If you’re looking for a quaint English countryside, an area of outstanding natural beauty, then you’ll find that in Cotswold Way. It’s a trail or a footpath that runs 102 miles or 164 kilometers long that overlooks this vast, beautiful panoramic view of the Cotswold Hills. You can meet all the incredibly gracious and friendly locals along the way. Going on an adventure to this quintessentially English place, you can either plan the trip yourself or make a self-guided trip. Kit tells you all about it so prepare yourself for a long walk through this magical holiday and see if this is the adventure you’re looking for.
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Picture Perfect English Countryside Walking Holiday
If you close your eyes and dream about what the quintessential English countryside looks like with the charming medieval villages, pastures marked by hedgerows, rolling hills, stone cottages with equally charming gardens, the you are dreaming about the Cotswold Way.
Perfect UK Walking Holiday
The Cotswold Way is a 102 mile (165 km) historic footpath through some of England’s most stunning scenery. Most of the trail is located within the noted Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. This footpath is not particularly diffiuclt, but because it is long, it is a big of an endurance hike.
Each night you stay in a charming guest house or hotel in one cute village after another. You begin in either Chipping Camden (most common) or in Bath. Other notable villages include Broadway, Stanton, Painswick, and Wooten-Under-Edge. Cute – cute- cute!!!
Choose Self-Guided or Self-Planned
On this trip, I used Mickledore to make all of my arrnagements. After booking, I was sent a packet that included a full sized map, a descriptive book on the Cotswold Way, dining and other town recommendations, plus a very thorough itinerary of where I was staying that included photos, map and a description of how to find the room from the trail. Â Alternately, you can plan this trip yourself, but do be sure to book all rooms in advance as the villages are small and so they could be sold out when you arrive. Â Also, Mickledore told me in the packet when I should book dinners in advance as in some villages (surprisingly!), finding dinner could be scarce.
SPECTACULAR Scenery!
Much of the time you are walking on the ridge of the Cotswold Escarpment (and escarpment is where two mostly level landscapes are divided by different elevations). This is particularly true as you walk alongside the charming Cheltenhem (worthy of a day or two side trip if you have the time!).
There is no hill higher than 4000′, so the hills are not excessively challenging. This footpath is more of an endurance event rather than a killer hike. Â Usually most mornings you start in a valley and climb uphill. Â Then there will be a few ups and downs throughout the day. On my 9 day hike, I hiked between 7-16 miles per day. You can vary the length of your trip somewhat to accommodate your desired daily milage. Â On my 16 mile day, I was mostly on the ridge so it wasn’t too bad.
My instructions from Mickledore said that my first night’s accommodations would be in Stanton and to lookout for a red phone booth.
Boy was I happy to see this phone booth! Happily although my foot was miserable for the first two days, this hike seems to have made my heel better. I hardly even notice it now!
On a walking holiday, it usually takes your body a couple of days to get its ‘mojo’ and understand that ‘this’ is what it’s supposed to do now.
Cotswold Way Scenery
Much of the time you will be hiking through pasture land. I think the irregular hedgerows that mark the property borders make these pastures particularly charming. Land use laws in England allow you to walk across private property on these century’s old footpaths that connect villages and other trade routes. You go through gates or sometimes steps over the fences and walk often through sheep (beware the Cotswold Lion (kidding : it’s their lambs!) and sometimes horse or cow pastures. Once the path even goes through a golf course – and people are walking their dogs on the golf course!
Yet other times you are in rare undisturbed meadowland preserves or in beech forests. At the end of each day, you land in a charming village with cottages made of the local Cotswold quarried stone – stunning! Some of the roofs are still made of thatch! Most have boisterous cottage gardens contrasted with perfectly manicured hedges.
Cleeve Hill Cheese Rolling Contest
The video showcasing this annual ridiculous event is worth a minute of your time!
“Contestants” tumble down a super steep hill, competing to be first to grab a rolling cheese ball. Â Broken bones included!
Charming Villages
If you can spare the time, spend a night in Broadway even though it’s only five miles to Chipping Camden. Stanton is the quintecential English country village, so do stay there. Most of these villages are VERY small, so do make sure you know ahead of time whether you need to make a dinner reservation! You will be tired and hungry when you arrive and want to make sure that you can get a good meal! Be sure to download the FREE Travel Planner for my itinerary (you will get it automatically with the monthly newsletter if you subscribe).
Kit ‘carries’ the Royal Mail and a Folly for the Birds
As I entered town, I saw one of the adorable ‘Royal Mail’ carriers. I was taking a photo of the cute vehicle when the postamn returned from the house from which he had delivered a package. I told him how I loved his carriage and he asked if I wanted a picture in it: “Um, YES, please!!!”
Later on, I took this photo of a folly: Follies are extravagant, usually tower-like edifices, built to show wealth and prestige. The first folly I saw was for men only in its day. And they would laugh and take baths on its roof and just be ridiculous. The folly pictured here is modern built and is for the birds, not men: it is built as a haven for nesting owls and other barn dwelling birds.
Takeaways
This is a wonderful adventure for people interested in dipping their toes into adventure travel: it is challenging in an endurance way (you MUST make it to each day’s destination as accommodations are limited), but the trail itself is not too difficult. Everyone speaks English, and the food are things you would recognize. There is also public transport if you need a lift to the next destination.
It’s also great for someone who just needs some time to think. It is a very meditative footpath: you can be alone a lot if you wish. But there is also a lot of opportunities to interact with locals who use the path themselves for daily walks or to get somewhere. The locals are EXTREMELY friendly!
