Well, not exactly. If you just read the title of this post, you would probably think what am I talking about, when even yesterday I said that this trip is far from over. Yes, that is correct, but the theme of this post will be education, or rather one of the most famous universities and towns certainly in England, if not even the world. And that is – Oxford.
In comparison to London, the last time we went somewhere, Oxford is a lot smaller. We spent about 2 hours in the town, and that included sitting down for 2 meals, and seeing pretty much everything there is to see. Okay, we haven’t gone into any of the museums they have on offer there, but still shows that it’s not really a very big town. Also, the fact that most of the colleges are closed to public, and only students can get in, it made things a lot shorter.
Another day where my friend planned the whole thing, especially since he actually went to university in Oxford, and it was yet another great day! The weather didn’t really cooperate with us as much as in London, as it was lightly raining for most of our time there, but nonetheless, it was great to see all of it. Just looking at all the University buildings, all the different colleges, and how much history they contain behind those stone walls… These are the kind of things I’m always thinking about and imagining how it was back in the day, and how it was at the very beginning of all of it.
At one point, we stopped at one of the primary schools, the Magdalen College (Junior) School, which was founded in 1480! Now try to comprehend that. Just to put it into more of a perspective, the discovery of America, by Christopher Columbus, goes back to 1492, the USA declared their independence in 1776, and the Tube in London opened in 1863. That school predates all of these events, and we look at those as being so far in the past already. 543 years of a school is just insane to me!
After we were done with Oxford, we got back in the car again, and onto the second part of our day. Which was cut short slightly, due to time management and pushing something from yesterday onto one of the upcoming days still left, but we managed to see a couple of places we intended to anyway.
Many will already know that I am a big Formula 1 fan, and since I’m currently staying in Northampton, many of the teams’ factories and headquarters are not that far away from here, as well as the British GP venue, Silverstone. We decided we were going to at least try and get as close as we can to those that are accessible, maybe get a photo or 2, just to be able to say that we were there. Or rather I could say it, since my friend has already seen most of them.
First stop after Oxford was the factory of the Williams F1 Team, which I was able to get relatively close to, meaning the entrance to it, but not so close that I could see inside. Naturally, all of the teams have security guards at the entrances, so that no one can enter that shouldn’t be there, unless they get invited in. So I took a couple of photos of the entrance, and the sign on the side of the road, and it was time to jump back into the car.
Next, we decided we were going to head out to the Alpine F1 Team headquarters. If I tell you that it’s in the middle of nowhere, you’re probably not going to believe me, but that is actually the case. Took us quite some time to get there, down some proper English countryside roads, but we made our way to the front of the establishment once again, actually even closer than at Williams, so once again, a couple of photos, and we were gone.
We tried squeezing in a visit to the Mercedes F1 HQ, but due to the time of the day, and in correlation with our other plans, we decided it was better to just head home, leave that for one of the next days and call it a day. With everything that happened over the last couple of days, walking so much and travelling around, we’re both pretty tired and it just feels nice to sit down, relax and reflect on what has been happening.
I didn’t think I would have gotten this much into this post, since not as much has happened throughout the day as it did in London, but once I get into it, I manage to find a way to put down a few more thoughts than I initially think I would. Like I said, this trip is still not over, got plenty more to come in these few more days that I have left here so stay tuned!
Blogging with Jure 