- Start: The Bear, Wantage
- Finish: The Swan, Streatley
- Walking Distance: 26.5km
- Total Time: 8.5 hours
The Bear was a pleasant hotel, located in the market square in Wantage, it had clearly been a coaching inn for centuries, albeit with several makeovers.
The rooms were probably overdue for another one, though it still had a guest lounge and breakfast room which we found rather quaint. The meal last night was probably the best that we have had so far, though we didn’t do it justice at the time. Breakfast was good but didn’t quite live up to that. I had the kippers and Craig an omelette.
The market square in Wantage comes complete with a statue of King Alfred who was supposedly born here in 849AD. It bore a striking resemblance to the one in Winchester and as I’m not convinced that anyone really knows what Alfred looked like, I wondered if they had the same model? Was there a King Alfred doppelganger wandering around the south of England in the 1870’s??
From Wantage we had to get back to the Ridgeway, which sadly meant going up, 6km of up in fact! Walking along a ridge gives amazing views, but it would be nice, occasionally, if it is was a little lower!
Whilst our time in Wiltshire had been spent looking at the memorials of the pre-historic dead, today we came across much more recent memorials.
A massive erection dedicated to Lord Wantage, who co-founded the British Red Cross, amongst many other achievements.
A small Saracen stone placed in memorial to Lady Penelope Betjeman (wife of Sir John)
and a memorial to Hugh Grosvenor of The Lifeguards who died in a military accident.
We didn’t have a completely ancient-free day though. We also stopped at an earthwork reputed to be the burial site of the Saxon King Cwichelm, known as Scutchamer Knob (a name which gave Craig endless amusement!). It appears from the detritus of beer cans, fire pits and other things(!!) in the vicinity, to be living up to its name amongst the local youth!
After lunch we passed from Oxfordshire into West Berkshire and a new section of map.
As we walked we had excellent views of two pieces of modern construction which are both important, but have very different trajectories now.
Didcot power station was a huge (originally coal) power station which has now mostly been demolished. A small amount remains which serves as a gas powered emergency back-up for the National Grid. Given how prominent it is in the landscape currently, it must have dominated it when all its towers were intact.
Not far from Didcot is the Harwell Science and Innovation Centre. Established in 1946, it was Britain’s first Atomic energy research station. The facility now houses the Diamond Light Source Synchrotron, completed in 2001, which is the UK’s largest scientific investment since the 1960’s. It produces intense beams of light which are used for a vast array of different applications in scientific research.
Continuing on, we cross underneath the A34, where the dank tunnel is illuminated by some interesting local murals. I’m not exactly sure what the residents of Isley have been up to, but it might be fun finding out 😉
We climbed over another ridge and eventually descended towards the Thames. We are very nearly half way now on our journey along the Ridgeway and from tomorrow onwards we will journeying through the Chilterns, which we could just see in the distance.
The sheep grazed valley we walked down was very pleasant, though our feet were aching again by this point and the journey from the end of the path into Streatley seemed to last forever!
Streatley -on-Thames is everything you would expect from a village sitting on the banks of our longest river, so close to London. The lovely historic houses are immaculately preserved and ‘money’ is evident everywhere.
The Swan, at one point in it’s life, was clearly a pleasant, maybe Georgian/Early Victorian Hostelry, taking advantage of the Upper Middle/Lower Upper class desire to spend time on the river. However, now it is a monster wedding venue, modernised and extended out of all recognition, with fake fireplaces all over the place!
(It is August!, I know it doesn’t actually generate any heat unless you want it to, but…..)
The views from the restaurant window were still exactly what you would expect, the lovely river, boats etc.
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But we were not expecting the cuisine to emulate this. The menu was very generic, there were no draught ales or organic local produce or any of the stuff that we (in our entitled little liberal-elite bubble!) have come to expect.
However, we were pleasantly surprised. I had some really nice chicken and Craig had a lovely pasta dish.
They were unexciting perhaps, but excellently executed. It is probably the second best meal we have had on this trip and despite the location, the cost was not horrendous.
We are now half-way through this trip and although we are tired and have an amazing collection of sores and blisters, (which I won’t share!) We are still enjoying ourselves (most of the time) and we still haven’t got divorced!
Bring on the Chilterns!
I really look forward to reading these missives. Quite educational too. Glad you’re still able to keep going. Suzy