Warwick Castle DUNGEON tour!

So… Stratford Upon Avon was NOT my next stop on the itinerary… rather it was Warwick Castle, however plans needed to change!

I arranged my driver to get me to Stratford Upon Avon by noon, I then checked in (with a rather rude Romanian woman who advised that check-in wasn’t until 2pm… to which I responded that I just wanted to leave my bags here… to which she rolled her eyes at me… to which I stopped myself from giving her a quick head-bop!). 

Long story short, bags were dropped and I struck out alone attempting to find a bus that would take me to the castle, and get me there before 1.30pm when my tour around the dungeons were due to begin.

Fortunately… I found the right bus. Unfortunately this was the first day for this bus driver on this route, so he didn’t actually know where Warwick Castle was or where to drop me off.

Upon seeing what looked like a castle, I jumped off and wandered left and right, following intuition and signs and finally arriving at the entrance.

The original castle was built around 1068 by William the Conqueror (technically his slaves / serfs or ‘people’) but was originally wooden. The history of the castle is ridiculously long and convoluted, my highlights were that Queen Elizabeth the first visited in 1572 and the amount of Lords executed for treason – I do like a bit of treason!

Lets just say that the castle was austere, well preserved, intimidating in its opulence and impressive in keeping with its history…

And now… move on to more important matters, such as the Devilish Dungeon Tour!

Met by a jester, face a ghastly white with bloodied scars, we are ‘welcomed’ closer to the entrance of the dungeons… a place most oft used during the black plague, where they would leave peasants infected by the death to rot away in the damp and squalid underground.

It was dark, literally pitch, as we creaked our way, hunched, up stairs and around corridors. There was a howling wind, a smell of fire… We met our guide again and were advised of our imminent and rather terrible demise.

We carried on through, meeting masters of the dark arts who promised to ‘cure’ us through the use of leeches, or better yet, a bath in urine. The doctor showed how best to extract the rotting innards of corpses before we were hustled into the evil, diabolical, worse-than-hell clutches of… the COURT!

Moving into another confined room in the depths of the castle, above us the judge leered down, calling upon one of our group to come to the front and admit their witch craft! Another, to confirm his making use of a waterway as a latrine and finally… her finger pointed poignantly at… yes… me

I stood, unsure what was to befall, and entered the docks.

“YOU!” shouted the judge, “What is your NAME?”

“Ffffiona” I responded

“And… WHERE do you come FROM”, she enunciated

“ ‘Straya” was all I could get out, with a group of 15 sitting behind me

The judge shuddered and SLAMMED down her gavel,

“GUILTY!” she yelled, “CLEARLY… AN AUSTRALIAN… GUILTYYYYYY!”

The rest of the group laughed as I meekishly returned to my place.

We were shortly escorted to the next room, an important room, the room where heads were detached from bodies by a rather chirpy executioner.

I wanted to avoid being the chosen one, so while entering first, took a seat on the second pew and all seemed well, until…

“TRECHARY!” shouted the executioner… “TREASON!”… and pointed, yes… pointed directly at me… I was hauled upon the stage and my charges read out. I was NOT asked what I pleaded, apparently innocent til proven guilty was not the thing in the 17^th Century…

Worse though? After it being concluded that I WAS guilty, I was then required to KNEEL on a small velvet cushion and put my head on a wooden block in preparation for the head severing aspect of the punishment.

Once, twice… the executioner got close to chopping my head off, but stalled… the energy in the space increased as they all wondered what would happen – as was I… kneeling, butt thrust out, head on a wooden block – I mean, really… do I have one of those faces.

Third time… the lights went out, silence… then… I felt something cold on my shoulder, and with all the dark and intimidation and… and… well… I BLOODY SCREAMED!!!!

And the whole cast of compatriots screamed in response!

The executioner apologised for having only chopped off my left ear, and I was allowed to head back to my spot…

Finally we entered the dungeon room of the witch. The granddaughter of the witch recounted the story, when the lights were shut and then came on again she’d somehow moved from one corner of the room to another, resulting in yelps and yips from us sat around.

At the conclusion of her speech the room went pitch dark, doors started banging about us, hinges moving and knockers knocking… whooshing winds and… then… WHOAA! I yelped, which made other scream, and the screams moved around the room. Something had touched my bottom and then again and again…

The lights came on, then flicked off, like a thunderous lightening storm over-top.

A final flicker and there infront of me, for less than a second, was the witch herself and I tell you, I almost jumped OUT of my skin!

Ohhhh I cant tell you what fun it was! How well done! I recommend to all, but I still don’t know what it was about me that resulted in my being picked on not once, not twice but three bloody times!