One of the Breeze riders had told me about a VERY colourful garden that I would enjoy visiting called Aston Pottery. Sort of North East of Abingdon. It's primarily a pottery, which has expanded it's surrounding garden over time, and has a very nice gift shop and cafe.
I put together a route starting in Kingstone Bagpuize mainly because its about 1hr from home, and I thought that would be a good place to park and not make the ride too long. It's all very flat in that area, so no hills to worry about! But there are some main roads and loads of little streams with not too many bridges, so it wasn't so easy to plan as I thought. Today was a test ride. John tweaked a little bit towards the end to avoid a main road.... would that work? 😉
Garmin route screenshot at end
It's a Monday ride, but Dave decided not to come since it's still warm, but ONLY 25 degrees today, and Daphne is busy with family. It would have been a good flat one for Linda, but let's just say she was on standby thanks to a family issue. So, just the 2 of us today.
I had researched an excellent free car park at the village hall, (incase I return with friends and more cars), but it had signs up saying PRIVATE, no unauthorised parking. 😖. We just found street parking, so that was fine.
We got slightly lost to start with, but soon found the track we needed leading to a pedestrian bridge over a dual carriageway (A420), and immediately into a little village called Hinton Waldrist.
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| Cotswold stone houses in all the villages near here. |
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| Shame that like home everywhere is parched |
A dogleg over the A420 and through a Hamlet called Pusey, and the countryside was very open, and a quiet road.
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| In the far distance the hilly part of the Cotswolds but today it was mostly flat. |
We used the B4508 all the way then to Stanford in the Vale, where I had found a cafe. This was only about 5 miles into our ride, but already 10.30ish.
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| Arriving in Stanford in the Vale. A pretty village of one long street. |
The only thing NOT pretty in the village was the cafe! forget to take a photo. But they had a good selection of food and we sat outside. A bit slow with the drinks arriving, but I think we just arrived at a busy time for some workmen having breakfast.
With another A road and streams in the area, out route backtracked a couple of miles, the a left turn and straight across the A420, to Buckland. We noticed some cattle in the tree shade with estate fencing around this area. (Buckland House). One cow came over to see us..... then 3.. then 5... then most of them. The highlight of their day. 😂
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| Loads of enormous white Agapathus in pots at the cafe / shop area. |
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| This border next to the road. |
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| Walkway next to the car park. |
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| At the end of the walkway, another HUGE border beyond banked up. |
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| This border completely of annuals |
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| This grass border, with wooden stakes which are for the Dahlias. Not yet mature, but soon will be adding lots more colour. |
We had arrived around 12.30 and a bit of queue for lunch, but not too bad. Its certainly a popular cafe. We opted for filled Brioche rolls made on the premises.
The next few miles were certainly quiet and STRAIGHT roads, but not much to see beyond flat fields and hedges. A short section on the A415, but downhill and had been traffic light controlled to join it, so a few cars passed then nothing. A left turn into more quiet roads in the area called Standlake. Then a road closure which was handy, since cyclists were allowed though. I stopped at this bridge. This is the River Windrush.
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| River Windrush with plenty of water flowing. Most other smaller streams were dry. |
We joined the A415 again at a T junction next to another traffic light controlled bridge over the Thames in Newbridge, next to a pub called the Maybush. A couple of hundred yards later, is where John's " deviation" to my route came into play. And here it is!
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| ok. I guess its straight on? |
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| Eventually we joined this track, which looks ok but as it rose up to the farm they had put down a new base of thick large scalpings. I got off to walk. |
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| After the farm, the track was fine again, Not an ideal deviation, but the only choice other than the main road. |
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| Looking back to the farmhouse |
Almost back, and we soon crossed back over of the pedestrian bridge over the dual carriageway A420 back to the start.
Nice to go somewhere different. Just a little disappointing with lack of points of interest along the route, especially after the garden. Although this time of year the landscape is never looking it's best, and certainly not this year. But the gardens were beautiful, and both glad we went.
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