Tall tales and tall trees - Nottingham and Sherwood Forest

I'd been warned that it was the murder capital of Britain, but the part of me that grew up devouring tales of Robin Hood and Sherwood forest was just dying to go check out Nottingham.

Nevertheless, we went there during daylight.

The road from Leeds is curvy and scenic, but it's very clear that Sherwood Forest is not a patch on the mighty greenwood of 1000 years ago. Just a few hundred of the thousands of 'really old trees' remain, the rest were cut down for ship-building in the 1700s. Signposts now mark out patches of remnant forest amid fields and shrubby regrowth, and the visitor's centre, when we get there, is (as Ants put it) "In desperate need of a cash injection". No doubt it was leading edge when it was built in the 1970s... undaunted, we followed one of the walking trails to the oldest oak in the forest, said to be 1000 years old. Its massive limbs held up by scaffolds and steel posts, it looked as though it was being kept alive for the sake of a record, and it was all a bit sad, rather than awe inspiring. We cut our losses and headed to Nottingham for lunch.

As English cities go, Notts is pretty modern, but the shape of the old medieval town is easy to imagine - the castle (what's left of it - not much more than a posh renaissance manor house now, really) sits atop a massive rock formation that rises out of the earth. A lot of the hillside boasts prettily sculptured gardens, but many of the old walls at the foot of the hill remain, winding their way up a series of no-man's lands and narrow gateways. It would have commanded a powerful view of the town below, and seemed all but impregnable.

But it wasn't the castle we really came to see. Nestled at the base of the castle and built into excavated rock, is a stone and timber formation that claims to be England's oldest pub. Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem was opened in 1189AD, and is said to have been the staging point from which Richard I led his troops on the third Crusade. Tunnels dug into the rock connect it to the castle grounds - the infamous Mortimer's Hole is said to have been used by Roger Mortimer, Earl of March and lover of Queen Isabella (wife of the allegedly-not-very-into-women Edward II, of death-by-red-hot-poker fame) to access the queen when she was in residence. Most historians now agree that neither the tale of the midnight rendezvous nor the poker is likely to be true, but that doesn't stop venues from continuing the myths.

Ye Olde Trip... is full of plaques with tales of dodgy artefacts - from a 'pregnancy chair' to a ship in a bottle that kills anyone who tries to clean it. All good tourist fun. Best call in for a pint only though - food is standard english fare, and not as good as many other pubs we've seen in our travels.