elizabethan England, renowned for her political and business acumen. She had a penchant for building and her major achievement, Hardwick Hall, begun when she was 62, has survived in amazingly good condition. The house was the epitome of fashion, a balance of symmetry and ingenious detail in which the building’s rectangular lines are offset by line upon line of windows – there’s actually more glass than stone – while up above, her giant-sized initials (E.S.) hog every roof line.

The highlights of the labyrinthine mansion are on its top floor (closed late Dec), home to the breathtaking High Great Chamber, where Bess received her most distinguished guests. The Chamber boasts an extraordinary, brightly painted plaster frieze celebrating the goddess Diana, the virgin huntress – designed, of course, to please the Virgin Queen herself. Next door, the Long Gallery features eye-catching furnishings and fittings, from splendid chimneypieces and tapestries through to a set of portraits, including one each of the queen and Bess. Bess could exercise here while keeping out of the sun – at a time when any hint of a tan was considered decidedly plebeian.

Outside, the garden makes for a pleasant wander and, beyond the ha-ha, rare breeds of cattle and sheep graze the parkland. Finally – and rather confusingly – Hardwick Hall is next to Hardwick Old Hall, Bess’s previous home, but now little more than a broken-down if substantial ruin (combined tickets are available; £20).

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Southwell

SOUTHWELL, some fourteen miles northeast of Nottingham, is a well-heeled little town distinguished by Southwell Minster, whose perky twin towers are visible for miles around, and by the fine Georgian mansions facing it along Church Street.

Southwell Minster

Church St, NG25 0HD • Mon–Sat 8am–6pm or dusk; Sun hours depend on services • Free, but £5 donation requested • 01636 812649 • southwellminster.org

The Normans built Southwell Minster at the beginning of the twelfth century and, although some elements were added later, their design predominates, from the imposing west towers to the dog-tooth decoration and the clerestory’s bull’s-eye windows. Inside, the splendid Norman nave leads to the north transept, where there’s a fine alabaster tomb of Archbishop Sandys, who died in 1588; the red-flecked alabaster effigy is so precise that you can see the furrows on his brow and the crow’s feet round his eyes. His children are depicted kneeling below; it’s assumed that Sandys was one of the first bishops to marry – and beget – after the break with Rome changed the rules. Beyond the nave, the choir is Early English and a side door leads through to the remarkable chapter house, which is embellished with naturalistic foliage from the late thirteenth century – some of the earliest carving of its type in England.

Southwell Workhouse

Upton Road, NG25 0PT • Mid-Feb to Oct daily noon–5pm • £8.65; NT • 01636 817260, nationaltrust.org.uk/the-workhouse-southwell

About a mile from the minster, on the edge of town out on the road to Newark, stands Southwell Workhouse, a substantial three-storey brick building that looks like a prison, but is in fact a rare survivor of the Victorian workhouses that once dotted every corner of the country. Most were knocked down or redeveloped years ago, but this one remained almost untouched, though its bare rooms and barred windows make the whole experience rather depressing.

Arrival and departure: Southwell

By bus There are regular NCT (Nottingham City Transport; nctx.co.uk) buses to Southwell from King Street in central Nottingham; buses stop near the minster.

Eating

Saracen’s Head Market Place, NG25 0HE 01636 812701, saracensheadhotel.com. Metres from the Minster is the rambling Saracen’s Head, which dates back to the fourteenth century and has one major claim to fame: it was here that Charles I spent a sleepless night before being handed over to his enemies in Newark (see opposite). Several of the downstairs rooms have been restored to their original half-timbered appearance, with furniture and fittings to match – a pleasant spot for lunch (mains average £10) or afternoon tea (Fri–Sun 2–5pm; £13). Mon–Sat noon–2.30pm & 5–8pm, Sun 6–8pm.

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Newark

From Nottingham, it’s about twenty miles northeast to NEWARK, an old and really rather good-looking river port and market town that was once a major staging point on the Great North Road. Fronting the town as you approach from the west are the gaunt riverside ruins of Newark Castle (daily dawn–dusk; free), all that’s left of the mighty medieval fortress that was pounded to pieces during the Civil War by the Parliamentarians. Opposite, just across the street to the north, is former Ossington Coffee Palace, a flashy structure whose Tudor appearance is entirely fraudulent – it was built in the 1880s as a temperance hotel by a local bigwig, in an effort to save drinkers from themselves. From here, it’s just a couple of minutes’ walk east through a network of narrow lanes and alleys to the Market Place, an expansive square framed by attractive Georgian and Victorian facades.

Church of St Mary Magdalene

Church Walk, NG24 1JS • Mon–Sat 8.30am–4pm, but often closed for lunch; May–Sept also Sun noon–4pm • Free • 01636 706473

Standing just off the Market Place, the mostly thirteenth-century church of St Mary Magdalene is a handsome if badly weathered structure whose massive spire (236ft) soars high above the town centre. Inside, look out for the pair of medieval Dance of Death panel paintings, behind the reredos in the choir’s Markham Chantry Chapel. One panel has a well-to-do man slipping his hand into his purse, the other shows a ghoulish, carnation-carrying skeleton pointing to the grave – an obvious reminder to observers of their mortality.

National Civil War Centre

14 Appletongate, NG24 1JY • Daily: April–Sept 10am–5pm; Oct–March 10am–4pm • £8 • 01636 655765, nationalcivilwarcentre.com

Newark played a leading role in the Civil War as a Royalist stronghold, and endured three Parliamentary sieges. The National Civil War Centre, housed in a thoroughly refurbished former school behind St Mary Magdalene, describes these military comings and goings in some detail, all illuminated by short films and a few archeological bits and pieces. The Centre also has details of Newark’s Civil War Trail, which takes in those local sites associated with the conflict, most notably the Queen’s Sconce, the well-preserved, star-shaped, earthen fortification on the southwest side of town near the River Trent.

Arrival and information: Newark

By train Newark has two train stations: Newark Castle on the Nottingham–Lincoln line is on the west side of the River Trent, a 5min walk from the castle, while the larger Newark North Gate station, on the main London–Edinburgh line, is to the northeast of the centre at the far end of Appletongate.

Destinations Lincoln (1–2 hourly; 30min); London (every 30min; 1hr 30min); Nottingham (2 hourly; 30min).

By bus Newark bus station is on Lombard St, on the south side of the town centre.

Destinations Nottingham (2 hourly; 1hr); Southwell (hourly; 30min).

Tourist office In the National Civil War Centre (daily: April–Sept 10am–5pm, Oct–March 10am–4pm; 01636 655765).

Eating and drinking

Gannets 35 Castlegate, NG24 1AZ 01636 702066, gannetsinnewark.co.uk. This bright and breezy modern café/restaurant has been popular with locals for the last few decades. It’s an informal sort of place with shared tables and a wide-ranging, well-priced menu, in which the salads and bakes are special highlights, though there is much more – lasagnes, risottos, jacket potatoes and a real local favourite, the carrot cake. Also caters to most dietary requirements. Mon–Fri & Sun 8.30am–4pm, Sat 8.30am–5pm.

Leicester

At first glance, LEICESTER, some 25 miles south of Nottingham, seems a resolutely modern city, but further inspection reveals traces of its medieval and Roman past as a settlement on the Fosse Way (now the A46) linking Exeter and Lincoln. In 2012, Leicester’s national profile was boosted by the discovery of the remains of Richard III beneath a council car park in the centre – the body was originally brought here after the Battle of Bosworth Field. There followed a prolonged legal battle with York as to who should keep the king’s skeleton, but Leicester won and the body has now been reinterred in Leicester Cathedral. This was, however, small beer compared with Leicester’s general delirium when their football team won the English Premier League title in 2016, at odds which started out at 5000/1.

Skeleton and football apart, it’s probably fair to say that Leicester has a reputation for looking rather glum, but the centre is on the move, with the addition of Highcross, a large and glitzy shopping centre, and the creation of a Cultural Quarter equipped with both a flashy performance venue, Curve Theatre, and a first-rate independent cinema, the Phoenix. The star attractions are, however, the New Walk Museum and Art Gallery, which features an exemplary collection of German Expressionist paintings, and the intriguing King Richard III Visitor Centre. Leicester is also distinctive in its make-up: more than a third of the population is Asian and indeed the city elected England’s first Asian MP, Keith Vaz, in 1987. The traditional focus of the Asian community is Belgrave Road and its environs, an area of terraced houses about a mile to the northeast of the centre.

Leicester’s finest festivals

The crowded terraced streets on and around Belgrave Road are the hub for the city’s principal Hindu festival, Diwali (visitleicester.info), the Festival of Light, held in October or November, when thousands of lamps illuminate proceedings. In addition, the city’s sizeable African-Caribbean community holds England’s second-biggest street festival (after Notting Hill Carnival). It’s called the Leicester Caribbean Carnival (facebook.com/LeicesterCaribbeanCarnival), and it’s held on the first weekend in August.

Brief history

The Romans chose this site beside the River Soar to keep an eye on the rebellious Corieltauvi, constructing a fortified town here beside the Fosse Way in about 47 AD. Later, the Emperor Hadrian kitted the place out with huge public buildings, though the Danes, who overran the area in the eighth century, were not overly impressed and didn’t even bother to pilfer much of the stone. Later still, the town’s medieval castle became the base of the earls of Leicester, the most distinguished of whom was Simon de Montfort, who forced Henry III to convene the first English Parliament in 1265. Since the late seventeenth century, Leicester has been a centre of the hosiery trade and it was this industry that attracted a stream of Asian immigrants to settle here from the 1950s onwards.

