Friday, 2 July 1943
Log of a Cycle Tour to North Wales, by Roy Spurgeon, with Leslie Lee. 1 July 3 July
Following a splendid breakfast, we left the hostel at 1015 hours (2097.1) and ran down the long hill in a chilly morning mist into Cheltenham. We found a teashop for our "elevenses", then, the mist having cleared into a scorching day, we set course across the Cotswolds, almost due South for Cirencester at 1150 hours.
Leaving the Spa, we had a long climb up out of the town but having once reached the top, we went very fast indeed, the wind being behind us and the road a gentle gradient almost all the way.
We passed through the villages of Colesbourn, Rencomb, North Cerney and Baunton, finally reaching Cirencester at 1315 hours (2117.7). We secured an excellent lunch at the Crown Hotel and then explored the town. There is a fine old church - the parish church of St. John the Baptist - with an embattled tower 134 feet high and a large market place, but a round trip of the town, which I made alone was somewhat complicated by the many one-way streets made necessary by the narrow main roads.
Leaving at 1430 hours, we took the main Oxford and London road towards the hostel at Inglesham, our next stop. We passed through a number of very pretty little villages consisting of grey stone and slate cottages nestling just off the road among the folds of the hills. These were the villages of Ampney St. Mary, Ampney Crucis, Ampney St. Peter, Poulton and Meysey Hampton. Shortly after passing the latter, we crossed into Wiltshire for a few hundred yards and then back again into Gloucestershire for tea at Fairford at 1545 hours (2127.9). Fairford is a comparatively large place and its 15th Century church, which unfortunately we did not see, contains some of the most wonderful stained glass in the country.
On our way once more, we came to Lechlade, another fair size market town, with a very wide main street. Here we left the London road and turned south towards Inglesham; this road brought us to a bridge over the Thames, which at this point is not more than ten yards wide. St. John's Lock, sited on the London side of this bridge is the first lock from the source of the river near Cirencester and it was here that, after some discussion and slight differences of opinion, caused by those wishing to swim not liking the place we had chosen for them, our party divided, Grif and I proceeding along the tow path beside the river. This little excursion took us into the extreme North West tip of Berkshire, an honour not shared by the rest of the party, though we did not realise it at the time! After negotiating one or two hazardous crossings of a small marshy ditch, marked on our maps as the River Cole, tributary of the Thames, we sat in a field and ate two of our packed lunches despite a slight misunderstanding with a cow (see Appendix B) and then rejoined the road to Inglesham. We had hoped to cross this part of the country by what appeared on our map to be a road but which turned out to be an overgrown ditch or dyke.
The rest of the party had, in the meantime, proceeded to the hostel so as to dump their kit and were next seen travelling at high speed in the opposite direction, bound for a swim in the Thames.
Grif and I arrived at the hostel, a small but very well kept cottage with a lovely little garden shortly before 1900 hours (2136.2). After supper, we all went for a short walk down the lane and through some fields, inspected agricultural implements until an irate countryman begged us (in no uncertain terms) to "leave them machines alone" and to "come out of it" and then went back to the hostel at 2200 hours. We had a short talk to the warden sitting in the porch in the beautiful evening air and went to bed at 2300 hours, the girls upstairs in the house and the boys in a specially built brick dormitory in the garden.
Total cycling distance for the day 39.1 miles.
Next day: 3 July