The Cotswold Way
Cotswold Way Part I – The Tale of 6 Horses
November 2008 – Hailes Abbey to Birdlip (24 miles)
And so began our inaugural ‘walking weekend with a spot of wild camping thrown in for good measure’. Amid some faffing around with packs, removal of packs for a quick al fresco pee, more pack faffing, a quick ‘ooh’ and ‘aaah’ at the ruin of Hailes Abbey and time out for a mars bar, Sam and I begin our exploration of the Cotswold Way, O/S trail guide in hand!
Deliriously pleased with ourselves for negotiating the first couple of cross-country miles in reasonable health, we stop for cake o-clock at Winchcombe, in a very nice olde tea room where Sam is required to cover her muddy boots with attractive plastic bags. Scrumptious toasted tea cake.
The walk over Cleeve Common is stunning, with its gorse and soft spongy, short cut grass that is beautifully maintained by the bountiful sheep. The views over the surrounding area are quite beautiful. After a few steep twists and turns, we reward ourselves with lunch at Cleeve Common Golf Club in the club house. Its clientelle is very local (by which I mean full of ‘twighlight golfers’) but a very satisfying Lasagna and a couple of short lived pints of ale take away the early signs of novice walkers’ fatique.
Unsurprisingly, the hour or so after lunch is a little hard going. We cross fields, climb hills, hang on to tree limbs for dear life while gasping for a breath or two, tromp through copses, descend slopes, cross a road, negotiate a ploughed field and lo, across the field lurks a posse of large horses with a proud and haughty demeanor, and verily Sam is of a nervous disposition where our equine chums are concerned. And though not ordinarily too intimidated by these fine be-maned creatures, I, being attuned to Sam’s heightened state of nervosa, acquire some of her concern. Our jaunty air fades as we negotiate a soggy trench and upon landing the other side notice all equine eyes focused in our direction with more than just a passing curiosity. Rational thought long since abandoned, our self preservation instincts engage and we peg it for the gate, arms a flailing, packs a bouncing, and squeals abounding. The very bent, slightly rusty, tied to the gate posts with a bit of old string gate that separates us from equine free nirvana. Sam arrives first and, if not elegantly then at least deftly, vaults the gate in 3 quick moves. With the added seconds of angst further addling my sense of reason I scrabble up the gate and am perched astride its top when the old bit of string gives way, and the gate drops several inches. Suspended mid air for but a second, I arrive back in my position astride the gate feeling much less fertile and somewhat short of breath. A pained dismount later and we note that the horses are no longer interested in our activities and have in fact buggered off.
Now we find ourselves facing a very steep ascent through the woods to our left and a very appealing descent to our right. With an ignorable sense of foreboding we choose the right. Happening upon another human being we establish that it is of course the wrong choice and thus begin a very disheartened ascent back from whence we came. The climb is seemingly endless through an ever narrowing canopy of trees and we admit that we are now very lost indeed, the Cotswold Way as it is being very winding and the trail guide map incomprehensible to our adrenalin drowned brains. Up and up and up we climb, looking for a quarry, cross country we go with dusk not far away.
The correct path is reestablished after a monumental detour and we descend past Dowdeswell Reservoir, just as night begins to fall, pitch our tent and head to the Reservoir Inn across the road, looking quite scruffy, where we proceed to fall asleep fork mid-way to mouth and bottle of wine barely touched.
Back at the tent, we were both asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillow, despite the squawking of pheasant and the slight anxiety about fly camping in the woods without so much as baseball bat for protection.
The shelter of the woods made for a relatively dry packing up of the tent, but the drizzle had set in for the day. Facing a day of trudging through muddy fields in the driving rain, and not yet feeling satisfied that we had eaten enough calorific food to sustain us, we were prepared to wait 45 minutes for the Hungry Horse to open to eat breakfast and drink several pots of tea. Drizzle coloured much of our morning’s walking through soggy fields, but a nice pint by the fire at the Air Balloon restored us for the final stroll through the wild garlic filled woods to Birdlip.
Afterthought … We rather naively underestimated the topography of the Cotswold Way. We also admit to a gross oversight in the matter of pack weight, both encumbered as we were with unsuitable 60 litre packs, a regular 3 man tent and enough food to feed a gathering of the WI (including one whole kilo of apples which needless to say only came along for the ride and returned home with our soggy selves and our knackered feet). More thought, and perhaps a smidgen of research, might be required before we embark on our next section of the trail. It is also perhaps unneccessary to consume 4 times the normal daily amount of food, just because we are walking a few miles up hill. (Fun though)
November 2008 – Hailes Abbey to Birdlip (24 miles)
And so began our inaugural ‘walking weekend with a spot of wild camping thrown in for good measure’. Amid some faffing around with packs, removal of packs for a quick al fresco pee, more pack faffing, a quick ‘ooh’ and ‘aaah’ at the ruin of Hailes Abbey and time out for a mars bar, Sam and I begin our exploration of the Cotswold Way, O/S trail guide in hand!
