England Guide
The West Midlands and the Peak District
With justification, the small country towns and untrammelled scenery of the West Midlands are the apple of the tourist eye, but there's no disputing the urban epicentre of the region – Birmingham, Britain's second city, once the world's greatest industrial metropolis, now jazzed up with fashionable canalside developments and a prestigious cultural scene. Southeast of the conurbation, the county of Warwickshire draws immense crowds of visitors, all of them heading to Shakespeare's home town of Stratford-upon-Avon and the chance to visit some of his family haunts and watch his plays in performance. The diverting town of Warwick, with its whopping castle, is an additional nearby attraction.
To the west, Herefordshire is a large and sparsely populated county that's home to several charming market towns, most notably Hay-on-Wye, which boasts the largest concentration of second-hand bookshops in the world, and Hereford, where the remarkable medieval Mappa Mundi map is displayed. Next door, to the north, rural Shropshire weighs in with Ludlow, one of the region's prettiest towns, awash with antique half-timbered buildings. Shropshire has a fascinating industrial history, too, for it was here in the Ironbridge Gorge that British industrialists built the world's first iron bridge and pioneered the use of coal as a smelting fuel. These were two key events in the Industrial Revolution and, appropriately, the gorge's industrial heyday is recalled by a phalanx of museums.
To the north of the sprawling Birmingham conurbation, is Derbyshire, whose northern reaches incorporate the region's finest scenery in the rough landscapes of the Peak District National Park. The latter offers great opportunities for moderately strenuous walks, as well as the comely former spa town of Buxton and the grandiose stately pile of Chatsworth House.
Highlights
1 Royal Shakespeare Company, Stratford-upon-Avon The pre-eminent performers of Shakespeare's plays.
2 Mappa Mundi, Hereford Cathedral This antique map, dating to around 1300 AD, provides a riveting insight into the medieval mind.
3 Hay-on-Wye Deep in the countryside, this dinky little town has more second-hand bookshops than anywhere else in the world.
4 Ironbridge Gorge The first iron bridge ever constructed arches high above the River Severn.
5 Ludlow A postcard-pretty country town with half-timbered houses and a sprawling castle.
6 Buxton Good-looking former spa town that makes an ideal base for exploring the Peak District.