The Clock Tower and around

The most conspicuous buildings in Leicester’s bustling centre are the two large shopping centres, the ultramodern Highcross and the clumpy Haymarket, but the proper landmark is the Victorian Clock Tower of 1868, standing in front of the Haymarket and marking the spot where seven streets meet. One of the seven is Cheapside, which leads to Leicester’s open-air market (Mon–Sat), one of the best in the country and the place where the young Gary Lineker, now the UK’s best-known football pundit, worked on the family stall. Good-hearted Gary remains a popular figure hereabouts and has been made a freeman of the city, which, among other things, gives him the right to graze his sheep in front of the town hall. Another of the seven streets is Silver Street (subsequently Guildhall Lane), which passes through The Lanes, where a medley of small, independent shops gives this part of the centre real character.

Leicester Cathedral

St Martin’s, LE1 5PZ • Mon–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun 12.30–2.30pm (dependent on services) • Free, suggested donation £3 • 0116 261 5200, leicestercathedral.org

Abutting Guildhall Lane is Leicester Cathedral, a much-modified eleventh-century structure incorporating two finely carved porches – a stone one at the front and an earlier timber version at the rear. The interior, with its clutch of Gothic arches, holds several interesting side chapels, in one of which is a splendid wooden tabernacle, as well as the conspicuous stone tomb of Richard III.

King Richard III Visitor Centre

4a St Martin’s, LE1 5DB • Mon–Fri & Sun 10am–4pm, Sat & bank hols 10am–5pm • £8.95 • 0300 300 0900, kriii.com

Across the street from the cathedral, Leicester’s old Grammar School is a substantial Victorian redbrick that has been turned into the ambitious King Richard III Visitor Centre after the royal body was discovered in 2012 beneath the adjoining car park, where Greyfriars church had once stood. The Centre has four distinct sections. The first examines Richard’s reign and the battle of Bosworth Field that ended it; the second explores the nature of Richard’s disability – he suffered from curvature of the spine – and relates the story of how the body was discovered, a remarkable tale in itself. The third section comprises a replica of Richard’s skeleton with the various wounds the king suffered at the Battle of Bosworth Field clearly observable. This is really intriguing stuff – and it’s all immaculately presented. The fourth and final section gives visitors the chance to peer down into the makeshift grave where the body was found.

The Jewry Wall

A five-minute stroll from the cathedral, beside the large St Nicholas Circle roundabout, you’ll spot the conspicuous church of St Nicholas; beside that, in a small dell, lie the foundations of Emperor Hadrian’s public baths, which culminate in the Jewry Wall, a substantial chunk of Roman masonry some 18ft high and 73ft long. The baths were a real irritation to the emperor: the grand scheme was spoilt by the engineers, who miscalculated the line of the aqueduct that was to pipe in the water, and so bathers had to rely on a hand-filled cistern replenished from the river – not what Hadrian had in mind at all.

Castle Gardens and around

Near the Roman ruins, Castle Gardens is a narrow strip of a park that runs alongside a canalized portion of the River Soar. It’s a pleasant spot and one that incorporates the overgrown mound where Leicester’s Norman castle motte once stood. Beyond the motte, at the far end of Castle Gardens, you emerge on The Newarke; turn left and follow the road round, and in a jiffy you’ll reach Castle View, a narrow lane spanned by the Turret Gateway, a rare survivor of the city’s medieval castle. Just beyond the gateway is St Mary de Castro, a rambling old church with a chunky crocketed tower; curiously, Chaucer may well have got married here.

New Walk Museum and Art Gallery

53–55 New Walk, LE1 7EA • Mon–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun 11am–5pm • Free • 0116 225 4900, visitleicester.info

The New Walk is a long and agreeable pedestrianized promenade that’s home to the city’s best museum, the New Walk Museum and Art Gallery. The museum covers a lot of ground, from dinosaurs to geology and beyond, but one highlight is its collection of Ancient Egyptian artefacts, featuring mummies and hieroglyphic tablets brought back to Leicester in the 1880s. The museum also holds an enjoyable collection of paintings and, although these are rotated regularly, you’re likely to see a good range of works by British artists as well as an outstanding collection of German Expressionist works, mostly sketches, woodcuts and lithographs by artists such as Otto Dix and George Grosz.

The National Space Centre

Exploration Drive, LE4 5NS, 2 miles north of the city centre, off the A6 • Mon–Fri 10am–4pm, Sat & Sun 10am–5pm • £14, under-17s £11 • 0116 261 0261, spacecentre.co.uk • Bus #54 links the train station with Abbey Lane, a 5min walk from the Space Centre

On the outskirts of Leicester, the National Space Centre is devoted to all things astronom­ical, with a string of themed galleries plus a planetarium and a 135m-high Rocket Tower. The emphasis is on the interactive, which makes the place very popular with kids.

Arrival and information: Leicester

By train Leicester train station is on London Rd, on the southeast edge of the city centre.

Destinations Birmingham (every 30min; 1hr); Lincoln (hourly; 2hr); London (every 30min; 1hr 15min); Nottingham (every 30min; 30min); Oakham (hourly; 30min); Stamford (hourly; 40min).

By bus St Margaret’s bus station is on the north side of the centre, just off Gravel St.

Destinations Ashby-de-la-Zouch (hourly; 1hr 20min); Market Bosworth (hourly; 1hr 10min).

Tourist office In the centre at 51 Gallowtree Gate (Mon–Sat 9.30am–5.30pm, Sun 10am–4pm; 0116 299 4444, visitleicester.info).

Accommodation

Belmont Hotel 20 De Montfort Square, LE1 7GR 0116 254 4773, belmonthotel.co.uk; map. A particularly pleasant and proficient hotel in an attractively modernized Victorian property, about 300yd south of the train station via London Rd. Independently owned, it’s popular with business folk and tourists alike, and the 74 rooms vary in size and character, though all are extremely well-appointed. £100

Maiyango 13–21 St Nicholas Place, LE1 4LD 0116 251 8898, maiyango.com; map. This small, independent hotel has fourteen slick modern rooms, each with bespoke artwork and handmade furniture. Their “superior” rooms have rain showers, whereas the larger “deluxe” rooms opt for walk-in wet rooms and bathtubs – and both have king-size beds. The hotel is also in a handy location, a brief walk from Leicester’s main sights and shopping centres. There’s a first-rate restaurant on site, too (see below). £170

Eating

Bobbys 154 Belgrave Rd, LE4 5AT 0116 266 0106, eatatbobbys.com; map. In operation for more than forty years, Bobbys is something of a local institution. It’s an unpretentious, family-run place with simple decor, where they serve all things vegetarian; £15 will cover a meal for two. At the junction with MacDonald Road. Mon–Fri 11am–10pm, Sat & Sun 10am–10pm.

I Buongustai 82 Granby St, LE1 1DJ 0116 367 0511, facebook.com/BuongustaiLeicester; map. Unusual little café – with just three tables and takeaway – that specializes in Italian street food at bargain prices. The calzone, for instance cost just £3, and very tasty they are too. Mon–Fri 9am–5.30pm & Sat 9am–4pm.

Kayal 153 Granby St, LE1 6FE 0116 255 4667, kayalrestaurant.com; map. Outstanding South Indian restaurant offering a well-conceived menu covering all the classic dishes and then some – try the Kayal fish curry (£12), or the Njandu crab curry (£14), influenced by Portuguese seafarers. In a handy location near the train station. Mon–Fri noon–3pm & 6–11pm, Sat & Sun noon–10pm.

Maiyango 13–21 St Nicholas Place, LE1 4LD 0116 251 8898, maiyango.com; map. Chi-chi lounge-bar and restaurant beneath the hotel of the same name (see above). The restaurant zeroes in on local, seasonal ingredients and the menu is wide-ranging – try the parmesan and truffle spelt risotto, for example, or the soy-marinated trout. Afterwards, you can relax in the rooftop terrace bar. Mains average £18. Restaurant: Mon–Wed 6–11pm, Thurs & Fri noon–2pm & 6–11pm, Sat noon–midnight, Sun noon–4pm & 6–11pm.

Drinking

Globe 43 Silver St, LE1 5EU 0116 253 9492, www.eversosensible.com/globe; map. Popular and traditional pub in an attractive old building at the heart of the city. Smashing range of real ales, and filling bar food too. Mon–Thurs & Sun 11am–11pm, Fri & Sat 11am–1am.

Taps 10 Guildhall Lane, LE1 5FQ 0116 253 0904, taps-leicester.com; map. Inventive bar and restaurant, whose main claim to fame is the beer taps at many of the tables – help yourself and pay later (yes, the taps are monitored as they dispense). Excellent range of bottled beers too, plus vaulted cellars that date back yonks, and an above-average menu – lamb shank with mash and apricot gravy, for example, for just £15. Mon–Sat noon–11.30pm.

Entertainment

Curve Rutland St, LE1 1SB 0116 242 3595, curveonline.co.uk; map. The heart of the Cultural Quarter, Curve is Leicester’s leading performing arts venue, offering a varied programme from within its startlingly dramatic glass facade.

