Cotswold Way

Cotswold Way, Day 7 Old Sodbury to Cold Ashton

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Looking back at Day 7 on the Cotswold Way and our 16km hike from Old Sodbury to Cold Ashton.

This was another hot one – smack dab in the middle of the unexpected and inconvenient UK heat wave. Temps were forecasted to hit 36C but we lucked out and it topped out at a ‘comfy’ 33C while we were on the trail. Ugh! No matter, we were getting ahead of the heat by starting early again. We left the Dog Inn in Old Sodbury at 5am. It was even a touch chilly as we started out and I got to wear the thin long sleeve I had dragged from Canada for a good minute or two.

Our ramble the first hours of the day had all the things that make early morning walking my favorite! Great temp, amazing landscape, good friends and all is quiet. I find peace when walking and with these conditions, I was in complete Zen!

We walked across wheat field after wheat field, which were easy underfoot and had very little incline, as the sun came up – making the landscape (and our photos) looks pretty magical! Even the dew glistening off the spider webs in our path or across the wheat tops looked pretty and I don’t think I have ever put pretty and spider in the same sentence. Ick.

The icing on the early morning cake? We were blessed with a view of hot air balloons off in the distance. Beautiful! When planning this trip to the Cotswold many people asked ‘where is that’ and my answer was always ‘do you know those images of rolling green hills, clear blue skies and air balloons on calendars, puzzles and screen savers? That’s the Cotswolds’. I could not even believe we got to actually experience this in person. Wow, pinch me I was in a puzzle!

Following a lengthy and thoroughly enjoyable hot air balloon photo shoot – we are all scrapbookers and photograph junkies so you cannot even imagine how many photos we took collectively – we were on our way again.

Not too long later we came upon some signage that diverted the Way around a police incident on Beacon Lane or Road or some such place. The diversion didn’t change the distance we walked, just took us off then back to the route a little.

As we walked the diversion, which I think was about an hour, we discussed what the possible police incident could be. In my always very logical and pragmatic approach to life, I assumed the obvious – a multi person murder / suicide event. Oh wait maybe a horrible alien cult problem. Hmm no. Most definitely and had to be a serial killer. For sure. In stark contrast to my drama, Cheryl suggested it was likely just a grow-op. Which I interpret as a scary, international gang growing whatever makes heroine and amassing stock piles of weapons of mass destruction and serial killing. Obviously. Definitely. Whatever the reason, nothing came up in the media – we looked – so one of my assumptions is surely true if it was so very secret squirrel.

Back to the walk …

We stopped in Tormarton for our morning break – some snacks and a chance to get the feet out of our shoes and up for a bit. I personally had to break every 2-3 hours due to my pesky foot injuries and I needed to do some surgery on my hiking shoes. They were falling apart and I had been using duct tape, sports tape and a sewing kit for the last 100+ km already. They just needed to work with me for a few more days – so a bit more duct tape and sweet talking was required! ‘I love you shoes-sies, we got this! Please do not fall apart on me now’ may have been heard as I coaxed them back to hike-able condition.

Rosa was feeling the need to keep waltzing so spent a just bit of time with us at the break spot and then carried on the Way. It was fun knowing she was ahead of us and we would be ‘hunting’ her aka excited to see her again once the rest of us got going again. I am competitive person by nature so felt a bit like the greyhound with the rabbit on the track in front.

While ‘hunting’ Rosa, we passed through a fantastic forested area called Dryham Wood and came across a message box!

When Cheryl, Shar and I came across the message book, among messages from MANY walkers, we saw a note from Rosa. A proof of life that she was ahead of us and we were on her tail! The hunt continues.

After spending some time to add our own message – which included a hello to our New York friends who were behind us on the trail and a drawing of all of us by our resident artist Shar (she is mumbling ‘I am an artist’ right now as she reads this I bet) – the ‘hunt Rosa’ adventure picked up again.

Pleased to report, we found her not too far after the forest and it’s funny how good it felt to have the band back together. I think she got lonely and stopped to wait for us cause her long legs and steady pace could have our ran us all day if she wanted to.

After a bunch more kilometers, we were so excited to arrive at little cafe just off route. A dangerous road walk (think playing chicken with a big truck or 2) by Shar to confirm it was open, followed by a much safer jaunt across a field by the rest of us to join her, and we had a fantastic place for our Elevensies break. This may have included bacon rolls, hot tea, black pudding and more. Such a fantastic spot and we were out of the sun!

