Walking the Cotswold Way pursued by a golfing trolley

I like to take long walks occasionally and I do not like the idea of paying for overnight accommodation, porterage and such, so I wild camp and carry everything on my back. But it’s heavy and seems to become heavier as the days progress. That’s why for some years now I have been incubating this idea of pulling my camping gear behind me rather than hefting it on my back. I tried various solutions without success. Then I made a lucky find. Someone in a rather rich area near my flat in Oxford had thrown away a used golfing trolley. I adapted it and this contraption with the luggage bag or box (a slightly modified modern grass box from an electric mower) plus flexibly attached and also modified haversack became known to me as the trolley. Now I could carry a much bigger tent and have a go at a walk I have often fancied: the Cotswold Way.

So, at the end of August in 2023, I struggled onto a very busy train from Oxford with my trolley and travelled to Bath, the southern end of the Way. It seemed to take forever extricating myself from the city but I did it and ended that first day in a camping spot beyond a rusty gate just to the north of Hinton near a massive manure heap and a wood. As I erected the tent a car parked in the rusty gate entranceway! I could not believe it. Who could it be? The owners of the field? Officers of the Stop Wild Camping Brigade? Lovers? Everything was already wet from the rain soaked grass so I had no choice but to continue making camp. By the time I’d finished it was almost dark, so I took my torch to the gate and waved it about a bit. A light came on in the car and the driver’s window was lowered. A youngish woman said, “Sorry, is this your gate?”

“Not exactly”, I replied as she quickly reversed and sped off, away from Hinton. I walked in the other direction in the near darkness to Hinton’s only pub, the Bull. It had beer, but no food so I dined on salted peanuts. No breakfast the next day either as I towed the trolley alongside the M4 then crossed it to the village of Tormarton. Its pub had closed down, so on again to Old Sodbury where in a pub called The Dog I had a much needed sausage, egg and chips.

By this time I had developed a hatred of styles, kissing gates and all of the things that blocked my way along the Cotswold Way: they are not made for walkers with trolleys. However, that night I made it to Hawkesbury Upton where lay my perfect pub: the Beaufort Arms. Perfect with one exception, the otherwise friendly landlord did not provide tasters of the real ales he purveyed. “You can buy a half or a pint,” he told me bluntly – and he had good reason for his rule. Had a good dinner of faggots and mash then returned to my camp in a corner of the local football field.

Hygiene when wild camping is always a problem, but I did manage a refreshing wash down the next day in a very cold stream. I then sweated my way up Wortley Hill, which overlooks Wotton under Edge. But there was a reward for my efforts: the first good views of the Severn Valley with that wide river shimmering in the distance beside my ancestral home: Berkeley.

A long trek then to North Nibley Monument with its even more panoramic views and onwards to Dursley where I drank in the Old Spot, lost my boots, and had great difficulty finding a wild camping site. Next and last day I made it to Stroud in my sandals and took a three bus trip to Stow on the Wold having completed about half of the Cotswold Way’s one hundred odd miles. There I parked my trolley in the garage ready for an assault on the other half of that beautiful, but challenging footpath.

(This is a much abbreviated version of my notes. If you want the whole story email me.)

Religion and Climate Change

 

I’ve not written many blogs this year and I’ve not been to many lectures. What’s happening to me?

Well, I am spending a lot of time writing my next book and I also devote many hours to making videos for my Rob’s Oxford channel. But tonight I did go to a lecture, actually more like a debate, at Oxford University’s Museum of Natural History just round the corner from where I live.

It was titled “Is livestock grazing essential to mitigating climate change?” Not a very exciting topic for many, I thought, but I do have an interest in this topic through the field we have been re-wilding for some years at Stow. Anyway I could not have been more wrong, it was exciting and the main lecture theatre was packed to the gods, literally. Probably 200 people there and the place was abuzz even before the debate started. If I had done my usual 'just in time act' I wouldn’t have got a seat!

The speakers were Allan Savory, listed as a founder and leading proponent of Holistic Management and George Monbiot, simply described as a prominent critic, but generally known as a writer specialising in environmental and political activism.

Why did I put religion in the title of this blog?  Well, I do not think I have ever witnessed such passion and division at a lecture in Oxford before this one. And the zeal of the supporters for each point of view certainly smacked of religiosity. It extended to applause and hooting, yet hooting, at times

So what was it all about? Actually I wasn’t quite sure. I certainly did not understand what the holistic man supported. Lacking only the surplice, he talked like a vicar, a passionate one. He lived in Africa but had spent the last two  years in the USA. He had been a military man and seemed to think that military thinking was the only way forward for dealing with climate change. He did not seem to address the title of the debate.

Monbiot was much clearer. He knew that grazing animals and big corporations were the problem and rewilding together with vegetarianism or even veganism the solution. He was more explicit, more passionate and strongly challenged Allan Savory to address the topic under discussion.

At it simplest I think the Monbiot camp favoured banning grazing animals and Savory favoured biodiversity but I may have oversimplified. The audience seemed to know what was what and divided almost equally into the camps, I think.

Savory had the last word by reading a statement which sounded like a sermon and ended with the repeated statement that “we have to look after each other”. Amen.

Meanwhile the sheep in the next field are attacking my rewilded hedge. Should I let then in? Not likely.

A day in life of an Oxford tour guide.

 Here you can read about three very different Oxford tours and then get a link to my latest video,  a pub one and just the place to go after these three tours.