Were I to do it again (and I might!), I think I would go slower so I wasn’t so tired when I arrived at the village. I would also take a detour and spend a couple of days in Cheltenhem, which is just downhill from the trail.
Here’s a link with more information on the National Trails.
Other Links Mentioned in this podcast episode:
UK’s Ten Best Walking Holidays
Scotland’s West Highland Way Walking Holiday
Trailblazer Guidebook on the Cotswold Way
Podcast: Â How I Built This with Guy Raz with Sir James Dyson (Dyson bagless vacs)
Hike The Cotswold Way – Charming English Walking Holiday
We’re going to go to the Cotswold Way and hike this 100-mile trek through the most picturesque part of the English countryside. I first discovered the Cotswold Way when I was doing The UK’s 10 Best Walking Holidays. Out of all the ten, I was like, “That’s the one I’m doing next. The next time, I get a chance to go to Europe, I’m walking that trail.” I was up near JFK. I was like, “I know I’m going to be by a good airport. I’ve got points.†Walking holidays are pretty cheap, so I booked it and off to the races I went. It is a gorgeous hike. This is a perfect introductory adventure. If you’re not quite sure if you’re ready for adventure travel, this is a wonderful way to dip your toes into it to see if this is the adventure for you. Join me as I take you day by day through a magical walking holiday, the Cotswold Way through the English countryside from Chipping Campden to Bath.
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You always hear me saying how you seem to bond very quickly when you’re out on an adventure vacation. This is a good example. When I was hiking the West Highland Way in Scotland, I hiked the morning from Tyndrum to Bridge of Orchy with a man I met on the trail by the name of Simon. We chatted up the few hours that we’re hiking. I don’t know how many miles it was, until a late lunch. We had lunch. He was hiking another seven or eight miles that day and that was my stop for the day so off we went. We ended up meeting again for dinner a couple of days later and since then, kept up on Facebook. A year or so later, I happened to be close to where he lives, getting ready to hike another long-distance trail this time, the Cotswold Way. Simon volunteers to pick me up at Heathrow Airport, which is a couple of hours drive for him.
He gives a path of the day of his life. He picks me up and he takes me to these cute little towns on the way back to his town. He hosts me for the evening. The next day, he goes to work. I had to take a bus into Gloucestershire and explored. I did some museums and all that. He kicks off work early. We stopped mid-day and have a pint. We go meet his girlfriend and her daughter and go out for a lovely dinner. I spend the night at her house. The next day, I take a bus to start my journey to do my trek. It goes to show you how you can form close friendships in a very short period of time. I consider Simon and now his girlfriend, Helen and her daughter Emma, good friends. I look forward to seeing them and hosting them in my neck of the woods, which we’ve talked about. Hopefully, they’ll be here to come to see a little bit of my southern hospitality.
Cotswold Way
What exactly is the Cotswold Way? It’s a trail or a footpath that runs 102 miles long or 164 kilometers. The path is often along the Cotswold escarpment. An escarpment is a steep slope, a large cliff or a long cliff that separates two relatively level areas that have different elevations. A lot of this path, you’re up on top overlooking this tremendous and beautiful panoramic view of the Cotswold Hills. England has designated an area of outstanding natural beauty and almost the entire trail falls within this particular area. It is stunning. When you think of the quaint English countryside, that’s the Cotswold Way. You’re going to see the beautiful honey-colored stone cottages. When you come to the small villages, you’ll see some thatched roofs.
You’ll see cottage gardens, flower beds and neatly manicured hedges counter-posed against the riotous cottage gardens. You’ll see sheep’s galore. You’ll see the little hedgerows that separate the different property lines of all the different farmlands. It’s a stunning, quaint, quintessentially English countryside. It’s picture postcard gorgeous. The trail itself became a national trail in 2007 even though it had been a footpath for centuries beforehand. In fact, I was told by Simon that the reason that a lot of the UK footpaths are allowed to go through all this private property is because these were the past people have used for centuries to get from one place to another to trade goods, move livestock, etc.
These are common areas that people are allowed to use with respect. When you come to pasture, there’s usually a gate or step over the fence that you do to so that you keep the livestock in, but you’re allowed to walk on the footpaths through peoples’ private properties. It’s something that would be unheard of in the United States where I live. Because there are so many footpaths, you got to be very careful to look for the acorn, which is the symbol of this particular footpath. It’s like the thistle emblem that marked the West Highland Way, here you’re looking for the acorn. On my first day, my job was to get to Chipping Campden, which is the start. You can either start at Chipping Campden as I did or Bath. The most popular way to do it is the way that I do, starting from Chipping Campden. I took a bus from Helen’s place and arrived in this cute little village of like, “This is going to be grand.”
Every building is stone. It’s all in this tanny, honey-colored local stone. The homes are 400, 500 years old. Many of them have thatched roofs and these thatched roofs are fifteen inches thick of the reed or whatever grass is that they’re using. There’s some like a wire mesh. It was like chicken wire to make sure it stays down there. They are so cute. I wonder if these people appreciate that they live in fairyland. There’s at least one cool church to look at in each of the villages and generally a little square area. The trail itself starts at the market area, which is right in the center of the downtown. I wanted to check out that. I knew right where to start in the morning. When I say downtown, we’re talking maybe a couple of thousand people live there. It’s not a very big town where the bus drops you off no matter where you’re staying. It’s easy walking distance.
