Venues in Hampshire; hire a String Quartet

An ancient town on the Lymington River, which has become a popular yachting centre. Its tidal harbour is usually crammed to capacity with yachts. Each Saturday a market is held along the main street. Lymington has a sports ground and a large open-air swimming pool. Pier Station is the departure point for car ferries to the Isle of Wight.

String Quartets at Alton Grange Hotel, Alton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Alton House Hotel, Alton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Audleys Wood Hotel, Basingstoke, Hampshire

Longstock

The Danes had a ship maintenance and construction yard here for their long ships, 15 miles up the Test from Southampton Water. The village is one of the most delightful in Hampshire, with one winding street, lined with period houses—colour-washed, timber-framed, with red brick and thatch. A minor road leads eastwards across the Test; at this point the river runs in separate channels, and along the banks stand circular thatched huts used by anglers. There is an important fish hatchery i mile upstream at Leckford, a village with a 13th-century church

String Quartets at Balmer Lawn, Brockenhurst, New Forest, Hampshire

String Quartets at Barceló Basingstoke Country Hotel, Hook nr Basingstoke, Hampshire

String Quartets at Bijou Wedding Venue - Cain Manor, Headley Down, Hampshire

String Quartets at Cams Hall, Fareham, Hampshire

Mottisfont

A quiet cluster of houses on the fringe of the River Test flood plain. Mottisfont Abbey, approached by a wide straight drive, is an imposing 18th-century house incorporating the remains of a t2th-century Augustinian priory. It has paintings by Rex Whistler.

String Quartets at Casa Dei Cesari Restaurant & Hotel, Yateley, Hampshire

String Quartets at Chawton House, Alton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Clock Barn, Whitchurch, Hampshire

String Quartets at Cornucopia, Kingsley, Bordon, Hampshire

String Quartets at Esseborne Manor Hotel, Andover, Hampshire

Romsey

An old market town built round its famous abbey, founded in the loth century and retaining some traces of its Saxon beginnings.The cruciform church was enlarged by the Normans in the 12th century. Broadlands, an i8th-cen-tury house in a fine park, was the home of the statesman Lord Palmerston. Both house and gardens were remodelled by Capability Brown. It is now the home of Lord Mountbatten, and the Queen and Prince Philip spent part of their honeymoon there in 1947.

String Quartets at Fifehead Manor Hotel, Stockbridge, Hampshire

String Quartets at Game Larder, The, Stockbridge, Hampshire

String Quartets at Groomes Country House, Bordon (nr Farnham), Hampshire

String Quartets at Grosvenor Hotel, Stockbridge, Hampshire

String Quartets at Heckfield Place, Nr Hook Fleet Basingstoke & Reading, Hampshire

String Quartets at Holiday Inn Basingstoke, Basingstoke, Hampshire

String Quartets at Holiday Inn Farnborough, Farnborough, Hampshire

String Quartets at Holiday Inn Southampton, Southampton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Lainston House Hotel, Winchester, Hampshire

String Quartets at Langrish House, Langrish, Petersfield, Hampshire

String Quartets at Leith's at Beaulieu, Beaulieu, Brockenhurst, Hampshire

String Quartets at Marriott Meon Valley Hotel & Country Club, Shedfield, Hampshire

String Quartets at New Place Management Centre, Southampton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Norton Park, Nr Winchester, Hampshire

String Quartets at Oakley Hall, Basingstoke, Hampshire

Stockbridge

The reaches of the Test near Stock-bridge are the best for trout in southern England, and a rod may cost as much as £450 a season..The town's wide main street has a bridge at one end, and the town hall, built c. 1810, has its clock in a turret. The Grosvenor Hotel, meeting point of the angling set, has a built-out porch where coach travellers could alight under cover. Marsh Court, i mile south, is by Sir Edwin Lutyens and is one of the few houses in England to be built of chalk. The lake beside the court is a haunt of water birds. There are fine walks over Stockbridge Down, owned by the National Trust, which lies to the east of the village.

