We visited the castle at Harlech in Wales right after having a yummy breakfast and headed down all the tiny, twisty roads. Our destination was the Crown Inn in a tiny town called Newcastle, a pub where we are staying on our Offa's Dyke trek. Despite several e-mails, they have not yet confirmed our reservation there in two weeks. We certainly don't want to be out in the middle of nowhere and find no where to stay after a long day of walking. It took us about three hours of navigating tiny roads to get there. No one around!!! After another three hours we finally reached our rented bungalow in the town of Malmesbury in Wiltshire. It is located in the Cotswold area so is very old and fun to explore. The day had been rainy but things finally tapered off so around 5:30. After meeting our hosts and being shown around, we headed into town. It only takes about 12 minutes to get there. There are lots of pubs and eateries spread out and the old market area is in an open air type building, adjacent to the amazing Malmesbury Abbey. We are saving the Abbey visit for Thursday after we pick up Stephen at Heathrow, so he'll have something to do without having to drive to the ends of the earth to get there. We are also keeping an eye out for a room for him because the couch where we are staying is just too small for comfort!
We had a pretty good dinner...at least... I did. I ordered salmon and Vinnie had Welsh Faggots (which are ground meatball type things). However, these seemed to be made of all the throw away bits like heart, liver etc, or at least tasted like it!! I had a taste and it was all I could do not to spew it into a napkin and then drink all the liquid on the table...I almost lost it!! Vinnie liked them well enough to eat one whole one... we brought the other one back to the room... fab idea!
Saturday was a glorious day!! The sun was shining, the wind had just the right breeze and the air was just warm enough that you could take off your jacket while walking. We planned a quick trek to the old town of Tetbury that is located just three miles northwest of us. We got going at a decent hour and walked into Malmesbury so we could pick up a map. We left the town, headed down below the abbey, and down by the River Avon. The river is fairly narrow up by us but it is still very pretty. We saw a HUGE swan sitting on a nest, passed lots of ducks and people. It took us seven miles of walking to arrive in Tetbury... we were starving and glad to be there. We didn't get lost, per se, just kept having to look at the map and readjust! We got to the cute town, wandered around for a bit, ended picking the first place we'd looked at to eat, ate, then knew we had a long trek back. There were tons of people there due to the beautiful weather and Mother's Day that takes place today. We shortened our way back by two miles ;0) and ended up doing a total of 12.5 miles.
Since we didn't get back until around 4:30 we were too pooped to walk any more so we drove back to Tetbury (stop laughing!!) and went to the supermarket there to pick up some detergent for washing clothes and some fruit. We were also too tired to go to a pub so we picked up take-away Indian food, and had it while watching a movie in our rooms!
Yesterday, we headed out on a much shorter walk (about seven miles….yes, you’d better start worrying Stephen!) east of Malmesbury through a couple of tiny towns. We followed the Avon again, and walked through some really beautiful estates. There are still signs of the massive rains they had in England a few weeks ago, but all is rapidly coming back under control. We are convinced the lawn grasses are tame and trained, anyway. They never seem to be out of place, no bare spots, no weeds, etc. We saw lots of mallard duck pairs all along the river. In a few weeks, we expect to see lots of little duck families in all the creeks and rivers, with ducklings flitting about everywhere. We stopped by the room, got confirmation that they have a room for Stephen on Thursday night in the main house, then walked into Malmesbury for some pretty good pizza, some wine, and an excellent Malmesbury ale.