Today’s final walking destination was Cold Ashton, a very-tiny-wee town (read that as a grouping of houses and a parish hall) where we would be getting a pre-arranged taxi to Bath where we had our next B&B. The taxi was meant to come for us at 4pm but we were due to arrive in Cold Ashton by noon and we wanted to get the Bath asap to get out of the heat. A morning of calling and texting via WhatsApp with the taxi transport company while I walked (good thing it was easy walking today or I would have fallen in a death gully) – and we had a taxi pick up for noon!

Following our break, we made our way to Cold Ashton to make sure we were ready for the taxi. The time between arrival and pick up afforded time for a little photo session!

Our taxi was on time and made quick work of the 20min ride to the Walton’s Guest House in Bath. We would be staying at this B&B for the next 3 nights and we were excited about not packing everything each morning.

We had showers and naps and then headed out about Bath (in the sweltering heat) for the evening – this included an amazing Italian meal on the riverside for Cheryl’s birthday. The best Carbonara I ever had that day and the worst sleep ever for all of us that night – historic buildings are not built for heat waves. Sweat, toss, sweat, hit pillow in frustration, sweat, toss, and morning alarm. The belly full of pasta and pints did not help but totally worth it!

More on our Bath excursions in a future post and our final day on the Cotswolds Way too!

Brande

Cotswold Way, Day 6 Dursley to Old Sodbury

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Day 6 of 8 on the Cotswold Way was the first day we saw the temperatures rise to well above the 30C mark. The heatwave that we are experiencing here in England has definitely changed our approach to the walk and I am secretly loving it .. we have decided to start these last days of the Way as the sunrises at 5am. My favourite time to be hiking! Brings back fond memories of my Camino adventure.

All of us were up at 430am (if not earlier) to get ready and quietly sneak out the doors of the Woodlands House B&B in Dursley. The B&B does not do breakfast for 430am so instead they left us a nice note and had some fruit, crisps (potato chips) and granola bars for us to grab and go. I have to admit I did missed my full English Breakfast and pot of tea.

As we started our walk with the moon heading to bed and the sun coming up all in the first hour of the day. The temperature was perfect and, crazy enough, still warm enough to be in just tank tops and shorts (a signal of the heat to come!)

The Way kicked off with a climb out of the town (of course), a nice jaunt across a golf course, some more uphill and then we were rewarded with our first break of the day at the Broadway Tower.

An amazing tower on the top of a lengthy hill surrounded by forest and fantastic footpaths all over the place. No wonder we saw so many early morning dog walkers here – they too were beating the heat of the day at a great place!

While the rest of us settled into our first break to enjoy our trial breakfast, Shar popped up the 187 steps of the tower to see the 360 views of the landscape. Adding more steps to an already 26km day on a skinny old, stone, skinny spiral staircase was not my idea of a good time. She was our tribute to head up and see what she could see – while we snacked lol.

While sitting enjoying our breakfast we heard scary, freaky animal screaming from the forest we would be entering next – like blood curdling kind of screaming. We had no idea what made the sound. A bird of prey, tortured souls, maybe a werewolf! The dogs in the area were barking heaps when it happened too. When we asked the locals who passed us what is was they also had no idea. What the heck?! I asked one chap walking his dog if there are werewolves in the areas, jokingly of course, oh wow he laughed. We chatted about our hike with him a bit more and as we said goodbye, he said ‘good luck with the beasties’. Hilarious!

Happy to report we made it through the woods safely. We may never know if it was a werewolf or white walker or a death eater.

From there we crossed field after field of crops and livestock. One crop we had not seen yet was a field of, we think, Canola plants. They were head height and the field was so long it took us quite some time to get through – poor Cheryl was in the front of our pack on spider web clearing duty and her shoulders and arms were on fire by the time we came through. Thanks Cheryl!

I took my turn on spider web clearing in the next Vegetation Corridor of Humid Hell (what we came to call skinny paths between chest height brambles and grasses). One of the down sides of getting out first on the trail is that no other hikers cleared the arachnids for us already.

One ‘exciting’ moment on the trial was when we tried to get through a pasture of cattle. Other walkers came through before us and cause the cattle to move to one end of the pasture which was quite skinny with bramble (thistle, stinging nettle, blackberry bushes, etc) and either side and our gate dead centre where the beef were currently standing. Doh!

