COTSWALDS
Thursday Sept. 5th 2019
I'll do my best at describing today despite the bad news back home of hurricane damage to our home and vehicles
ok. Apparently Mells is NOT considered part of the Coltwalds. The buildings, roads and surroundings all resemble the Coltswalds but that said I embarked on a fabulous day trip through the infamous COTSWALDS.
I can honestly say I have mastered the left handed shifting and the extreme numerous entrances to roundabouts. If I could give an educated, near accurate guess of how many roundabouts I went through today, I would say in excess of 100. For most of my trip, the roundabouts came sometimes every 1/2 mile or so. When there was a 2 mile break between 2 of them, I said "oh good". A couple of times I would see a 6 mile stretch until the next. That was great!
I started with setting my GPS for Stow-on-the-wold, followed by Bourton-on-the-hill and Moreton-in-Marsh. Chipping Norton was next. Then down to Burford ending with my 2 favorite towns: Bilbury and Barnsley. There were many beautiful towns in between. But these were the towns I put into the GPS. I took so many pictures, I will have to edit out the doubles because every turn was more beautiful than the one before. There were many sites off the beaten path that I just couldn't take due to my time constraint. But I feel I got a true representation of why the Coltwalds are written up in so many books and talked about so lovingly by anyone who has been there. There were many corn fields and hay fields but little could be seen of herds of sheep. Wales seemed to have so many more herds of sheep as I saw it.
I didn't get lost at all today and only scraped my left tires once. But it was a bad one. It's all ok though.
I am really glad to be out of the car and sipping on butternut squash soup at the pub. I drove all day.
My cottage was built in 1596 BTW. Renovated in 2006
BEST part of my day: Although I was surrounded and awed by all I saw today the most impressive and fun thing I did was go to a Falconry. They had over 150 birds with more than 50 different species of birds including owls, eagles, vultures and of course falcons. The trainer brought out a total of 4 different birds that she handled for the one hour show. I got up so close to each, as they flew over our heads, their wing brushed on our heads. It was amazing. I wish I had more time to stay for all the shows but I had to keep going. Many birds were imprinted so thought their handler was either their mom or they were of the same species. So these imprinted birds will never breed. They are all encouraged to fly away for as long as they want to hunt. They always all come back, relying on easy food that they don't have to hunt for. The falconry was amazing with a herd of red tail deer in an adjacent field. The whole place was unlike any place I have ever been to.
Tomorrow: drive 66 miles to Milford-on-Sea and give Cornwall and Essex a go.
I'll do my best at describing today despite the bad news back home of hurricane damage to our home and vehicles
ok. Apparently Mells is NOT considered part of the Coltwalds. The buildings, roads and surroundings all resemble the Coltswalds but that said I embarked on a fabulous day trip through the infamous COTSWALDS.
I can honestly say I have mastered the left handed shifting and the extreme numerous entrances to roundabouts. If I could give an educated, near accurate guess of how many roundabouts I went through today, I would say in excess of 100. For most of my trip, the roundabouts came sometimes every 1/2 mile or so. When there was a 2 mile break between 2 of them, I said "oh good". A couple of times I would see a 6 mile stretch until the next. That was great!
I started with setting my GPS for Stow-on-the-wold, followed by Bourton-on-the-hill and Moreton-in-Marsh. Chipping Norton was next. Then down to Burford ending with my 2 favorite towns: Bilbury and Barnsley. There were many beautiful towns in between. But these were the towns I put into the GPS. I took so many pictures, I will have to edit out the doubles because every turn was more beautiful than the one before. There were many sites off the beaten path that I just couldn't take due to my time constraint. But I feel I got a true representation of why the Coltwalds are written up in so many books and talked about so lovingly by anyone who has been there. There were many corn fields and hay fields but little could be seen of herds of sheep. Wales seemed to have so many more herds of sheep as I saw it.
I didn't get lost at all today and only scraped my left tires once. But it was a bad one. It's all ok though.
I am really glad to be out of the car and sipping on butternut squash soup at the pub. I drove all day.
My cottage was built in 1596 BTW. Renovated in 2006
BEST part of my day: Although I was surrounded and awed by all I saw today the most impressive and fun thing I did was go to a Falconry. They had over 150 birds with more than 50 different species of birds including owls, eagles, vultures and of course falcons. The trainer brought out a total of 4 different birds that she handled for the one hour show. I got up so close to each, as they flew over our heads, their wing brushed on our heads. It was amazing. I wish I had more time to stay for all the shows but I had to keep going. Many birds were imprinted so thought their handler was either their mom or they were of the same species. So these imprinted birds will never breed. They are all encouraged to fly away for as long as they want to hunt. They always all come back, relying on easy food that they don't have to hunt for. The falconry was amazing with a herd of red tail deer in an adjacent field. The whole place was unlike any place I have ever been to.
Tomorrow: drive 66 miles to Milford-on-Sea and give Cornwall and Essex a go.
Remember the "roundabout" in the center of Stafford? lol 100, did you get dizzier? lol
ReplyDeleteSorry you had storm damage. Just missed me. Hope its not too bad. Love your blog, Karen. Wish I was there. All that crazy driving and navigating is good for your brain as harrowing as it can be. Have a Macallan 12 yr for me.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry to hear you had storm damage. I hope its not severe. The Falconry sounds awesome!
ReplyDelete