Chawton
Steventon church
Chawton Church
Jane Austen Tour Program
Friday. Morning departure from London for the county of Hampshire. With our Jane Austen guide we take you back in time to the 18th and 19th century and drive along one of the toll roads with the Turnpikes and Toll Roads. Visit one of the important posting-houses. Hear about the different modes of transports mentioned 388 times in Jane Austen's novels: such as the barouche, the curricle, the barouche landau and the fashionable Gig. Lunch in a typical 18th century pub. A walking tour of Winchester including the city museum and the house where she died. We visit Winchester Cathedral where Jane Austen is buried and take part in Evensong a special experience. Overnight accommodation in Hampshire hotel.
Saturday. Today we visit Bath. We enjoy a walking tour of the places where Jane lived, walked, visited, and shopped. See her various homes in Bath and the church where her parents were married. Places made famous in her Bath novels; 'Northanger Abbey' and 'Persuasion' - the Assembly Rooms, Pump Room, Abbey Church Yard and Bath Street. Visit the Jane Centre and enjoy the authentic period atmosphere and watch the video of Jane Austen's Bath. Lunch at leisure. Stop in the picturesque village of Lacock. Church Street and High Street were used in the filming of 'Emma' and 'Pride & Prejudice'. The village is a popular setting for period dramas as it remains much as it did in the eighteenth century. Option of a typical English afternoon tea in a country tea room or gardens. Overnight accommodation in Hampshire hotel.
Sunday. Visit the site of Steventon Rectory, where Jane was born the seventh of eight children in 1775, where she spent the first twenty-five years of her life and where her father was rector. Here she wrote the initial drafts of 'Northanger Abbey', 'Sense and Sensibility' and 'Pride and Prejudice'. Halt at the old posting inn at Deane Gate, where Jane's brother once failed to obtain a seat, as the coach was full. Follow the route often taken by Jane herself to Steventon, admiring the country life so vividly reproduced in her novels. Visit Jane Austen's home in Chawton, where she lived for the last eight years of her life, and the museum which houses a fine range of Austen memorabilia. Jane moved here in 1809 with her mother and sister Cassandra, and lived in the former bailiff's house on the opulent Chawton Estate, which belonged to her fortunate brother Edward who had been adopted by a wealthy, childless couple, the Knights. Chawton is known as Jane's literary home, and it was here that she revised, and decided to publish, classics earlier written at Steventon, such as 'Pride and Prejudice' and 'Sense and Sensibility'. Close by is St Nicholas' Church, where Jane's mother and sister are buried. Return to London early evening.