We tried to find a high path to get past and down to the gate but nope, trued a low route and nope, tried to encourage them as a group to move along to one side or the other but nope, and tried to walk through them also nope.

After way too many minutes in the hot sun hoping they might move away from the gate on their own, we made our way through the devil brambles and used the arms wide and saying ‘Bubba Bubba Bubba’ over and over again (not sure why I used that word in the first place but we all got in on it and it worked) moved the massive cows off the path enough to get to the gate. We mostly came out unscathed…Rosa’s legs (she was the lead on the bramble taming portion of our plan) however will never be the same!

In our travels we passed a few other cool sights, another tower, a fantastic church, neat shine stile and some new Cotswold Way sign style we hadn’t seen before.

Our most favorite moment, was this sweet sign from a local child offering us weary hikers some fresh water on way too hot of a day.

Just a few kilometers from Old Sodbury, our destination for the day, we stumbled into the Beaufort Arms pub to refresh with some iced sparkling water and a look at the trail ahead. The temp was already in the 30s and we had just finished a long section of the trail where there was little or no shade to take breaks in.

As it got hot on the trail our technique was to hike from shade to shade. Cross a long pasture in the sun, take a micro standing break in the shade to cool down and slow the heart rate – repeat! During the afternoon, these shaded breaks were getting far and few between with no trees or clouds to provide refuge. We were sorta, kinda, totally melting.

Looking at the trail ahead, we had just a few km left but it was all through wide open farmland – that meant waist high crops and zero trees / shade. We would have been like mini donuts on the deep fryer conveyor belt at a carnival. I like to eat donuts not be a donut. So what to do? When in doubt let the path decide…

The bartender (we refer to her as Beaufort Bonnie now) was going into Old Sodbury at the end of her shift in an hour and offered us a ride AND the kitchen had cooked too many roasted potatoes for Sunday dinner and brought us out a warm bowl for free to enjoy. A sign to order cold pints to wash the potatoes of joy down and hitch the ride!

We arrived at the Old Sodbury, thanks Beaufort Bonnie, at about 4pm to enjoy a shower, maybe a nap, and then a great supper in the Dogs Inn pub (also our accommodation) and some pints in the beer garden with some other hikers we met along the way. Fun!

A fantastic way to end the day before we start again tomorrow at 5am again!

Brandé

Cotswold Way, Day 4 Birdlip to Haresfeild

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Day 4 of 8 of the Cotswold Way wrapped up yesterday at 23km (8.5hours) and it was one of those amazing yet full of personal challenging days on the trail…

If you have done any multi day treks you know exactly what I mean .. the trail is great but your body or your headspace or your gear or your whatever is not great and it impacts every darn step you take and every thought you have. Pretty amazing how much a small or a very big personal thing can impact your day’s 40,000+ steps regardless of how majestic the views are. For those of you who have had ‘that day’ – we see you, we honour you, we send hugs, we cheerlead you, and we cheers your perseverance no matter what that looks like for you!

We started the day with a short but a death defying jog down a busy road from our hotel to the trail head – good morning! Then we were right away into a long and peaceful forest track for quite and time. Meeting dog walkers and petting some pups on our way.

From there we had our usual forest track mixed with fields and some lane bits…

We had the chance to stop a golf course the path runs directly through the middle of for our first break – snacks and an accidental half-pint! Such a good little stop.

From there we kept on trucking and made our way into Painswick. We had the chance to visit Saint Mary’s Church that has 99 Yew tree growing – legend has it the devil will not let the 100th Yew tree grow. Pretty amazing.

We met the cutest little grandma on the trail and her grand-doggie Teddy and got some puppy pets in before we grabbed some lunch for our afternoon break and headed out of town. We stopped on a grassy hill just out of town and enjoyed a socks and shoes off with feet up yummy lunch!

Just after lunch we were rewarded with, of course, some big steep climbs out of the town – we have come to expect this after every town – and the ‘halfway’ point. Just 55 miles to Bath and 47 miles to Chipping Campden .. so not really, really the half way point but still photo worthy! This marker was in the middle of some farmer’s cattle field.

From there we were in the home stretch (well a couple hours of home stretch but who is counting .. we were every kilometer!).

We finished the day with a 1.4 kilometer downhill lane off the Path into Haresfeild straight into our home for the night, the Beacon Inn. This place was pretty fantastic! We were all jammed into the same room like a summer camp and oh the arrival pint on the deck was exactly what we needed to cheers the day! A few visits by their pet chicken George as we sat on the patio was a nice touch too!