Deliriously pleased with ourselves for negotiating the first couple of cross-country miles in reasonable health, we stop for cake o-clock at Winchcombe, in a very nice olde tea room where Sam is required to cover her muddy boots with attractive plastic bags. Scrumptious toasted tea cake.
The walk over Cleeve Common is stunning, with its gorse and soft spongy, short cut grass that is beautifully maintained by the bountiful sheep. The views over the surrounding area are quite beautiful. After a few steep twists and turns, we reward ourselves with lunch at Cleeve Common Golf Club in the club house. Its clientelle is very local (by which I mean full of ‘twighlight golfers’) but a very satisfying Lasagna and a couple of short lived pints of ale take away the early signs of novice walkers’ fatique.
Unsurprisingly, the hour or so after lunch is a little hard going. We cross fields, climb hills, hang on to tree limbs for dear life while gasping for a breath or two, tromp through copses, descend slopes, cross a road, negotiate a ploughed field and lo, across the field lurks a posse of large horses with a proud and haughty demeanor, and verily Sam is of a nervous disposition where our equine chums are concerned. And though not ordinarily too intimidated by these fine be-maned creatures, I, being attuned to Sam’s heightened state of nervosa, acquire some of her concern. Our jaunty air fades as we negotiate a soggy trench and upon landing the other side notice all equine eyes focused in our direction with more than just a passing curiosity. Rational thought long since abandoned, our self preservation instincts engage and we peg it for the gate, arms a flailing, packs a bouncing, and squeals abounding. The very bent, slightly rusty, tied to the gate posts with a bit of old string gate that separates us from equine free nirvana. Sam arrives first and, if not elegantly then at least deftly, vaults the gate in 3 quick moves. With the added seconds of angst further addling my sense of reason I scrabble up the gate and am perched astride its top when the old bit of string gives way, and the gate drops several inches. Suspended mid air for but a second, I arrive back in my position astride the gate feeling much less fertile and somewhat short of breath. A pained dismount later and we note that the horses are no longer interested in our activities and have in fact buggered off.
Now we find ourselves facing a very steep ascent through the woods to our left and a very appealing descent to our right. With an ignorable sense of foreboding we choose the right. Happening upon another human being we establish that it is of course the wrong choice and thus begin a very disheartened ascent back from whence we came. The climb is seemingly endless through an ever narrowing canopy of trees and we admit that we are now very lost indeed, the Cotswold Way as it is being very winding and the trail guide map incomprehensible to our adrenalin drowned brains. Up and up and up we climb, looking for a quarry, cross country we go with dusk not far away.
The correct path is reestablished after a monumental detour and we descend past Dowdeswell Reservoir, just as night begins to fall, pitch our tent and head to the Reservoir Inn across the road, looking quite scruffy, where we proceed to fall asleep fork mid-way to mouth and bottle of wine barely touched.
Back at the tent, we were both asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillow, despite the squawking of pheasant and the slight anxiety about fly camping in the woods without so much as baseball bat for protection.
The shelter of the woods made for a relatively dry packing up of the tent, but the drizzle had set in for the day. Facing a day of trudging through muddy fields in the driving rain, and not yet feeling satisfied that we had eaten enough calorific food to sustain us, we were prepared to wait 45 minutes for the Hungry Horse to open to eat breakfast and drink several pots of tea. Drizzle coloured much of our morning’s walking through soggy fields, but a nice pint by the fire at the Air Balloon restored us for the final stroll through the wild garlic filled woods to Birdlip.
Afterthought … We rather naively underestimated the topography of the Cotswold Way. We also admit to a gross oversight in the matter of pack weight, both encumbered as we were with unsuitable 60 litre packs, a regular 3 man tent and enough food to feed a gathering of the WI (including one whole kilo of apples which needless to say only came along for the ride and returned home with our soggy selves and our knackered feet). More thought, and perhaps a smidgen of research, might be required before we embark on our next section of the trail. It is also perhaps unneccessary to consume 4 times the normal daily amount of food, just because we are walking a few miles up hill. (Fun though)