Phoenix 4 Midland St, LE1 1TG 0116 242 2800, www.phoenix.org.uk; map. Just a couple of minutes’ walk from Curve, the Phoenix is an outstanding art-house cinema, one of the best in the Midlands.

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Leicestershire

Shaped rather like a fox’s head, Leicestershire is perhaps one of the more anonymous of the English shires, its undulating landscapes comprising an apparently haphazard mix of the industrial, post-industrial and rural with Leicester itself plumb in the middle. The star turn is the pretty little village of Market Bosworth, or rather the neighbouring Bosworth Battlefield Heritage Centre, near where – at the Battle of Bosworth Field – Richard III met a sticky and untimely end in 1485. Less well known are the county’s most intriguing church, St Mary and St Hardulph, perched high above tiny Breedon-on-the-Hill, and Calke Abbey, technically over the boundary in Derbyshire and not an abbey at all, but an intriguing country house whose faded charms bear witness to the declining fortunes of the landed gentry.

Market Bosworth

The thatched cottages and Georgian houses of pocket-sized MARKET BOSWORTH, some thirteen miles west of Leicester, fan out from a dinky Market Place, which was an important trading centre throughout the Middle Ages. From the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, the dominant family hereabouts were the Dixies, merchant-landlords who were not universally admired: the young Samuel Johnson, who taught at the Dixie Grammar School – its elongated facade still abuts the Market Place – disliked the founder, Sir Wolstan Dixie, so much that he recalled his time there “with the strongest aversion and even a sense of horror”. The Dixies mostly ended up at the Church of St Peter (daily 8.30am–dusk), a sturdy structure just north of Market Place, whose chancel holds the early eighteenth-century tomb of John Dixie, one-time rector, who is honoured by a long hagiographic plaque and the striking effigy of his weeping sister.

Bosworth Field

Sutton Cheney, Nuneaton, CV13 0AD, just south of Market Bosworth • Heritage Centre Daily: April–Oct 10am–5pm; Nov–March 10am–4pm • £8.95 • 01455 290429, bosworthbattlefield.org.uk • The Centre is clearly signed, but there is also an unsigned, 2km-long lane from the south side of Market Bosworth’s Market Place

Market Bosworth is best known for the Battle of Bosworth Field, which was fought on hilly countryside near the village in 1485. This was the last and most decisive battle of the Wars of the Roses, an interminably long-winded and bitterly violent conflict among the nobility for control of the English Crown. The victor was Henry Tudor, subsequently Henry VII, and he defeated Richard III (1452–85), who famously died on the battlefield. In desperation, Shakespeare’s villainous Richard cried out “A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse,” but in fact the defeated king seems to have been a much more phlegmatic character. Taking a glass of water before the fighting started, he actually said, “I live a king: if I die, I die a king”. What happened to Richard’s body after the battle was long a matter of conjecture, but in 2012 his skeleton was unearthed in the centre of Leicester beneath a council car park.

The Pork Pie: a gastronomic delight?

Melton Mowbray, some eighteen miles northeast of Leicester, is famous for its pork pies, an extraordinarily popular English delicacy made of compressed balls of meat and gristle encased in wobbly jelly and thick pastry. To many, the pie’s appeal is unaccountable, but in 2009 the EU accorded the pie Protected Geographical Status, a coveted designation if ever there was one. Pork pies were the traditional repast of the foxhunting fraternity, for whom Melton Mowbray was long a favourite haunt. The antics of some of the aristocratic huntsmen are legend – in 1837 the Marquis of Waterford literally painted the town’s buildings red, hence the saying. Today, connoisseurs swear by the pork pies of Dickinson & Morris and, although their products are widely distributed, you may want to go to their shop at 10 Nottingham St, just off the Market Place (Mon–Sat 8am–5pm; porkpie.co.uk), to sample (or gawp at) the full range, from the tiny to the enormous.

The Bosworth Battlefield Heritage Centre features a lucid and well-illustrated description of the battle and explains its historical context in intriguing detail. There is also a section on recent archeological efforts to verify the actual site of the battle: when it was set up in the 1970s, the Heritage Centre followed eighteenth-century tradition in claiming that the battle took place on adjacent Ambion Hill and a circular 1.5-mile Battle Trail was laid out accordingly. In the event, it turns out that the battlefield was actually a couple of miles further west in marshy ground on what is now private land, so there has been some tinkering; the Battle Trail now offers views over to the actual battlefield, and it does still make for an enjoyable ramble. On the way you’ll pass King Richard’s Well, a rough cairn where the king was supposed to have had his final drink. Pick up a trail map at the Heritage Centre before you set out.

Arrival and departure: Market Bosworth

By bus There are regular services from Leicester to Market Bosworth’s Market Place (hourly; 1hr 10min).

Accommodation and eating

Softleys 2 Market Place, CV13 0LE 01455 290464, softleys.com. In the centre of the village, this first-rate, family-run hotel has three well-appointed bedrooms decorated in a homely version of country-house style. The rooms serve as an adjunct to the restaurant, where the menu is lively, creative and locally sourced wherever possible – the lamb is especially good. Mains average around £19. Tues–Thurs noon–1.45pm & 6.30–9pm, Fri & Sat noon–1.45pm & 6.30–9.30pm, Sun noon–2.30pm. £100

Calke Abbey

Near the hamlet of Ticknall, DE73 7LE • House Early March to Oct daily 11am–5pm • £13.50 (includes gardens and park); NT; timed tickets only • Gardens Feb–Oct daily 10am–5pm • £9.10 (includes park); NT • Park Daily 7.30am–7.30pm (dusk if sooner) • £3.60; NT • 01332 863822, nationaltrust.org.uk/calke-abbey • No public transport

The eighteenth-century facade of Calke Abbey, set deep in the countryside about 25 miles northwest of Leicester, is all self-confidence, its acres of dressed stone and three long lines of windows polished off with an imposing Greek Revival portico. This all cost oodles of money and the Harpurs, and then the Harpur-Crewes, who owned the estate, were doing very well until the finances of the English country estate changed after World War I. Then they simply hung on, becoming the epitome of faded gentility and refusing to make all but the smallest of changes – though they did finally plump for electricity in 1962. In 1985, the estate was passed to the National Trust, who decided not to bring in the restorers and have kept the house in its dishevelled state – and this is its real charm.

In the house, the entrance hall sets the scene, its walls decorated with ancient, moth-eaten stuffed heads from the family’s herd of prize cattle. Beyond is the Caricature Room, whose walls are lined with satirical drawings, some by the leading cartoonists of their day. Further on are more animal heads and glass cabinets of stuffed birds in the capacious Saloon; an intensely cluttered Miss Havisham-like Drawing Room; a chaotic at-home School Room; and an endearingly dilapidated top floor. After you’ve finished in the house, you can stroll out into the gardens, pop into the Victorian estate church, and wander through wooded parkland.

Breedon-on-the-Hill

Sitting pretty just off the A42, some 9km from Calke Abbey, the hamlet of BREEDON-ON-THE-HILL lies at the foot of the large, partly quarried hill from which it takes its name. A steep footpath and a winding, half-mile byroad lead up from the village to the summit, from where there are commanding views over the surrounding countryside. The site of an Iron Age hillfort and an eighth-century Anglo-Saxon monastery, today the hill provides a grand setting for the village’s fascinating church.

Church of St Mary and St Hardulph

DE73 8AJ • Daily 9.30am–4pm, sometimes later in summer • Free • 01530 564372, breedonchurches.co.uk • There are no buses to the church; the village is poorly served, too

A sturdy edifice that mostly dates from the thirteenth century, the Church of St Mary and St Hardulph has an evocative interior holding a finely preserved set of Georgian pews, a large and intricately carved box-pew dating to the seventeenth century, and a trio of exquisite alabaster tombs. Even more rare, however, are a number of Anglo-Saxon carvings that include individual saints and prophets as well as panels in which a dense foliage of vines is inhabited by a tangle of animals and humans. The carvings are quite extraordinary, and the fact that the figures look Byzantine rather than Anglo-Saxon has fuelled much academic debate.

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Rutland

To the east of Leicestershire lies Rutland, England’s smallest county – at least when it’s not low tide on the Isle of Wight – a well-heeled pocket of steeply rolling hills just eighteen miles from north to south. Rutland has three places of note: Oakham, the amiable county town, and Uppingham – both rural centres with some elegant Georgian architecture – and the prettier, much smaller ironstone hamlet of Lyddington.

Oakham

The prosperity of OAKHAM, twenty miles east of Leicester, is bolstered by Oakham School, one of the region’s more exclusive private schools, and by its proximity to Rutland Water, a large reservoir whose assorted facilities attract cyclists, ramblers, sailors and birdwatchers by the hundred. Oakham’s stone terraces and Georgian villas are too often interrupted to assume much grace, but the town does have its architectural moments, particularly in the L-shaped Market Place, where a brace of sturdy awnings shelter the old water pump and town stocks, and where Oakham School is housed in a series of impressive ironstone buildings.

Oakham Castle

Market Place, LE15 6DR • Mon & Wed–Sat 10am–4pm, Sun noon–4pm • Free • 01572 757578, oakhamcastle.org

Footsteps from the Market Place stands Oakham Castle, a large banqueting hall that was once part of a twelfth-century fortified house. The hall is a good example of Norman domestic architecture and surrounding the building are the grassy banks of the castle that once protected it. Inside, the whitewashed walls are covered with horseshoes, the result of an ancient custom by which every lord or lady, king or queen, is obliged to present an ornamental horseshoe when they first set foot in the town.

