The Canterbury Tales Experience

Wait for Annie’s post that will come soon if you want to hear about a deeply spiritual experience at Canterbury Cathedral, involving an Archdeaconess and a candlelight tour to the shrine of St. Thomas. 

Read on if you want to hear about a deeply disconcerting yet laughably outrageous visit to The Canterbury Tales Experience.

The brochure for this attraction reads “Step back in time to experience the sights, sounds and smells of the Middle Ages in this stunning reconstruction of 14th century England!”

Well, here’s something: they weren’t lying about the smells part! But as far as “stunning” is concerned—imagine the Pirates of the Caribbean ride in Disneyland, minus the riding in boats part, the water, the music, and the life-like animatronic figures. Now add in mannequins with odd facial expressions in awkward poses, darkened rooms that must be walked through, and a cheesy recorded audio guide that you hold up to your ear the whole time. Also, there was a gag involving a mannequin pretending to empty her chamber pot out the window onto our heads as we walked below.

Hopefully most of you are familiar with Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. I had read a couple, but a few of the tales they chose to depict were new to me. Of course I knew about some of the rather adult themes present. The folks at The Experience did not shy away from re-creating that idea, no sirree bobbo! One particularly bawdy tale (the Miller’s Tale, if I remember correctly) was pretty cheeky… Some giant plastic mannequin lips kissed a plastic mannequin rear end sticking out of a window. (pun) This happened not once, but twice.

There were times when I didn’t want to go into the next room after we had finished hearing the story in the current one. After all, if we had already encountered the aforementioned window kissing at about room three, what was coming next? This was a 45-minute long journey; this was not for the faint of heart. Or children who want to remain innocent.

Thankfully, the rest of the risque humor was only in the dialogue, casually added in almost as an afterthought. Probably my favorite line had to do with the story of Chaunticleer (a rooster who lived with 20 hens) and his favorite hen, the beautiful Lady Pertelote. The birds were the stars of this tale; they were the talkers here. Was the best part of the story Lady Pertelote’s suggesting to Chaunticleer that he “take a laxative to stop having nightmares”? Well, that’s a close second, but first place has to go to the narrator’s description of Chaunticleer’s manly capabilities. “He ignored Lady Pertelote’s request,” says the narrator, “and then feathered her 20 more times before breakfast!”

On that note, I leave you. May your day be full of cheer, chickens, and cheesy fun.