OXFORD PULSE
pulse
Oxford
This month
Sheila Manchester
takes a punt to see Oxford’s cathedral, colleges and choirs.
o
xford, known the world over as the City of Dreaming Spires. Historic, exquisite, elegant and deep, this city epitomises that rare combination; beauty
and brains. The beauty is in its architecture and its green spaces; the brains are, of course in that pinnacle of education, Oxford University. With 48 colleges, 20,000 students and 9500 staff it is fair to say that to many, Oxford, the oldest university in the world, is its university. Many of the city’s attractions are based
around or connected to the university but Oxford isn’t all about education; there is plenty to delight the eye, feed the stomach and lift the spirit. Oxford residents young and old will
be found, on those fine sunny days, on or around the River Thames, in punts, canoes, narrowboats, cruisers and, Lord help us, in pedaloes. This obsession with the river is illustrated by the world famous Boat Race which doesn’t actually take place in Oxford but features just two teams, Oxford and its arch rival, Cambridge. On dry land, the beauty continues in the
University of Oxford Botanic Garden - the oldest botanical garden in Britain with over 7,000 species, set beside the River Cherwell, adjacent to Magdalen Bridge. Still on foot, you could spend hours,
days, months or years wandering through the historic streets, in and out of colleges and their quadrangles and, even, meadows. It’s difficult to know when you would tire of gazing at the glory of it all. On danker days, there are museums
including the Museum of Oxford and The Ashmolean, there are galleries and
oxonian’s homes
where would you aspire to live?
summary oF properties For sale in oxFord on
www.findaproperty.com 10 February 2010
Total for sale in Oxford: 591 Lowest priced home for sale: £30,000 Highest priced home: £2.75 million
summary oF properties to let in oxFord on
www.findaproperty.com 10 February 2010
Total properties to let in Oxford: 524 Lowest rent listed: £600 pcm Highest rent listed: £3,500 pcm
a plethora of stunning churches (under all those dreaming spires) including the fabulous Christ Church Cathedral, which is part of the largest college of Oxford University. The Cathedral boasts a famous men and boys’ choir, and is one of the main choral foundations in Oxford. You can’t have a university without
having books and while bookshops across the country close every month, in this city there are shops and libraries aplenty, most significantly, the Oxford University Press and Blackwells, where you can while away a long wet day. And the most captivating sight? For me,
the Bridge of Sighs, built in 1913 to link the two buildings of Hertford College. Although it’s named after the one in Venice it is nothing like it but it is romantic, peaceful and utterly charming.
PROPERTYdrum MARCH 2010 23
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