Coberley bubbly

As last week, we were today only three Wednesday walkers. Though the sun was shining in Cheltenham, we hit the mist as we drove up Leckhampton Hill: it cleared as the morning went on. Happily, we were at lunch (at the Star Bistro) before it started raining much.

After climbing half a mile or so along the Cotswold Way, we swung down South of Hartley Farm and along its secret valley. Crossing the A436, our peace was shattered: my "Stay!" was heard as "Okay!", with near fatal consequences.

Having admired the Berkeley tombs in Coberley church, we found ourselves sitting down in the porch. Whereupon a bottle and glasses were conjured up, so we could drink to the health of a birthday-boy walker. A nice surprise, this convention, to me as a relative newcomer to the group!

As my photograph shows, the stained glass in front of which we sat was appropriate to the occasion: Arts and Crafts-looking, but in fact late 20th Century.

Christmas walk

The rain having lifted, we had a perfect Christmas morning walk, parking above Coberley, and completing the Woodland Trust (Barber Wood) triangle clockwise. Not much mud to speak of, though plenty of other walkers. (Coldwell Bottom is to the right of the photograph.)

Feuilles lourdes

With friends staying the weekend, we were dropped at the end of the Stockwell lane this morning, and set off to walk home, via Coberley. The inch or two of snow that fell over the past few days had frozen, making walking easy on this windless morning, provided you avoided the icy patches: no mud, at least! But the real pleasure of being out today was to see trees glistening as if coated in caramel. Nature, in suspended animation! Hard to describe such rare beauty, and to capture it in a photograph: I had forgotten how necessary it is, in a snowy world, to stop down, to compensate for the glare. So, thank you, Lightroom!

(Today we are celebrating the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes.)

The Churn Valley

On Thursday morning, instead of my usual walk up the old track from Coberley towards Birdlip (shown in this photograph running from centre to bottom right), I found myself going round the edge of the big field to its North. This opens up a slightly different view. A long line of lime trees guards the field's road boundary, with Coberley village nestling in the trees beyond. Straggly Upper Coberley hides likewise in trees on the far side of the main Churn Valley. The two prehistoric tumps (just left of centre) look no older than the rusting farm machinery I passed in their lee. Beyond Coldwell Bottom, Bubb's Hill - in Elkstone Parish - presides on the right horizon. Behind me, hawthorn berries gleam in the sunshine, the Rosebay Willowherb - though no longer in flower - retains the attraction of its russet stems, and the Old Man's Beard shows promise for later on, when Autumn's colours have drained away. Unsurprisingly for October, I heard not a single bird.

Coldwell Bottom

At last Caroline has treated herself to some new boots (£16 in the Bath Road). So today was green welly baptism day up near Coberley: we braved the wind and rain to do my favourite walk, up the track past the prehistoric burial tumps to Barber Wood, round it and down along the edge of the great sweep that is Coldwell Bottom. And the question for discussion was, should the countryside be treated as a recreational playground?

Above Coldwell Bottom

We often walk here, above Coberley. It's a convenient triangle, a variety of scenery within a short space.

The Winter sun was shining this morning, the sheep casting unreally long shadows on the hillside flanking Coldwell Bottom. The plantation, which we saw going in when first we came to live in Cheltenham in 1994, is now serious woodland, the track up to it only partly chewed up by the mountain bikers. It's not as bad for walkers anyway as would be the adjacent fields.

But this was a tame walk bearing in mind what lies ahead for us: on Holy Saturday, we set out from Seville for Salamanca, the first half of the Via de la Plata: the second, to Santiago de Compostela, is planned for October.

Not only longer walks, therefore, but heavier weights than a camera need to be factored in regularly from now on!

The Gloucestershire Way

Yesterday, I set out to fulfil a New Year's Resolution: to walk the Gloucestershire Way. I shall leave the more remote bits till later in the year. It was easiest to start near home, from Crickley Hill.

The photograph was taken looking back North-Westwards at the Hill, across the A417. It must be the most hazardous crossing on all the 100-mile route: three lanes of traffic without any central reservation. But walk for five minutes up and away from the road and - noise apart - you are in the most glorious landscape: on a day like yesterday especially.

You couldn't find a better example of Cotswold walling than here at Coberley, supporting the garden of the former Rectory, a couple of miles down the Gloucestershire Way from Crickley Hill.

The church is certainly in need of a signpost: you can't see it at all from the village road. You approach it through a gate in a house wall, leading to a garden path. It's what Pevsner calls "the shadow of an outer courtyard of Coberley Court (demolished 1790)." The church contains some handsome 14th Century memorials, but was more or less entirely rebuilt 500 years later. Apart from its situation, it's not one of my favourite buildings though it feels much loved and cared for.



Pevsner seems to have missed the rather mysterious face in the farmhouse wall high above the entrance to the church from the road.

Pinswell

On our way to supper with friends on Sunday, we interrupted Pippa and Jeremy Jefferies on their mission - a walk via Pinswell to the Colesbourne Inn. They have the three books written by Australian author and illustrator Annette Macarthur-Onslow, they said, based on her time at the "round" house (well, it is half round - see photograph taken earlier this year) at Pinswell. This most idyllic of cottages stands by the fork in the track where the gospel was first preached in these parts - before the Norman church at Coberley was built. A few hundred yards distant, on higher ground, is the even more ancient Norbury Camp, the layout of which is clearly visible on Google Earth. (The photograph at the head of this post shows the track leading up towards Norbury from the Colesbourne direction, on Sunday evening.)