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I checked into my 400-year-old BnB and I was delighted to see a charming, cute little room. I went out for an early dinner. I want to get a good night’s rest so I could start my hike nice and fresh in the morning. When you’re on the trail, about 80% of it you’re going to be going through farmland. It gives you this nice wide-open view for most of the time although there are times that you are going through villages and going through some woodland. It gives you some nice diversity there as well. I like when I was able to see this whole panoramic view for miles and miles. I’m super excited to start this trail. Even though my body thinks it’s the middle of the night because of the five-hour time difference and it’s only had a couple of days to adapt, I still wake up early. I have a nice hearty breakfast and scamper on down to the market place to start my adventure.
The village isn’t very large, but you do go through some cute streets, pass some cute little homes, big homes, stone homes and thatched-roofed homes. As you leave the town and you finally start heading up the hill, like most towns, they’re down in the valleys so you usually start low and begin your day heading uphill. That’s what you do. You were rewarded with a gorgeous view when you get to the top of the hill. A good way to get your heart racing to get the day going. None of these hills are particularly tall. They don’t even call them mountains. They don’t call it hiking. They call it walking. In fact, it’s hill walking up here.
I’m not sure along this whole path if there’s any hill higher than 4,000 feet. A little while down the path, I see a pheasant. I was like, “Cool,†because that’s a big bird eye. Maybe we have them here. I’ve never seen one. I was all excited. I was saying, “There’s a pheasant.” Little did I know I would be seeing hundreds of pheasants on this trip. In the beginning, you get excited. After a few miles, about five miles, I land in the town of Broadway. If you want to take your time, most of my days are going to be between ten and fourteen miles a day. That takes me five to six hours and some stops or stop for lunch and all that.
If you want to make it a little bit easier on yourself and explore the towns along the way and not be so tired when you do so perhaps you break it up. Broadway is a great town. It’s only five miles down so you only walk in a few hours. You’re in this cute town for lunch. They’ve got art galleries and shops. Unlike any of the other towns I went to, Broadway is more geared towards tourists. There are lots of things to see and do. I remember if you buy something unless it fits into your suitcase, which they’ll transfer for you, you’ve got to haul it. Keep that in mind when you pick up any souvenirs.
After a nice lunch in Broadway, I’m halfway home to my endpoint of the day of the cute little town of Stanton, which is the picture-perfect Cotswold Way town. I stayed in the historic Old Post House, which I love and is right on the way. I like it when my accommodations are right on the path. In day one, I’ve hiked ten and a half miles and do my feet feel it. It has been a while since I’ve hiked ten miles in a day. In addition to that, I have developed over the last couple of months, plantar fasciitis, which is a painful condition on the heel. My feet are absolutely screaming. I could not be happier when I see that quintessential red telephone booth that tells me that I’m finally home.
My instructions had told me to be on the lookout for the iconic red telephone booth that you see in all the old movies in England. When I saw that booth, my feet did a happy dance. My heart skipped for joy. As much as I had enjoyed the day, I was ready to sit down and chill. I get there. I knocked on the door and nobody answered. I walked around and I see this woman. I said, “Is this your place?” She said, “No, I’m staying here.” It turns out that Christine was also doing the walk. She had checked in. We chatted a little bit and said, “Hopefully, we’d see each other for dinner or whatnot.”
Eventually, I get into my room. I have a nice comfortable room with a private bath outside my door. I took the nicest soak you ever had in your whole life and had made previous arrangements to eat at the mountain. There are not many places to eat in a lot of these little towns. A lot of times you make arrangements ahead of time to make a reservation so they’re open for you and they have some food for you. I climbed up the little hill to this beautiful view of this restaurant. I had a delightful dinner. As I was leaving, I saw that Christine was over. I went and had a drink with her. We chatted a little bit. I liked how she’s doing because she’s doing the slow route.
She stayed in Broadway for the night. Each stop, she’s has the time to go check out the local castles, go check out this little scene here or go to this garden. It’s pretty nice if you can do the time to do it at a slower pace than the ten to fourteen miles that I did it in. Christine had it right. She was soaking in all of the culture as well as the landscape. Doing Christine’s leisurely pace, that gave her not only the time to see the different sites but also the energy. There was no way I could ask my feet to take any extra steps by the time I got to my guest house that night. Exploring Stanton was going to have to wait until the morning.
The town that we’re staying in Stanton is this quintessential, English countryside, cute little town. Everything is adorable. Your eyes can’t drink it all in quickly enough. You walk around and it’s one cute thing after another. It’s adorable. As cute as it all was and I went to bed early and all that, when I woke up in the middle of the night, my feet were still on fire, which is very unusual for me. Normally, I can be tired at the end of a long day of hiking or whatnot, but I couldn’t believe they were still absolutely screaming. I was like, “I don’t know if I’m going to be able to do this hike. What am I going to do?” You could quit, but I don’t want to quit. I had little heart palpitations. I said, “My feet are not cooperating with me on this trip, particularly my heel was giving me an issue.” Anyway, I went back to sleep. When I woke up in the morning, they were tired. I was like, “I think I can do it. I’m going to go forward.” In the middle of the night, I thought it was game over. The trip is over.
Self-Guided Cotswold Way Trip
When I woke up in the morning, I’m cautiously optimistic. My feet were tired, but they weren’t screaming like they were the night before, like the little engine that goes, “I think I can,” so I decided to go for it. After a nice hearty breakfast, my trip included a nice hot breakfast cooked to order plus a continental breakfast if I wanted every single day at all my guest houses that I stayed in. I went on a self-guided trip where you plan the whole thing. That’s what Christine did. She planned her whole thing.