Outdoors at Rutland Water

The gentle waters and easy, green hills of Rutland Water (rutlandwater.org.uk) have made it a major centre for outdoor pursuits. There’s sailing at Rutland Sailing Club (rutlandsc.co.uk); cycle hire with Rutland Cycling (rutlandcycling.com); and a Watersports Centre at Whitwell on the north shore (anglianwater.co.uk). Rutland Water also attracts a wide range of waterfowl, which prompted the establishment of a nature reserve with numerous hides and a Birdwatching Centre (rutlandwater.org.uk/awbc). The reserve is home to a successful Osprey breeding project.

All Saints’ Church

Church St, LE15 6AA • Daily dawn to dusk • Free • 01572 724007, oakhamteam.uk/oakham

A narrow lane leads from the Market Place to All Saints’ Church, whose heavy tower and spire rise high above the town. Dating from the thirteenth century, the church is an architectural hybrid, its solemn interior distinguished by a handsome timber ceiling and intense medieval carvings along the columns of the nave and choir, with Christian scenes and symbols set alongside dragons, grotesques, devils and demons.

Arrival and departure: Oakham

By train Rutland’s only train station is here in Oakham on Station Rd, on the northwest side of town, a 10min walk from Market Place.

Destinations Birmingham (hourly; 1hr 20min); Leicester (hourly; 30min); Melton Mowbray (hourly; 10min); Stamford (hourly; 15min).

By bus The bus station is on John St, just off the High St, a 5min walk west of the Market Place.

Destinations Lyddington (Mon–Sat hourly; 25min); Uppingham (Mon–Sat hourly; 15min).

Accommodation and eating

Castle Cottage Café Church Passage, off Church St, LE15 6DR 01572 757952, castlecottagecafe.co.uk. Cosy little café at the back of All Saints’ Church featuring a tempting range of moderately priced home-made dishes. They do a particularly good line in cakes and salads. Mon–Fri 10am–4pm, Sat 8.30am–4.30pm, plus dinner specials.

Hambleton Hall Hambleton, LE15 7PL 01572 756991, hambletonhall.com. Just a couple of miles from Oakham, overlooking Rutland Water in tiny Hambleton, this opulent hotel occupies an imposing Baronial-Gothic mansion set in its own immaculate grounds. It’s seriously expensive – and seriously luxurious. £300

Uppingham

The High Street, the narrow main street of UPPINGHAM, six miles from Oakham, has the uniformity of style Oakham lacks, its course flanked by motly eighteenth-century bow-fronted shops and ironstone houses. It’s the general appearance that pleases, rather than any individual sight, but the town is famous as the home of Uppingham School, founded in 1587, a bastion of privilege tucked away within imposing, fortress-like buildings.

Arrival and departure: Uppingham

By bus Buses pull in along North St East, just to the north of the High St.

Destinations Lyddington (Mon–Sat hourly; 5min); Oakham (Mon–Sat hourly; 15min).

Accommodation and eating

Lake Isle 16 High St East, LE15 9PZ 01572 822951, lakeisle.co.uk. A tastefully modernized eighteenth-century townhouse, with rooms decorated in a pleasant rendition of traditional style. The restaurant is first-rate too, offering a superb and varied menu from guinea fowl to local venison; main courses average £17. Mon 7–9pm, Tues–Thurs noon–2pm & 7–9pm, Fri & Sat noon–2pm & 6.30–9.30pm, Sun noon–2pm. £90

Lyddington

LYDDINGTON, about two miles south of Uppingham, is a sleepy little village of honey-coloured cottages that straggle along a meandering main street, backed by plump hills and broadleaf woodland. The most conspicuous building here is the Church of St Andrew, whose weathered stonework stands adjacent to Lyddington Bede House (April–Oct Wed–Sun 10am–5pm; £5.40; EH), a beautifully restored set of seventeenth-century almshouses, whose origins were as a country retreat for the bishops of Lincoln. The highlight is the light and airy Great Chamber, with its exquisitely carved oak cornices, but look out also for the tiny ground-floor rooms, which were occupied by impoverished locals until the 1930s.

Arrival and departure: Lyddington

By bus Buses travel along the main street – and there’s a stop outside the Old White Hart.

Destinations Oakham (Mon–Sat hourly; 25min); Uppingham (Mon–Sat hourly; 5min).

Accommodation and eating

Old White Hart 51 Main St, LE15 9LR 01572 821703, oldwhitehart.co.uk. This most convivial of pubs, with its wooden floors and beamed ceilings, occupies a handsome stone building and modern extension in the centre of Lyddington. It has fourteen bright and breezily decorated rooms and serves delicious food, both in the bar and in the restaurant; mains around £14. Mon–Sat noon–2pm & 6.30–9pm, Sun noon–2.30pm. £100

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Northampton

Spreading north from the River Nene, NORTHAMPTON is a workaday town whose modern appearance largely belies its ancient past. Throughout the Middle Ages, this was one of central England’s most important towns, a flourishing commercial hub whose now demolished castle was a popular stopping-off point for travelling royalty. A fire in 1675 burnt most of the medieval city to a cinder, and the Georgian town that grew up in its stead was itself swamped by the Industrial Revolution, when Northampton swarmed with boot- and shoemakers, whose products shod almost everyone in the British Empire. Errol Flynn kitted himself out with several pairs of Northampton shoes and boots when he was in repertory here in 1933, but he annoyed his suppliers no end by hightailing it out of town after a year, leaving a whopping debt behind him – justifying David Niven’s cryptic comment, “You can count on Errol Flynn, he will always let you down”.

Church of All Saints

George Row, NN1 1DF • Mon–Sat 10am–5pm • Free • 01604 632845, allsaintsnorthampton.co.uk

Right in the centre of town, the Church of All Saints is Northampton’s finest building, its unusually secular appearance stemming from its finely proportioned, pillared portico and towered cupola. A statue of a bewigged Charles II in Roman attire surmounts the portico, a (flattering) thank-you for his donation of a thousand tonnes of timber after the Great Fire of 1675 had incinerated the earlier church. Inside, the handsome interior holds a sweeping timber gallery and a quartet of Neoclassical pillars, which lead the eye up to the fancy plasterwork decorating the ceiling.

Northampton Museum and Art Gallery

4 Guildhall Rd, NN1 1DP • Closed till 2018/19 • 01604 838111, northampton.gov.uk/museums

Closed for a thoroughgoing refit and expansion, the Northampton Museum and Art Gallery celebrates the town’s industrial heritage with a wonderful collection of shoes and boots, from silk slippers, clogs and antique court shoes through to riding boots, Ottoman sandals and celebrity footwear.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh House

78 Derngate, NN1 1UH • Feb to mid-Dec Tues–Sun & bank hols 10am–5pm; last entry 4pm • £7.50 • 01604 603407, 78derngate.org.uk

In 1916–17, the Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868–1928), the most celebrated proponent of Art Nouveau in the UK, played a key role in the remodelling of this Northampton house on behalf of two, well-heeled newly-weds, Florence and Wenman Bassett-Lowke. Since the redesign, 78 Derngate – the Charles Rennie Mackintosh House – has had a chequered history, but in recent years it has been painstakingly restored and now shows to fine effect many of the man’s stylistic hallmarks, most notably the strong, almost stern, right angles that are set against the flowing lines of floral-influenced decorative motifs. The adjacent buildings are now part of the site too, holding a café and exhibition space.

Clockwise from top Robin Hood statue outside Nottingham Castle; Calke Abbey; Gibraltar Point

Arrival and information: Northampton

By train Northampton train station is on the western edge of the city centre, a 10min walk from All Saints’ church.

Destinations Birmingham (every 30min; 1hr); London Euston (every 30min; 1hr).

By bus North Gate bus station is on Bradshaw St, a short walk from All Saints, with regular Leicester services (every 30min; 1hr 20min).

Tourist office In the former county courthouse across from All Saints on George Row (Mon–Fri 8am–5.30pm, plus April–Sept Sat 10am–2pm; 01604 367997, northamptonshire.gov.uk).

Eating

Charles Rennie Mackintosh House Café 76 Derngate, NN1 1UH 01604 230166, 78derngate.org.uk. This pleasantly turned-out café offers a straightforward menu of home-cooked dinners – for example, fish and chips (£9) – and afternoon teas. Feb to mid-Dec Tues–Sun 10am–4.30pm.

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Northamptonshire

Running northeast to southwest and sliced by the M1, Northamptonshire holds four medium-sized, semi-industrial towns – Kettering, Corby, Wellingborough and Northampton and a scattering of stone villages set amid rolling countryside. Of the villages, two standouts are the postcard-pretty hamlet of Ashby St Ledgers, and tiny Fotheringhay, where Mary, Queen of Scots came to her untimely end.

Ashby St Ledgers

The Gunpowder Plot (see box below) was hatched in ASHBY ST LEDGERS, immediately to the west of the M1, about fifteen miles northwest of Northampton. Since those heated conversations, nothing much seems to have happened here and the village’s one and only street, flanked by handsome limestone cottages and a patch of ancient grazing land, still leads to the conspiratorial manor house (no access), a beautiful Elizabethan complex set around a wide courtyard. Also of interest is the village church, St Mary and St Leodegarius (no fixed opening times), which contains some wonderful, if faded, medieval murals: the clearest is the large painting in the nave of St Christopher carrying the infant Jesus.

