Sherwood Forest and Nottingham

Last Saturday we caught the train up to Nottinghamshire to check out the 22nd Annual Robin Hood Festival over in Sherwood Forest.

We arrived in Nottingham fairly early and decided to hit the town and see what there was to offer. And we immediately liked what we saw. After leaving the train station, we made our way inside a shopping centre to look for a memory card for our camera (as I'd taken them out to load up the photos for the blog and forgot to put them back in, D'Oh!). It turned out that we were in a Westfield Shoppingtown (just like back home!) and we got a bit homesick. We found a cheap memory card and then went in search of coffee and the tourist information centre to find out how to get to Sherwood Forest.

After a quick caffeine fix and information about bus times and everything we decided to check out the Nottingham City of Caves, which is a local award-winning attraction of a series of underground man-made caves and tunnels where (poor) people used to live (and work) and that were also used as bomb shelters during the war. Bizarrely enough, the entrance to the caves is inside the Westfields.

We made our way back and the Cave lady at the front suggested that it would take about 40 minutes to an hour, so we thought we'd do this, get a spot of lunch at the Wimpy Burgers (as recommended by Candy), and then catch the bus to Sherwood Forest. Plan! Unfortunately, we may have had greater expectations of the caves (this may have perhaps been to do with our visit to the caves in Slovenia) as it was a purely disappointing visit. Sure, it had some interesting things inside to look at and a couple of actors dressed up and telling us about the history of the caves and how they were used, but it wasn't anything 'special'.

Great expectations and a cool helmet. Unfortunately, like the Bateaux-Mouches in Paris, this attraction deserves two thumbs down and one big frown.


An enchanted well (with tacky eerie lighting and smoke machine) for your loose change.


Further along and after the first actor trying to recruit us for his underground tannery, we came across a air raid shelter warden and an area which was affected by the bombing during the war. I got to try on this cool gas mask. Which may have been a very bad idea as I then developed some major pimples.


Here's me in the kiddie area looking for some archaeologically-interesting specimens.


And that was the end of that and we spent perhaps a record time in there of half an hour. So, we ended up having an early lunch at Wimpy (a UK burger chain like macca's). They don't have Wimpy in central London and so we were curious to try it. The prices were about the same as macca's and the food was about the same too. But again, nothing special to write about. Moving on.

We caught the Sherwood Arrow bus over to Sherwood Forest (about 45 mins away and more than what we paid for our return train fares to Nottingham from London, go figure) and made our way into the Festival. Where I bought a cool little Robin Hood hat for £1.25. We also got free "I (heart) Sherwood" stickers!




Robin Hood fighting with Little John on a bridge.


One of the main drawcards for us going up this particular Saturday was that they were having a jousting tournament.


Here are the main characters.
A slightly effeminate Robin Hood (wearing a "Marian" head band as sold at the souvenir shops)


Maid Marian, playing on Robin Hood's team


Robin Hood's band of merry men (and one incredibly merry fellow on the right)


The dastardly and villainous Guy of Gisbourne


The most evil Sheriff of Nottingham


The actors were all pretty good and kept in character well. Disappointing however was the complete lack of actual jousting. Instead, the tasks included tests of skill, such as riding a galloping horse and trying to slice a cabbage (on top of a spear) in half with a sword without damaging the spear or injuring the spear bearer; or trying to collect a hoop on the tip of a jousting spear also whilst on a galloping horse. Breaking up the horse tasks were fights with swords or quarter staffs between members of the two teams (Robin Hood, Maid Marion and the Merry Men vs the Sheriff of Nottingham, Guy of Gisbourne and his men).

Swordfight between Robin Hood and one of Guy's men


After his team wins two of the three jousting challenges, confusingly, a Mêlée has been called by Robin Hood and it's everyone for themself to the death.


So everyone fights with each other and die. They try to make this more believable by having each of the dead people lying on the ground prone, whilst the winning person gets their sword and does a jumping chop across the "dead" person's chest. Soon enough, everyone's dead on the ground except for our hero, Robin Hood, and the evil Guy of Gisbourne and Sheriff of Nottingham. Needless to say, Guy doesn't survive, leaving Robin Hood and the Sheriff to duke it out. And shock horror! Robin is the victor and everyone else is dead. At this point, the scary dark magician MC calls upon the spirits to raise up all those who have been sacrificed. And they're ALIVE again. Wow, what a show.

Then we went in search of the famed Major Oak tree. Is that it? No... not big enough.


Tam wandering around Sherwood Forest engaging in some fungus-hunting.


Fungus! (just for you Tina)


More fungus!


One of the Merry Men's campsites? No one was home.


The Major Oak of Sherwood Forest, which is apparently the most famous living tree in the world as it once used to shelter Robin Hood and his Merry Men. It sure is big.


Visiting the Alchemist


Souvenirs anyone?


After some more wandering around, we caught the bus back to Nottingham from Edwinstowe.

Robin Hood and Maid Marian doing an impression of John Travolta and Uma Thurman dancing in Pulp Fiction.


Back in Nottingham we had a look at the Robin Hood statue outside the Castle.


And then we headed down to Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem (est. 1189AD), which claims to be the oldest pub in England, then had some fish and chips for dinner at Wetherspoon's before catching the train back to London.