Colchester: like the Curate's egg....

...parts of it are very good. Other parts are stinkers.

We had a pleasant one-hour train journey to Colchester in Essex this morning, keen to see what is left of a once-thriving Roman town that was razed to the ground by the mighty warrior queen, Boudicca in 60 AD.  After Boudicca and her army (possibly including my Iceni tribe antecedents!) destroyed the joint, the Romans built a huge wall around the town, some of which still stands. 

But before the wall, the Romans had built a monumental arch in 49 AD to mark the town's foundation.  After Boudicca blazed through 11 years later, the arch was incorporated into the new defensive wall.  This is the remains of the arch.

It is still mightily impressive, almost 2000 years later.

And right next to the arch is this building, now a pub known as the Hole in the Wall.  It was originally a house and was built over remnants of the wall in the 1600s. Once it was completed, the tradies clearly downed tools and said "we're done", leaving a big slab of the Roman wall in situ.  I'm rather glad they did because it looks great! 





A momentary digression now.  We had been forewarned that Colchester is not the most sophisticated of regional towns and we can report that this is a very fair assessment.  A huge magistrate's court dominates the main drag and I'm pretty sure it has a regular clientele of locals who are mostly white,  tattooed, very loud and ready for a bit of biff.  In the high street there's an over-abundance of beauty parlours and nail salons as well as barber shops.  We did wonder if the barber shops do an under-the-counter line in other services, given their numbers.  We also saw three pawn shops with people entering carrying heavy bags of stuff to offload. It was all a bit sad really.  But we did get a laugh when we saw a pub called "The Slug and Lettuce". 

Alas, this is all that remains of what was once the most famous building in Roman Britain:  The Temple of Claudius.  We can thank Boudicca for its destruction in AD 60, but it was later rebuilt, although not to the same dimensions.  One thousand years later, enter William the Conquerer! He pulled the temple down and built an immense castle over the ruins. 

Mr Geoffy will now share castle and priory pics, as well as details of our most satisfactory elevenses in a right proper tea shop.   

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We think the Roman walls are the most complete and substantial of anywhere we've seen in Britain.  Others have their own charms, but these are particularly impressive. 

Last wall photo.  We promise.

The stones originally used in the Roman wall never went to waste.  It's immediately obvious that they've been used elsewhere, in the following thousands of years.

Here's part of the castle Anne mentioned earlier.  Constructed a mere thousand years later, as she says.  Rolls off the tongue pretty easily, but ... a thousand years ???  As you can see, the Colchester locals were enjoying it too.  Speaking of the Colchesterians (just made that up), they were having a ball today, courtesy of the weather.  In addition to the wonderfully named Slug and Lettuce, I reckon we went past another 10 pubs in the High Street, at all of which patrons were lolling about outside in the sun, beer and wine at the ready.  It's hard to find fault, considering that there are only 4 days a year when it's suitable to do this in Colchester.








I just remembered I was deputed to report on elevenses.  You sure as hell wouldn't go to Colchester based on its culinary reputation, but in our case we lucked out.  A most agreeable morning tea was to be had at the Small Talk Tea Rooms.  The Victoria sponge cake is highly recommended.  Suitably fortified, we lasted another hour or so until lunch in the High Street, where we had a truly excellent soup, salad and sandwich.  Don't judge Colchester by the seeming abundance of pawn shops,  nail salons and barbers.

Our final attraction was the ruined St Botolph's Priory.

Constructed in the 12th century by the Augustinians (as distinct from the Cistercians, who seemed to be more prominent oop north).  Now, what did they use for building materials?  Hands up all those who said the remnants of the Roman walls ... correct answer!







It's just beautiful, if you like that sort of thing.

But why would you not?

You can wander through at your leisure, and laze around on the grass and admire the splendour.  Today there were indeed a number of Colchesterians lazing around on the grass, although most of them seemed to either recovering from last night or preparing for tonight, or maybe both.  Have they no sense of the unbelievable history that is everywhere in their town?



I think Anne's title for the title for the day is most apposite.  Colchester is actually wonderful, and if you visit, focus on the undoubted highlights and ignore any downsides.  I couldn't help but think that every middle-aged woman looked and sounded like Gavin's mum Pamlaa in Gavin and Stacey.  I know they lived in Billericay, not Colchester, bu' i's still Essex innit?