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Created on Tuesday, 25 January 2011 16:20

Written by Marc Adami

London is a magnificent “world class” city, but as residents of rural U.S.A., we all know that a city is not always the best example of life in any particular country. So to get more of a taste of Britain or to visit other important cities, London is also a great base of operation.

A small group of friends and I decided to go to Canterbury one day during our London trip and visit the Cathedral which is both a World Heritage site and the seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the head of the Church of England and the symbolic leader of the world-wide Anglican Comm.  If you aren’t interested in history, literature, cathedrals, Norman architecture, or religion, you might still want to make the “pilgrimage,” so to speak, to honor the beginning of the tourism industry.

In the days before planes, trains, and automobiles, it wasn’t always easy to travel and certainly not safe with highway robbers and unfamiliar surroundings. There wasn’t much incentive to leave the safety of home, but there was a tradition and need to visit holy sites and seek indulgences and healing. Pilgrims, made famous by Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, would take that risk, seek those rewards, and come back home with stories to tell. At the same time innovations such as signposts, hospices (forerunners of both hotels and hospitals), banking (facilities that would allow you to draw money from a location far from home so you wouldn’t have to carry so much to be relieved of when Robin Hood stopped your carriage), and public houses or pubs (forerunners of McDonalds and Holiday Inn) came into existence to cater to the needs of pilgrims. It was certainly easier to visit Canterbury a day’s journey from London on horseback at a canter, then it was to travel to Jerusalem or Rome.

Canterbury was probably always a destination for pilgrims because of the cathedral, but it got an even bigger boost when Archbishop Thomas Becket was martyred there in 1170 by the supposedly offhand remarks of King Henry II. I’d recommend the 1964 movie Becket to get a flavor for the friends turned rivals and the conflicts arising from the concepts of loyalty, duty, and honor. Needless to say, the Church made fortunes from pilgrims who paid for indulgences or bought souvenirs and the State wanted its cut.

We journeyed to Canterbury by train from Victoria Station, which leaves every half hour, and got back by early evening. We also found out that Canterbury is a popular destination for French school children (part of their Norman culture) particularly on Friday afternoons, which you might want to avoid. Maybe the best time to go would be Sunday morning for a service, as there will not likely be a big crowd at that time.

There are also numerous bus tours with guides available in and out of London. We also took a trip to Salisbury, Stonehenge, and Bath one day and enjoyed our time immensely. Others took trips as far away as Paris (via the Chunnel) or Edinburgh Scotland via British Rail, a 400 mile journey one way on a fast train that only takes about four hours. You could also rent a car and tour the countryside which many people do, but don’t forget to get in the passenger seat to drive, shift with your left hand, and keep left.