Chester may be one of the coolest cities for sightseeing and shopping.

But it’s really hot stuff when it comes to history, as Helen Werin discovers…

It was lunchtime in Chester and our guide Janet Holman was leading us into Spud-U-Like in Bridge Street.
Despite my rumbling tummy, we weren’t about to dig our teeth into a hot buttery potato. Instead we were to feast our eyes on the incredible sight of a Roman hypocaust in this most unlikely of settings.
The perfectly preserved section of the heating system which kept the city’s founders warm and their bath water piping hot is still - nearly 2,000 years later - in situ in the far corner of Spud U Like’s basement. Whilst we gazed in awe, hungry office workers were filling up on fast food, seemingly blasé about this wonder just feet from their dinner table.
Ah, but is this really any wonder when you live in Chester? This is after all a glorious city where an ancient and fascinating history is not just around every corner, but in every wall, street and cellar, literally. I’m not exaggerating when I say that.
The delightfully knowledgeable Janet, who likes to trip little frivolities about the city’s past off her tongue, is one of the city’s Blue Badge guides who offer a ‘secret’ Chester tour.
If I thought there could be no more incongruous a setting than finding the ancient heating system in a house of hot potatoes then I was very wrong. Walk past the latest fashions in Miss Selfridge, in Northgate Street, and you will discover another part of the heating system for the Legionary Commander’s quarters at the back of the shop. Nearby at Black’s, a substantial column base, part of a colonnade in the massive Legionary HQ, can be seen through a viewing panel in the floor. In the basement of the Castle Galleries, in St. Michael’s Row, a section of black and white mosaic flooring which once decorated part of Roman Chester’s large bathhouse complex is on view. Apparently anyone with Roman remains in their building is obliged to display them. But it is expected that you ask first, of course.

Roman heritage

However, we’d only been in Chester 30 minutes and already we were being ‘overun’ by Romans; albeit four-feet-nothing ones in school uniforms.
By now Janet had whisked us round to another of Chester’s pride and joys, the great Roman military amphitheatre.
The area around the amphitheatre - the largest of its kind in the UK - was filled with groups of eight and nine year-olds dwarfed by ‘Roman’ soldiers who appeared to be leading them on ‘rampages’ around the city walls.
Time here, perhaps, for another of Janet’s interesting snippets; the leader of the Roman soldiers, the ‘centurion’ Paul Harston, has, apparently, got more Roman clothes than contemporary gear. I can well believe that, judging by the very obvious popularity of his Roman soldier ‘tours’, which are not confined to school groups.
I wouldn’t want to step out of line with Paul and his ‘army’, though. These guys are actually authorised by the police to carry some very scary-looking weapons; all in the interest of authenticity, you understand.

Chester, or Deva - to give it its original name - was founded by the Romans in around 70-80 AD, and the city loves nothing better than to play this prestigious heritage to the hilt. In the time of the Romans the Dee estuary reached right up to Chester and what is now the racecourse was a tidal pool outside the Roman walls.
Now these very walls are the most complete circuit of Roman and Medieval defensive town walls in the UK and, for visitors, provide one of the best ways of getting to know the city.
It took us about one hour to gently stroll the 2.5miles or so along the walls early on a glorious Sunday morning when the only other people about were joggers.
From our elevated position we had great views of the city’s famous racecourse and the site of Britain’s very first horse races almost 500 years ago. It’s yet another interesting - and amusing - fact that horse racing began in 1539 after football was banned; apparently because so many players were getting hurt.
One can’t imagine what antics footballers in those days must have got up to to inflict such injuries. And it’s possibly even harder to imagine the city as an ocean-going port around that period as well, with cargoes bringing in wine, figs and olive oil from the Mediterranean.
In fact the reason the racecourse exists to this day is that the port was disused by the Middle Ages because the Dee silted up and changed course and the land used for racing.

Medieval galleries
 

Indeed, Chester’s wonderful history is threaded through the modern-day city’s everyday life in so many other ways as well; take shopping, for instance.
The city may be a consumer ‘paradise’ but to my mind is also one of the most charming as well as easy on the feet in the whole of Britain, thanks to the 13th century Rows. Without doubt The Rows – two-tiered medieval galleries reached by stairs at ground level - are the city’s best known architectural feature. These covered walkways, yet another ‘bonus’ in an already traffic-free city centre, are now home to major high-street brands as well as thriving ‘designer’ stores and quirky independent shops.
Centuries ago the traders lived and worked here and the lower ’rows’ were stores for goods off the ships. The quaint names by which different Rows were known, after their businesses - Butter Steps, Honey Steps, Milk Stoops Rows and Shoemaker Row - may have long gone, but the innate charm and character is what attracts hordes of tourists every year.
 

Oyez! Oyez!
 

Many visitors, like us, get their bearings with a Blue Badge walking tour, which are so popular that they run every day, including Christmas Day. Unfortunately this means that Janet has not had a Christmas Day off for 15 years. One suspects that she doesn’t really mind that much, such is her enthusiasm for this city.
She takes great pleasure in reeling off Chester’s other ‘notables: the city has no less than four park and ride facilities; a few Tudor buildings remain despite Oliver Cromwell’s attempts at destruction and, the one I like best; Chester still has a town crier, complete with top hat and full ceremonial regalia. Well, from May to August anyway.
Sadly we didn’t get to see the crier, who ‘performs’ at mid day at the High Cross with their customary “Oyez! Oyez!”.
By this time we’d soaked up enough of Chester’s engaging and vibrant ‘personality’ to make our own proclamation. Chester? Oh, yes!
 

Photos courtesy Visit Chester