Difficult First Day

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Day 1 Walking,

Thursday, July 17,

Bantam Tea Rooms, Chipping Campden to White Hart Inn, Winchcombe,

29,997 steps, 12 miles plus 5 miles in John Deere.

’Be happy while you’re living, for you’re a long time dead.’

Depart Chipping Campden after traditional photo by the start of the Cotswold Way.outside ancient market building. Climbed to ridge top and felt great striding along.

Slight side trip to Broadway Tower built in 1794. A Folly of limestone and had 4 levels. “A Folly is a structure with no practical purpose other than pretending to be something it is not.”

Rookie Mistake was then made, which I should have known better not to do - follow hikers who ended up being on a different hike.

To get to the Broadway Tower which was slightly off trail it seemed at the time a bit of a waste of time and effort to go back to the trail. Met up with 2 women from Finland who had a large map, and they were deciding to not go back to the trail, but follow roads to the next village. Lois chose to follow their lead assuming I would easily reconnect with the Cotswold Way.

Missed due to my own folly: village of Broadway with more Arts and Crafts Movement work on display, an Iron Age Hill Fort, the Stanway Estate, village of Wood Stanway, a ruined abbey.

Instead visited village of Snowshill which explains why when I asked for directions at the pub back to the Cotswold Way, they didn’t know about it.

As I was climbing up out of Snowshill met a couple who were equally lost. The lady looked about as shattered (English term for exhausted) as myself.

Kept following roads as I stopped cars to ask directions to Winchcombe. At first I felt great, knee was doing fine. Shoulder a bit tender where the pack shoulder strap was pressing (took to wearing extra socks as padding under the strap).

At some point outside of left foot under/over/below the toes started to give out. Sat on the verge in the dirt to remove insert but could hardly get back up. Had to roll around and push up like a turtle.

Hobbled along road a short distance and basically flagged down a John Deere work vehicle coming out of a big farm operation. They offered to take me the mile down the road to their destination. We chatted. In the end they drove me the remaining 5 miles to Winchcombe and delivered this tired hiker directly to where tonight’s home is. I was grateful!

Thank you John and Mark for the ride!

Orange line is what I walked, the blue was the John Deere ride.

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