England 2015

On our last day, Kathy remains at Charingworth to enjoy the Manor Life™ while LeAnn and I join John and Marianne on a quick trip down the Fosse Way (an old and VERY STRAIGHT Roman road) to the Chedworth Roman Villa historic site.

One of the largest discovered Roman villas in England, Chedworth was home to some of the richest British Romans in the 4th Century.

This villa, in the hills near the Fosse Way, but far enough away from the old Roman town of Cirencester, seems to imply that this could have been more of a “destination” or vacation home, rather than a full-time and year-round residence.

These hills and the surrounding trees give a natural shape to the placement of the villa, leading down towards a natural meadow – currently occupied by a field full of sheep!

After a quick coffee and snack, we meet our personal tour guide for the day. She starts off by describing the overall Villa layout, as presented by a really nice 3D model at the entrance.

Even though she initially comes across as a “stuffy English museum docent”, she rapidly dispels that perception. It starts with the description (complete with photo recreation!) of the Roman latrine facilities and pointing out the (ew) location right next to where we’re standing! 🙂

While describing the layout of the villa and some of the surrounding countryside, a beautiful pheasant perches on a railing some short distance away. Of course, I take a picture of it. 😉

The morning started out gray, gloomy, and a bit drizzly, but the weather rapidly improved throughout the day to be quite lovely for our visit to Chedworth.

The overall villa structure was in a classic Roman style, with the main house at the top end, long barracks and guest houses along each side, and a front wall/gate all surrounding the central courtyard.

The main house included a formal dining room and private baths (more on those later). Communal baths for the soldiers, servants, and “lessers” were available, too, as they were an integral part of daily Roman life.

A still functioning water pond was located at the upper corner of the villa. Enough archaeological evidence has been uncovered to state that this was also a temple, of sorts, as well as part of their (always effective) Roman water management system.

One of the neat things that the British National Trust has done here, beyond the great job of actual preservation and presentation, is promoting the presence of their “Roman snails”.

These snails, introduced as the name might suggest by Romans to Britain, are essentially the same edible snails (escargot) in France. They are, however, a protected species in the UK, making it illegal to kill, injure, collect or sell them!

As we walk along, I spot a few.. and of course, take their photo! Ha!


Several places throughout the villa are some really interesting heated floors that have been uncovered. The Romans used hot air, forced from fire pits outside through channels or other open areas underneath the stone floors, to heat individual rooms.

This was also the method used to heat the saunas (hot rooms) and the heated bath pools, which we’ll see later.

Back towards the main house, our guide told us about a recent uncovered mosaic floor section. Looking at the photos, it was obvious that we were standing on that exact spot, except it was now back to being covered with grass.

This led to a “spirited conversation” between John and our guide about excavation, archaeology, and conservation/preservation. John was shocked that they had uncovered these amazing mosaic tile floors and the subsequently covered them back up! The guide explained that, until they had the plan and funding fully in place to preserve and present them in a safe manner, it was decided to return the find to the “pre-discovered” state.

I don’t think they ever came to agreement… 🙂

The best part of the site, though, was the presentation of the uncovered main house sections.

The private bath sections were extremely well-preserved. Going from the hot sauna to the hot bath to the cold plunge baths must have been quite the experience – and an intricate pre-dinner ritual!

The other rooms all culminated in the main dining room. The heated sub-structure beneath the floor was visible as was a great deal of the beautiful and intricate mosaic patterns.

Our guide offered very detailed explanations of not only how the Romans ate their dinner, but also how the mosaic designs on the floor were representations of the actual owners, interspersed with various gods and other mythical figures – again, as a status symbol to impress their guests.

After bidding our guide farewell and thank you, we poke around the site some more and make a run through the small house at the center, which has been partially converted into a small museum – showing off some of the smaller items uncovered during various excavations.

As we leave Chedworth, we decide to take a quick run out to Broadway Tower – I’ve seen this several times (always fun!), but we have a first-timer that needs to experience it.

When we arrive, though, the weather does not cooperate with us *at all*, drenching us a bit as we run over to the Cafe/Visitor’s Centre to (hopefully) wait out the rain over a cup of coffee/tea and a light snack.

