"Tea with the Archbishop of Canterbury" Oxford by OiKnow

You really get the feel for a place like Oxford when you able to spend a few days there, absorbing the feel, smell, and texture of the place. I had the extreme pleasure of spending five days accompanying a friend at a conference at Oxford University in August of 2003. We stayed “in College,” meaning that as part of the conference we lived in one of the residence halls on campus with all of our meals provided in the College dinning hall. As part of the Conference we had access to a significant part of the University campus. Because it was not my Conference, I had significant parts of each day free to explore the University and the city of Oxford. Oxford was the home institution of Lewis Carroll who penned Alice in Wonderland, Professor Halley who Halley’s comet is named after, the place that Bill Clinton is reported to have smoked and not inhaled and Roger Banister the first man to break the four-minute mile mark. I found a couple of buildings around the city that for a fee allow you to climb a bell tower for a bird’s eye view of the city and the University.

Christ Church College

The architecture of Christ Church College’s main dinning hall has become famous in recent years as the model for the dinning hall in the Harry Potter films. Christ Church College is also the site of Christ Church Cathedral. The Cathedral is both towering and small at the same time. The stonework and carving are tremendous and the vaulted ceilings tower over you, yet the naïve, choir and sanctuary are very short from door to alter as major churches go. We had the pleasure of the conference opening with a tea party in the private garden at Christ Church, hosted by the Archbishop of Canterbury. When you walk around behind Christ Church you can look in through the gates at the private gardens, then walk ahead to the meadow, athletic fields and onto the river.

Carved in Stone

Ceiling in Christ Church Cathedral and an Cherub from anther building

• In a nutshell:Go spend a few days exploring the wonders of the city and University