Virginia Water

:"For the lake, see Virginia Water Lake".Virginia Water is a large village, a lake and, originally, a stream, the village being in the borough of Runnymede in Surrey and the bodies of water stretching over the borders of Runnymede, Old Windsor and Sunninghill and Ascot, all in England.

The village takes its name from the lake which is in the nearby Windsor Great Park. The lake's name was transferred from a previous stream which was probably named after the 'Virgin Queen', Elizabeth I.

The lake

Virginia Water Lake lies within Windsor Great Park. It was created from a body of water of the same name: originally little more than a stream, which existed from at least the 17th century and may well be named after Elizabeth I, the Virgin Queen.

The lake is mostly in Surrey, though the western extremities are in the civil parishes of Old Windsor and Sunninghill and Ascot in Berkshire.

Recently the shores of the lake have been used for lakeside scenes in the Harry Potter films.The lake is also the site of the British record Pike capture of 58lb 5oz

The village

Virginia Water village has an adult population of 4,814.Fact|date=July 2008 The 2001 census population of Virginia Water was 6113. [http://www.anytownuk.com/Virginia_Water.html] The village's residents are more elderly and substantially more wealthy, on average, than the nation as a whole, making it one of the wealthiest locations in England.Fact|date=July 2008 Many of the village's houses are large detached homes situated on the private Wentworth Estate close to the famous Wentworth Club which has four golf courses. The Ryder Cup was first played at Wentworth. Wentworth is also home to the headquarters of the PGA European Tour, the world's second-richest professional golf tour (after the PGA Tour)in the US. The estate reached the headlines in 1998 when General Augusto Pinochet was kept under house arrest in one of its houses prior to his extradition [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/225567.stm] . Edward VIII and Sarah Ferguson are former royal residents. Many well-known entertainment personalities also have or had homes on the Wentworth Estate — for example, Elton John (in a house called 'Hercules' after the horse in 'Steptoe and Son' TV series), Russ Abbott, Cliff Richard and Bruce Forsyth.Fact|date=July 2008 World-class golfers with homes on the Estate include Ernie Els and Thomas Bjørn. The author and traveller Bill Bryson spent his early married life in the village. Katie Price and Peter Andre have recently relocated to Virginia Water, as seen in their television series .

Virginia Water is also home to many commuters. It is close to the M25 and M3 motorways. The village has a four track railway station in the middle of the village on the line between London Waterloo, Weybridge and Reading. Heathrow Airport is located eight miles to the north-east. The village supports two rows of shops, although many inhabitants travel to the nearby towns of Staines, Ascot and Windsor for shopping. The towns of Egham, Englefield Green and Old Windsor are nearby. The insane asylum, Holloway Sanatorium, was located near to the village but closed in the 1980s.

Virginia Water is noted by bird-watchers [http://www.birdguides.com/html/vidlib/species/Aix_galericulata.htm] as the best place in the country for viewing feral Mandarin Ducks.

External reference

* [http://www.virginiawater.co.uk/ Home page of virginiawater.co.uk - the most substantive site about Virginia Water online]

External links

* [http://gallery.beautifulengland.net/main.php?g2_itemId=3247 Photographs of Virginia Water]