Thursday 01st August - Avening to Sherston

Day 8:

Avening to Sherston :

We left Nailsworth around 9am after a good english breakfast 

at Lyndhurst B&B where we had a very good night sleep.

Roger from the B&B kindly gave us a lift to 

where he took us the previous day and

pointed to me Avening church which worse a visit.

Here is one of the most interesting and best preserved 

of the ancient Churches on the Cotswold.

The art of building a Drystone Wall,
so common in Cotswold.

Dry stone is a building method by which structures are constructed 

from stones without any mortar to bind them together. 

Traditionally used for the boundaries of fields and churchyards.

Thousands of years later some walls were built 

much wider than they needed to be, 

just to consume the large quantities of stone removed while clearing land.

In the year 1050, Brittric of Avening, Lord of Gloucester was sent 

by Edward the Confessor as an ambassador to Baldwin, 
Count of Flanders. It was here that he met Matilda who fell in love 
with Brittric despite him being married. 
However Brittric rejected her advances much to the annoyance of Matilda. 
Shortly after she became queen, she had the King disposses Brittric 
of the manor of Avening and had him thrown into prison 
at Worcester, where he died. 
Rumours have it that the death sounded very much like poisoning. 
Some years later the queen deeply regretted her actions and built a church 
at Avening in penance. 
The Queen consecrated the church in 1080 and gave a feast of a pigs head to the builders. 
This feast is still commemorated in the village as Pig Face Day 
on September the 14th where the villagers “feast” in the village hall.

Well we are missing Bailey today. It was a silence walk without him. 

We started our walk out of the town, up hill, and threw fields,

leaving Avening down in the beautiful valley of Gatcombe Park.

Farmhouse with clock tower

Yes, we went threw the field with a horse in it !

We had a glimpse of Chavenage castle. 

We passed a polo club which meant for us fields full of horses. 

We are not the most courageous people in front of big animals
like cows or horses.

Our technique now is to stay in a group and 

walk as fast as we can threw the field !! 

So when you carry a heavy rucksack, going up hill, 

you arrived at the top at the limit of exhaustion !!

My first glimpse of Westonbirt Arboretum

First we went threw a couple of fields belonging to the 

Polo club full of beautiful horses.

We then walk between the arboretum and the fields

surrounded by electric line.

The game is to avoid the stingers and thorns on our left

while you keep away from the electric line on your right.

The treat for me today was to go threw Westonbirt Arboretum. 

This is in my bucket list to come back to see it all.

We went threw fields which were harvested as we passed them, 

making sure to keep away from machinery. 

We have now left Gloucestershire and came in Wiltshire.

Once again we are taking the wrong side of the edge,

thinking we are on the right path according to the GPS 

even so it has a difficult access.

Coming up to Sherston

We have worked out that we now walk 3km/ hour. 

We reach Sherston after 4 pm in a self catering B&B 

called the old bakery, in a cosy little cottage. 

Avening to Sherston today : 18,5km