July 27, 2013, by Kiran

The Search for Robin Hood

Three years in Nottingham and I had been an awful tourist; no jumper tied around the waist, no asking the locals to take my picture in front of the Castle and no sightings of Robin Hood! To be fair I was pretty sure Mr Hood had taken up his retirement and started selling jacket potatoes in the town centre….

So the day before graduation, myself and my family headed to Sherwood Forest to find the real Robin Hood. But it seems the man who stole from the rich and gave to the poor did not want to be found as on our way to the woodland we got quite lost. There were hardly any road signs and I suspect the merry mobsters had taken them down to delay us so they could put Mr Hood into hiding. It was clearly sabotage…or it could have been that we didn’t have a great sense of direction.

As it turns out Sherwood Forest is not in Nottingham. It is actually in Mansfield, Edwinstone, near Doncaster. Okay so it might be in Nottinghamshire but it’s still a trek! You’ll know when you’re close though because the stench of manure will hit and in the words of my brother, you will see ‘too many trees’ and the landscape will be ‘too green’. Confronted with the countryside, the best interaction of the car journey had to be this:

Me: ‘Can sheep be violent?’

Little Brother: ‘Yes! Have you never heard of the Billy Goats Gruff?!’

Mum: ‘They were goats’

Little Brother: ‘Oh yeah.’

 

You will be relieved to know we did find our way in the end and getting out of the car….what’s this?! It can’t be! Robin Hood hiding in the bushes?!

Nope. It was just a statue. Clearly, a decoy. Luckily, after stumbling upon a Laughing Tree (the protector of the Forest and bringer of laughter and joy to the Green Wood) we regarded our mistake in good spirits!

 

In other news we did see an elephant disguised as a tree! Known as The Major Oak, it’s over 800 years old and apparently in 2002 was voted ‘Britain’s Favourite Tree.’ Quite the accolade!

One that was lost on my Dad though; every tree we saw Dad assumed this must be the famous Oak tree and every time he was incorrect. After seeing the impressive tree he simply said ‘Well the rest is just forest after this, isn’t it?’

Beautiful.

 

Back to the search! Our investigation continued and I have some unfortunate news. I am sad to announce that Robin Hood and Little Jon are no longer friends.

We don’t know exactly what led to the fisticuffs but we just hope that they can find away to make up. Perhaps pay a visit to the Laughing Tree!

So although I saw Robin Hood Avenue, Robin Hood Pub, Robin Hood Festival and Robin Hood Farm there was no sign of Robin Hood himself. The good news is…

Hmmm…so really what the sign is saying is that I succeeded in my mission to find Robin Hood! No, I know I failed. The sign only taunts my efforts.

 

p.s. Oh Look! We actually did find Robin in the Nottingham Tourist Centre…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

p.p.s Apologies for that. You won’t have to put up with this for much longer as my blogs will shortly be coming to an end!

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