West Country news (2)

When we got up on Thursday morning, we couldn't believe it - the streets were completely clear - not a sign of the MOP Fair, which had run until 11 pm the night before. They must have been working all through the night to clear everything away. This was the view of our hotel from the street:

We had our meeting with SellMyTimeshare in the morning and it turned out much as we expected - they try to suck you in to their system, which smelled ever so slightly of pyramid selling. We weren't comfortable with signing up there and then - we're treating it as stage one in our learning process as to what to do with our two weeks in Hollywood, Florida. We're unlikely to ever use them as they're the Xmas/New Year weeks - premium time in USA - and we've been having difficulty recently in using them for suitable exchanges through Interval International. Meanwhile the maintenance fees are rising, especially after Sterling's recent collapse, so we didn't think that any of our offspring would want to take them on either, so we'll have to find a solution in due course. We're keeping our separate Marriott week and Points however - we like them.

Once we freed ourselves from their clutches we were able to do the Shakespeare thing - 5 separate properties to view, but first, lunch. We chose well - The One Elm was quirky but very good:

We rather rushed through the first Shakespeare property, which was a pity, but we had forgotten to renew our parking ticket. We took a bit more time and had some fun in the second one:

The third property was Hall's Croft:

All three so far had been within easy walking distance but Anne Hathaway's Cottage was a mile away, but worth the walk:

Back in the town, it was time for a beer - and we'd found the Stratford Ale House, a dinky little place but excellent beer. Dinner that night was in Stratford's oldest pub - the Old Thatch Tavern, another Fuller's property.