Summer Solstice: Monday, June 21 On this longest day, I leaped out of bed, intending to visit ancestral stomping grounds up in the Highlands. First step: find a nearby car to hire. By 10:30 or so, I was behind the wheel of a sleek, black Opal Astra, negotiating my way through Edinburgh traffic. Two adjacent roundabouts …
Month: June 2010
Sunday, June 20 It was time to break our fellowship. L and L headed south to the Lake District while I rode a bus to Edinburgh, Scotland’s inspiring capital. Ronald was kind enough to motor me down to Dumfries, where I boarded the coach. I had no map, but kept notes of routes and towns. …
Saturday, June 19 One of my all-time favorite movies is The Wicker Man. We fully contribute to its cult status by hosting a festive showing every May first. The film would require several articles on its own, but to connect to this trip, we three travelers visited several locations where shooting happened in 1972. In Lou’s rented car, we drove through Dumfries …
Friday, June 18 Thanks to our hostess, we were able to spend a couple nights in southern Scotland, staying with a co-worker of Lou’s. The trip north in a rented Hyudai gave us a taste of British motorways—way too similar to freeway travel in the States. It took most of the day to crawl past …
Thursday, June 17 This was a not-so-busy day as I blogged and guzzled while the two Ls attended a book club circle up in Winderton. Good sleeping, too . . .
Wednesday, June 16 Here came another jaunt around the Cotswolds, which name means an elevated, open place with stone sheep shelters. This day began with a stop to pick strawberries at Hidcote Boyce. From there, we wound our way through Chipping Campden. “Chipping” denotes shopping, a little of which we did. Our picnic lunch overlooked a gorgeous …
Tuesday, June 15 Lou dropped us off at the train station in Moreton-in-Marsh for our 37-minute commute to a fabulously medieval city we had only passed through days earlier. Oxford is known as the City of Dreaming Spires and certainly lives up to its motto. The university consists of some 38 colleges and six private halls, all …
Out and about . . . Many English town, village, and hamlet names include geographical references to rivers, hills, roads, and other settlements. The closest town to Brailes is Shipston-on-Stour, four miles west. Like the Spanish, English folk put the noun before the adjective: River Stour rises in these eastern Cotswolds and joins the River …
Pardon the brevity: photos in the meantime . . . Sunday the 13th, off to Stratford.
Saturday the 12th began with a trip to the local bakery for trail snacks and a half-pint stop at Gate Inn, the pub in Upper Brailes. According to Linda: Louisa dropped us north of town to begin our day’s walk. The path led to a cattle paddock with a herd of HUGE cows and one …