Kendeline Fields Farms, Claybrooke Parva, near Lutterworth, Leicestershire

This morning, like everyone else in the UK, we woke to find that Mrs May had screwed up in calling a snap election, and that the young British voters were no longer disengaged from the political process. I have to confess that had I the privilege of voting in this election, I would have voted for my Conservative candidate, but then so did more voters than before, and if this country had Proportional Representation or Mixed Member Proportional systems rather than First Past the Post, the outcome may have been very different. In the meantime the United Kingdom is saddled with a hung Parliament and the political stage for the next year or so will be very interesting indeed.

Interested as we were, we remained glued to the television set long after breakfast was cleared away, until I insisted we either mute or kill the set, to sort out our travel schedule for the next week or so. Surprisingly this met with little resistance and within half an hour we had made telephone calls, been rejected then accepted for accommodation ahead. 

And so with some certainty, we headed off into the local settlement of Lutterworth to attend to a few domestic matters, posting of mail and a haircut for Chris. En route we noted that Lutterworth was the workplace of both John Wycliffe and Frank Whittle.

The former was one of the great Christians of the Middle Ages. Born in the north of England about 1328, he was educated at Oxford University and soon became famous for his learning and skill in debate. He also believed that people should be able to read the Bible in their own language, so in the early 1380s, he translated the Bible from Latin to English.

Frank Whittle who lived from 1907 to 1996, developed jet engines and did some of his work in Lutterworth. His name was unfamiliar to me, although not to Chris; the reverse of our limited knowledge of Wycliffe. This second son of Lutterworth, albeit a fleeting resident, is celebrated in the little town square.

Back to the car park within an hour, hence enjoying the amazing generosity of the local council in not being charged, we headed south on the M1 to Northampton, the county town of Northamptonshire, today with a population of over 216,200. There is no Park & Ride here, or none shown on the map, so we headed straight into town and found a spot in the multi-story car park. With the aid of a local, we were saved from wandering about lost between the concrete floors, and led out into the market area of the town. Here there was the noisy vibrancy of the weekly fresh produce markets along with the ever present stalls of books, cell-phone covers and of course the chippy.  Chris indulged in a paper “cone” of hot chips to reward himelf for the stress of having dealt with the slow progress on the M1, the whole extent of our journey undergoing road works.

Northampton has an ancient past like most such settlements, but was mostly destroyed by fire in 1675. Of course it was subsequently rebuilt and a Georgian town grew up in its stead, this in turn swamped by the Industrial Revolution.  It was the shoe and boot making industry that Northampton became famous for and there is apparently a wonderful celebration of this in the local museum, which unfortunately is closed until next year for expansion and modernising; a great disappointment to us.

We had a list of attractions gleaned from our travel guides and managed to find the Information Centre, whose employees explained that this one was closed or that might not be open. So much of our exploration was restricted to viewing the exterior of structures.

Next to the vibrant market place is the Church of All Saints which was rebuilt after the Great Fire to a design by architect Henry Bell. It has such a fine interior, and outside, a statue of bewigged and Roman attired Charles II stands above the portico, as a token of thanks for his donation of a thousand tonnes of timber.  A bistro straddles the entry of the church, no doubt providing welcome rental income to the parish, but seemingly at odds with the spirit of the building. We entered to the strains of the organ, a young man practicing for services; to enter a church or cathedral to resounding organ music sends tingles up one’s spine, no matter how secular one’s leanings might be.

We lunched within sight of the porch until the rain drove us under the eaves; cold showers persisted until we returned to the car to leave.

The Victorian gothic Guildhall is well worth a visit, and would be even more so if one were allowed inside to enjoy the interior. Unfortunately the rooms were all closed up for security purposes, but the glimpse we did get, impressed greatly.  This was constructed in the 1860s to a design by Edward Godwin and is very fine indeed. 

Walking west of the centre, we came first to Hazelrigg House, a substantial Elizabethan town house built about 1580 which survived the Great Fire and was owned by the Hazelrigg family from 1680 until 1831. I found the street frontage very attractive, even viewed through the rain.

Almost next door is one of the five churches with survived the fire, St Peter’s Church, dating from the 12^th century and one of the finest examples of Norman church architecture in the region. Unfortunately this too was padlocked up, the church yard and the church likewise.

A little further on we arrived at the Castle Mound, all that remains of the famous Norman castle built by Simon de Senilis, Earl of Northampton. The trial of Thomas a Becket took place here in 1164. In 1660 King Charles II had the castle destroyed as punishment for the town’s disloyalty during the English Civil War. Any views from this promontory are obscured by trees and modern structures, although the extensive modern railway station lies immediately below to the west.

From this viewpoint too one can see the National Lift Tower which was visible as we travelled into the city from the M1. Truly it is an eyesore and we did wonder what on earth it was all about. Fortunately these days if the tourist information people don’t offer answers, there is always Google. The 1275 metres high tower was completed in 1980 and was amazingly given Grade II Listed Building status in 1997, making it the youngest listed building in the United Kingdom. It was built as a lift testing tower, the only one in Britain, but fell out of use in 1997 when Express Lifts was taken over by Otis, but reopened for business in 2009. It is used by lift companies for research, development, testing and marketing. There are six shafts of varying heights and speeds, including a high speed shaft with a travel of 100 metres and a theoretical maximum speed of ten metres per second.  Since 2011 the tower has been used for abseiling, a fact that makes me feel a little more sympathetic toward a structure so at odds with the surrounding environment.

Near the castle mound there is another of the five surviving churches, this the United Reformed Church, built in 1695, and later enlarged. It has little in common with standard Anglican or Catholic churches, but is an attractive building. Apparently 18^th century non-conformist Philip Doddridge preached here for twenty two years, in a time where he was unlikely to lose his head for doing so. 

Back up through the centre of the town, we headed north past the multi-story car park and headed for the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Dating from 1103 and the oldest building in Northampton, it is the largest and best preserved medieval round church in the country inviting further exploration. Alas, this too was locked up, so we were left to wander about the exterior. We found the grounds very neglected, grave stones leaning this way and that, if not entirely fallen. There was litter everywhere and a notice lying in the long grass, “Overnight camping is prohibited. Bedding, etc. will be removed”. This seemed a rather strange directive until we spied an abandoned sleeping bag in a doorway and there and all along the north side of the church, abandoned hypodermic needles and discarded packets of drugs handed out to addicts to ease them off their habit, among a pile of other unpleasant rubbish. It is no wonder that the keepers of the church keep their doors locked in an attempt to keep this all out of the church’s interior, although one then must ask about the concept of Christian refuge for the needy.  

By now the skies were clearing, but we felt we had seen all there was to see in Northampton, or at least that open for view. We retraced our steps to the car, paid the parking fee and headed north on an alternative route home, via the A5199 through beautiful Northamptonshire and Leistershire rural countryside, crossing the A14 and A4304, routes we had travelled two days ago when travelling to Stamford, on up through the lovely little villages of Husbands Bosworth, Walton, Gilmorton, Ullesthorpe and home. It was still only mid-afternoon and we passed the afternoon in a relaxed manner, glad that our fellow campers had already moved on.