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Thanks Oxboffice for nearly eight years of selling tickets for our Birmingham, Sutton and Warwick Ghost Walks, you have been a great agent, working hard to support our walks.
Sadly Oxboffice have decided to hang up their ticket machine, enter a great new agent to us, WeGotTickets. Their other clients rave about them, and our experience has been great too.
We look forward to working long into the future.
Check out their site at WeGotTickets, with Tickets for walks at WeGotTickets/birminghamghost
With style and design references to the Warwickshire 6th of Foot, and the Warwickshire Fusiliers, I gave my new Town Criers livery its first outing in the grounds of the Warwickshire Yeomanry, cap badge to follow soon.
I was pleased that it arrived in time for the Shakespeare Birthday Celebrations in Stratford Upon Avon, and was one of 4 local Town Criers, that joined in with the Towns Beadle in ringing our Oyez’s to accompany his “Three cheers”.
Although I’ve now done a few events, my appointment will be made official at the Mayor Making Ceremony on 14th May.
Michael
After 28 years of sterling service as Town Crier for Warwick, Graham Sutherland has hung up his bell, however he has decided to continue his role of Ale Taster.
A new Town Crier has been appointed, and we are delighted that Michael, half of Midlands Discovery Tours is the new crier.
His duties started with being thrown in at the deep end, acting as Master of Ceremonies for the Mayor of Warwick’s Civic Ceremony, as well as the Mayor’s Civic Church Service.
His first town crying role will be on the 24th February at the Rotary Pancake races in Warwick Market Square.
There are many great causes, but as a volunteer breeder for Guide Dogs I see the difference guide dogs make to peoples lives, read this blog then consider coming along on our special Warwick Ghost Walk on 12th September. Proceeds from the walk go to Guide Dogs. Our Guide Dog Brood Bitch won’t be joining us as she will be busy looking after the 7 potential Guide Dogs she gave birth to yesterday. Tickets from Oxboffice
Michael Reddy
Birmingham Ghost Walks have been a huge success over the last five years, with over 3,000 people having been on either the Graveyard or Sinister City walks. Newspaper articles have been published on hauntings at two of the pubs featured in the Ghost Walks, along with the story of the haunting of a waiting room on New Street Station with details supplied by the great grand daughter of the ex-railway worker from the 1930’s.
In 2013, Michael and Ian, qualified Institute of Tourist Guiding guides, ran some trial walks to get a feel for the right stories to use. They say that 2014 Warwick’s 1,100 year, seemed like a good year to share with visitors and residents alike some of its rich history of plague, torture, public execution, murder and unexplained activity. The Rose and Crown in Market Square is the walks start and finish point, a long dead ex-landlady is sometimes seen in the bar, and during a research visit to the cellar, Michael was told of a playful poltergeist moving small items around the cellar. The Tudor House on West Street is the furtherest we walk West, Sweetie the owner shared stories of builders meeting a ghostly Lady of the Manor, whilst they were on a tea break. There are also reports of a young chimney sweep that sits in a rocking chair by the fire in the bar. Heading back towards Westgate, we talk about the inspiration for Tolkien’s Ghost Army. Onto Castle Street once the home of a one of Warwick’s most successful and most generous merchant, Thomas Oken. His home now the Thomas Oken Tearoom, is run by Jo. Generous with her time sharing stories, Michael thinks Thomas Oken would have approved of Jo, her warm friendly manor is mirrored by that of the man, believed to be Thomas Oken, who has been seen walking around the Tea Room smiling at guests before fading into nothing. Of course the castle must feature in any walk of Warwick, and although Francis Greville, the 5th Earl of Warwick, didn’t share his wife’s Daisy’s views on the supernatural, it is believed he made up stories of ghosts to encourage curious Victorians to pay a few Shillings to visit the Castle. As the County town Warwick was also the centre for justice for hundreds of years, people being hanged in public was a regular sight, about one a quarter in the mid 1700’s but the last public hanging in Warwick was 150 years ago, with the last hanging behind closed doors 50 years later.