Fotheringhay

Hard to believe today, but FOTHERINGHAY, a delightful hamlet nestling by the River Nene about thirty miles northeast of Northampton, was once an important centre of feudal power with both a weekly market and a castle. The castle was demolished long ago, but the magnificent Church of St Mary and All Saints, rising mirage-like above the green riverine meadows, recalls Fotheringhay’s medieval heyday.

The Gunpowder Plot

Many of England’s Catholics were delighted when the Protestant Queen Elizabeth I died in 1603, but when her successor, James I (1603–25), proved even less sympathetic to their cause, a small group, under the leadership of a certain Robert Catesby, began to plot against the king. The conspirators met here at Ashby St Ledgers, where they hatched the simplest of plans: first they rented a cellar under Parliament and then they filled it with barrels of gunpowder – enough to blow Parliament sky high. The preparations were in the hands of Guy Fawkes, an ardent Catholic and experienced soldier, but the authorities discovered this so-called Gunpowder Plot on the eve of the attack, November 4, 1605, and the conspirators were soon rounded up and dispatched. It’s quite possible that James’s men knew of the plot long before November and allowed it to develop for political (anti-Catholic) reasons. Fawkes himself was tortured, tried and executed and he is still burnt in effigy across the UK on Bonfire Night (Nov 5).

Fotheringhay Castle ruins

Signposted down a short and bumpy lane on the bend of the road as you come into the village from Oundle • Daily 24hr • Free

Precious little remains of Fotheringhay Castle, but the fortress witnessed two key events – the birth of Richard III in 1452 and the beheading of Mary, Queen of Scots, in 1587. On the orders of Elizabeth I, Mary – who had been imprisoned for nearly twenty years – was beheaded in the castle’s Great Hall with no one to stand in her support, apart, that is, from her dog, which is said to have rushed from beneath her skirts as her head hit the deck. Thereafter, the castle fell into disrepair and nowadays only a grassy mound, the outline of earthen ramparts and a marshy ditch remain to mark where it once stood.

Church of St Mary and All Saints

Fotheringhay, PE8 5HZ • Daily 9am–5pm (4pm in winter) • Free • friends-of-fotheringhay-church.co.uk

Begun in 1411 and 150 years in the making, Fotheringay’s Church of St Mary and All Saints is a paradigm of the Perpendicular, its exterior sporting wonderful arching buttresses, its nave lit by soaring windows and the whole caboodle topped by a splendid octagonal lantern tower. The interior is a tad bare, but there are two fancily carved medieval pieces to inspect – a painted pulpit and a sturdy stone font – and two cumbersome memorials to the Dukes of York.

Eating and drinking: Fotheringhay

The Falcon PE8 5HZ 01832 226254, thefalcon-inn.co.uk. This excellent pub/restaurant, which occupies a neat stone building with a modern patio, offers an imaginative menu – lamb shank and artichoke for example – with delicious main courses costing around £15. Daily noon–11pm; kitchen Mon–Sat noon–2pm & 6–9pm, Sun noon–3pm.

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Lincoln

Reaching high into the sky from the top of a steep hill, the triple towers of LINCOLN’s magnificent cathedral are visible for miles across the surrounding flatlands. The cathedral, along with the neighbouring castle, are the city’s main tourist draws – although, for a smallish place, Lincoln also packs in several good places to eat and one outstanding hotel. The key sights are best seen over a leisurely weekend, not least in December during Lincoln’s lively open-air Christmas market, and there’s also a brand-new attraction on the southeast edge of town, The International Bomber Command Centre (internationalbcc.co.uk), which celebrates the Allied airmen of World War II.

Brief history

High ground is in short supply in Lincolnshire, so it’s no surprise that the steep hill which is today surmounted by Lincoln Cathedral was fortified early, firstly by the Celts, who called their settlement Lindon, “hillfort by the lake”, a reference to the pools formed by the River Witham in the marshy ground below. In 47 AD the Romans occupied Lindon and built a fortified town, which subsequently became Lindum Colonia, one of the four regional capitals of Roman Britain. During the reign of William the Conqueror the construction of the castle and cathedral initiated Lincoln’s medieval heyday – the town boomed, first as a Norman power base and then as a centre of the wool trade with Flanders, until 1369 when the wool market was transferred to neighbouring Boston. It was almost five hundred years before Lincoln revived, its recovery based upon the manufacture of agricultural machinery and drainage equipment for the neighbouring fenlands. As the nineteenth-century town spread south down the hill and out along the old Roman road – the Fosse Way – so Lincoln became a place of precise class distinctions: the Uphill area, spreading north from the cathedral, became synonymous with middle-class respectability, Downhill with the proletariat, a distinction which finally disappeared with the development of Lincoln University, whose campus abuts the old city harbour, Brayford Pool.

Guided tours of Lincoln Cathedral

The cathedral offers three types of guided tour. The first, the Floor Tour (Mon–Sat 2–3 daily; 30min; free with the price of admission), is a quick trot around the cathedral’s defining features; the second, the Roof Tour (Mon–Sat 1–2 daily; 1hr 30min; £4), takes in parts of the church otherwise out of bounds, as does the third, the Tower Tour (March–Nov Sat 3 daily; 1hr 30min; £4). Advance reservations are advised for the Tower and Roof tours.

Lincoln Cathedral

Minster Yard • July & Aug Mon–Fri 7.15am–8pm, Sat & Sun 7.15am–6pm; Sept–June Mon–Sat 7.15am–6pm, Sun 7.15am–5pm • Access restricted during services • £8 (includes tour; see box below), free Sun • 01522 561600, lincolncathedral.com

Lincoln Cathedral is best approached from the west, through the fancy stone arches of the medieval Exchequergate, beyond which soars the glorious main facade, a veritable cliff face of blind arcading mobbed by decorative carving. The west front’s apparent homogeneity is, however, deceptive, and further inspection reveals two phases of construction – the small stones and thick mortar of much of the facade belong to the original church, completed in 1092, whereas the longer stones and finer courses date from the early thirteenth century. These were enforced works: in 1185, an earthquake shattered much of the Norman church, which was then rebuilt under the auspices of Bishop Hugh of Avalon, the man responsible for most of the present cathedral, with the notable exception of the (largely) fourteenth-century central tower.

The Lincoln imp

The Lincoln imp, carved high on a column in Lincoln Cathedral, had long been a source of legend, but it was the entrepreneurial James Ward Usher who turned the wee beastie into a tidy profit in the 1880s, selling Lincoln imp tie-pins, cuff-links, spoons, brooches and beads. Usher also popularized the traditional legend of the imp, a tall tale in which a couple of imps are blown to Lincoln by a playful wind. They then proceed to hop around the cathedral, until one of them is turned to stone for trying to talk to the angels carved into the roof of the Angel Choir. His chum makes a hasty exit on the back of a witch, but the wind is still supposed to haunt the cathedral, awaiting its opportunity to be mischievous again.

The mighty interior is a fine example of Early English architecture, with the nave’s pillars conforming to the same general design yet differing slightly, their varied columns and bands of dark Purbeck marble contrasting with the oolitic limestone that is the building’s main material. Looking back up the nave from beneath the central tower, you can also observe a major medieval cock-up: Bishop Hugh’s roof is out of alignment with the earlier west front, and the point where they meet has all the wrong angles. It’s possible to pick out other irregularities, too – the pillars have bases of different heights, and there are ten windows in the nave’s north wall and nine in the south – but these are deliberate features, reflecting a medieval aversion to the vanity of symmetry.

Beyond the nave lies St Hugh’s Choir, more jumbled architecturally but with some exquisite medieval misericords, and beyond that is the open and airy Angel Choir, completed in 1280 and famous for the tiny, finely carved Lincoln imp (see box above), which embellishes one of its columns; helpfully, there’s a light trained on it, but it costs 20p to switch it on. Finally, a corridor off the choir’s north aisle leads to the wooden-roofed cloisters and the splendid, polygonal chapter house, where Edward I and Edward II convened gatherings that prefigured the creation of the English Parliament.

Medieval Bishops’ Palace

Minster Yard, LN2 1PU • April–Oct & bank hols Wed–Sun 10am–5/6pm; Nov–March Sat & Sun 10am–4pm; last entry 30min before closing • £5.50; EH • 01522 527468, www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/Lincoln-medieval-bishops-palace

Hidden behind a gated wall immediately to the south of the cathedral are the ruins of what would, in its day, have been the city’s most impressive building. This, the Medieval Bishop’s Palace, once consisted of two grand halls, a lavish chapel, kitchens and ritzy private chambers, but today the most coherent survivor is the battered and bruised Alnwick Tower – where the entrance is. The damage was done during the Civil War when a troop of Roundheads occupied the palace until they themselves had to evacuate after a fierce fire. Nonetheless, the ruins are suitably fetching, with wide views over the surrounding flatlands.

Lincoln Castle

Castle Hill, LN1 3AA • Daily: April–Sept 10am–5pm; Oct–March 10am–4pm • £13.80; prison & Magna Carta only £11.50; wall walkway only £6 • 01522 554559, lincolncastle.com

Intact and forbidding, the gateway, walls and towers of Lincoln Castle incorporate bits and pieces from the twelfth to the nineteenth centuries with the wall walkway offering great views over town. The wall encloses a large central courtyard dotted around which are law courts, a heritage skills centre and two former Victorian prisons. The debtors’ prison serves as the entrance to a newly constructed vault, which was built to display several rare documents, most memorably one of the four surviving copies of the Magna Carta.

