Day 1: Sunday 30 July. Overton Hill to Bishopstone (18 miles)
We had a superb breakfast. The B&B owners were very friendly and interested in what we were doing. We set off from there at 9:30.
It rained quite hard in the night. The forecast was for a sunny morning, so we had our sun hats on with our rain coats in the day-sack. Today was our longest walk; what a way to start - 18 miles! Also, we had forgotten to take account of the fact the B&B is not on The Ridgeway itself. It was a half hour walk from there to The Sanctuary and the start of the path.
The weather was fine. It was cooler with a bit of a breeze, and cloud obscured the sun for most of the day. That sounds a bit grim, but in fact we were plenty warm enough, indeed, it could be considered perfect walking weather.
We arrived at Ogbourne St. George for lunch having walked 11 miles (9 miles of The Ridgeway). We found the pub 'The Inn With The Well' by 14:20, and they stopped serving food at 14:30. Richard - Ham Ploughman's, Hil - Mackerel Salad Roll. We had a pint of beer to go with it, and a pint of lemonade, and a re-fill of the water bottle.
So on we walked. We were aware we had a fair distance to cover today, so we did keep up a reasonable pace, and did not let ourselves get distracted by things to see on the path. This was a shame as several ancient monuments and hill forts went unexplored.
We crossed the busy M4 to Fox Hill and then up to Bishopstone. We left The Ridgeway and walked down the hill through the valley near Bishopstone Folly.
Sunday night's B&B at Prebendal Farm. We arrived at 6:30pm. Our host was very friendly and invited us to sit down for a drink of water before going up to the room. Our room, once again, was superb, and huge.
There were 2 pubs in the village. We do not know how there is demand for this. We tried the Royal Oak, but they did not serve food that evening, so we went to the True Heart PH instead. Richard - Jacket potato with chicken & mushroom, Hil - Jacket potato with tuna mayonnaise. We did order extra coleslaw, but we really did not need it. We were a little full after the meal, and the prospect of a full English breakfast the next morning did not much appeal.