I LOVE Oxford, well, at least a short 48 hours, it had been a very memorable stay. This post will be more like touch and go because our itinerary was so full and we took way too many photos on that day. In fact the photo's you've seen here is only about 15% of the total.
Oxford city is the home to the second oldest university – Oxford University dated as far back as year 1096, comprises of more than 40 self governing colleges and halls.
The Carfax Tower marks the center of Oxford City. It was the remaining part from the 12th century St Martin Church which was demolished to make way for roads.
My first time on double decker London Bus.
The main thing I love about Oxford is everything is so rustic that you would have thought you were transported back to centuries ago felt from the architectures to even the post box.
Taking a walk in Broad Street.
Hertford Bridge, is the bridge the structure that link Old and New Quadrangles of Hertford College over New College Lane in Oxford. Due to its similarities to Bridge of Sighs in Venice, it was also called Bridge of Sighs of Oxford.
The university itself is the biggest attraction itself to this city. There is no exact compound or the area of the university as it was made up of 38 colleges and 6 Permanent Private Halls spread across the Oxford City.
If you haven’t heard of it (I doubt so), Oxford University is the filming location for Harry Potter. Yes, you guess it right. Oxford University is THE Hogwarts itself.
The Hogwarts’ Hall is a replicate of this - the Great Hall of Christ Church College.
The 16th century staircase that leads to the Hall, is where Professor McGonagall welcomed the new students.
One of the hang out place of the Harry Potter and friends – the middle courtyard which is the New College Cloister.
Then we were shown to Duke Humphrey’s Library, which is the library where Harry Potter searched for books with his Invisible Cloak at night. Thanks to CD, we were allowed to enter without having to sign up for a tour. However, photography is not allowed.
And let’s not forget that more than a century ago, Oxford University is the ‘birthplace’ of Alice in Wonderland. Author Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known with pen name Lewis Carroll. He was a mathematician here and ‘Alice’ was modeled after Alice Liddell, daughter of Dean of Christ Church College.
The green door is the White Rabbit’s Door in the book.
In olden times, a sundial was used to tell the time of day in old times by the position of the sun. This is just one of the magnificent sundial collections of Oxford with most of them inside the compounds of the colleges.
The Garden Quad of New College with the famous Mound (the staircase behind the bench). There’s a myth about the mound, something about clapping hands when sitting on it that CD told us but we forgot about that after one year. I’m afraid my photography skill did not justify its beauty. One has to sit at this spot themselves to truly admire the landscape. In fact, right behind us is the ancient Oxford City Wall.
Ancient Oxford City Wall.
Sheldonian Theater is the hall use for graduations, music recitals and other ceremonies of Oxford University.
While CD lead CS to the top of the building to admire the view of Oxford City, I was satisfied to just sit in the hall, lifting my head up and admire the beautiful artwork on the ceiling.
The staircase at top of Sheldonian Theater, and after this one will get ..
A great view of Oxford.
Before heading for lunch, we stopped at the largest bookshop in Oxford which is none other than Blackswell’s Bookshop. I decided to try my luck to find a book that I could not find in Malaysia. I got it. Not without embarrassment (cause I thought it was written by Henry James but it's actually MR James) but I got it!
The Covered Market was where we went for our lunch and is the home to numerous food traders.
We stood at the window of an artisan cake shop for a long 5 minutes to admire their work.
Then, I spent another 5 minutes drooling at this…
And this!
After lunch we hurried to Bicester Village (pronounced as Bister Village) where I hoped to get good bargains for luxury products, specially aiming to buy a Radley handbag. Regrettably, it turned out to be a disappointment. The bus journey from city center to Bicester Village was far (with traffic jam) and cost us 4.40 pounds each. When we reached BV, we were greeted with a stench, in fact, the stench lingers over the whole village that it ruined our mood to shop. There’s a Radley outlet in BV but the designs are so ‘classic’, that being said – old fashioned. The only bargain I got, was buying Bobbi Brown at 50% cheaper than in Malaysia WITH tax refund.
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