Thames Path Ramble 10: Thursday 28th May 2015 Clifton Hampden to Wallingford Bridge.

Thames Path Ramble 10: Thursday 28th May 2015 Clifton Hampden to Wallingford Bridge, which is about 8 miles.

Sue C, Jem, Dot, Ann, Margaret H, Jean, Peter, Sue H, John, Julie, Janet, Ian and I set off along this stretch of the Thames, and Maurice joined us at Day’s Lock.

At Clifton Hampden, the Thames Path crosses the road bridge, and we started out walking alongside another large loop in the river towards Day’s Lock.  Here the grass was high, very green and dotted with many flowers. The weather was sunny so, all in all, it was turning out to be a delightful day. We saw red kites, herons and ducklings.

Looking ahead, southwards, two hills topped by trees stood out. These are the Sinodun Hills - known usually as the Wittenham Clumps and less respectfully as Mother Dunch's Buttocks. (Mother Dunch was the wife of a less-than-popular local medieval squire).

 The area around Day's Lock is said to be the most historic place in Oxfordshire. The hilltop fort was built by iron-age man on Castle Hill and when the Romans invaded they built a camp nearby which became Dorchester-on-Thames.

  As Christianity became widely established, St Birinus created a Saxon Cathedral here and in 635AD he baptised the Saxon King Cyneglis in the river Thame (which flows through Dorchester and then into the Thames). An Augustinian monastery was built on the site in 1140 which, 400 years later, was saved from Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries after it was purchased for £140 and bequeathed to the village. The huge medieval abbey church of St Peter and St Paul remains open for worship and as a concert venue. Photogenic Dorchester is regularly used as a location for the television series, Midsomer Murders.

Day's Lock is the main gauging station for measuring the flow of water in the river.

We stopped at the lock to celebrate Dot’s birthday in style with chocolate cake and champagne.

 Continuing, we went under Little Wittenham footbridge (where the World Poohsticks Championships are held each year. The game is described in A.A. Milne's book, The House at Pooh Corner, written in 1928) along field edges for a mile or so, before going on a short road stretch that led us into Shillingford. We went through small alleyways and rejoined the river alongside the graceful stone arches of Shillingford Bridge.

  After having stopped to picnic on a grassy bank near to Shillingford, we continued and walked through the much busier spot at Benson. 

Here there are many boat moorings and hire boats (Hoseasons have a base here), a large outdoor cafe and many people were enjoying the sunshine during the school half-term.   

 We saw a stone in the ground which seemed to say London was 92 miles away (we calculate that we are over 40% of the way from source to Thames Barrier). The path diverted away from the river again, along a lane to go over Benson Weir and then arrived at Benson Lock.

  It was here that we persuaded another walker to take our group picture.

The last mile or so led us to Wallingford, said to be the best example of a surviving Saxon Fortified town in England. To our right, we could see the remains of Wallingford Castle, which at one time was used by King Henry VIII as a Royal Castle. As a Norman Castle it was built in 1071, but was destroyed by Fairfax in 1646 by the order of Oliver Cromwell during the Civil War. 

 Wallingford Bridge came into view, with its 17 beautiful arches. It is of medieval origin, built first around 1141 and then re-built in 1809 when the balustrades were added. By the bridge there is an outdoor swimming pool. We turned towards the town centre, having completed our walk for the day, enjoyed a break in Catherine’s Café and saw the Market Place with its 17th century Town Hall.

The ‘Queen of Crime', Dame Agatha Christie, lived on the outskirts of Wallingford for forty years and is buried in the neighbouring village of Cholsey.  There are more grisly links with crime through Midsomer Murders, the TV series as Wallingford, is the original ‘Causton' and home of DCI Barnaby.

Thames Path Ramble 9: Saturday 16th May 2015 Abingdon to Clifton Hampden

Thames Path Ramble 9: Saturday 16th May 2015

Abingdon to Clifton Hampden, which is about 5½ miles.

Sue and Jem, Ann, John, Julie, Ian and I set off walking from Abingdon at about 11am (after visiting the Throwing Buns café) and the weather was fresh. Later on, the weather became much warmer and with the wealth of green foliage both sides of the river, this was certainly a lovely walk.

