Friday 31 Aug 2018 Winchcombe to Broadway

This, our longest hike at 9.2 miles, was relatively flat through sheep and cattle fields. It was sunny and almost hot, but still perfect hiking weather. Broadway is a bustling tourist town.

Our favorite dessert - Sticky Toffee Pudding

 Sticky toffee pudding is not what we would call a pudding, but more of a spongy cake which includes dates served over a pool of caramel with a side of ice cream. Salted caramel is a new rage flavor here in England.

Barbara found apples for a trail snack

Norman style churches don't have steeples

Cow pasture with stone barn

Great climate for roses

Architecture changes from stone to thatched roofs

Sunday 26 Aug 2018 London – Moreton-in-Marsh

We had a late afternoon train, so we booked a tour of the state rooms at Buckingham Palace. Tours are not allowed when the Queen is in residence. August is the time she spends in Scotland at Balmoral, so…our tour. “Our” tour was with several hundred others! The palace is truly spectacular. No pictures are allowed, but we saw many places that have been part of the series, “The Crown.” The art and furnishings are all museum quality. My favorite was the entrance hall, because it was so frequently shown on “The Crown” when the Prime Minister would come to report to Elizabeth.

Buckingham Palace from the rear

Moreton-in-Marsh is, as expected, a cute little village made even more cute and typical of what we think of England because of the light drizzle that had just stopped when we arrived. Our inn, the Redesdale Inn, (B&B) is comfortable. We ate with our travel companions, had a short walk then went back to the B&B’s pub for dessert - sticky toffee pudding, now our favorite.

Monday 27 Aug 2018 – Moreton-in-Marsh to Stow in the Wold

The day started out threatening, but in the end, 7-miles later, we were dry. It was actually great hiking weather. As expected, we were hiking across fields and through back yards. There were plenty of sheep and milk-cows. We missed most of the paddies!

Jai, Peter, Wynn, Barbara, Linda, Lauve

Stow is at the top of a hill, a small “market town.” Our B&B, the Sheep on Sheep Street, was fine. Dinner was Indian.

One of our primary trails - Heart of England Way

Sezincote - an Indian inspired country mansion

Tuesday 28 Aug 2018 – Stow to Bourton on the Water

This was a shorter day – 4-miles, but we added a couple by taking a side trip along the way. In Lower Slaughter we did an out and back to Upper Slaughter because we heard that it was less crowded, but then Lower wasn’t very crowded. Upper is frequently used as a movie set. We’ll look for it as we follow “The Crown” on PBS. The two towns are connected by the River Eye, which is more of a stream, but big enough to support a mill during the peak of the wool industry. “Slaughter” means muddy. I think it came from when sheep were brought to market the Eye got muddy in both Slaughters.

"Make my day, punk!"

After a light lunch at the Manor House Hotel in Lower Slaughter we were on to the short hike into Bourton on the Water and the Windrush River running through it. Our hotel was Chester House. The town was crowded with tourists.

Pub snack stop

Cottage garden

Church in Lower Slaughter

Manor House Hotel in Upper Slaughter

Windrush River through Bourton on the Water

Wednesday 29 Aug 2018 Bourton to Guiting Power

I have been mapping our daily course into the Garmin GPS using the paper map provided for the walk and the Garmin Connect computer app. This is a manual process and sometimes not so accurate, so we have been using a combination of the que sheet instructions and the GPS with occasional reference to the paper map. It is working without too much stopping and discussing which is the right way.

Linda & Wynn leaving "kissing gate"

Towards Naunton for pub lunch

Black  berries everywhere

We loaded up on pastry at the Bakery on the Water in Bourton to make sure we didn’t run short on the 6 mile walk along the Windrush River through sheep pastures and woods.. We had our pastry snack in the village of Naughton and arrived at the Hollow Bottom Hotel & Pub in Guiting Power at about 1:30. It was sunny most of the way. We found out the village was once totally owned by a Power family trust, thus the name. But because of increasing cost of maintaining the buildings and infrastructure, the trust is slowly selling off properties.

Garden in Guiting Power

The Hollow Bottom has been recommended by several friends and guide books. Based on the dinner, the recommendations have been correct. The dishes were all innovative, delicious and well presented.

Thursday 30 Aug 2018 Guiting to Winchcombe

This was a 5.9-mile rolling walk through farm fields and forests. One stretch was through Farmcote Estate. It took a while to figure out why we saw so many pheasants. Then we stared to see what looked like feeding stations, then gun shots.  Finally, it dawned – they were raising pheasants for hunting probably on the estate. Beautiful, big birds. Our hotel, White Hart Inn, is fine.

Approaching Winchcombe

Saturday 25 Aug 2018 – London, Stonehenge, Oxford and Windsor

This was our epic tour day. We had to get up at 3:15 AM to make it to our 5 AM bus departure in central London. But it was worth it!

