Cheltenham Tourist Information Guide Cotswolds

Cheltenham Tourist Information, Gloucestershire

Cheltenham lies beneath Cleeve Hill, the highest point in the Cotswolds and above the vale of the River Severn. It is known as 'The Western Gateway to the Cotswolds'. The village of Broadway being known as 'The Northern Gateway to the Cotswolds'.

From humble beginnings as a modest market town, Cheltenham became one of the most fashionable health resorts in the country. In 1716, in a meadow outside the town, pigeons were found to be pecking at what turned out to be salt crystals at a spring which led to the establishment of the town as a Spa. The importance of the pigeons leading to the discovery of the 'Spa Waters' is reflected in three pigeons being included in the Cheltenham Coat of Arms.

King George III arrived to treat his infirmities in 1788, rows of Regency houses then appeared – and the town then known as "Cheltenham Spa" was born.

Visitors can still sample the Spa Waters at the beautiful Pitville Pump Room. John Forbes was the architect and interestingly sentenced for fraud to transportation for life to Australia. The sentence was subsequently commuted to a few years in prison.

The Promenade is considered to be one of the most beautiful thoroughfares in the country, with its tree lined avenue flanked by smart shops and cafés. The composer Gustav Holst was born here in 1874 and the Antarctic explorer Edward Wilson in 1872.

The Regency town of Cheltenham is where Zara Phillips (Queen's eldest granddaughter) and husband Mike Tindall have their home (see Royalty in the Cotswolds).

Visitors from all round the world flock to Cheltenham for the International Festival of Literature and Music, and the town is the western gateway to the Cotswolds.

Cheltenham, on the edge of the Cotswolds, is an inland spa resort of handsome Regency architecture, broad avenues and fine parks. The medicinal waters can be taken at several sites in the town but mainly at the Pittville Pump Room.

The principal street of Cheltenham is the Promenade with its fine regency terraces and Neptune Fountain. Montpellier is where Cheltenham's elite reside. Here, small boutiques jostle for space with wine bars and restaurants such as Brasserie Blanc, Raymond Blanc's informal spin-off of Le Manoir at Oxford.

The centrepiece is the Montpellier Gardens, blooming with flowers and containing a fountain surmounted by a bespectacled Gustav Holst, who was born in Cheltenham and now stands with his baton raised aloft above the water jets.

Cheltenham is world famous for it's horse racing course at Prestbury Park and the main hurdles event being the Gold Cup National Hunt Festival week in March.

VOTED ONE OF BEST TOP 5 SHOPPING STREETS IN BRITAIN (2011)

The Promenade in Cheltenham has been named as one of the top five best shopping streets in Britain in a poll for Google Street View.

The Promenade - Main Shopping Street in Cheltenham

Over 20,000 people voted in May 2011 on a short list drawn up by a panel of judges of travel, shopping and lifestyle experts.

Interesting Facts

The real Alice in Wonderland

The story of a girl who falls down a hole and finds herself in a magical world is believed to be based on Alice Liddell, a girl who often visited her grandparents at their Charlton Kings (a suburb of Cheltenham) home.

Her grandfather Dr Henry Liddell was Dean of Christ Church College in Oxford where he became a friend of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson – better known under his pen name Lewis Carroll. The author was a maths teacher at Oxford University Christ Church College and took Alice and her two sisters on a boat trip.

To keep them amused he told a story about Alice and a white rabbit, later published as Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland in 1865.

The Liddell’s lived in Hetton Lawn, Cudnall Street, Charlton Kings. The original mirror, or looking glass, is still there. Lewis Carroll was a regular visitor to the home, where Alice’s grandparents lived.

There are at least three links between Alice Liddell and the protagonist in Lewis Carroll’s books.

Carroll set the story on May 4, Alice Liddell’s birthday and in Through the Looking-Glass the fictional Alice declares that her age is “seven-and-a-half exactly“, the same as Liddell on that date.

Carroll dedicated the book to Alice Pleasance Liddell. The poem at the end of Through the Looking-Glass, when read downward, spells out Alice Liddell’s full name.

John Higgs

The following is an epitaph in the cemetery of St Mary's Church:-

IN MEMORY OF JOHN HIGGS, DIED 1825

HERE LIES JOHN HIGGS
A FAMOUS MAN FOR KILLING PIGS
FOR KILLING PIGS WAS HIS DELIGHT
BOTH MORNING , AFTERNOON AND NIGHT.
BOTH HEATS AND COLD HE DID ENDURE
WHICH NO PHYSICIAN COULD E'ER CURE
HIS KNIFE IS LAID, HIS WORK IS DONE,
I HOPE TO HEAVEN HIS SOUL IS GONE.

The Church is very much in the heart of Cheltenham, its Steeple can be clearly seen from the area near the retail outlets of Boots and Littlewoods on the main shopping street.
Although, as with many sites of Churches, origins go back further than the present church, in fact worship here dates back to  the 8th Century , the present building has parts that date back to Norman times.
The stained glass windows are superb and are of Victorian times.  The rose Window is particularly attractive, there are many intesting memorials, one in particular is situated next to the Pulpit, this refers to Captain Skillicorne who developed Cheltenhams first Spa, the visit of King George III is recorded also on this tablet.
Visitors will observe an American Flag on display, it was during World War 2 that many American servicemen worshiped  here and many have returned to visit the church.
Interestingly one of the worshipers was a General Robert E.Lee, he was a decendant of General Lee of the american civil war fame.
The Domesday book the name of Cheltenham is spelt "Chilteham" and "Ciltenham".