Tour 1 Chaos

Four mature guides, including myself, were waiting for a party of eighty people on a company jolly to Oxford from a far eastern country which will remain nameless to protect the innocent. They arrived at the visitor centre of the college of Christchurch and the first requirement was - you’ve guessed it – toilets. That took a while. Then they had to be lined up in four different groups, single file, for the distribution of audio-visual guides – the staff members at the visitor centre are quite draconian about this. That too took a while. In fact half an hour had passed fruitlessly by before I could take my group into the college through the Meadow Gate. Inside they fiddled haplessly with their multiple language audio-visual guides attempting to begin the tour – many failed and I helped as best I could. I would much prefer to guide them round this top tourist spot myself, but the college no longer allows us to do so.

Their group leader was enthusiastic, but spoke little English. Nevertheless he managed to convey to me that the full tour was far too complicated so I suggested that we just visit the dining hall (he called it the Harry Potter dining hall) and the cathedral. So, we joined the slow moving queue on the famous (Harry Potter) access stairs then wormed our way slowly around the even more famous dining hall while they filled their phones with images of it all.

The next port of call was the visually striking Tom Quad, where more images were captured and the group scattered before we could herd them into the cathedral. Once inside I had just one follower – the group leader – he had lost the entire group.

Somehow we got most of them together in order to leave the college and as we left they dispersed. I explained as best that I could that it was now my role as the guide to take them to a number of interesting sites in the city. Their leader smiled tolerantly whilst continuing to send them off, unaccompanied, with instructions to meet at McDonalds at 4pm. Soon he was the only person left – so I went home. An unwanted and useless guide.

Tour 2 The donor and family

Many people give money to Oxford University and its colleges. The most recent big ones are: the Blavatnik School of Government, Reuben College and the nascent Schwartzman Centre for the Humanities. Many other philanthropic gifts have been provided and donors seem keen to oblige.

This tour had been arranged by the University and I was the guide. My role was to show the potential donor (PD) around the central buildings, explain the way the University and Colleges interwork and so on – the usual stuff. The group consisted of the PD and wife, their two teenage sons and a younger daughter, an Oxford graduate who worked for the PD and a young lady who worked for the University and who had the resources ready to pay for any entry fees.

I was a little nervous, this was not my usual group by any means, and people with huge amounts of money can often be egotistical and demanding. This PD was not; in fact he was quite pleasant, fairly knowledgeable and engaged. After him my main worry was the Oxford graduate.  How dare I, having finished school at the age of sixteen, explain the intricacies of the top University in the world when he had just recently been though the mill? In fact he was delightful, telling me in an aside that he had not yet experienced the graduation ceremony. Then there was the PD’s wife, she was not happy and her face portrayed that. I have no idea why she was not happy, but she contributed little to the proceeding and did not sour them. Then there were the two lads. They were at the age where showing interest in something said or shown by a person of my age would be devastatingly embarrassing and they mostly avoided eye contact. The daughter was rather sweet, and responded well to my asides about the locations used in the Harry Potter films. I believe the high point of the tour, the thing which really grabbed their attention was the long list of past donors which is displayed within the Clarendon Building passageway.

The tour done, the PD took me aside and said that on the basis of my tour he had decided to donate a huge sum of cash to the University and then requested a visiting card from me. I hasten to add that only the final part of that sentence in true. But he seemed happy enough and walked off with his minders to a busy day where he would see more of the university and its colleges than a humble tour guide ever would. 

Tour 3 The American Indians

This was a tour that had all the hallmarks of failure. It was in my diary as a group of Indians arriving at a certain time date and place who had prepaid for a visit to New College. Well, first the booking had two different dates, second the group were American not Indian and third the college was closed on the day of the tour! I thought the second date the most likely but went along to the meeting place on the first just in case. Just as well, there, at the Martyr’s Memorial I was approached by Bob and his eight or so companions. They were my sort of age and enthusiastic about Oxford, though they had very limited time to spend with me.

I whizzed them round to St John’s College which was open and free to enter and there gave my potted version of what a college does in the Oxford scheme of things and then what was left for the University to do. They were hungry for details. The questions kept a ‘coming and I did have all the answers for them. They particularly liked the chapel and the magnificent Canterbury Quad. After that we ventured into the city proper where we shared the wonder of the Divinity School, the Sheldonian Theatre and Old Schools Quad followed by the majesty of Radcliffe Square and its dominating Camera.

They appreciated the whole thing so much and my delivery was much enhanced by their obvious appreciation. There was talk of return trips and a general ambience of a good experience shared. I cycled home a happy man and a contented tour guide.

That was quite a day. As you know my other thing is making videos for my YouTube channel: Rob’s Oxford. Here’s the latest, fresh out of the “studio”.  It’s about the Harcourt Arms, one my and Margaret’s favourite pubs. We go along most Sunday’s for its excellent open mike night – and beer.

Back from the world trip and straight into a pub

 

Now settled back in England after the world tour and spending some of my time making my notes and recollections into a book of sorts. Don’t know whether it will be published at all but I am enjoying revisiting all of the places that we visited in this way – have just left Hawaii and arrived in Tasmania. I expect that I will finish it later in the year.

Also have resurrected and added to one of my favourite tours: Literary Oxford. I‘ve given it a quite a few times now for Bodleian Tours and the Oxford Literature Festival and it’s been great. It covers ten or so colleges detailing the work of authors and poets from them plus a visit to the Divinity School which has the first library of the University (outside of the church) above it.

Meanwhile I have been working on another video and this one has been a great pleasure since it is based in a pub and, unlike my earlier Pubs of Oxford videos which were mostly done during lockdown, this one captures the family who run the Rose and Crown telling me what they do there. And, what is more, it’s my local (or at least one of them).

It’s a great little pub, very traditional and very welcoming. Have a look. Here’s the link.