I went with a new company for me called Mickledore. I have to tell you, I was very happy with them. The packet that I got after I booked the trip was exceptional. It had more than I could ever want to know about this trip, including restaurant suggestions, the marker telling me, “Look for the red postbox. Look for the red telephone box to know that you’re at the right place.” It had maps to the locations, the guidebook. They went above and beyond in making me feel very comfortable in doing this trip and feeling that I would be as prepared as I could be of knowing what to expect. Part of my trip is they are transferring my luggage. That means I’m not backpacking it.
In fact, the Cotswold Way is not set up to backpack. On the whole trip, I only saw two places that you could feasibly camp. This is not a suitable trail for backpacking. You can either plan it yourself or do a self-guided trip or a self-plan trip but not a backpacking trip. What’d you do instead is you have a company transfer your luggage every day. You put it out by the lobby or wherever is your guest house, wherever you’re staying. They pick it up around 9:00 in the morning. They have it at your next destination around 4:00 in the afternoon. Every time I arrived at my place, there is my luggage ready for me so I could take a nice shower or tub and be in clean clothes and nice fresh spanking feeling good again.
Self-Guided Cotswold Way Trip: Day Two
On my day two, I’m hiking to Cleeve Hill. I’ve got a long day with these feet. They were not very cooperative. I got fourteen and a half miles to do. Before I left, I wanted to check out the town of Stanton because this is one of the cute towns along the way. It’s not a very big town, so it doesn’t take a whole lot of time to go explore. One thing I’ve already started to notice is all the towns seem to have a high street that’s like their main street seems to be the equivalent to Main Street. That’s like the main commercial district of all the little villages. Another thing I’m noticing too is all the colleges seemed to have a name. They have a number too. I’d bet the local send you to the house name rather than the house number when giving directions.
When I was hanging out with Christine, she told me that she was terrified of cows. She has a big phobia. On this trip, you are going through a lot of cow pastures, mainly lambs, but a lot of cow pastures as well. I get to this one pasture, I get up there. This one’s got a sign saying “Warning, bull in the field.” I was like, “I don’t know what that means.” I decided what I’m going to do, and the cows are right on the trail, is I’m going to hug the fence line. Should the bull be there and should the bull not like me being there, I can go over the fence into the hedgerow. That’s my plan. I cautiously walked through and the cows don’t even care. They look at you and then they go about eating or doing whatever they’re doing. I was worried about Christine because I knew if I was a little antsy, I could only imagine what she must have been like.
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In fact, I saw her the next day and she said she was going to outwait them. After a while, the cow simply was not moving so she built up her courage and she walked through those cows to get to that pasture. I was proud of her. Along the way too, if you get a little hungry, I happened to be there right when the blackberries were all in fresh fruit. Anytime I wanted to snack, pretty much most of the hedgerows had a little blackberry vine so you could pick off and snack at will. There are several interesting cultural things that you can do including going to the Stanley House, which features the tallest fountain in England as well as the tallest gravity-fed fountain in the world.
You also walk right by Hailes Abbey. This abbey was built in 1246 by Richard the Earl of Cornwall. His son supposedly bought some of the blood from the crucifix and he gave that to the abbey. That made this a pilgrimage site, which brought lots of pilgrims and lots of money, which gave them the money to refurbish the abbey in the future. It wasn’t until Henry VIII, who had the fight with the Catholic Church and created his own little religion over there. He said, “No. That’s duck’s blood,” so that went away. The remnants of the abbey are still there. Even if you don’t pay the admission to go into the abbey itself, you can see the remaining arches and all of that, which is cool. Christine, because she was doing the slower pace, was able to do everything as I found out from her.
I was curious about how did the name come about to be called the Cotswold. I asked the lady that I sat with on the bus on the way to the hike. She’s like, “I don’t know. It’s the Cotswold.†I asked Simon as well and again to them it’s the Cotswold. It’s a name as we think of the Beatles as a band. We don’t think of it as a bug or whatever. It is what it is. With the magic of Google, we found out that cots mean lamb and wold mean hill. One thing you’re going to see a whole lot on this hike is lots and lots of lambs. As I came upon a turn, I saw some commotion going up ahead of me. There was a vehicle there and some people. What I saw was an actual lamb shepherd with a metal shepherd’s hook, which I didn’t know they use those, but I guess he’d do something to corral the lambs with them. I’m not sure about that. They are trying to move the lambs from one pasture to the next.
I was watching that with interest in all that. One lamb had gotten a little panicky and got trapped into the fence. The shepherd was trying to get the lamb out. He and this girl that I was talking to that were with him to get the lamb out. Literally, this lamb jumped four feet in the air with joy and then went racing off to join the other lambs in the pasture and that was so cute. The people were so friendly. Along the whole trail, everybody I met, because you’re going to meet lots and lots of locals. Unlike the West Highland Way where I met mainly international people and very few Scott’s. On this hike, you meet the locals because they’re using this path as part of their daily walks, as part of getting to one place to the other. I had lots and lots of local interaction including spending maybe ten minutes talking to the shepherds. It was very cool.
Throughout this hike, I saw the tremendous panoramic view, spectacular views. It was a very windy day, but that didn’t stop the views. You would be on top of this hill and see for miles and miles of these rolling hills. The mountains in my area are covered in trees, which are spectacular. They’re some of the prettiest mountains in the world. Because this is so much pasture land and then they’re divided into all these little patchwork quilts separated by the hedgerows, that it gives this some charm that’s different than the mountains I normally hike.
