Continuing a new ambition to shake off the familiarity of the known experience and to venture out to discover new and interesting locations.
This article first appeared on Comfortably Adventurous 10th December 2024.
Earlier in the summer, Anna and I decided to try something a little different, recognising the benefit of shaking off the comfort of doing the familiar and predictable and instead going out into the world to discover some interesting unexpected locations. The remit, relatively simple, find the most obscure location as a starting point then gradually finding our way home stopping at any point of interest that took our fancy, using tourist signs as our markers along the way. On our first Brown Sign Adventure, we discovered a railway coach museum, a quirky little craft village and a horse and donkey sanctuary a short distance from her home in East London. It was an enjoyable day without the weight of expectations on our shoulders. It was also enjoyable on a personal level to just go out and enjoy the experience of living in the moment without feeling any pressure to chose somewhere notable or of merit. If they were dreadful places, that was part of the enjoyment.
One of the things we both realised that made that first adventure a success was the realisation it really was about the journey together, in fact the more niche and quirky our destination the more enjoyable the whole experience was. The railway coach museum was a fantastic starting point, a real local attraction that had a charm and quality of its own but easily somewhere you would dismiss in any other circumstance. It was fun to discover and that spirit of discovery continued as we journeyed home spotting somewhere new along the way without any foreknowledge, just a positive attitude to embrace whatever lay ahead. This next adventure begun on my side of London, finding a starting point about a half hour away from home and then seeing what happened along the way. And so it happened that on this particular day, our adventure would land us in gaol.
A gaol, a milkshake machine and a ruined castle
For our second Brown Sign adventure, we set our bearings north west from my side of London into Buckinghamshire, a lovely corner of England, a world away from the city life we both live and work in. Our starting point, the old gaol and museum in Buckingham, a quirky little castle shaped building sitting in a market square that instantly had that feel of somewhere worth exploring. And given Anna’s ‘stock-in-trade’ in the legal profession, an interesting perspective of justice in days gone by. After a lovely drive in the Autumn sunshine, we arrived to see a busy local market day well under way, and fortuitously, the gaol was free to visit on this particular occasion. It had a wonderful aesthetic and appearance, a castle in the middle of a market square open for visitors to explore. I visited another jail with Ruth many years ago in Dublin, it was very different experience to this. That felt like a prison, this felt like stepping back into the middle ages.
It was a little small, a little compact but had it a wonderfully welcoming atmosphere about it, volunteers and staff guiding visitors and curious explorers upstairs to learn a little of the history of the market town and the gaol itself. It had the feel of a local museum, no interactive displays or immersive experiences, instead information printed off and stuck up on the walls, but that added to its charm. It was nice to take a step back from the ‘experience’ led approach of modern larger exhibits and enjoy a more earnest and simpler way of bringing history to life. It was fun seeing mannequins and figures used to bring to life those that resided in the gaol at one point in time. History in the way it’s taught today can be a touch abrasive at times, the current interpretation of history juxtaposing modern social trends onto historical events for example. It was nice to actually just enjoy some basic history.
There were a few opportunities to take a quick picture here and there, the more relaxed atmosphere brought out the playful sides of our characters. It wasn’t too conducive to taller guests, clearly the criminality a couple of hundred years ago were an inch or two shorter than today but with a little careful navigating, relatively easy to get around the gaol. It led to a wonderful surprise, for one of us at least, towards the end with an exhibit on Lark Rise To Candleford, costumes and props from the TV adaptation of the Flora Thompson series of books set in Buckinghamshire. Anna does enjoy her period and historical dramas, not my particular penchant but it was nice to see her light up in a way she experienced with me earlier in the year when we went along to Comic Con in London. I enjoy heroes in leather and steel, she enjoys Ladies in lace and petticoats, normalcy is somewhere in-between.
After buying a postcard for our visit, and enjoying a short walk around town taking in a little of the market day atmosphere, our journey home begun having spent a little more time at this first exhibit and enjoying the spirit of the occasion. Avoiding the main roads and highways, the journey was a little longer snaking through the country side along small narrow lanes but it did present a wonderful opportunity to stop along the way and pick up a little dairy refreshment. We were both a little thirsty but trusting in the power of the local road side signs, we came across a fresh milk farm shop with a milkshake vending machine. These are a little more common down in Somerset and so it was wonderful to discover a fresh shake more close to home. Still a little bit of a drive but a great discovery by chance, with an assortment of syrups to accompany the natural great taste of the raw milk.
Drawing closer to home, we passed through a few familiar locations, having walked through this part of the Cotswolds on my Thames Path and Grand Union Canal walk over the years. With the sun hidden away and the weather a little cooler, we made our final stop of the day, parking up in Berkhamsted, a stopping point I passed through walking from Tring a few years ago but now having the opportunity and inclination to explore the castle ruins. These type of Castles are an interesting experience to explain to anyone outside the UK, essentially the ruins and remains of historical buildings overseen by English Heritage to preserve the location in its entirety. To visitors today, a large open space with relatively little intact to indicate what once stood there but historically, one of England’s oldest motte and baily castles. This was a historical brown sign adventure to explore.
It’s the sort of location you definitely need to have a sense of imagination to appreciate. In the absence of urbanization, the area being some distance away from the nearest city, it does retain some of the key landscape features suggestive of its former purpose. As such, it makes for a lovely, peaceful area to just sit on one of the wooden benches situated around what remains of the castle walls to see how those living locally make use of the green space. For a sense of accomplishment, there was of course a personal challenge to hike up to the top of the small mound to view the castle yard below. For what remained, it was enjoyable to visit, to see. Walking lazily back towards the car, it presented a nice opportunity to spend a few minutes exploring the town of Berkhamsted by foot before leaving another castle behind and making our way back home.
Final Thoughts
A lovely and spontaneous way to spend a day, discovering some interesting local attractions inspired entirely by the spirit of adventure. We started our day in a preserved gaol that resembled a small castle and finished in one of England’s oldest castle remains in the Hertfordshire countryside. It was fun to continue this new series of adventures, with no pressure or sense of fulfilment, just throwing ourselves out there and seeing what we found along the way. The highlight was the gaol in the morning, it had such a wonderful, welcoming local charm with friendly staff pointing out a few interesting bits of information but more the opportunity to just explore on a whim and take our time. It lacked a little of the polish and prestige of a large museum or attraction but that wasn’t the point of this particular endeavour. We set out to find a quirky, local museum and accomplished that with merit.
Overall, the experience was a little more relaxed this time, starting and finishing closer to home than our first trip out. There was still an element of anxiety pushing out into the unknown but certainly more manageable and less challenging to face into. My main barrier in recent years has been overcoming the stress of situations outside my control, travelling to new unknown places was not always an enjoyable prospect. This new endeavour and spirit of adventure has had a transformative impact on being able to manage those situations more effectively, hyperbole perhaps, but it’s been really enjoyable to just set out on the open road without a plan or destination and to just enjoy some of the fascinating attractions a stone’s throw from home. Gradually, we are pushing further out, our next Brown Sign Adventure the furthest from home exploring locations attractions around Wiltshire and Dorset.
Thank you so much for reading.
Brown Sign Chronicles 
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