Windsor

Only a small part of old Windsor—the settlement that grew up around the town's famous castle in the Middle Ages—has survived. The town isn't what it was in the time of Sir John Falstaff and the Merry Wives of Windsor, when it was famous for its convivial inns—in 1650, it had about 70 of them. Only a handful remain today, with the others replaced, it seems, by endless cafés. Windsor can feel overrun by tourists in summer, but even so, romantics appreciate cobbled Church Lane and noble Queen Charlotte Street, opposite the castle entrance.