I don’t know how to explain it other than it’s this bucolic, comforting, peaceful hike. It’s a beautiful hike. In addition to seeing thousands of lambs, you’re also going to see a lot of dogs. It seems like all the locals seemed to be walking with a dog. You see signs everywhere asking them to please keep them on a lead because sometimes the dogs will get in their predatory mode and then hurt some of the lambs. They’re pretty much off leash. However, they were well mannered. They wouldn’t even come up and sniff you, unlike the dogs that I see in my area. They would waltz on by you and not pay you any mind.
I had a couple of rainy days. I would see families out. We’re miles from a parking lot, so you know that the whole family was walking in the rain as a Sunday outing. I would never see anything like that at home. Sometimes the weather is not the greatest in the UK. If you’re going to be outdoors, they embrace it. When I was in Berlin, it’s in the wintertime and the people are having their coffee outside with blankets on rather than sitting inside in the heat. They want fresh air. I see that in the UK and I saw it in Germany.
You’re not always walking in pastures. Sometimes you’re going through these woods that have some mature trees that are ancient. I would like to know how old some of them are. They had to be hundreds of years old. They have massive trunks. You also go through a lot of beach course. Seeing the leaves shimmering in the wind and the sunlight is magical. About mid-day I arrive in Winchcombe and have a nice hearty lunch, nice soup and bread. It’s a nice meal. My feet are a little sore, but they’re hanging in there. They also have a little tourist information office. I’d go in there to see what I could find out and all that. The lady said, “The bus goes to Cleeve Hill once an hour.” The little devil inside says, “You could take that bus.” I was like, “I can do it. I can do this.” I am so glad that I did because I like to push myself. I like to see what I’m capable of. I wasn’t injured. It was just sore. The heel hurts, but I’m not hurting myself by walking on it. It sometimes can be a little bit painful. I’m glad that I pushed myself to do that.
I was at the top and I knew that my guest house was down the hill and I couldn’t quite see where to go down off the escarpment. I said, “I’m going to go down here,” because I can see the town. I know that I’m getting close. I figured once I get down there, I can find my place. When I finally saw the sign, I was staying in a hotel this night, you get so happy. It’s like backpacking when you finally get to eat something at night, everything tastes so good when you let yourself get so tired. It’s one of the odd joys of adventure travel because you’re pushing your body and you’re pushing your limits. There’s a perverse pleasure in the struggle and I like it.
Another thing I started doing on this trip is taking pictures of signs that meant nothing to me. I saw one “No fly tipping, £50,000 fine.” I was like, “That’s got to be something awful.” I wonder what that could be. Another one, I could tell some sports field but the gibberish on the sign meant absolutely nothing to me. In fact, that’s how I got to meet one of the locals is he happened to be walking to where he was going as I was taking this picture. It was weird. I’m taking a picture of this blank field. I said, “I’m collecting sayings and signs of things that mean nothing to me. Would you mind interpreting for me?”
We passed an enjoyable 20 to 30-minute hike until we both diverge paths as he was explaining what some of my photos meant and fly-tipping means don’t dump your trash there. The other thing, it was a cricket field and even when he was trying to explain it to me, I still had no clue. It’s amusing that we both speak the English language, but we still had problems communicating. You’ll also come across something called the Belas Knap. This is a long barrow, which is a burial ground. It’s back from the Neolithic period, an ancient place where our prehistoric ancestors buried their dead. It’s a mound above ground. There are several that you’ll pass by on this trail and in the area that is cool. Radiocarbon dating puts it around 3,700 BC.
They have a little interpretive sign there to help you understand what you’re seeing. Along this section too, you’re going to also go through a lot of unimproved grasslands, which is very rare in this society that you find some undisturbed land. They’re being very careful to preserve that because it’s a magnificent habitat for tons of wildlife, including lots of different kinds of butterflies and birds and whatnot. I had missed by perhaps maybe three or four weeks the peak of the early fall wildflower seasons. Everything I was going to see, but I can imagine how magical it must have looked. When I finally arrived at my hotel that evening, it looked a little tired but I was tired. It made no difference to me.
Self-Guided Cotswold Way Trip:Â Day Three
Day three is my longest day. I’m going from Cleeve Hill to Birdlip. It’s about sixteen and a half miles. The good thing is I can go from my hotel, walk up the hill and try to find the path without backtracking another quarter mile back from where I got off the trail of the first time around. I figured if I go straight up, get on the escarpment and walk along the ridge, I should be able to find the trail, which gratefully I do. I wove through some sheep pastures and all that, but it wasn’t too hard. Again, there are paths everywhere. Eventually, you see that famous acorn sign and you breathe a sigh of relief, “I found it.” On this long day, I do not want to make any mistakes. Even though this is long mileage, it turns out to be a fairly easy hike because I’m hiking mostly along the ridge with spectacular views. I’m talking miles and miles of views of Cheltenham. Cheltenham is the town that Simon’s girlfriend, Helen, stayed in. It’s a cute town. If you have time, spend a day or two there on your trip. It’s very nice.
You can also take a detour, go down to Cheltenham for a little bit and come back on the trail. It’s a cool town I think you’d enjoy it. You also go through Prestbury Hill Reserve, a nice sanctuary for some rare plants and lots of butterflies. Up on Leckhampton Hill, you’re going to see remnants of old hillforts. You’ll see lots of hillforts or remnants of those on this path because they’re great lookout points. This hike is relatively easy because you’re mostly flat up on the ridge, I was pleasantly surprised to make it to the Cotswold Diner about lunchtime, which is perfect.
