1.646.560.3205
andrew@oscarwildetours.com
This was our second tour with Oscar Wilde tours. This tour of England equaled or even exceeded the expectations we had after last year’s Greece and Turkey experience.
Led by Professor Andrew Lear, an expert on ancient Greece and also gay history, he crafted a tour of England that included a carefully curated selection of sites in London and southern England that was both delightful and educational. In London, we had a walking tour of Bloomsbury, famous for the early 20th century Bloomsbury group; LGBT focused-tours at the Victoria & Albert Museum and the National Portrait Gallery; historic homes in Kensington once occupied by gay artists; and an LGBT focused tour of the reconstructed Globe Theatre, built near the location of Shakespeare’s original. The pièce de résistance was a visit to Oscar Wilde’s old house in Tite Street. This is a private residence and not open to the public, but one of the current residents kindly opened her home to our group. Her exuberant hospitality at the home of the tour company’s famous namesake was the cherry on top of our time in London.
During our time in the countryside we visited Bletchley Park, where gay mathematician Alan Turing led the team of codebreakers during World War II; an excellent LGBT tour of Oxford University, including Oscar Wilde’s alma mater Magdalen College; a visit to stunning Blenheim Palace, built by Queen Anne’s favorite, Sarah Duchess of Marlborough; magnificent Gloucester Cathedral, site of the burial of one of England’s (probably) gay kings, Edward II; beautiful Bath where we had high tea in the Pump Room in the steps of Jane Austen; seaside Brighton (England gayest city) and the fabulous Brighton Pavilion; and the great country houses associated with Vita Sackville-West, Knole and Sissinghurst.
Finally, we also opted to do the York extension. Here we saw the glorious York Minster and had an LGBT walking tour of the city that was once the leading city of the North of England. This was followed by visits to lovely Castle Howard, famous as the film setting for Brideshead Revisited; and Shibden Hall, the country house of Anne Lister, who married her female partner, and left coded diaries of their lives together.
All of the hotels throughout our stay were top-notch (especially the Bloomsbury in London), we had excellent food (despite English cuisine’s less than stellar reputation), and convivial compony throughout. Beside the quality of the tour, the experience was enhanced by Andrew and the group of guys that made up the participants. The camaraderie amongst all of us, coupled with Andrew’s expertise and leadership, made this a trip to remember always.
P.S. We can’t wait for the next one (Germany, next year, I hope!)
It was a pleasure to be part of the interesting and friendly community that Professor Lear gathered for our May ‘26 tour of Sicily. I’ll try not repeat the many positive comments already written by the other members of the tour which you may have already read. For me, the highlights of our trip went far beyond the few glimpses of the White Lotus locations (as fun as these were). The rich gay history of Sicily was covered from antiquity to modern times by a series of very engaging lectures both by Professor Lear and by several local guides. Special welcomes into two privately owned palace/villas connected us with living descendants of Sicilian nobility. An opera performance and a sophisticated puppet show added a typically Italian mix of high and low culture. The food, of course, was abundant. The gelato addictive.
As an alumnus of the Oscar Wilde tour of Japan I had high expectations for this tour; I can confirm that these were met and exceeded!
People are fascinated by Japan: by its refined arts and crafts, from calligraphy to kimonos: its exotic (to us) cultural traditions, such as geishas and tea ceremonies, and by its contrasting, almost futuristic modernity, as in the Shinkansen bullet trains and anime.
But did you know that Japan also has one of the world’s most interesting LGBTQ+ histories? Until Westernization took over in the 19th century, Japan had very different sexual customs from the West—including *male* geishas, to start with—and some claim this is still reflected in today’s worlds of manga and Japanese TV.
So come on Oscar Wilde Tours and Out Asia’s LGBTQ+ history and art tour of Japan. See the beautiful temples of Kyoto, relax in a traditional hot spring spa by Mount Fuji, experience a Japanese tea ceremony, ride on a bullet train—and learn about Japan’s LGBTQ+ side while doing it, from the time when (supposedly) monks brought same-sex love from China to Japan’s Buddhist monasteries and Samurai warriors to the elegant “pleasure quarters” of the 17th and 18th centuries to today’s Shinjuku Ni-chome gay town and its 300 bars.
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Professor Andrew Lear combines a love of travel with a passion for gay history, and he brings both of those attributes to Oscar Wilde Tours.
Professor Lear holds a B.A. from Harvard and a Ph.D. from UCLA. He has published a widely praised book on male-male love in ancient Greek art, as well as a number of important scholarly articles in this area… READ MORE
Our tour starts and ends at our Japanese hotel. It includes hotel accommodation; all breakfasts, 7 lunches, and 5 dinners; guide, escort, admission to all sights on the tour, and transportation to them (by minibus or train).
Singles and seniors are very welcome! Ages on our tours generally range from 40 to 80+. Our groups generally consist of a mix of couples and singles, and there is generally a nice group ethos, so no-one will ever feel left out. Single rooms are available, with a supplement; we are also happy to try to find you a room-mate if you would prefer.
All of the main sights in the tour are visited on foot, on walking or museum tours. There may be uneven ground, for instance in archaeological sites, and steps in some museums or historic houses. The amount of walking is not, however, excessive: we rarely exceed 2 miles a day. We travel from site to site by train, air conditioned bus, or private van.