String Quartets at Old Barn New Milton, New Milton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Old Somerley, Ringwood, Hampshire

String Quartets at Old Thorns, Liphook, Hampshire

String Quartets at Portsmouth Marriott Hotel, Portsmouth, Hampshire

String Quartets at Princess Caroline, Southampton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Quality Hotel Andover, Andover, Hampshire

String Quartets at Red Lion Hotel, Basingstoke, Hampshire

The Wallops

The three villages strung along the willowed Wallop Brook are an enchantment of framed thatched cottages. Nether Wallop has a 14th-century church raised a little above the village, and a mill. On Danebury Hill, 17 miles north-east, are the remains of an Iron Age fort; from here a track crossing the Test by the bridge at Longstock leads to another hill fort, Woolbury Ring, 3', miles away. The church at Over Wallop, to the west, has a fine i^th-century font. The pretty village of Middle Wallop links the other two villages

String Quartets at Rhinefield House Hotel, Brockenhurst, Hampshire

String Quartets at Rivervale Barn, Yateley, Hampshire

String Quartets at Royal Armouries, Fareham, Hampshire

String Quartets at Sandford Springs Golf Club, Tadley, Hampshire

String Quartets at Sherfield Oaks Golf Club, Basingstoke, Hampshire

Whitchurch

Six roads converge on this small town on the upper Test, and their traffic somewhat overwhelms it. There is an old coaching inn, The White Hart, and a silk mill on the river, once water-driven but now powered by electricity. The mill stands on the site of a corn mill mentioned in the Domesday Book. A footpath from the village crosses the river twice on its way to the hamlet of Tufton, which has a manor house, two splendid barns still in use, watercress beds, a Norman church and a bridge which used to carry a railway over the river.

String Quartets at Somerley, Ringwood, Hampshire

String Quartets at The Lyndhurst Park Hotel, Lyndhurst, Hampshire

String Quartets at The Manor Barn, Buriton, Hampshire

String Quartets at The Winchester Hotel, Winchester, Hampshire

String Quartets at The Winchester Royal Hotel, Winchester, Hampshire

String Quartets at Vine, The, Basingstoke, Hampshire

WINCHESTER

Saxon England's capital. The   centre   of  Hampshire   in   every   way   is Winchester, for centuries the capital of Saxon and Norman Kings of England and still a city of history and charm, dominated by its long, grey-backed cathedral. Even when the Normans finally moved their capital to London, Parliament continued to meet often at Winchester and in 1485, Henry VII had his first son christened in the cathedral.

Long before King Alfred, whose statue today dominates the city's Broadway, made his capital at Winchester, the site on the downs on the west bank of the River Itchen was an important Belgic settlement. Under the Romans, Venta Belgarum became the fifth-largest city in Britain, and parts of the medieval city walls are of Roman origin.

The building of Winchester Cathedral was begun in 1079 on a sitc adjacent to that of an earlier Saxon church. Consecration took place in 1093, and extensions continued until about 1525. At 556 ft it is one of the longest cathedrals in Europe. Its design blends several styles, from the Norman transepts to the huge Perpendicular nave, transformed from its Norman original under Bishop William of Wykeham. Throughout the Middle Ages, Winchester and St Swithin's Shrine in its cathedral formed an important centre for pilgrims from the Continent on their way to Becket's Shrine in Canterbury.

The cathedral's treasures include no fewer than seven elaborately carved chantry chapels, endowed for the singing of special masses; mortuary chests enclosing the bones of ancient kings; medieval wall-paintings; iQth-ccntury stained glass; and a square 12th-century black marble font with carved scenes from the life of St Nicholas. The cathedral library contains a loth-century copy of Bede's Ecclesiastical History and the rath-century Winchester Bible.

The grandeur of the cathedral is enhanced by the spacious lawns which set it well apart from the remainder of the city. In the cathedral Close are a deanery dating back to the i3th century, a Pilgrim's Hall, where pilgrims lodged in the Middle Ages on their way to Canterbury, and the half-timbered Cheyne Court, a Tudor building partly set into the medieval city walls.

Winchester is rich in architecture from every period after the I3th century, and particularly in Queen Anne and Georgian buildings. The River Itchen flows swiftly through the city, fringed by attractive riverside walks and gardens, and the sight and sound of gaily running water is never far distant. Separated from the river by part of the old city walls are the remains of Wolvesey Castle, the former Bishop's residence, which stand next to the present partly 17th-century Bishop's Palace. South of the castle is Winchester College, founded by Bishop William of Wykeham in 1382 and one of the oldest public schools in the country.

Two of the five original gates into the city survive. Westgate, once used as a prison, is now a museum; near it stands the Castle Hall, a relic of the former Norman castle on the site, in which hangs a representation of the Round Table of King Arthur's

String Quartets at Warsash Maritime Academy, Warsash, Southampton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Wellesley Suite, Basingstoke, Hampshire

String Quartets at West End Farm, Froyle, Alton, Hampshire

String Quartets at Winchester Guildhall, Winchester, Hampshire

String Quartets at Winslowe House, Southampton, Hampshire