Thomas Vernon Harwood's Shakespeare Vacation, Week One

One summer in between semesters at the university, Thomas Vernon Harwood took a trip just for fun. He visited a list of the places Shakespeare describes in his written works. It took him two weeks to visit all of the places mentioned in the books and he loved every minute of it.

He started at Elsinore, otherwise known as Kronborg Castle, in Denmark. This is where Hamlet saw the ghost of his father. Next, he boarded a plane to Pontefract, England, to visit the castle where Richard II most likely met his bloody fate.

He was also granted special access to the Jerusalem Chamber in London, which is the setting where King Henry IV has his last moments. It is not normally open to the public, but Thomas was granted special access due to his historical research. He plans on writing a piece about his experience at the location.

The London Stone is a lesser known historical site, located under a modern-day sign for a shoe store. No one knows the exact significance of the rock, but he felt it was important to see it firsthand, because it was used in Henry IV. Afterward, he headed to the site of the original Boar's Head Tavern, which burned down in the Great Fire of London in 1666. While the original site is now an office building, true Shakespeare fans know to bring a flask and toast the stone carving of a boar's head above the doorway of the building.