First was Stonehenge - a 2-hour drive from London. The reason for the early start was to get there before the official opening and be allowed “inside the stones.” Most tours are restricted to a loop walkway about 50 feet from the perimeter of the stones. At shortly after sunrise, this was very dramatic. The sight ranks with Machu Picchu, the pyramids of Giza and Easter Island for spiritual significance and mysteries surrounding the construction. The 4-ton stones at Stonehenge were moved to the sight ~5000 years ago from 120 miles away; the 30-ton ones from “only” 20 miles. Our guide pointed out that 30 tons is three times the weight of our 50-passenger tour bus!

Next, Oxford, the famous college town and setting for many Harry Potter movie scenes. The campus is divided between various colleges where students live and study. We had an interesting tour and lunch.

A view inside one college quad

Another quad from the outside

Finally, Windsor where Windsor Castle is located. This was a madhouse! Tourists were everywhere. The town is mostly tacky tourist shops and restaurants. We had a brief tour of the town, but quickly ruled out an optional Castle tour when we saw there was at least an hour que.

Where Harry and Megan left their wedding

Cute pub in Windsor

Part of the que to get in!

We arrived back in London eleven hours after we started with time left to pop back into the Victoria and Albert Museum to follow up on the jewelry exhibition we missed the day before.

Thursday 23 Aug 2018 – London

We did the National Gallery today. It had a nice collection of impressionists – our favorites. The architecture was also a big feature for us.

When in London one must have tea, high tea. Done right, it is an elaborate affair in a “royal” setting. We booked high tea at the Café Royal Hotel in Piccadilly. It starts out with your selection of a tea from maybe 20 and a glass of champagne. The first course includes little sandwiches, the kind with the crusts cut off. Then there is a break for an aperitif – a concoction with several fruit juices. Following that are scones with clotted cream and jam and little dessert pastries. It all took over an hour. Many of the guests were Asian or Middle Eastern maybe because of the price.

Our friends, Peter and Barbara, arranged tickets for all of us to the London showing of Hamilton. We were afraid we wouldn’t understand the rap music, so we had been furiously studying the life of Hamilton and listening to the music on Amazon Prime. In the end it was a wonderful play. The acting and dancing were very dynamic and the songs packed a punch. The mostly British audience was very demonstrative and seemed to get all the jokes and jabs. My favorite characters were Arron Burr because he was the easies to understand and King George because he had the funniest lines.

Friday 24 Aug 2018 - London

We had a quiet morning working on logistic plans for the day and tomorrow when we must be at the start of our bus tour at 4:45 AM!

We had lunch at a typical English pub in Covent Gardens with Peter Brown, a British wellness colleague of Lauve’s. They had a good time reminiscing and talking about the current state of the field. Peter is a Conservative, so we got his views on why Brexit was good for the country – mainly because England has gotten soft economically and Brexit will require beneficial reforms. Lunch was great, but the main feature was beer, for at least Peter and me – lost count. It was great fun, but it did cut in to some of our time at the Victoria & Albert Museum. We dodged rain showers on our walk home across Hyde Park.

Victoria's memorial to her beloved Albert

Wednesday 22 Aug 2018 – London

The day was overcast and cool, but no rain – a great day for a guided Fat Tire Bike tour of London royal spots. We avoided much road travel by using bike paths through Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park stopping at places like Kensington Palace (William and Harry’s residences are there), Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abby, Parliament and Big Ben which was totally obscured for repairs by scaffolding. Although it was a 4 -hour tour we covered all these sights in what would take less than a half hour by road bike – there is plenty of sightseeing in London in a small area.  

Royal Horse Guard

Buckingham Palace

Westminster Abby

Buckingham Gates

In the afternoon we caught up with an old friend and biking buddy of mine from Singapore – Jenny Mussett. She came in from Reading where she now lives and teaches preschoolers for drinks and dinner near our flat. It was nice reminiscing and getting her insight on current affairs from a British viewpoint.

Outside our Airbnb flat

Monday Tuesday 20, 21 Aug 2018

We took American to Paris CDG via Dallas. Then took the Eurostar train through the Channel Tunnel to London. This involved a connecting subway and taxi moves, but it was cheaper than flying into London Heathrow. Since we will eventually return home via Paris, our air is round trip Tucson – Paris.

There was some trauma. Our Dallas – Paris flight was delayed 2 hours so our connection to the Eurostar train from Paris was very tight. The train left from Gare du Nord in Paris so rather than taking the train from CDG we took a taxi. We made it with about 10 minutes to spare! The rest of the journey was routine.

I have always been impressed by the engineering involved in building the Channel Tunnel so wanted to experience it. Except for the long approach to the tunnel – an excavated, gradually sloping “valley” – it was just a 20-minute train ride through the dark. But now I’ve seen it.

We are staying at an Airbnb near Hyde Park in Bathurst Mews. We learned that a mews is British for stable area. This area was used for stabling horses used in the past to ride in Hyde Park. In fact, as we walked around after arrival we saw some stables still housing horses. Our place is a small one bedroom flat with separate living room/kitchen. Our host, Robert, lives downstairs and is very helpful. We walked a little of Hyde Park before eating at a restaurant (pub, really) Robert recommended. Great weather.