We admired the tall spire of St Helen’s Church, (dates from 1100 and apparently it is very wide) and the old buildings around (according to the architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner, "No other churchyard anywhere has anything like it”) including some almshouses (built in 1446) with a picture of the old Market Cross by Sampson Strong on the gable end.

The River Ock joins the River Thames here,  and also the Berks and Wilts Canal did once upon a time, and hopefully will again when the restoration is complete.

 Then, on past Abingdon School Boathouse (from where I believe the rowers, with their pink paddles, that we saw later had come) and the entrance to Abingdon Marina.

Continuing, we followed the curving loop of the river around low lying water meadows (the A415 road that crosses here has an old ‘causeway’ foot path).  We came upon a lovely house (and boat moored in front) beside the lovely stone Culham Old Bridge. This was hidden behind greenery.  The bridge spans Back Water, once called Swift Ditch and the main navigation channel, now just a cut. It was the site of a battle in the English Civil War and had 2 pillboxes built on it during WW2.

 

Again the course of the Thames River forms another large loop but this time the Thames Path takes us the shorter route, along Culham Cut. At various points we could see Didcot Power Station to the south. Three of the six iconic cooling towers of the redundant Didcot A power station were demolished last year (the other cooling towers and turbine hall are due the same fate this year).  Also, last year some parts of the still operating Didcot B power station were seriously damaged by fire.

We stopped by Culham Lock (a cold and deep one according to J. K. Jerome) to have Eccles Cakes, (kindly made by Ian S.). Here, we met another Thames Path walker, taking it more leisurely second-time time round. Nearby are two more fine stone bridges:  Sutton Bridge over the main Thames channel and Culham Bridge over the cut.

The path continued to be really green with lush growth either side. It was easy walking and not jungle-like, as a mower had been along recently. We saw many butterflies and other insects, birds including a heron and a nature- loving photographer.

 

The imposing string and bow Appleford railway bridge made of iron with all its rivets carries trains between Didcot and Oxford.

Next in the distance looking northwards we could see pillboxes (still part of the main defence line along the Thames but in a line across some of the larger loops) and Culham Science Park (with a large white building).

On the opposite bank the unusual low, ‘squashed’ spire of Long Wittenham Church stood out, with the more modern tower of Didcot Power Station behind.

As we passed Clifton Lock we saw a couple motoring upstream in a lovely slipper launch, (a traditional long and low River Thames boat that has a stern that curves elegantly down to the waterline).
 

At the end of our walk the river curves gently around and slowly, through the undergrowth, appeared the striking red brick Clifton Hampden Bridge, designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott (of Midland Hotel, St Pancras and Albert Memorial fame) in 1864.

The village of Clifton Hampden and The Barley Mow were featured in Jerome K. Jerome's 1889 classic book ‘Three Men in a Boat’.  Jerome says -
‘Round Clifton Hampden, itself a wonderfully pretty village, old-fashioned, peaceful, and dainty with flowers, the river scenery is rich and beautiful. If you stay the night on land at Clifton, you cannot do better than put up at the “Barley Mow.” It is, without exception, I should say, the quaintest, most old-world inn up the river. It stands on the right of the bridge, quite away from the village. Its low-pitched gables and thatched roof and latticed windows give it quite a story-book appearance, while inside it is even still more once-upon-a-timeyfied’.
It would not be a good place for the heroine of a modern novel to stay at. The heroine of a modern novel is always “divinely tall,” and she is ever “drawing herself up to her full height.” At the “Barley Mow” she would bump her head against the ceiling each time she did this.
It would also be a bad house for a drunken man to put up at. There are too many surprises in the way of unexpected steps down into this room and up into that; and as for getting upstairs to his bedroom, or ever finding his bed when he got up, either operation would be an utter impossibility to him.’

Charles Dickens was full of praise when he wrote about the pub too. So, at the end of our walk we followed, as many before us, to the Barley Mow for a meal and saw the low beams for ourselves.

