European Trip Day 35 Painswick & Cheltenham

Painswick & Cheltenham

John's good friend Judith Munro and her husband Ross live in Painswick, which is only about 35 minuted from Cirencester, so we arranged to meet up with them for morning tea at their place. In usual style we allowed plenty of time to get there and just as well we did as John missed a turn and ended up going via Stroud (about 20 minute diversion). Eventually we got there and still a minute or two early!

Judith and Ross had just returned from a trip on their canal boat. They love to get away on their boat whenever they can and now Ross does the locks while Judith does the steering due to Judith's CCF.

She had had a defibrillator inserted after they discovered after doing an Echocardiogram that her Ejection Fraction was 10!!! It is UP to 24 now after treatment and she's been told that's as good as she can expect. She continues to do what she can, but any kind of walking or walking more than 200 metres is out.

She and Ross were in good form otherwise and we caught up on all their family news, chatted about books and a whole range of topics. So glad we got the chance to see them.

Ross gave John very detailed instructions on how to get to Cheltenham (our GPS not working). Of course he took a wrong turn almost immediately and we did another vast detour down winding steep roads until we met up with the road we should've been on 20 minutes later. Well we're getting to see the countryside and it's really quite lovely round here.

We found a parking station at Cheltenham and went inside a big shopping plaza to find somewhere to have lunch. We ended up finding a very nice Italian restaurant and with a belly full of pasta all thoughts of getting lost were overcome.

The shopping centre had a rather magnificent clock that featured a mechanical fish. When the hour chimed it played the tune "I'm forever blowing bubbles" whilst the fish blew real bubbles out its mouth. The kids loved it!

We spent a couple of hours in Cheltenham trawling through some shops. John even bought two pairs of shoes in the Clarkes Store (it's very hard to find shoes to fit his small feet in Australia) and also bought another bag.

We got home by 4pm and have been chilling out at Pat's house. We have to pack up to go to Wales tomorrow. It's been so lovely staying here and we're grateful for Pat's generosity.

European Trip Day 34 Cotswolds

The Cotswolds

We are staying At Pat's house in Cirencester which is in the very scenic Cotswolds. Cirencester is a fair sized town and this morning we walked into town to have a look around. As we walked past the Cathedral, the carillion had just finished ringing. The town, being a Sunday morning  was almost deserted at this early hour too, but we had a stroll around anyway and then came home to get the car.

Last time we were here we'd driven through a very picturesque village on our way to Belnheim palace. Barb had badly wanted to stop for a look around, but it was very busy with tourists and there was no parking to be had anywhere. Today we arrived before the coaches.

W

e strolled around lookng at the Trout farm with its manicured gardens and babbling stream running through it and admired the picture perfect buidings and gardens in the town. By the time we'd had a cappuccino and look around the gift shop, the coaches had arrived and the street was blocked in both directions much to the chagrin of the other motorists who were trying to get through. Horns were blasting in anger, but the Asian tourists didn't care. They were determined to get their Cotswold pictures come what may.

Luckily we were parked beyond the melee, so we headed on our way to Boughton-on-the-Water. This place was starting to heave with tourists too, but as it is a larger town it was coping with the throngs better.

It was getting close to lunch time by now, so we went to Stow-on-the-Wold. This is also a large town, and there were a lot of cafe options and also lots of shops open for the tourists. We were again fortunate to get a park. We trundled through some shops and then finally settled on Huffkins as a place to have lunch. It's been in operation since 1890, so presumably they must be doing something right. The food was really good! We just had a simple sandwich and it came with embellishment of then fries and salad. 

After lunch we drove on to Upper Slaughter. This little village is accessed by very narrow roads, but that doesn't seem to deter the visitors. We parked on the edge of town and walked in. It nestles on the slopes of a hill and there is a lovely little church on the hill whose gardens are a little neglected, which is surprising because most of the gardens in town were lovely cottage gardens full of flowers.

The next destination, just a couple of miles further on down even more narrow roads was Lower Slaughter. We could not find anywhere to even stop here. They don't seem to have space for a public car-park and only the Manor House had any space ( but you had to pay to go in). By now we were feeling tired anyway, as Barb is still bunged up with a heavy cold. So we drove back to Cirencester and had a lovely afternoon nap.