| The Ridgeway - West | |
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Barrows, horse rumps and peep shows ...
Despite the less than favourable impression our accommodation had given the night before, they redeemed themselves considerably by sending us off with the best packed lunch of the entire walk. A strange place, all in all — disappointing in almost every visible respect, and then quietly generous in the one that mattered most.
We were ferried back to the start via taxi and set off again along the familiar wide chalk-packed path. For a few miles little changed in scenery, and it was another hot day, already warm despite the early hour. I fell in with Jess for a stretch and we talked about this and that — a rare opportunity for me, since I don't see nearly as much of Colin and Jess as I'd like. Colin has lived in Massachusetts for several years now and I have yet to make the trip out to stay with them at their place, so time alone with Jess is a genuine rarity, and a pleasure.
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Colin and Jess on the trail |
The terrain shifted subtly, becoming more uneven, the chalk giving way to grass, and then a modest climb presented itself up to the remains of an Iron Age fort — mere suggestions of earthworks, softened over the centuries by nature. Modest it may have been, but the combination of heat and my own questionable fitness had me toiling regardless. I was quietly grateful when Bod suggested a break at the summit, and threw myself to the ground with ungainly relief.
A short rest to rehydrate and we were off again, along an avenue of hedgerows and trees that offered some shelter and threw pleasing dappled shadow across the path. Bod had mentioned Wayland's Smithy on our first evening, though I'd been only half listening, so when the others diverted off the main path ahead of me I was momentarily puzzled. I reached an information board describing the site, fully intending to just sit and wait rather than follow them down — but the board described the place in such enticing detail that I found myself walking the short woodland track to the clearing where it lay.
I found my companions seated on a stone wall, saying nothing, simply absorbing the place. Wayland's Smithy is a long barrow — a burial chamber completed over five thousand years ago. Its entrance, a crude but imposing arrangement of huge stone slabs, is blocked now, but would once have led into a long chamber housing housing the interred along with their precious belongings. People of considerable importance were laid to rest here, clearly, and the site carries the feel of a shrine — a weight of time, echoes of whoever raised this thing in the first place. The barrow itself, a long grass-clad mound, lies beyond the entrance stones, the whole place ringed by mature trees that give it a sense of isolation from the world outside. Like the sarsen stones at Avebury, the Smithy compels you to sit still and absorb whatever it is the place is giving off — to run your hand over stones quarried and set in place by people who lived here before the rise of Pharaohs, before the building of pyramids. Ancient people we still know remarkably little about. Wayland was a Germanic smith-god, and the site takes its name from the Saxons who arrived long after it was built; its true original name is lost somewhere in the depths of prehistory. The place had an effect on all of us, and leaving it felt a little like stepping back into the real world from somewhere else entirely.
We knew there was another landmark waiting for us further along — the Uffington White Horse — reached after the Ridgeway climbed the steady, purposeful slope of Whitehorse Hill and emerged onto a plateau of gently rolling grassy embankments studded with daisies and buttercups. The green hummocks of another Iron Age fort, Uffington Castle I believe, lay off to our left, but we pressed on, intending to take lunch overlooking the Vale of the White Horse with the horse itself, hopefully, as the centrepiece.
Unfortunately, when we reached the shelf overlooking the vale, all we could actually see of the horse was its rump. Had we been on the opposite side of the valley, or airborne, we'd have seen it whole. Instead we got its angular hindquarters and the suggestion of a leg.
A mild disappointment, but the beauty of the vale spread out below us — bathed in glorious sunshine — more than made up for it. We settled onto the soft turf for lunch and then simply rested for a while, legs grateful for the break. I watched tiny vehicles crawling along the A420 far below, too distant even for their engines to reach us — birdsong and the gentle soughing of a warm breeze were the only soundtrack on offer. Presently a pair of red kites soared into the blue above us and I attempted, with debatable success, to capture them wheeling in circles on camera.
Soon enough it was time to move, and I rose on legs registering a silent but unmistakable protest to rejoin the path. The next few miles offered easy walking across wide, flat ground with the views still spectacular, and at some point along this stretch we crossed the border from Wiltshire into Oxfordshire without any particular ceremony marking the occasion.
The day was, at times, unbearably hot,
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Pause for thought at Wayland's Smithy |
The trail continued flat and uncomplicated ahead of us, and I was perfectly happy to march along like that for the rest of the day — but the Ridgeway had other plans and threw in a few inclines as a parting treat. One climb in particular I did not enjoy. We crossed a rare road and followed the Ridgeway up a steep metalled lane. Anyone who has read other journals of mine will know that climbs and I have never got on, and that twenty years hasn't improved matters — if anything, the addition of twenty years to my age has worked actively against me. I climbed. I stopped for breath. I climbed again. It was hot, I was sweating freely, and I grumbled quietly to myself the entire way to the top, where I found the others waiting and looking infuriatingly unbothered by the whole thing. I learned afterward that Jess had been struggling with her feet at this point and was in genuine discomfort. She began floating the idea of skipping the third and final day — sensible, probably, but disappointing for her all the same. The final stretch put us back on the familiar wide chalky path, fields stretching away either side, Bod assuring us the end was within reach. The end, when it arrived, was a dusty crossroads on the trail where, after some deliberation, we turned left and made our way down toward the village of Letcombe Regis. The path became a metalled lane that dropped very steeply, for quite some distance, and I realised with some misgiving that we would have to climb back up the same gradient before we'd even started walking in the morning. I wasn't keen, and resolved on the spot to propose a taxi back up to the Ridgeway the next day.
Letcombe Regis, when we eventually reached it, was every bit the idyllic English village — handsome, expansive properties along a series of little lanes, leading us to our accommodation. The whole place suggested wealth in that quiet, understated English way, and I'd have happily bet on a fair number of retired businessmen and professionals tending immaculate lawns behind high hedges somewhere nearby.
Our accommodation, the Greyhound Inn, sat neatly between two handsome period properties and was itself a fine Georgian building. The bar was open, and we rewarded our efforts with several cold beers. A young woman appeared to show us to our rooms, and it transpired that Bod and I had been allocated an attic room reached via several flights of steep, rickety stairs. I was walking just behind her, lugging my pack, forcing legs that had begun seizing up to take each reluctant step.
"Shall I take your bag?" she offered.
Well meant, but — not for the first time recently — I found myself being offered help by someone considerably younger than me. A sign of the times, evidently. Bod snorted quietly behind me as I politely declined. I could have pointed out that I'd just walked thirteen miles in a heatwave, but that would have sounded like an excuse rather than an explanation, so I said nothing and kept climbing. The room itself was an oven, but came with a decent bathroom, where I washed away the day's accumulated sweat and effort.
Later we all sat in the pub garden as darkness gathered. Owing to some unfortunate architectural planning, a couple of the bedrooms were visible from our table, and we watched — with a mixture of amusement and mild embarrassment — as an occupant undressed and climbed into bed entirely for our benefit. I raised the subject of a taxi back to the Ridgeway in the morning, and was relieved when it was agreed without argument. It was at this point that Jess announced she wouldn't be walking the next day at all — she would take a taxi straight to Goring and spend the day there waiting for the rest of us to arrive.
Sad news, but not entirely unexpected.
See Route on ......
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