Thames Path Ramble 8: Oxford to Abingdon Bridge, which is about 8½ miles, walked on Saturday 2nd May 2015.

Thames Path Ramble 8: Saturday 2nd May 2015 Oxford  to Abingdon Bridge, which is about 8½ miles.

 Sue C, Jem, Dot, Ann, Margaret H, Jean F, Jean H, Peter, Sue H, Judith, Carole, Howard, John, Julie, Ian and I did this walk today; that includes 4 new people to the group and the largest group on a Thames Path ramble we have had.

 We set out along the side of the River Thames from Folly Bridge, with the imposing Head of the River pub/restaurant opposite. Several large cruise boats were moored on the small, central island where Salters Steamers Ltd has a base for their boat hire and public boat trip business. 

 It was immediately apparent that this stretch of the Thames is well used and it seemed grander and very wide. The River Cherwell enters the Thames here. After Magdalen Bridge (where the day before, being May Day, students used to jump into the river after a night of revelry), the River Cherwell flows beside Christ Church meadow and Oxford Botanical Gardens to then split into two branches. There is significant discharge into the Thames and the island formed between these two branches is where many of the University college boathouses for rowing are.  As it was a Saturday morning, there was much activity and many boats and students were out, with coaches on bikes shouting advice from the bankside.

 Many people call this section of the River Thames the Isis (the upper section from Iffley Lock (or Dorchester) to the source). It is associated with the intercollegiate rowing races called the Torpids and Eights. They start in line with each other and aim to catch up and bump the boat in front. The overall winner is the ‘Head of the River’.

No races today: all we saw where fast going canal narrowboats, one with a harassed woman aboard, aiming to bump anyone who got in the way.

Iffley Lock, has a boat slide and two interesting bridges (one wooden similar to the ‘Mathematical’ bridge in Cambridge and the other an ornate stone bridge).

 After Iffley Lock and going under a road bridge (carrying the main Southern Oxford Bypass (A423)) and a disused bridge (that once carried the Oxford to Thame railway), life became a lot more peaceful.

We began to notice the wildlife; more birds including a couple of geese with goslings, a reed bunting but I must confess that I didn’t notice any fritillaries that may have been in the meadows nearby (Iffley Meadows are well-known for the fritillaries flowering in early April).

 We stopped for lunch at Sandford Lock. On one side the Kings Arms pub occupies a large stretch of the river bank. The lock itself has the greatest fall of water in the Thames (nearly 9feet) and the lock is massive (174 x 22 feet).

The whirlpool below the weir, called the Sandford Lasher, has been responsible for several deaths and is mentioned in many literary works.

Just beside here is the site of a very old papermill, now converted into housing.

 Going onwards, we passed Radley College boathouse, with a fleet of moored motorised rafts (maybe for marshalling?). Opposite was a lovely large, but isolated, boathouse and not long after we passed Pumney Farm. Here there is a large, attractive, old, extended farmhouse, maybe flats now, surrounded by the river and water in two large ponds (with midges).

 

 On the opposite bank and occupying a high vantage point, Nuneham House came into view (not Radley College). This is Palladian Villa built for Earl Harcourt in the mid-1700s. The building is currently used as a retreat centre for Brahma Kumaris World University and part of the grounds are where Oxford University has an arboretum. During World War II it was requisitioned by the Ministry of Defence and people there examined and interpreted reconnaissance photographs.

When we spotted the tall, slender spire of St Helen’s Church, Abingdon we knew that we were nearing the end of our walk. The path deviates slightly, away from the main channel through a wood, and then goes over the weir at Abingdon Lock. 

Here we posed for the group photograph and walked on to cross the bridges (originally medieval) into Abingdon. 

Abingdon was once the home of Morland ales and the MG car works. It is now in Oxfordshire, but was the original county town of Berkshire and is famous for bun-throwing from the County Hall (now newly restored and a museum).  The Ock Fair and air-shows continue. We heard, while having a rewarding cuppa at the Crown and Thistle the announcement that a new addition to the Royal Family had been born; a daughter to Kate and William. Is that reason enough to throw buns from the old County Hall I wonder?