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The Cotswold Diner is basically a food truck off the trail on the road that you had to get close to. I recommend going in there. It’s nice, even if it was cold. I had a rainy day. It was nice to have some hot chocolate and a nice hot meal before I continued on my way. After lunch, I’m walking up a little way further. I see three ranchers with what I thought was a distress lamb. They’re right by the trail doing whatever it is to this lamb. I went over and said, “Is everything okay?” They said, “Yeah.” They were dealing with a lamb. It was time for them to carve the hooves off a little bit like a toenail clipping for the lambs. They said, “These were Cotswold lambs and they were more high maintenance than the regular lambs. They had more pedicure needs than a typical lamb.”
I watched them for a little bit. They are very friendly. Everybody in the trail, all the locals were extremely gracious and friendly and it add to this whole trip. I see a sign for the detour to go take a side trip to go see Devil’s Chimney, which I would love to see but with sixteen and a half miles, I’m like, “I don’t know if I could do an extra mile or two because I’m worried about doing sixteen and a half miles. That’s a lot of mileage for me. My feet usually start screaming around thirteen miles.
I decided to bypass Devil’s Chimney to my dismay. I did what I thought was the right decision. I’m walking along the top of the ridge and everything is going fine. It’s all beautiful and loving it. I have a map and I see them going to the jackknifing to the right or doing dogleg right as you would say in the golf world at all that. I see the sign and down I go because remember I’m up on the ridge. I’m going downhill. Down I go and I can start to hear traffic. I see some tops of houses and all that. I get to this intersection of about five paths. I’m in the woods now. I’ve left the open air of the escarpment.
I’m down in the woods. I don’t see any signs at all. I have walked down a long way. I was like, “It’s a wrong turn.” It’s the wrong day to make the wrong turn. I swore, I looked at the sign and I thought I saw an acorn or thought I saw something and whatever it was. Apparently, you get a little meditative mood and whatever it was, I had made the wrong turn and had gone downhill a long way. I was like, “I don’t want to climb up that hill.” I had an app on my phone that Simon had recommended that I put on ViewRanger. I had that. I could see where I was but didn’t have the Cotswold Way trail on it.
With my map and with that app, I could triangulate a little bit to figure out where I was. I decided I’m going to figure out how to get down to the road that I could hear. I saw that the trail crossed that road. Hopefully, it would make me not have to climb up that hill again because like I said, it was a long way down. As I’m trying to figure all that out, I look up and there is the Devil’s Chimney right above me. I had this perfect view from down below of the thing that people were hiking up a top to look down on and here I’m looking up at it.
The Devil’s Chimney folklore says the devil would throw stones on the Christians on their way to church on Sundays. Others say that the somewhat phallic-looking shape of this chimney was a prank by the quarry workers. You decide. I eventually did find the road, which unfortunately it went uphill, so I didn’t bypass going back up the hill. I went to a very crowded street. I should probably backtrack up the way I came. Nonetheless, I eventually find the trail again and off to the races I am now. I get very particular about looking at the markers and looking not only for the acorn because there’s a head of a man was another trail but from a distance, we’re not paying that close of attention.
It looks a little bit like an acorn. Now, I look to see it doesn’t have the acorn and it says the Cotswold Way. There’s also the Cotswold loop up there and perhaps that’s what I did. I have no idea what I did to go wrong, but it probably took an extra hour and a half of my life to go down, around and all that and added in at least a mile or two to a very long day. Did I mention it was raining? In addition to the long miles, I also don’t have very cooperative weather. I also have developed a small blister between my left baby toe and the next toe and it hurts. I wrap the medical tape around it. With the rain, the sweat and all that, it keeps sliding off. I make myself disciplined every time I feel the pain to take off my shoe, my sock and reposition that tape.
When it comes to blisters, you’ve got to be disciplined and as soon as you feel the hot spot, you need to address it. I swear the thing snuck up on me, but now that I’ve got it, I’m making sure that I’m doing what I’m supposed to do. As soon as I feel the least a little bit of pain, I stop what I’m doing and I make sure I take care of it. The good news is that all this walking is starting to help my heel because what was agony three days ago is now starting to feel better. I’m pleasantly surprised. My legs and feet are also starting to get their mojo. Even though this is a very long day and I’m obviously very tired at the end of the day, it’s nowhere near what it was day one. My body is saying, “This is what I’m supposed to do.”
Eventually walking up the road, I crossed the path again and off I go to Crickley Hill. In route, you pass this massive mansion. That’s interesting to look at. Then you start seeing the interpretive signs for Crickley Hill, which is an incredible historical area where there have been three major settlements in this area over time. The first time was in the Stone Age. It was settled again in the Iron Age followed then by the post-Roman Period. Now, it’s a nice park with some lovely views. As you near civilization again, you come to a roundabout near a restaurant called The Air Balloon, which is a lovely pub, but take a lot of care at this crossing. Unlike where I live where people stop for pedestrians, they don’t do that here. You have got to watch crossing the street. I watched and I still think I almost got hit.
At The Air Balloon, I was tempted to stop in for pop but I still had a way to go. I was like, “No, I better wait until I get to my final destination.” What I was looking forward to is a nice hot tub, my new thing. I was never a tub person. Now I am, I love at the end of the day. I guess they do lots of tubs over there because that’s mainly what I’ve been seeing is so good in that tub for 30 or 40 minutes at the end of the day. It is pure heaven. I don’t pack a whole lot when I travel and even when I adventure travel, I tend to wear the same things. I’ll wear the same hiking pants almost all the time or at least I’ll wear it for a week. I watched my dainties and socks at night. My hiking shirt, every couple of days. I wash them in the sink with some soap. I will ring them out as best I can. Roll them up in a towel and then hang them to dry. All my clothes are performance clothes so they’re always dry by morning. If not, within an hour or so of wearing them, my body heat will dry them.
