Sometimes you don’t need to travel far for an adventure. Whilst my younger self demanded exciting experiences or exotic destinations last weekend we hopped on a couple of buses, hoisted on our backpacks and walked the Lambourn Valley Way.
Continue reading Backpacking the Lambourn Valley Way, Berkshire
As regular readers will know I believe a good walk always features cake. So it’s probably no surprise that our weekend walk included afternoon tea at a church. Most visitors were probably there for the main event, snowdrops in the churchyard, but not us. Instead I’d chosen a longer walk with a cake stop halfway round.
Continue reading A snowdrop walk near Swyncombe, Oxfordshire
It’s hard to imagine that an area of heathland near Newbury once played an important role in the Cold War. The former RAF base at Greenham Common was controversially used by the United States Air Force as a storage site for cruise missiles. Those days are gone now and Greenham has a much more peaceful existence. We spent an afternoon walking from the Nature Discovery Centre at Thatcham, along the Kennet and Avon Canal to Greenham Common and then back to the start via Bowdown Woods.
Continue reading A Cold War walk on Greenham Common, Berkshire
A couple of months ago I saw the flyer for this year’s Oxford Playhouse panto, Aladdin. As I glanced over the familiar Korky Paul illustrations I noticed something was amiss. Where was Peter Duncan’s name? He, of Blue Peter fame, who has written and directed every Oxford Playhouse panto I’ve seen. He, who is personally responsible (not that he knows it), for my panto entertainment. A quick ferret through the internet and I discover he’s touring in Hairspray, the musical. How was this allowed? And what does this mean for the Playhouse panto?
Continue reading Review: Aladdin panto at the Oxford Playhouse
A couple of weekends ago we decided on an impromptu trip to the Isle of Wight. We belatedly realised that trying to book a late afternoon car ferry on a sunny Sunday just a few hours before travelling is rather expensive! Time for Plan B; travel as a foot passenger and a ride on the Needles Breezer.
Continue reading Riding the Needles Breezer; an open top bus on the Isle of Wight
There aren’t many places in this country where you can visit two empty villages just a few miles from each other. Yet Salisbury Plain is home to two military training villages. Usually closed to the public we took advantage of an open day at Imber church and combined it with a walk across the Plain to a fake German village.
Continue reading Imber and Copehill Down; the ghost villages of Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire
