STRATFORD-UPON-AVON

Despite its worldwide fame, Stratford is, at heart, an unassuming market town. Spreading back from the River Avon, Stratford's town centre is flat and compact, its mostly modern buildings filling out a simple gridiron. Running along the northern edge of the centre is Bridge Street, the main thoroughfare lined with shops and chock-a-block with local buses.

Clopton Bridge and pleasure boat. Royal Shakespeare Theatre and Holy Trinity Church. Holy Trinity Church. Canal boats by the Royal Shakespeare Theatre. Punting on the River Avon

Famous as the birth place and final home of playwright William Shakespeare, Stratford has suffered from an overdose of visitors for decades. There are five sites associated with Shakespeare and his family. Three sites are within walking distance of each other in the town centre:

• Shakespeare's Birthplace, where the dramatist was born, in 1564, and grew up;
• Hall's Croft was the home Shakespeare's elder daughter, Susana, and her husband, Dr. John Hall;
• Nash's House, home of Thomas Nash, husband of Shakespeare's granddaughter. Next door was New Place, where Shakespeare died. Only the foundations remain, with an Elizabethan-style knot garden.

The Birthplace, Holy Trinity Church, Nash's House, Mary Arden's House, Anne Hathaway's Cottage.

Out of town are two sites:

• Anne Hathaway's Cottage, where Shakespeare's wife lived as a child;
• Arden's House, the childhood home of Shakespeare's mother.