Pray and Display

Signs in the car park of the Catholic Church in Great Missenden, Buckinghamshire. Not sure what evidence you can give if you get a ticket but finding evidence is always the problem with religion!

Great Missenden at the head of the Misbourne valley is an attractive small town, with a long curving High Street of half timbered and Georgian shops, a graciously proportioned Baptist Church and a number of traditional pubs.


Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre, Great Missenden

Church Street is full of interesting old houses and leads, via a bridge over the by - pass, to the mainly 14th century Parish Church of St. Peter and St. Paul. Missenden Abbey, founded in 1133 as an Augustinian monastery, is now a residential college offering adult education courses.


Chiltern Hills

Great Missenden has been host to a variety of famous people over the centuries, including Robert Louis Stevenson (author of Treasure Island). The village is now best known as home to the late Roald Dahl, the internationally famous children's author.

Roald Dahl (13 September 1916 23 November 1990) was a British novelist, short story writer and screenwriter, born in Wales of Norwegian parents, who rose to prominence in the 1940s with works for both children and adults, and became one of the world's bestselling authors.


Roald Dahl

His most popular books include The Twits, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, Matilda, The Witches and The BFG. Roald Dahl’s grave is in the graveyard of St. Peter and St Paul Church, Great Missenden. It is covered with a slab of Welsh slate as he grew up in Swansea and a small Norwegian flag is on the grave acknowledging the land of his forefathers. As you go to the grave at the edge of the path, you see an enormous footprint, pointing in the direction of Roald Dahl's grave. Then there are 3 more of these (concrete) footprints in the grass that lead right to his stone. These are footprints of a character in one of his books, The BFG - The Big, Friendly Giant. So it was like the BFG was either visiting his grave or had laid him in it!!


Roald Dahl's Grave St. Peter and St Paul Church, Great Missenden

For the museum devoted to Great Missenden’s most famous resident Roald Dahl see;

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2008/01/roald-dahl-museum-and-story-centre.html


For scenes of Spring in the Chiltern Hills see;

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2009/04/chiltern-spring.html