I had my quarterly trip to Europe planned for two weeks in March, with a trip to the UK coupled with my usual trip to Toulouse. The craziness around the COVID-19 virus outbreak had just started to ramp up when I left, and by the time my trip was half over it was clear that I needed to cancel and get home. I decided to wrap up my work with our Partner in Lincoln, then headed home. As it turned out that was a very good decision, but I managed to find a couple of hours on Friday afternoon to wander about.

The beautiful Lincoln Cathedral, from the walls of Lincoln Castle.

The trip itself was pretty much all about work, and there was not a lot of time to do much sightseeing. The last time we were in Lincoln, Justine managed to see Lincoln Castle and the Magna Carta, but as I was working, I did not. Despite being busy, I did manage to carve out a couple of hours Friday afternoon to Walk up and see both the Lincoln Cathedral and Lincoln Castle.

I was staying at a standard hotel down on the riverfront, which was nice, but would have been really nice in the summer if the weather was better. The castle and cathedral are up on top of the hill, where the original Roman fortification and settlement were located. Closer to the river, my walk started at the main shopping street, that heads up the very aptly names Steep hill, towards the older section of the city.

It was a beautiful, sunny day. Perfect for a walk.

The walk up the main street and up Steep Hill is quite nice. Lots of little, interesting shops and restaurants. Sadly, i didn’t have a lot of time so I wasn’t able to really explore. It was also fairly quiet, which was nice. Work had kept me busy most of the day, so I was short on time to explore. I misread the opening times, and so by the time I got up to the castle I only had half an hour within the castle, and an hour to explore the grounds. The Cathedral was open longer, so I headed to the castle first.

A slightly wider view of the castle entrance.

Lincoln Castle is a major Norman castle constructed during the late 11th century by William the Conqueror on the site of a pre-existing Roman fortress. The castle is unusual in that it has two mottes. It is one of only two such castles in the country. Lincoln Castle remained in use as a prison and law court into modern times, and is one of the better preserved castles in England; the Crown Courts continue to this day.

They built a very nice vault and display center to show off the Magna Carta.

The main reason I wanted to see the castle was because it houses one of only 4 copies of the Magna Carta, one of the world’s most important and historic documents. The Magna Carta Libertatum (Medieval Latin for "Great Charter of Freedoms"), commonly called Magna Carta is a charter of rights agreed to by King John of England at Runnymede, near Windsor, on 15 June 1215.

First drafted by the Archbishop of Canterbury to make peace between the unpopular King and a group of rebel barons, it promised the protection of church rights, protection for the barons from illegal imprisonment, access to swift justice, and limitations on feudal payments to the Crown. Neither side stood behind their commitments, and the charter was annulled by Pope Innocent III, leading to the First Barons' War.

The castle was also a prison at one point, and they have an interesting display that shows how bad it was to be incarcerated at that time. It wasn’t pleasant.

A view of the interior of the former prison.

The other main attraction of the castle is the walk you can do around the upper ramparts. You can walk the full way around the castle, and it provides amazing views of the city, the Cathedral and the surrounding landscape.

Some nice view of the Lincoln Cathedral from the walk along the top of Lincoln Castle

After maxing out my time at the Castle, I wandered over to the Cathedral to have a look inside. I had already spent a fair bit of time looking at the outside of it, but the inside was maybe even nicer.

Lincoln Cathedral is the seat of the Anglican Bishop of Lincoln. Construction commenced in 1072 and continued in several phases throughout the High Middle Ages. Like many of the medieval cathedrals of England it was built in the Gothic style. It was the tallest building in the world for 238 years (1311–1548), and the first building to hold that title after the Great Pyramid of Giza.

The central spire collapsed in 1548 and was not rebuilt. For hundreds of years the cathedral held one of the four remaining copies of the original Magna Carta, now securely displayed in Lincoln Castle, which I had seen earlier in the day.

Their was amazing stained glass windows throughout the cathedral.

My favorite part of most medieval cathedrals are their cloisters. This one was very nice, if under construction.

I like this view back over the cathedral from the cloisters.

The interior of the cathedral is is beautiful as the outside, but in very different ways. As the sun was setting, I called it a day and wandered back down towards the hotel. I found a nice little pub for dinner, and wrapped up my short visit to Lincoln.