Behind the vault is the old felons’ prison, where you can wander several floors of cells and visit a truly remarkable prison chapel. Here, the prisoners were locked in high-sided cubicles designed so that they could see the pulpit but not each other. This approach was not only applied to the chapel: prisoners were kept in perpetual solitary confinement, even compelled to wear masks in the exercise yard. This so-called Pentonville System of “Separation and Silence”, introduced here in 1846, was based on the pseudo-scientific theory that crime is a contagious disease, but unfortunately for the theorists it drove so many prisoners crazy that it had to be abandoned thirty years later; nobody ever bothered to dismantle the chapel.

Castle Hill and around

Not a hill at all, Castle Hill is in fact a wide, short and level cobbled street that links Lincoln’s castle and cathedral. It’s a charming spot and from here it’s a brief stroll to the Newport Arch, a much-weathered chunk of Roman wall dating to the second century AD and once the main north gate into Lincoln. In the opposite direction, Steep Hill and then The Strait cut an antique route down to the centre and are flanked by sweet little shops and a handful of well-preserved medieval stone houses.

The Collection

Danes Terrace, LN2 1LP • Daily 10am–4pm • Free • 01522 782040, thecollectionmuseum.com

Occupying two contrasting buildings – a striking modern structure and a really rather grand 1920s edifice close by – The Collection is Lincoln’s main museum. Pride of place in the more modern building is the city’s extensive collection of archeological artefacts, from prehistoric times onwards, while the older building, aka the Usher Gallery, features a regularly rotated selection of fine and applied art, including English landscape paintings, sculptures, porcelain, watches and clocks.

Arrival and information: Lincoln

By train Lincoln train station is on St Mary’s Street, on the south side of the centre.

Destinations Leicester (hourly; 2hr); Newark (1–2 hourly; 30min); Nottingham (hourly; 1hr); Stamford (hourly; 2hr–2hr 30min, min of one change).

By bus The brand-new bus station is next door to the train station.

Tourist office 9 Castle Hill, between the cathedral and the castle (April–Sept Mon–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun 10.30am–4pm; Oct–March daily 11am–3pm; 01522 545458, visitlincoln.com).

Getting around

By Walk & Ride From both the train and bus stations, it’s a steep, 20min walk up to the cathedral, or you can take the Walk & Ride minibus (Mon–Sat 9am–2pm & 4–5pm, every 20min; single £1.50), which loops through the city centre. Another handy Walk & Ride stop is on Silver St, just off High St.

Accommodation

Hillcrest 15 Lindum Terrace, LN2 5RT 01522 510182, hillcresthotel-lincoln.co.uk; map. Traditional, very English hotel in a large red-brick house that was originally a Victorian rectory. Sixteen comfortable rooms with all mod cons plus a large, sloping garden. About 10min walk from the cathedral. £100

Old Palace Hotel Minster Yard, LN2 1PU 01522 580000, theoldpalace.org; map. Easily the best place to stay in Lincoln, this excellent hotel occupies a rambling, largely nineteenth-century mansion – once a bishops’ palace – within earshot of the cathedral. The hotel has 32 rooms, half in the main building, including a tower suite, and the remainder in an immaculately reconfigured 1920s chapel. The hotel’s grand drawing room is in the former library and most of the furniture has been made by local carpenters. Smashing views, too. £90

St Clements Lodge 21 Langworthgate, LN2 4AD 01522 521532, stclementslodge.co.uk; map. In a smart, modern house a short walk from the cathedral, this comfortable B&B has three cosy, en-suite rooms. Home-made breakfasts too – try the haddock or the kippers. £85

White Hart Bailgate, LN1 3AR 01522 526222, whitehart-lincoln.co.uk; map. Antique former coaching inn, whose public rooms have received a fairly humdrum revamp. The bedrooms are in a more traditional, country-house style and the pick overlook the cathedral. Curiously, it was here in an upstairs room during World War I that a local engineering firm set about designing a motorized gun at the behest of the government. To camouflage their intentions, the new behemoths were called water carriers – hence “tanks” – and the name stuck. £100

Eating

Cheese Society Café 1 St Martin’s Lane, LN2 1HY 01522 511003, thecheesesociety.co.uk; map. This bright and breezy little café is something of a gastronomic landmark hereabouts, its menu featuring all things cheesy, from rare­bits and raclettes – all with salads – through to an especially delicious stilton, red wine and walnut pâté. There are non-cheesy options, too, plus a good range of beers and ciders. Mains at £9. Mon–Fri 10am–­4.30pm, Sat 10am–5pm.

Old Bakery 26 Burton Rd, LN1 3LB 01522 576057, theold-bakery.co.uk; map. Cosy, rural-chic restaurant, where the menu is both well considered and inventive – try, for example, the grilled polenta and cherry tomatoes with Gorgonzola and green olive purée. Has an excellent wine cellar, too. Reservations recommended. Mains average £18. Tues & Wed 7–8.30pm, Thurs–Sat noon–1.30pm & 7–8.30pm, Sun noon–1.30pm.

Stokes Collection Café Danes Terrace, LN2 1LP 01522 523548, stokes-coffee.co.uk; map. Attached to Lincoln’s principal museum (see opposite), this cheerful modern café is a self-service affair where they do a tasty line in crêpes, sandwiches and salads. They also have a line-up of special musical events, mainly jazz and classical. The owners, the Stokes family, have been roasting coffee and blending tea in Lincoln for several generations. Daily 10am–4pm.

Entertainment

Lincoln Drill Hall Free School Lane, LN2 1EY 01522 873891, lincolndrillhall.com; map. Lincoln’s prime arts and entertainment venue, featuring everything from stand-up and theatre to classical concerts, rock and pop.

The Lincolnshire Wolds and the coast

Northeast of Lincoln, the Lincolnshire Wolds are a narrow band of chalky land whose rolling hills and gentle valleys are particularly appealing in the vicinity of Louth, a trim little place where conscientious objectors were sent to dig potatoes during World War II. South of Louth, the Wolds dip down to both Woodhall Spa, a one-time Victorian spa that served as the HQ of the Dambusters as they prepared for their celebrated Ruhr raid in 1943, and the imposing remains of Tattershall Castle nearby. East of the Wolds lies the coast, with its bungalows, campsites and caravans parked behind a sandy beach that extends, with a few marshy interruptions, north from Skegness, the main resort, to Mablethorpe and ultimately Cleethorpes. At its worst, the coast’s amusement-arcade commercialism can be hard to warm to, but small portions have been preserved and protected, most notably at the Gibraltar Point Natural Nature Reserve, just south of Skegness.

Louth

Henry VIII didn’t much care for Lincolnshire, describing it as “one of the most brutal and beestlie counties of the whole realm”, his contempt based on the events of 1536, when thousands of northern peasants rebelled against his religious reforms. The insurrection – the Lincolnshire Rising, which led on to the Pilgrimage of Grace in Yorkshire – began at LOUTH, about 25 miles from Lincoln, now a pleasant country town with narrow streets and old brick terraces surrounded by woods and farmland.

Church of St James

Westgate, LN11 9YD • Easter–Christmas Mon–Sat 10.30am–4pm; Christmas–Easter no fixed hours • Free • 01507 610247, stjameschurchlouth.com

Louth’s one outstanding building is the Church of St James, a handsome medieval structure topped with a mighty Perpendicular spire, set on a grassy knoll on the west side of the centre. The interior is delightful too, illuminated by slender windows and capped by a handsome Georgian timber roof decorated with dinky little angels.

Arrival and departure: Louth

By bus Louth bus station is on the east side of – and a 5min walk from – the centre.

Destinations Lincoln (Mon–Sat 6 daily; 1hr); Skegness (hourly; 2hr).

Eating

The Coffee Shop St James’s Church, Westgate, LN11 9YD 01507 603118. This volunteer-run café has just a few tables and chairs inside the church, but the home-made cakes are simply delicious – locals set out early to get a slice of the lemon drizzle. Easter–Christmas Mon–Sat 10.30am–4pm.

Woodhall Spa and around

Set in a generous chunk of woodland, WOODHALL SPA, some nineteen miles from Lincoln, is one of the county’s most engaging villages, its long main street – The Broadway – flanked by Victorian and Edwardian houses and shops, reminders of the time when visitors gathered here to sample the local spring water, rich in iodine and bromine. Nowadays, the village maintains a genteel and relaxed air, and is kept afloat by its golf course, generally reckoned to be one of the best in England.

The Cottage Museum

Iddesleigh Road, off The Broadway, LN10 6SH • April–Oct daily 12.30am–4.30pm; sometimes opens earlier, see website for details • £3.50 • 01526 352456, cottagemuseum.co.uk

Tiny and extraordinarily cute, the Cottage Museum outlines the evolution of Woodhall Spa from genteel Victorian spa to golfing retreat via World War II, when several thousand servicemen were billeted around here. During the war, the RAF requisitioned a local mansion, Petwood, and turned it into the Officers’ Mess of 617 Squadron, the Dambusters, famous for their bombing raid of May 16, 1943. The raid was planned to deprive German industry of water and electricity by breaching several dams in the Ruhr valley, a mission made possible by Barnes Wallis’s famous bouncing bomb; Petwood – and the old Officers’ Bar – has survived and is now a hotel (see opposite).

