Stacey's kids and husband flew back to NY yesterday after a week, while she has stayed on a for a few days to see some friends. But top of her list was to do a bike ride with us again, so thankfully the weather was perfect. John planned this route, most of which we did just recently, but it's such a pretty area that we were happy to do it again, this time with Stacey. We drove West on the M4, then south on the A34 to start at St Mary Bourne.
Route
We left in the direction of Hurstbourne Priors, following the Bourne Rivulet. All very flat with the occasional downhill too.
 |
| Several fields with men with metal detectors not far from St Mary Bourne |
 |
| Next to the "detectorist" fields. |
 |
| Hurstbourne Prior Church on our left. |
 |
Approaching Longparish. The Valais Blacknose sheep. And we are now following
the River Test. |
 |
| Approaching Longparish. Thatched cottages everywhere. |
The next section was a new loop for us, continuing with a climb to swing round a section of road to safely cross the A303. At the highest point, on the B3408 we stopped to admire this view.
 |
| Lovely views near South Harewood, and now we drop downhill again into Wherwell. |
 |
| Wherwell School |
 |
| Cottage next to the school. |
 |
| Another pretty cottage, where we now turn left into a quiet lane. |
 |
| Left now and a quieter lane to Chilbolton. |
 |
| Arriving in Chilbolton |
 |
| Chilbolton Church with its unusual steeple of timber, and tiles. |
 |
Stacey using artistic licence to photograph the village signpost.
Our route goes left here but we turned right for a detour and found a tea shop!! |
 |
| The village green |
 |
| That's handy! |
 |
hearing horses hooves, I dashed across the road to get a shot of them passing,
but they stopped right outside the shop. |
 |
| Proper teapots. |
We retraced our steps back to the village green, now heading for Newton Stacey and Barton Stacey.
 |
The sunny yellow of Rape Crop as we ride towards Barton Stacey.
A few undulations on this part of the route. |
 |
| Arriving in Barton Stacey, with this church on our left. |
 |
| Obviously I got there first.😉 |
A dogleg across into Bullington Lane, dropping downhill to do and a loop around Lower Bullington before we doubled back a short section. We passed this church with it's pollarded tree lined path.
 |
| Bullington Church |
We went straight on, going under railway arches, and now we are following the River Dever. A left and left again, and back under another railway arch, into Upper Bullington Road. Having dropped down to get here....... guess what.... it's uphill.
We turned right into a road called Roberts Road, which is basically a not very attractive residential area which drops back downhill again, in a long curve, and we join The Street, to climb over the A303 once more. We passed a gate called Owl's Lodge, and notice now on the map that there is a Clay pidgdeon shooting school here.
The Street continues, until we cross the River Test once more, where the name changes to Southside Road, for a loop through Longparish. (where we passed earlier).
 |
| River Test, Long Parish, and one of several Trout fishing locations. |
 |
| "Chapel House" Longparish., where we turned right into Mill Lane. |
 |
| At the end of Mill Lane, back over the River Test again, and into Nun's Walk. |
 |
| crossing the ford in to Nun's Walk. Several Swans and the flock of "skinny" sheep. |
 |
| A brief stop on Nun's Walk to photograph this field full of Dandelions. |
A the end of Nun's Walk, about 2 miles further on, we go under the A34, and ride into Whitchurch. We had considered a tea stop here today at the pretty Silk Mill, but it's not usually open on Mondays so had discounted it. (It WAS open). Never mind, we had a good tea stop earlier.
Whichever way you leave Whitchuch involves climbing, and today we used a different route into Bell Street. All very gradual, but it went on and on, actually for 6 miles. At one point, we dropped down to cross Harroway, but climbed back up again. We rode along a pretty lane with Bluebells either side as well as loads of wild Primula, on our way to a Hamlet called Egbury, and even further up hill to Upper Woodcote.
 |
| Between Whitchurch and Egbury. |
 |
| Primula along the verges. Stacey seems to have got ahead. Power or not? Hmmm. |
 |
| I caught up with Stacey at this road sign, we now head for Binley. We are at the top! |
 |
| heading dowhill to Binley, and several fields zingy of Rape Crop. |
 |
| Binley Church opposite the field of Rape. |
 |
| Looking back. |
We continue downhill for a long way, and having taken my jacket off, I suddenly felt cold with no work to do. We arrived into Stoke, just on the edge of St Mary Bourne.
