A guard at Winchester Cathedral
Cheesefoot Head, the hill that is
View back to the Winchester bypass
The Milbury's, our only lunchtime pub stop on the SDW
A very stylish walker
A sleepwalker 
Exton comes into view
Diane strides out
Come on Doug keep up
Church flowers 
Exton ChurchDay 1 - Wednesday 19th April 2006, Winchester to Exton
Cloudy AM, sunshine and cloudy PM
We travelled from Brighton to Winchester by train, having been driven to Brighton Station from Diane's home in Peacehaven by Keith. We walked the short distance from Winchester Station to the Cathedral and the start of the SDW. We found an obliging bystander to take our photograph in front of the Cathedral entrance, and at 10am precise we started our SDW adventure.
Within 5 minutes of the walk, we had lost the SDW route out of Winchester. It was one of only two occasions on the whole SDW walk we had problems navigating. The SDW signposts were good, except for in Winchester city centre, and along with our invaluable Trailblazer South Downs Way Guide, route finding was rarely a problem.
The first day's walking was relatively uneventful, the only mishap being Doug losing the bottom section of one of his walking poles. We stopped at the Milbury's pub en route, the only time we stopped at a pub for lunch on the entire SDW, and enjoyed our first real ale or Guinness of the next eight days. A mile or two after this decedent lunch stop we made a short detour to Beacon Hill to see the views across the Meon Valley.
The final section of the day's walk was downhill to Exton and was memorable for the number of stiles, there were very few stiles on the rest of the SDW. We arrived in Exton in fine sunshine, looked around Exton church, and then rang our B&B owner who offered to pick us up from outside the Shoe Inn.
The B&B was a couple of miles outside Exton, along a somewhat busy road, so we were very pleased with the transport to and from the B&B. The owner of the B&B had booked us a table at the Shoe Inn for our evening meal, a comfortable hostelry, serving good ale and food. Our B&B host not only drove us to the pub but picked us up when we phoned him. What service.
We did go to bed somewhat early that night in a very comfortable B&B, what a fine start to the SDW.
|
Day 1 |
Total |
To SDW |
SDW |
From SDW |
Evening |
|
Miles |
13.00 |
0.50 |
12.50 |
0.00 |
0.00 |
|
Hours |
5.58 |
0.25 |
5.33 |
0.00 |
0.00 |
|
MPH |
2.33 |
2.00 |
2.35 |
0.00 |
0.00 |
Nature: Seagulls, buzzards, kestrels, lots of little birds, primroses, cowslips, daffodils, lots of small flowers.
Breakfast - Brighton Station: tea or coffee with Danish
Lunch - Pub garden: excellent pint or half, own sandwiches, apple or banana. Home | The Milbury
Afternoon Tea - B&B: coffee, tea, biscuits
Evening Meal - Shoe Inn, Exton. Good food and beer, and a nice pub. £40.40 for two. theshoeexton.co.uk
B&B: Corhampton Lane Farm. 1 double, 1 single, bathroom. Bed and Breakfast in Corhampton, Meon Valley Hampshire | Corhampton Lane Farm
Pre-booked £30pp. Excellent B&B and a helpful owner.
No comments:
Post a Comment