Until recently England was generally thought of as a gentle, fabled land freeze-framed sometime in the 1930s, home of the post office, country pub and vicarage. It’s now better known for vibrant cities with great nightlife and attractions, contrasted with green and pleasant countryside.

From Stonehenge and Tower Bridge to Eton and Oxford, England is loaded with cherished icons of a past era. Fashion, fine dining, clubbing, shopping – England’s rates with the world’s best.

England is looking forward into the new century while trying to forget many of the developments of the previous century. That period witnessed the fall of the empire, the loss of its trading base and the nation’s inability to adjust to a diminished role in the modern world – from colonial empire to member of the EC