THE sun was blazing down as lunchtime approached so, from a nearby stall, we bought tomato and feta salad, artichoke hearts, stuffed vine leaves, huge juicy olives and a hunk of crusty bread to mop up the oil and juices.

The shop across the road supplied coffee and fruit juice and, under a shady tree, we enjoyed the perfect picnic.

The previous evening, we'd sat at a table crowded with delicious tapas, in a restaurant which suggested choosing a dry sherry as the perfect accompaniment to these dishes in miniature. It was.

When not eating, we'd strolled along the riverbank watching irridescent blue-winged dragonflies swooping among the plants at the water's edge, and sat watching waterfowl pottering about. We wondered at a giant waterlily and admired its smaller relations.

I got bitten by some unknown insect I hadn't intended to annoy at all and it took another day before the bite actually swelled and began to hurt. If I knew the biter, I'd dodge the next one.

We'd admired medieval buildings and wandered along narrow old streets, window-shopping for curios, antiques and the striking clothes which look good only on rail-thin women over 5ft 10ins. At a concert, the instruments weren't an everyday ensemble.

Back with the food, from a local grocery I bought a slab of dried apricot paste, being a fan of any sort of apricot, though I wasn't quite sure how to use it. "Well, in Syria we steep it overnight to make a fruit drink in the morning. You can just chew it, but it sticks to your teeth," said the young man serving me.

But we weren't anywhere exotic; we were slap in the middle of England.

I should have told you the riverside walk was punctuated - food again - with a traditional pork pie lunch in the garden of a lock-side pub and that our Mediterranean-style picnic, bought at a food fair, was suddenly accompanied by change-ringing from a nearby tower.

The waterlily was in the botanic gardens' tropical house and the unusual instruments were virginals, lute and viol (we're early music fans).

It's not often I do as politicians ask. I wouldn't like them to get any ideas about having influence. But this year they suggested people might holiday at home and we were taking what is known in the tourist trade as a "short city break".

We were in Oxford, but we've had a similarly interesting break in Lincoln, and enjoyed Exeter too. York and Durham are popular choices; Liverpool is a city of surprises and friends from further south couldn't have been more enthusiastic about their city break in Newcastle.

Cities are good bases for touring, as well, so benefits knock on into rural areas.

Our Oxford weekend included a drive out to Long Wittenham and the quirky Pendon Museum, an absolute must for railway modellers and lovers of the miniature.

Our "tourist industry" doesn't simply mean visitors from overseas. We can be tourists in our own country; there's an awful lot of that we haven't seen yet.