Kinema in the Woods

Coronation Rd, LN10 6QD • Tickets £6.50 • 01526 352166, thekinemainthewoods.co.uk

An unexpected delight, the Kinema in the Woods is flanked by forest, but is only five minutes’ walk from The Broadway – just follow the signs. Opened in 1922, the Kinema is one of England’s few remaining picture houses where the film is projected from behind the screen, and at weekends a 1930s organ rises in front of the screen to play you through the ice-cream break. It’s all very delightful – and very nostalgic too.

Tattershall Castle

Sleaford Road, Tattershall, LN4 4LR • Mid-Feb to Oct daily 11am–5pm; early Nov Sat & Sun 11am–3pm • £6.40; NT • 01526 342543, nationaltrust.org.uk/tattershall-castle

From Woodhall Spa, it’s about four miles southeast to Tattershall Castle, a massive, moated, red-brick keep that towers above the surrounding flatlands. There’s been a castle here since Norman times, but it was Ralph Cromwell, the Lord High Treasurer, who built the present quadrangled tower in the 1440s. A veteran of Agincourt, Cromwell was familiar with contemporary French architecture and it was to France that he looked for his basic design – in England, keeps had been out of fashion since the thirteenth century. Cromwell’s quest for style explains Tattershall’s contradictions: though the castle walls are sixteen feet thick, there are lots of lower-level windows and three doorways. In effect, it’s a medieval keep as fashion accessory, a theatricality that continues with the grand chimneypieces inside the castle, though otherwise the interior is almost entirely bare.

Arrival and information: Woodhall Spa and around

By bus Most buses stop on The Broadway, with regular Lincoln services (Mon–Sat every 1–2hr; 50min).

Tourist office At the Cottage Museum (same times; 01526 352456).

Accommodation and eating

Petwood Hotel Stixwould Rd, LN10 6QG 01526 352411, petwood.co.uk. Set in immaculate gardens, Petwood’s handsome half-timbered gables shelter a fine panelled interior and fifty large, well-appointed bedrooms decorated in unfussy, modern style. The all-English breakfasts are excellent and so are the dinners (mains from £16) featuring local, seasonal ingredients. Here also, in prime condition, is the old Officers’ Bar of the Dambusters, complete with incidental memorabilia. Daily 6.30–9pm. £120

Skegness

SKEGNESS has been a busy resort ever since the railways reached the Lincolnshire coast in 1875. Its heyday was before the 1960s, when the Brits began to take themselves off to sunnier climes, but it still attracts tens of thousands of city-dwellers who come for the wide, sandy beaches and attractions ranging from nightclubs to bowling greens. Every inch the traditional English seaside town, Skegness outdoes its rivals by keeping its beaches sparklingly clean and its parks spick-and-span. That said, the seafront, with its rows of souvenir shops and amusement arcades, can be dismal, especially on a rainy day, and you may well decide to sidestep the whole thing by heading south along the coast to the Gibraltar Point National Nature Reserve.

Gibraltar Point National Nature Reserve

Gibraltar Rd, PE24 4SU, 3 miles south of Skegness • Reserve daily dawn–dusk; visitor centre daily 10am–3pm • Free • 01754 898057, lincstrust.org.uk/gibraltar-point

At the Gibraltar Point National Nature Reserve, a network of clearly signed footpaths patterns a narrow strip of salt- and freshwater marsh, sand dune and beach that attracts an inordinate number of birds, both resident and migratory. There are numerous hides dotted around and a brand-new visitor centre has been built to replace an earlier version, which was badly damaged by floods.

Arrival and Information: Skegness

By bus & train Skegness’s bus and train stations are adjacent, about 10min walk from the seashore – cut across Lumley Square and head straight up the main street to the landmark clocktower.

Destinations (bus) Lincoln (2–4 daily; 2hr).

Destinations (train) Boston (hourly; 30min); Nottingham (hourly; 2hr).

Tourist office Inside the Embassy Theatre, close to the clocktower on Grand Parade (core hours: daily 9.30am–­4pm; 01507 613100, visitlincolnshire.com).

Accommodation

Best Western Vine Hotel Vine Rd, Seacroft, PE25 3DB 01754 610611, vinehotelskegness.com. Skegness has scores of bargain-basement hotels, B&Bs and guest­houses, but this pleasant hotel is a cut above its rivals. It occupies a rambling old house, partly clad in ivy, but the decor is firmly modern. Located on a quiet residential street about three-quarters of a mile from the clocktower, on the road to Gibraltar Point. £80

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The Lincolnshire Fens

The Fens, that great chunk of eastern England extending from Boston in Lincolnshire right down to Cambridge, encompass some of the most productive farmland in Europe. Give or take the occasional hillock, this pancake-flat, treeless terrain has been painstakingly reclaimed, from the marshes and swamps which once drained into the intrusive stump of The Wash, an indentation of the North Sea, a process that has taken almost two thousand years. In earlier times, outsiders were often amazed by the dreadful conditions hereabouts, but they did spawn the distinctive culture of the so-called fen-slodgers, who embanked small portions of marsh to create pastureland and fields, supplementing their diets by catching fish and fowl and gathering reed and sedge for thatching and fuel. This local economy was threatened by the large-scale land reclamation schemes of the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and time and again the locals sabotaged progress by breaking down new banks and dams. But the odds were stacked against the saboteurs, and a succession of great landowners eventually drained huge tracts of the fenland – and by the 1790s the fen-slodgers’ way of life had all but disappeared.

Nonetheless, the Lincolnshire Fens remain a distinctive area, with a scattering of introverted little villages spread across the flatlands within easy striking distance of the A17. Several of these villages are distinguished by their imposing medieval churches – St Mary Magdalene’s in Gedney and St Mary’s in Long Sutton for example – and their soaring spires are seen to best advantage in the pale, watery sunlight and wide skies of the fenland evening. But it’s above the rough-edged old port of Boston, Lincolnshire’s second-largest settlement, that you’ll find the most impressive church of all, mighty St Botolph’s.

Boston

As it approaches The Wash, the muddy River Witham weaves its way through BOSTON, which is named after St Botwulf, the Anglo-Saxon monk-saint who first established a monastery here in 645 AD. In the fourteenth century, Boston became England’s second-largest seaport, its flourishing economy dependent on the wool trade with Flanders. Revelling in their success, local merchants built a church here that witnessed their wealth – the magnificent St Botolph’s – but by then Boston was in decline. The town’s fortunes only revived in the late eighteenth century when, after the nearby fens had been drained, it became a minor agricultural centre. A singular mix of fenland town and seaport, Boston is an unusual little place that is at its liveliest on market days – Wednesday and Saturday – when you’ll hear lots of Polish voices: in recent years, Eastern Europeans have come here in their hundreds to work in food processing and agriculture.

St Botolph’s Church

Church St, PE21 6NW • Church Mon–Sat 8.30am–4pm, Sun 7.30am–4pm • Free • Tower Mon–Sat 10am–3.30pm & Sun 1–3.30pm • £5 • 01205 354670, parish-of-boston.org.uk

The massive bulk of St Botolph’s looms over the River Witham, its exterior embellished by the high-pointed windows and elaborate tracery of the Decorated style. Most of the church dates from the fourteenth century, but the huge and distinctive tower – whose lack of a spire earned the church the nickname the “Boston Stump” – is of later construction, and the octagonal lantern is later still. Down below, St Botolph’s light and airy nave is an exercise in the Perpendicular, all soaring columns and high windows, a purity of design that is simply stunning. Look out also for the misericords in the chancel (a 50p leaflet gives the lowdown on all sixty), which sport a charming mixture of vernacular scenes, from organ-playing bears and a pair of medieval jesters squeezing cats in imitation of bagpipes through to a schoolmaster birching a boy, watched by three more awaiting the same fate – or perhaps they are just watching and laughing. A separate chapel commemorates the church’s most famous vicar, John Cotton (1584–1652), who helped stir the Puritan stew during his tenure, encouraging a stream of Lincolnshire dissidents to head off to the colonies of New England to found their “New Jerusalem”; Cotton emigrated himself in 1633. From beside the nave, a narrow and tortuous 365-step spiral staircase leads up the tower to a balcony, from where there are panoramic views over Boston and the fens.

The Guildhall

South St, PE21 6HT • Wed–Sat 10.30am–3.30pm • Free • 01205 365954, www.bostonguildhall.co.uk

A creaky affair, the Guildhall incorporates a series of period rooms, including an antique Council Chamber, several old prison cells and the court room where, in 1607, several of the Pilgrim Fathers were (probably) tried and sentenced: they got thirty days for their failed attempt to escape religious persecution by slipping across to Holland. They may have been imprisoned here too, but no one is really sure. The Guildhall also exhibits a fascinating hotchpotch of historical artefacts, notably a copy of the Book of Martyrs, an inflammatory anti-Catholic text written by Boston’s own John Foxe (1517–87).

Arrival and information: Boston

By train It’s a 15min walk east from Boston train station to the town centre: head along Station Approach, and at the end turn left onto Queen St, then take another left for West St. Keep going until Bridge St; turn left onto it and cross the river for the central Market Place.

Destinations Grantham (hourly; 1hr); Lincoln (hourly; 1hr 10min with 1 change); Skegness (hourly; 40min).