I’ve got a treat. Simon, Helen and Emma met me for dinner. I’m so close to Cheltenham where Helen lives, they’ve decided they’re going to come to join me for dinner. We have a lovely three-course meal at a traditional British pub that was so much fun. It was so nice and a bonus. Simon brings me something called Compeed. This is something better than the medical tape for my toe. This thing is like a rubberized Band-Aid that once you put it on it doesn’t come off. This is a Godsend for me. It totally solves my toe problem.
Self-Guided Cotswold Way Trip: Painswick
Next up is my hike to Painswick. This is not even nine miles so it’s going to be a pretty easy day for me. I’m looking forward to it. I leave the Cotswold escarpment and now I head into the woodland. In route, I pass Cooper’s Hill. Cooper’s Hill has an unusual claim to fame. They do an annual cheese rolling contest. This hill is extremely steep. What these folks do is once a year they gather and a big roll of cheese is tossed down the hill and people scrambling to catch the cheese ball. They are tossing and turning because of the steepness. It’s a few broken bones involved as a crowd cheers them on to get to the cheese. Whoever gets to the bottom and gets the cheese, gets the cheese.
At the bottom of the hill lies the rugby team there to block your fall so you don’t continue on past the hill. Should you make it down without falling, they’ll push you down at least according to Simon. He can’t make this stuff up. They do have a warning sign there that cheese rolling is a dangerous activity and they are not responsible. For lunch, I stopped at the Rococo Garden, the last remaining complete English Rococo Garden built in the 1740s and rebuilt in 1984 to its original plans. This is a great spot for a picnic lunch in the gardens or to stop in the cafe. One odd thing I thought was on the way to the gardens, you walk literally across a golf course. I can’t imagine that people are walking their dogs across the golf course. They’re jogging there. Literally, the trail goes through the golf course. It seems like you’re almost in a cement plant, but you outskirt it a little bit.
The whole thing is strange how their land use is so different than what I’m used to. When you finally get into town, then you see the sign, The Garden Café. They put it like 400 meters. I was like, “I can do 400 meters,” which is about 1,200 feet. I was like, “I can do that.” I made the right-hand turn to go to the gardens and I was glad I did. I checked into my guest house at Painswick. She warns me as it’s 4:00 by the time I got unsettled and all that. It’s like 4:30, she said, “The pub and the one store closes at 5:00.” I was like, “I’d never heard of a pub closing in 5:00.” It was on a Sunday. A lot of things did close. I rushed down to the store. I got a couple of things that I needed. I didn’t worry about the pub.
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I started looking around for food. I’m walking around. It’s like they’d rolled up the carpets and everything was closed. I was like, “What am I going to do for food?” I hadn’t booked anything so I’m walking around. I see a bowling alley. I said, “Maybe they have a cafe or something in the bowling alleys.” I’m walking towards there. I get into the parking lot. I see these two bizarrely dressed people. They looked harmless, just dressed funny. I went up to them and I said, “I’m looking for a place to eat. Can you recommend someplace?†They were thinking and said, “No.” They said, “I bet The Falcon is open.” The guy that looked particularly strange said, “I’ve got to go get my car. I’ll walk you there.” I said, “That’s great.”
We’re walking and he said, “We came from a Mad Hatter’s Party.†He was the Mad Hatter and dressed like it with this checkerboard jacket that with the back tales, the boxes on the checkerboard had to be eight to ten-inch squares. It looked ridiculous. If you’re the Mad Hatter, he was it. Me and the Mad Hatter walk to The Falcon. As I walked in, some people that I had seen on the trail recognized me coming in and they waved me to come to join them. What a delightful group of people. It was a woman, her husband and her two brothers. I so thoroughly enjoyed talking to them. They have had some extraordinary adventures. Out of Wisconsin is where they’re from and just charming people. That’s one thing I love about this travel, you meet the most interesting people who are doing interesting things with their lives. The town of Painswick itself is lovely. It’s an iconic English town. All the buildings are the traditional English architecture made out of the Cotswold stone, which I noticed is starting to get whiter.
Before in the early stages of the walk, it had this honey color. As I go further and further south, I’m seeing that the stone color is changing a little bit at a time. Each town is getting a little bit whiter as I go along. In the center of town is the Parish Church of Saint Mary’s. This is noted for 99 immaculately manicured Yew trees. It said, “The devil would not allow the 100th Yew tree.” There are 99 in the church grounds and a magnificent cemetery. At least from The Domesday Book, which was a survey of the UK in 1086, it’s believed that this church was probably built maybe even 40 years earlier than that. It’s quite something to see. The town itself is lovely. If you can try to get there, not on a Sunday, so things are open for you to be able to see them.
After a wonderful dinner, great company and a super nice guest house, I slept like a rock and was ready for the next day where I hit my halfway mark. I’m off to King’s Stanley. It’s a very short day. It’s not even eight miles. I’ve been walking now for five days. My feet and my body are ready for a little bit of rest. I’m tired when I finally get there. You get into the town and my guest house was not on the path this time. I love when my guest house is right on the path and you don’t have to add extra mileage to get to your accommodations. This time, for whatever reason, I’m easily a good mile off the path. I’m looking for a place to eat because it’s around lunchtime and I’m hungry. It’s well past lunchtime. I’m very hungry. I’m tired. On the way there, I’m walking. It’s residential. I was like, “Where are the stores? Where are the restaurants? I don’t see anything. I’m walking through this town and I’m seeing nothing.”
