Our walk began with a trek through wheat fields. In England all the land is public (or something like that), so you can just walk through peoples' fields and yards and horse pastures with abandon. We did all three of those things on this walk, but walking through a family's yard while the little kid was outside playing was definitely the most awkward part.
The weather was very warm yesterday, so we wore our shorts and man capris. What we didn't anticipate were the innocent looking plants called nettles, which were overgrown throughout our walk. Nettles are evil. With barely a brush, they can set your whole leg on fire, starting with massive itching that then turns into huge whelts. The whelts then go through a series of transformations from burning to itching to feeling like vibrating signals from under your skin. And it seemed like just as things started to feel better, we would run into another patch. Fortunately we ran into some nice women (I think that perhaps they were Amish or something like Amish because they were dressed in modest, plaid frocks and it seemed like there was a community of them living in the area), who showed us a plant to use as an antidote to the nettles. I'm not convinced the plant really worked, but it was still cool to rub "Dock leaves" all over us, just in case.
This walk was a little different, in that the pub stop was only about two miles into it. We started late and then the pub took forever, so when we finally got going it was early afternoon, but we still had about nine miles to go. We weren't worried, though, because it stays light until about 10pm these days, so we had plenty of time to tool through the countryside. Of course, we didn't think that we would be walking that long...
At the pub, Jim would not cooperate with picture taking:
The goal of the walk was to reach a castle. Aurelie, who is French, was very patient with our babbling along in our fast American English. At one point, we were yelling about nettles and she thought we said "castle." She was disappointed that we had only reached more nettles. But there were horses to distract her from her disappointment! Jim and Vladamir, the horse whisperer fed them carrots:
And then they convinced Aurelie to feed them, too:
The yellow horse was greedy but still very cute. We liked those horses.
Just down the hill was the long anticipated castle! We had passed through field and over hill, through nettles and greedy horses and finally there it was!!!
The castle:
Vladimir and Jim decided that the castle was going to be the stopping point for our walk and the plan was to take a cab the rest of the way. By this time it was around 5:00. So we enjoyed the OUTSIDE of the castle (because it closed a few minutes befoer we got there) and then made our way to yet another pub. As fate would have it, there were no cabs in this little town, so, after having settled into the idea of not walking anymore, we had to revive ourselves and make it the rest of the way back on foot.
We got a little lost due to some missing sign posts, but many nettles later we got back on track again, scrambled accross a dilapidated bridge (well, most of us went across), and made our way through an apple orchard, where Jim tried to take a quick nap:
We also were relieved to see this sign, pointing us in the direction of the train:
But then we encountered the beast:
This horse was not having any apples or carrots or US. As we tentatively made our way across his field, he started stomping his foot in a very bull-like way. He made some very agressive snorts and fixed his gaze on Jim's red shirt. Aurelie and I ran. Jim ran, too, although he claims was just pretending to be scared. Uh huh.
Aurelie and I hightail it over the fence!
After the horses, we were amazed to see three hot air balloons taking off into the sky. Aurelie had a great idea and we took the balloon lift off as an opportunity to hid out in the graveyard of a nearby church. As Jim and Vladamir walked by, we jumped out! They screamed like girls. It was awesome.
With the aid of some locals (who also lured V and Jim into yet another pub on our way back to the trainstation), we finally made it back to the train...with about an hour to spare. So, yes, we went to another pub. They had a really nice garden!
Our friend Dan won't let us post pictures of him anymore because he has a reputation to maintain, but Vladimir went out of his way to get on the blog. There were so many pictures to choose from, but this one was definitely the best.
When we finally got home, it was 10:30...whew. It was hard to get up for work today, our legs are still itchy, Jim's eye was swollen shut from some unidentified substance, but it was worth it! I'm waiting for the poison ivy to show up any day now...
No comments:
Post a Comment