Wow, yet another marathon of 41km! I must be insane. I think on future walks, I need to be more careful in my planning. Truth be told though, I've so little time/money/options in when and how I do this end2end that this kinda slog will probably be the norm...
Checked out of the hotel after a nice breakfast and head off through Chipping Norton to pick up the Shakespeare's Way again. But after searching for the way markers, ended up taking the main road out of town and up to Salford village. In a way, it was probably a good thing as I got to see the unusual Bliss Mill, a former tweed mill.
 |
| Casualties of yesterday's trip over the gate... |
 |
| Chipping Norton town hall |
 |
| Bliss Mill |
On passing Salford, headed up through woods and farms to hunt for the Rollright Stones. I've been fascinated by these stones and various others since they appeared in the Duncton Chronicles, a series of books by William Horwood. It's a fascinating place, although hard to get to!
 |
| A stile in a stream |
 |
| doe, a deer, a female deer... |
 |
| Brimstone butterfly (Gonepteryx rhamni) |
 |
| The Whispering Knights |
 |
| The King Stone |
 |
| Looking northwards to Stratford |
 |
| The King's Men stone circle |
From Little Rollright, head on down some country roads to Long Compton, a pretty little Cotswolds village with all the houses and other buildings being made of the local stone. Head on out of this village and through Whichford Woods, which partners the Macmillan Way for a short while, before splitting off and head towards Cherington, Willington and Barcheston, three small nondescript villages before stopping for a short while in Shipston-on-Stour.
 |
| Daffodils |
 |
| Thatched cottage |
 |
| Millennium Chronolog, Long Compton |
 |
| St Peter and St Paul, Long Compton |
 |
St John the Baptist, Cherington
|
 |
| Bridge near Shipston on Stour |
 |
| Church at Shipston on Stour |
At this point, I decided I wanted to get to Stratford-upon-Avon as quickly as possible, so followed the A3400 all the way! It was a mixture of overgrown grassy verges and paths, so ended up not being too bad a march and I head off to my hotel for the night after a quick explore around the RSC.
 |
| Lady MacBeth |
 |
| Shakespeare Memorial |
 |
| RSC |
The hotel is situated just outside the main centre of Stratford, so after showering, I went and had another explore! The problem with these long days of walking is that it gives you very little time to look around the towns, villages, monuments, fields that I pass through. As I said at the beginning of this post, this is probably something I will have to rectify next time around...
No comments:
Post a Comment