500 reasons why: Watercress Line & Jane Austen's House

Monday, October 01, 2012

Watercress Line & Jane Austen's House

On Sunday we decided to take a day trip with Norma. We tossed around a few options (some involving nights away and long drives which got progressively more complicated and expensive) but finally we decided to take a trip to Jane Austen's House Museum in Hampshire - something that had been on my list of things to do for a long time. Jane Austen's House (as Nick discovered) is actually the second most popular tourist attraction in the Alton area according to Trip Advisor. The first is the Alresford to Alton Railway, commonly known as the Watercress Line (Alresford being famous for producing - obviously - watercress.) So we reserved a Zipcar, Googled 'best Sunday roast in Hampshire' and our day was sorted.

Hampshire is lovely - very green, very lush. It took us about 90 minutes to get to Alresford and Nick, Norma, Milo and Henry boarded the train at Alresford while I took photos from the platform (as we were only going one way I drove the car to meet them in Alton). The railway is set up so that each station represents a period in English history which is a neat idea. Alresford is pre-WWII and Alton is 1960s.

After I collected them at Alton we went to lunch (see the next post) and after that, drove to Chawton to see Jane Austen's House. The house is very modestly sized - large for the period but just a relatively normal sized house now. The best thing of all was seeing the tiny table from which Jane Austen wrote. Amazing that such brilliance was created in such a small space. The house wasn't great for kids so we didn't stay long (though we didn't really need long to see the house) and after a quick play in a local playground, we headed back to London. All up, a lovely day.