Finally, I get to my guest house. There’s nobody there. I’m looking around. Finally, I see two men that were doing some tile work. I said, “Could you please tell me where I could get something to eat?†because it doesn’t look they’re open yet to take in guests. Usually, you can’t check into like 4:00s. I was early. It was probably like 2:00. As I said, 2:00 is late for me because my stomach is always hungry at noon, sometimes earlier. They said, “No.” They couldn’t think of any place. The one thing that I couldn’t understand about this whole trip, a lot of times finding the restaurants is difficult. This wasn’t a small town. I didn’t understand where the people ate when they wanted to go out. Maybe they go to a different town or bigger town because there are some big towns nearby. I did not see any little restaurants, pubs or whatever. This one was closed. The tile people are there because apparently, a previous guest had started the tub and because he was drunk, he fell asleep and the tub overflowed and ruined this whole floor and the floor below. That was my adjacent room. I smelled the moldy thing in that room. That wasn’t too good. The guy sees my face fall because he tells me this one place, it’s like a mile away. I was like, “I don’t think I can do a mile. I’m hungry.” He said, “I’m waiting for my tea water to boil. I’ll drop you down there.” I said, “That would be great.”
He takes me down there. They’re not serving either. I come out all dejected and gratefully he was still there. He said, “Maybe the next town we can find something,†so off we go. We drove another three or four miles to the next little village. He waited outside. I went and there was nobody in this restaurant. I go into the kitchen and I said, “Can you serve some food? We’ll serve you.” I had this huge restaurant all to myself. I waved my friendly tile man, driver goodbye. I took the most leisurely lunch in history, rested and enjoyed myself. I was like, “How am I going to get back?” The road that we took was super busy and they don’t have shoulders. There are no little walking places you can do right by the road. The hedgerows literally come right to the edge of the road so it was wasn’t going to be safe. I said, “I’m going to do what they do here.” They seemed to not have these rules that you can’t go on people’s property. I’m going to figure out how to get back to the town without going on the road. I’d made a game out of it. Remember, I had that little app, that ViewRanger so I could always find my way to the town even though it wouldn’t have a trail or anything.
The Domesday Book: England’s Heritage, Then & Now
After lunch, I settled through this one was a formal rundown estate. The buildings were all covered in weeds, vines and all that. It could have been a great haunted house. I go through there. I’m walking through pastures. I’d be blocked by a hedgerow. I’d pick a direction and go around. I was climbing over gates and climbing under hedgerows. It was fun. I felt like a little kid. I remember going to this one pasture that then turns into a field. On one side was corn and the other side was sunflower. I’m working my way between the two crops. I literally felt like a little kid playing hooky, cutting through everybody’s property and all that.
With my little app, I could see I was zigzagging my way in the right direction. Finally, when I could see, “Now it’s time to hook a right and try to find my way to the town.” I finally worked my way there. I only spent maybe 100 feet on the road before I hit a sidewalk. I was so proud of myself. I get to the hotel and they said, “No, we’re not serving dinner tonight. We’re going to close the restaurant.” I was like, “I’m going to have to deal with this all over again.” I did not want to do that. I went up. I got showered, cleaned and all that stuff. Gratefully, they decided they were indeed going to open the restaurant.
There are two Canadian couples and myself are the only people staying there that night. These were the two couples when I was having dinner. Fortunately, we were having dinner at the same time. I ended up seeing them off and on for the rest of the journey. It was a lovely evening. The next morning, my wakeup call is by the cows mooing in a pasture nearby. I don’t see them. I sure can hear them. That’s a nice way to wake up. I’m heading to Wotton-under-Edge, but before I get there, I have a special treat. In route, I’m going through my friend Simon’s parent’s town so I’m going to take a little detour and have lunch with his parents.
I’ll tell you about that and the rest of my Cotswold trip on our next episode. I cannot wait to tell you all about it. This was a magical and wonderful walking holiday. I sure hope that you can feel the excitement and the thrill that I had of doing it. It’s a wonderful adventure, particularly if you’re not sure if you want to do something hardcore. This is hard. This is an endurance thing because every day, even if you’re tired, you still got to get up and walk because you are committed to getting to the inn that you booked because there aren’t that many inns so you have to book this ahead of time. You can’t wing it like some trips. This one you’ve got to plan in advance. It’s if you say you’re going to Wotton-under-Edge, you’ve got to get to Wotton-under-Edge. Otherwise, you’re not sleeping anywhere. You do have to will your body to do things when you’re tired. It’s a beautiful, peaceful, serene trip. The landscape is stunning. The people are marvelous.
I’m going to tell you about the back half of my trip on our next episode. I would love to hear comments from you about reading about a trip blow by a blow like I did. This is the first time I did an episode like this versus an overall summary. I’d love your feedback on that. If you are enjoying this program, please take time to do a rating and review on Apple Podcast. It does help other people find the program. I appreciate your time in taking the time to review the show and also for taking the time to read. It means a lot to me. If you like the podcast, please share it with your friends. I’m here if I can help you in any way. Always reach out to me at Kit@ActiveTravelAdventures.com. I love getting your emails, reading your feedback, questions, comments and concerns. I look forward to seeing you in our next episode. Until then, adventure on.
Important Links:
- The UK’s 10 Best Walking Holidays – Previous episode
- Self-guided Trip – Previous episode
- Mickledore
- ViewRanger
- The Domesday Book
- Apple Podcast – Active Travel Adventures
- Kit@ActiveTravelAdventures.com
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