Brandé

Finally, A New Adventure

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Well after way, way, way too long since my last adventure …

I am excited to announce a new adventure is finally in the works!

What adventure do I have up my sleeve you ask? Oh sit down, grab that coffee or wine or pint or the hand of someone you love cause this is about to get exciting. Well, exciting for me at least, the one heading out on an adventure. Not sure how exciting this will be for you exactly but I will do my level best to make it at least entertaining.

Crazy. Fun. Here we go!

Offa’s Dyke Path, Wales

In 2008, I walked the Hadrian’s Wall Path which runs the length of the border of England and Scotland. So really it only makes sense that I would also walk England’s other border, the one with Wales. I cannot have borders getting all jelly if they are not included. They are quite dramatic like that …

Intro the Offa’s Dyke Path! The Path literally and mostly follows the Dyke that borders the two countries and was built by, you guessed it, a guy .. ok a King .. named Offa in the eighth century as a border (well there is a little debate on the purpose but it feels sorta border-ish so I am going with that). It is said to be the longest ancient monument in Britain and was opened as an official national trail in 1971. You had me at official national trail. Let’s go!

The official Offa’s Dyke Path trail runs the length of the dyke and walkers toggle between England and Wales a few times but mostly walk in Wales. The length? Just a short little jaunt of 283 kilometers (176 miles) marked by the classic acorn way finding signs of the UK national paths. I have read a few books and many are saying the elevation gain and loss combined is the same as claiming to the top of Mount Everest but the tail itself is clearly marked and the views are amazing … when it’s not raining. That is a little daunting and amazing.

I am walking this bad boy this summer, June 25 to July 9, and I cannot wait! The accommodations I will hike to each day all the way along the path have been booked and I have already started to explore torrential and constant Welsh rain strategies. I am also researching local folklore, legends and ghost stories – more on that later.

Want to know the icing on this trails’ cake? My friend Cheryl is joining me for the last week on the trail. What? No jokes! So excited.

After I give the Offa’s Dyke Path (or the OPD to us cool long distance hikers like me and Cheryl lol) a run for its money, we are off to …

Cotswold Way, England

The Cotswolds is the most picturesque region in England they say. You know that image of England with its rolling, beautiful green hills and crisp blue skies and there are a few air balloons dotted in the sky during the most beautiful sunrise that ever happened, ever. That is the Cotswolds! I am that little hiker off in the distance with the bright purple pack. Heyo!

The Cotsowld Way, a wee skip and a jump of 164 kilometers (102 miles), is another national trail in the UK and has been on the must do list for about a decade. Shar, my sister, and I started talking about this one when we did the Great Glen Way in Scotland in 2013. The intention to get this one under my boots was ‘thwarted’ first by the Camino de Santiago (wow), then the Arran Coastal Way (amazing) and finally the COVID-19 pandemic (not cool). While we might be doing the Way a few years later than planned, the wait almost makes it more exciting.

For this one, the band-o-four that conquered the Arran Way in Scotland in 2018 are making a comeback. Shar, and our closest friends Cheryl and Rosa are hitting the hills – the band is back together again folks and I cannot wait. We start walking on July 11th and wrap up July 20th. A couple nights in Bath, then a few nights in London (the queen has asked if I could swing by for a wee spot o tea and I would hate to let her down), and we head our happy selves home.

But before I go I need to recover …

Just the day before I was to start my fail-proof 20week training plan – I heard a pop, felt a hot but yet cold rip in my foot during a soccer match and I am now working through a 9-12 week recovery before I can even train. No damn way! Are you kidding me? Can the MRI be wrong?

I am reminding myself as I sit on a bike in a gym training instead of in my boots on a trail, that it could be worse. It could have been a full rupture and I could be heading to surgery. As it is, its just a couple of tears. Just. Ugh! I have a substantial longitudinal tear in my Peroneous Brevis Tendon, the one that runs from the pinkie toe to the heel (that little piggy is not running home anytime soon) and another Grade 2 (Moderate) tear of the medial Plantar Fascia. It hurts, I am frustrated, I could cry, I have cried, I could smash things, I might still, and I will overcome!

I will recover from this little pesky foot injury, train like a rock star in half the time I usually prefer and then voila .. 5 weeks doing what I love most and with my most favourite trail peeps. Stay tuned for how this one shapes up before we go and as we ramble!

Brande