Tickets are available from our ticket agents Oxboffice
On Thursday 1st May Radio Warwickshire interviewed Michael about both the Warwick and Birmingham Ghost Walks. Listen to the broadcast here, http://radiowarwickshire.com/?p=5909
Michael
On the hottest day of the year so far, 12 journalists from around the world, started their cycling trip of England, with a visit to Stratford Upon Avon. The trip, organised by Visit England in conjunction with The Carter Company, specialists walking and cycling holidays, will take in the Cotswolds, Oxford, Windsor and culminate in the journalists visiting the newly re-opened Olympic Velodrome.
By all means sit on an open top bus, but there is no better way on a beautiful sunny day to get around the Shakespeare houses of Stratford than on a bike. Bikes for the tours have been supplied by The Carter Company, however Todd, the journalist from the New York Times, decided that with such a hard winter on the East coast of America, he would dust off the cobwebs and bring his own road bike with him. Of course not all of the group were such seasoned cyclists as Todd, the journalist from the Sun was overheard joking; I think, that he had beer in his water bottle, he was sporting however his own BMX style cycle helmet.
With a tight schedule to keep, we paid a whistle stop tour out to Anne Hathaway’s House at Shottery, following part of the National Cycle Network, then onto a local cycle route, for a traffic free journey to the family home of Shakespeare’s wife. As the time came for us to leave for the final stop, a tour of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, half the group decide to spend more time at Anne Hathaway’s, whilst the other half dashed back into Stratford in time for their tour.
The Carter Company already run successful cycling tours of Oxford, London and the Cotswolds, and this Blue Badge Guide, looks forward to them doing more in the Midlands in the future, I loved every minute of the 2 hours I spent with the group. Thank you Visit England and The Carter Company for asking me to help out.
Michael Reddy
Yorks Bakery Café is the new venue for our pre-graveyard walk stories.
With not much more then a few e-mails and a couple of Tweets, our 1st Graveyard Ghost Walk of 2014 saw 10 of our guests join us a Yorks to listen to our creepy stories from the suburbs. Of course some of the customers in for a great cup of coffee, or those taking up the Pizza promotion, also moved places to listen in.
The back room at Yorks is the perfect place to tell the stories, with a slightly raise area, and dim lighting provided by candles.
The 7th March will be a bigger affair, more news of that will be on both of our web sites and Twitter feeds.
Ian and Michael are looking forward to a long relationships with our new Independent Coffee Shop partners.
In previous years, on the 1st Sunday following Valentines Day, we have taken guests on a walk around Birmingham, ending our walk with tea and cakes in a coffee shop in the Jewellery Quarter.
This year on Friday 14th February at 7:00pm we would like to take you and your loved one on an alternative Valentines walk, a Ghost Walk of Warwick, starting and finishing outside the haunted Rose and Crown pub, where you might like to treat your loved one to a Bloody Mary. Instead of Roses, we will be handing out small nooses as a memento of the evening.
Come and join us to hear of crimes of passion, murder and hangings in the old walled town of Warwick.
Tickets are available from our agents Oxboffice.
With the second Hobbit film hitting the cinemas at the tail end of 2013 interest in our Tolkien tour has rocketed. We still have a few tickets left for the Sunday 19th January 2014 tour.
Tickets are available from our ticket agent Oxboffice.
You’ve read the books, you’ve seen the films, now discover where the inspiration came from, as we take you on the trail of the man who created Middle Earth – J.R.R. Tolkien!
Led by an experienced Blue Badge Tourist Guide and Tolkien enthusiast, this very special tour explores the areas of Birmingham where Tolkien spent his childhood, and how the locations, events and characters in his life inspired his writing.
We can’t promise to find elves, wizards or dragons, but you will be amazed at the links between our city and Middle Earth.
The perfect tour for all Tolkien fans, and a great way to celebrate one of Birmingham’s most fascinating former residents.
We have had an incredible response to our Halloween tours, we are running one on Halloween itself, the other the following day, with tickets sold out 2 weeks before the event.
If you are lucky enough to have a ticket, for the Halloween event on the 31st, don’t forget we will be telling a few stories in Yorks Bakery Café from about 6:15
