The end of Oxford and me?

I cycled down to Oxford last Saturday to give a tour to some youngsters. I was not looking forward to it particularly. Youngsters know very little and therefore cannot easily relate to what they are seeing or what I am saying. They are generally much more interested in their friends, in eating and the odd passing distraction (a rising bollard, a descending bollard, a trashed student, a shop, etc).

My negativity was reinforced as I approached a renowned tourist focus - the Martyr’s Memorial. I could see a long line of white coaches with colourful streams of youngsters pouring forth and surging towards the city centre. They had damned up at the pedestrian crossing at the mouth of Beaumont Street no doubt in a deliberate attempt to block my path to the cycle stands. Nonetheless, I ploughed my way through and on towards the Playhouse where five of us badged guides were due to meet our hoard of 100 sixteen-year-olds from somewhere or other. The two coaches arrived disgorging their youthful cargo onto opposite sides of the roads. Bringing 100 independent bodies together in one place on what seemed to be Oxford’s busiest day was no mean feat, but we did it somehow and left it to the helpers to divide them into five groups and to distribute food bags (yep, they often bring their own). This took some time, in fact it nibbled almost half-an-hour off a tour duration of just one and half hours!

At last we were off with our separate groups all converging on New College where Harry Potter awaited. Threading ourselves through an over laden Broad Street was not easy. Mostly the pavements were blocked by large groups where the leader was often indistinguishable from the led and the street itself was chock-a-block with more conga-like groups, also threading. There was some easing around the Sheldonian, but the exit was blocked by a brilliant young woman who had the brilliant idea of addressing her crowd from the steps – brilliant.

I think it was about then, or maybe when a sub-group of my group announced a growing need for the toilet, that I decided that this was not what I wanted to do with my life; no more than I desired to contribute in any way to attracting yet more youngsters to visit Oxford. Enough was enough. So I smiled vaguely, turned on my heel and walked quickly back to my bicycle and pedalled off to my comfortable little flat high above the Woodstock Road and well away from the maddening crowd.

Not really. I persevered and, with the possible exception of two Spanish lads who probably could not understand a word that I was saying and were distracting two Spanish girls who could, they were a nice enough bunch. I can still remember the smile of delight as a pretty Italian girl first saw the Holm oak tree in New’s cloister (it’s the tree beneath which Harry Potter’s enemy...ah you don’t need to know that). Some of them even asked questions. I gave them the best time that I could – and allowed them a toilet visit as well.

Next day I led a literature tour and this healed the wounds. The invasive tides had ebbed; Sundays are usually quieter in Oxford. My group consisted of adults, all of whom had made a conscious choice to take the tour and had paid for it. Most of them knew of the authors that I talked about. They chipped in, asked questions, corrected me at times, laughed when they were supposed to, and were even mildly interested in where the Potter locations were. Someone bought one of my books, and I enjoyed the tour as much as they did – I think.

Isn’t Oxford a wonderful place? Yes it is, but its capacity to absorb ever increasing numbers of visitors has its limits.

By the way, these are not my photos. They were taken by a Spanish visistor during one of my tours. I thought that they were rather good.