By bus The bus station is also to the west of the River Witham, just north of West St on St George’s Rd – and a 5min walk away from Market Place.

Destinations Lincoln (every 1–2hr; 1hr 45min).

Tourist office In the Guildhall, on South Street (Wed–Sat 10.30am–3.30pm; 01205 365954, boston.gov.uk).

Church of St Mary Magdalene, Gedney

Church End, PE12 0BU, 17 miles from Boston via the A17 • Daily dawn–dusk • Free

The scattered hamlet of GEDNEY is home to the remarkable Church of St Mary Magdalene. Seen from a distance the church seems almost magical, or at least mystical, its imposing lines in striking contrast with its fen-flat surroundings. Up close, the triple-aisled nave is beautiful, its Norman arcade splendid, and a battery of windows lights the exquisite Renaissance alabaster effigies of husband and wife Adlard and Cassandra Welby, facing each other on the south wall near the chancel. Curiously, their tomb is decorated with a corn-on-the-cob motif – one of the earliest representations of this American import to be found in England.

Long Sutton

A modest farming centre, LONG SUTTON, a couple of miles from Gedney, limps along its main street until it reaches its trim Market Place. Here, the church of St Mary (daily dawn–dusk; free) has preserved many of its Norman features, with its arcaded tower supporting the oldest lead spire in the country, dating from around 1200. Long Sutton once lay on the edge of the five-mile-wide mouth of the River Nene, where it emptied into The Wash. This was the most treacherous part of the road from Lincoln to Norfolk, and for centuries locals had to guide travellers across the mud flats and marshes on horseback. In 1831, the River Nene was embanked and then spanned with a wooden bridge at Sutton Bridge, a hamlet just two miles east of Long Sutton. The present swing bridge, with its nifty central tower, was completed in 1894.

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Stamford and around

Tucked away in the southwest corner of Lincolnshire, STAMFORD, 35 miles from Boston, is delightful, a handsome little limestone town of yellow-grey seventeenth- and eighteenth-century buildings, which slope up from the River Welland. The town’s salad days were as a centre of the medieval wool and cloth trade, when wealthy merchants built its medley of stone churches and houses. Stamford was also the home of William Cecil, Elizabeth I’s sagacious chief minister, who built his splendid mansion, Burghley House, close by.

The town survived the collapse of the wool trade, prospering as an inland port after the Welland was made navigable to the sea in 1570, and, in the eighteenth century, as a staging point on the Great North Road from London. More recently, Stamford escaped the three main threats to old English towns – the Industrial Revolution, wartime bombing and postwar development – and was designated the country’s first Conservation Area in 1967. Thanks to this, its unspoilt streets readily lend themselves to period drama and filmmaking, and although it’s the harmony of Stamford’s architecture that pleases rather than any specific sight, there are still a handful of buildings of some special interest as well as an especially charming High Street.

Church of All Saints

All Saints’ Place, PE9 2AG • Mon–Sat 9am–5pm, Sun 9am–7pm • Free • stamfordallsaints.org.uk

A convenient place to start an exploration of Stamford, the Church of All Saints stands at the western end of the town centre, its beautiful facade a happy amalgamation of Early English and Perpendicular. Entry is via the south porch, an ornate structure with a fine – if badly weathered – crocketted gable. Beyond, though much of the interior is routinely Victorian, the nave’s carved capitals are of great delicacy. Look out also for an engaging folkloric carving of the Last Supper behind the high altar that dates to the 1870s.

Browne’s Hospital

Broad St, PE9 1PF • Guided tours Late May to Sept by arrangement; advance booking required • £3.50/person, but minimum £30/tour • Open days Two per year, spring & autumn, 11am–4pm • Free • 01780 763153, stamfordcivicsociety.org.uk

A stone’s throw from All Saints, wide and good-looking Broad Street is home to Browne’s Hospital, the most extensive of the town’s surviving almshouses, a substantial complex dating from the late fifteenth century. The cottages and the green towards the rear are rarely open to the public, but the old dormitory at the front, with its splendid wood-panelled ceiling, is usually included on the guided tour as is the adjacent chapel, which holds some fine stained-glass windows and appealingly folksy misericords.

Church of St Mary

St Mary’s St, PE9 2DS • No regular opening hours • Free • stamfordbenefice.com

A brief stroll from Broad Street, sitting pretty just above the main bridge over the River Welland, the Church of St Mary boasts a splendid spire, which rises high above its cramped surroundings. The interior is small but airy and incorporates an imposing reredos, a batch of Victorian stained glass and the Corpus Christi (or north) chapel, whose intricately embossed, painted and panelled ceiling dates back to the 1480s.

Church of St Martin

23 High St St Martin’s, PE9 2NT • Daily 9.30am–4pm • Free • 01780 753356, achurchnearyou.com/stamford-baron-st-martin

The sombre, late fifteenth-century Church of St Martin shelters the magnificent tombs of the lords Burghley, beginning with a recumbent William Cecil (1520–98) carved beneath twin canopies, holding his rod of office and with a lion at his feet. Immediately behind are the early eighteenth-century effigies of John Cecil, the fifth Lord Burghley (1648–1700), and his wife, with the couple depicted as Roman aristocrats, propped up on their elbows, John to stare across the nave commandingly, Anne to gaze at him.

Burghley House

Barnack Rd, PE9 3JY • House & gardens Mid-March to Oct Mon–Thurs, Sat & Sun 11am–5pm • £18, £16 in advance • Park Daily 8am–6pm (dusk if sooner) • Free • 01780 752451, burghley.co.uk • The main entrance is signposted 1.5miles southeast of Stamford

Now famous for the prestigious Burghley Horse Trials (burghley-horse.co.uk), held over four days in late August and/or early September, Stamford’s Burghley House is an extravagant Elizabethan mansion standing in parkland landscaped by Capability Brown. Completed in 1587 after 22 years in the making, the house sports a mellow-yellow ragstone exterior, embellished by dainty cupolas, a pyramidal clocktower and skeletal balustrading, all to a plan by William Cecil, the long-time adviser to Elizabeth I. However, with the notable exception of the Tudor kitchen, little remains of Burghley’s Elizabethan interior and, instead, the house bears the heavy hand of John Cecil, who toured France and Italy in the late seventeenth century, buying paintings and commissioning furniture, statuary and tapestries. To provide a suitable setting for his old masters, John brought in Antonio Verrio and his assistant Louis Laguerre, who between them covered many of Burghley’s walls and ceilings with frolicking gods and goddesses. These gaudy and gargantuan murals are at their most engulfing in the Heaven Room, an artfully painted classical temple that adjoins the Hell Staircase, where the entrance to the inferno is through the gaping mouth of a cat.

Arrival and information: Stamford and around

By train Stamford’s pretty station is on the south side of the River Welland, a 5–10min walk from the centre.

Destinations Cambridge (hourly; 1hr 10min); Leicester (hourly; 40min); Oakham (hourly; 15min).

By bus The bus station is on Sheepmarket, off All Saints’ St.

Tourist office In the Stamford Arts Centre, 27 St Mary’s Street (Mon–Sat 9.30am–5pm; 01780 755611, southwestlincs.com).

Accommodation

George Hotel 71 High St St Martin’s, PE9 2LB 01780 750750, georgehotelofstamford.com; map. Stamford’s most celebrated hotel by a country mile, The George is a sympathetically renovated old coaching inn, which comes complete with flagstone floors and antique furnishings; the most appealing of the plush rooms overlook a cobbled courtyard. Its Georgian facade supports one end of the gallows that span the street – not a warning to criminals, but a traditional advertising hoarding. There’s a good restaurant, too (see below). £200

Stamford Lodge Guest House 66 Scotgate, PE9 2YB 01780 482932, stamfordlodge.co.uk; map. In an attractive, Georgian stone house on the north side of the town centre, this smartly turned-out establish­ment has five, en-suite guest rooms decorated in a warm and cosy version of period style. £95

Eating

George Hotel 71 High St St Martin’s, PE9 2LB 01780 750750, georgehotelofstamford.com; map. The George has two excellent restaurants – one formal, the other, the Garden Room, much more informal. At the latter, a wide-ranging menu covers everything from hamburgers to lobster spaghetti, all prepared to a high standard; mains average £18. Finish off with a drink at the hotel’s delightfully antiquated York Bar. Garden Room daily noon–10pm.

Hambleton Bakery 1 Ironmonger St, PE9 1PL 01780 754327, hambletonbakery.co.uk; map. A small regional chain offering a first-rate range of breads – rye, sourdough and so forth – plus muffins and cakes. Takeaway only. Mon–Sat 8am–5pm.

No.3 The Yard 3 Ironmonger St, PE9 1PL 01780 756080, no3theyard.co.uk; map. Inside a creatively refurbished old building, at the back of a scrappy courtyard, this enjoyable spilt-level restaurant has an excellent Modern British menu – try, for example, the smoked haddock with pancetta. Mains hover around £16. Tues–Sat 11.30am–2pm & 6.30–9.30pm, Sun noon–3pm.

Stamford Shakespeare Company

One of the most enjoyable of Stamford’s several festivals is the Stamford Shakespeare Company’s (01780 756133, stamfordshakespeare.co.uk) open-air performances of the great man’s works set in the grounds of Tolethorpe Hall, an Elizabethan mansion just outside Stamford. The season lasts from June to August, with the audience protected from the elements by a vast canopy.

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