Unfortunately, the rain doesn’t let up enough for us to walk the short distance to the Tower, so that leaves this experience for LeAnn to a return visit! Of course, though, the rain stops as we’re driving away, so at least I get a new photo! Ha!

You can read more about my other visits to the Tower here: Broadway Tower - A Cotswolds Folly

After a stop at a posh shopping establishment, we return to Charingworth to clean up and prepare for our evening’s surprise. John and Marianne have been giddy about this event all week and are anxious for the “big reveal”.

As we pull up in front of the Three Ways House hotel in Mickleton, we’re told that it is home to the world famous Pudding Club! The Pudding Club was started in 1985 to “preserve the Great British Pudding”!

For my non-Anglophile readers, a “British Pudding” is, essentially, a yummy yummy dessert! You’ll see what I mean in a moment. 🙂

We’re really fortunate to be here, as invitations to Pudding Club meetings are difficult to come by, but John and Marianne have let them know about their “international guests”, and *boom*, we’re in!

So, what *is* the Pudding Club? From the website:

“Guests at Pudding Club® meetings enjoy a whole evening’s entertainment, from a jovial introduction by The Pudding Master at 7.30 pm through to a light main course followed by the reason guests gather – the Parade of Seven Puddings, with all its noise and ceremony, to the vote for best pudding of the night over coffee.”

This is so much fun from the beginning!

Our “Pudding Master” is hilarious and keeps things lively throughout the night. The light main course is, thankfully, light (but yummy), for it is the PUDDINGS for which we’ve all come.

The “Parade of Seven Puddings” is met with raucous applause and anticipation by the Pudding Club attendees… little did we know of the Herculean task ahead of us!

We are going to sample servings of ALL SEVEN of these desserts, scoring on each and voting for the winner!

Okay – let’s get on with it! I’ll give you my scores on each, since I’m writing! Ha!

First up – for no reason other than the humorous name – Spotted Dick Pudding! This is a traditional suet and currants pudding rolled into a circular pudding and served with custard! I gave this a 7 out of 10 – surprisingly good!

Next – Bread and Butter Pudding. This was spectacular, but … since we had just had an even more amazing B-and-B pudding, homemade by John at the exclusive Chez Edwards resort and restaurant complex, I had to (for no reason other than loyalty) mark this as a 6 (3 points loyalty deduction from my original well-deserved score of 9!).

Moving on, and for a change of pace to something tart – the Rhubarb Crumble! While Kathy and LeAnn scored this much higher (even voting it their favorite of the night!), it was *too* tart for me. A score of 6 on my sheet.

And then – the Chocolate Orange Sponge! Not an actual sponge, mind you, but a chocolate-orange sponge cake, with chocolate sauce. It was about this time that our collective stomachs started saying “hold on a minute…“, but none of us were going to be stopped! Oh … and this got a 7 from me.

Now, for what would be my second-favorite of the night – Syrup Sponge! While this initially sounds like the results of a breakfast cleanup effort, it was an absolutely amazing pud. A solid 9 on my score sheet!

Only two left, and I knew what I wanted to end the night with, so I went for what I hoped was a light and fruity selection – the Passion Fruit Roulade. Maybe it was being on dessert number six for the night (ouch!), or maybe it was just the meringue-y consistency… but my least favorite of the night. Say hello to a score of 5.

Finally … it was time for (my) star of the show – Sticky Toffee & Date Pudding. This was just *ridiculously* good. Perfect taste and the toffee sauce on top was to die for. A perfect 10 and my Pudding of the Night winner!

Coffee and Tea were brought around to the tables, and our collective gastronomic systems were all wondering just what the heck just happened.

Unfortunately, this was the last major event of this amazing adventure.

Our ride back to Charingworth was bittersweet, as we knew it meant saying “goodbye” to John and Marianne for this time. Lots of hugs and sappy words, lots of promises to “do it all again” at another location, and so much gratitude and humility that we have such amazing friends who are, as I’ve said before, our family.

We can’t thank them enough for the hospitality … only promise to return it or share it again.

We finish packing up that night, grab a few hours of sleep, and are picked up by Mick at 3:30am the next morning for our drive down to London Heathrow to catch our morning flight back home and back to reality.

Until the next time – hope you enjoyed reading and sharing our adventures. Drop me a line sometime if you have comments or questions! 🙂