The Cotswold Way

Greetings from Syracuse, everyone.  I arrived here Friday, and shortly afterwards Jordan and I headed to a cute nearby town for lunch in a historic hotel followed by some browsing in their cute downtown shops.  We have managed to make an important furniture purchase, but you will have to wait on the photos till tomorrow or the next day because the lighting wasn’t right.

 

 

 

  Meanwhile, we thought you might like reading about the walking tour that Mr. Right and I took in England two weeks ago.  We met up with our friends Ian and Becky who live in London and took a train from there to Painswick.  After a cozy night in the trip’s first B & B, we started our walking tour along the Cotswold Way.

Great Britain has managed to map out walking trails throughout the entire kingdom, and anyone/everyone can enjoy them.  We decided to make a four-day tour of the Cotswold Way which is located in the most picturesque region of the country, in my opinion.  Mr. Right and I did a week-long bicycle trip in the Cotswolds a few years ago, and we knew it would be hilly and beautiful.

 

 

The Cotswold Way runs from Bath to Chipping Camden and is 104 miles long.  We started in the middle and walked four days from Painswick to Chipping Camden.  We hope to do the other half next year.

 

Luckily, we had perfect weather with just a few drops of rain one day.  The walk took us over a variety of terrains from cleared forests……

 

 

to country roads……

 

…..to dirt paths lined with stone walls…..

 

 

……to open windy fields used by riders and sheep…..

 

…..to farmers’ fields…..

 

 …..to the highest point in the Cotswolds.

 

We had a map, a guide book, and there were always signs along the way.  We knew to follow the ones marked Cotswold Way.

 

The Brits are avid walkers, and if we were ever not sure about which path to take, there was usually a local to show us the right direction.

 

 

We weren’t always in the beautiful countryside, though.

 

We were in some of the most adorable and charming towns that you can imagine.

 

The law requires all of the buildings in the Cotswolds to be built from the local limestone.  There was a consistency and a charm that I haven’t seen anywhere else in the world.  The shade of the limestone varied depending on which quarry it came from. Some had an orange tint and some had a grayish/white tint.

 

Three of the four B & B’s that we stayed in were older than the United States.

 

When we arrived at our daily destinations, we were greeted with a snack and a warm pot of tea.  We were always tired at the end of our days, but we were also thankful that we have the opportunity and the health to take on adventures like these.  In the next few weeks, I will be sharing photos from a castle that we visited and some from Beechfield House.

 

 

Take care.