A rural bike ride near Long Parish and Whitchurch, Hampshire

Last weekend I was lucky enough to be able to find time to make the most of the dry but cold weather, and took the opportunity for a bike ride down to Whitchurch in Hampshire. I've cycled this route, or more accurately a slightly off road version of it, before but as always each visit reveals new things. The first revelation was a little sad, and that was of yet another closed pub. A couple of summers ago I stopped here mid bike ride for lunch and a pint at the Hurstbourne Inn, in Hurstbourne Priors, but alas those days would now seem to be gone. I also noticed that The Coronation Arms in St. Marybourne had also closed.

The Hurstbourne Inn, Hurstbourne Priors, Hampshire

As my ride continued, I came across more relics of a bygone ear, although these buttresses which supported the bridge carrying the railway line south from Whitchurch towards Winchester would have been closed to business several decades earlier than the pub above.

Buttresses of a former bridge carrying the railway south from Whitchurch

Buttresses of a former bridge carrying the railway south from Whitchurch

Buttresses of a former bridge carrying the railway south from Whitchurch

Buttresses of a former bridge carrying the railway south from Whitchurch

Whitchurch itself is probably about two thirds, or 20 miles, of the way around this particular loop and I'm always pleased to arrive and treat myself to a coffee, and sometimes a cake, at H's. The next two pictures are of the White Hart which I'm pleased to say is still open and sits proudly opposite H's, as I sat on the bench outside the café, sipping my takeaway Americano.

The White Hart, Whitchurch, Hampshire

The White Hart, Whitchurch, Hampshire

    

Cycling close to the former Sprat and Winkle railway line, Hampshire

Whilst trying to make the most of the summer, I've been out and about in the countryside cycling of late, and not doing much urban wandering. For the past few weekends I have ventured south towards Whitchurch and beyond. A few weeks ago I posted about the Whitchurch Town station and disused railway, but my latest two trips have taken me beyond Whitchurch to Long Parish and Wherwell, where the former Sprat and Winkle line used to run.

Much of this part of the line is now private and inaccessible, so I had to make do with cycling along the road beside it. Where the line used to run through Stockbridge through is now a foot-cum-cycling path, but going that far was pushing the limits of my cycling ability, and today's route was 50 miles as it was, so maybe that's one for a day when I take the car out. Here's a link to a good brochure about the Sprat and Winkle line.

All the pictures below are taken between Wherwell and Long Parish. The first four are just the bridge supports, but the last two are of one of the few bridges still intact.

Remnants of bridge along the former Sprat and Winkle railway line, Hampshire

Remnants of bridge along the former Sprat and Winkle railway line, Hampshire 

 Remnants of bridge along the former Sprat and Winkle railway line, Hampshire

 Remnants of bridge along the former Sprat and Winkle railway line, Hampshire

Bridge along the former Sprat and Winkle railway line, Hampshire

Bridge along the former Sprat and Winkle railway line, Hampshire

    

I'm not sure where my next venture will take me. I'm up in London a few times again next week, so maybe there'll be some more Urban Wandering taking place again, but for now I'm slightly obsessed with me sprats and winkles.

A Rural Wander along the Hockley Viaduct, Winchester, Hampshire

Having spent the day down near Hamble, and wanting to avoid the M27 and M3 on the way home, we ended up on the outskirts of Winchester and came across this former railway viaduct, the Hockley Viaduct, that I'd often seen from the M3 but never been up close to before. This magnificent viaduct is to the north of Winchester and used to carry the line south from Newbury, past Burghclere and Highclere, which I have blogged about previously. The weather was decidedly gray on arrival, but fortunately brightened up towards the end of our wander. 

Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Probably my favourite picture in this batch. I have fond memories of telegraph poles from my childhood where my Gran used to live alongside a railway, in a road called Telegraph Road which was, of course, lined with telegraph poles.

Telegraph Pole on the Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Such a shame it's no longer an operating railway and that you can instead hear the roar of the M3 running close by, but at least it's still accessible and is now a cycle path, affording wonderful views like this.

View from the Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Signal on the Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

We weren't quite there on the 70th anniversary of D-Day, but pretty close. Hard to believe that 16,000 trains used this route in the 12 months leading up to D-Day.

D-Day memorial plaque on the Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

A final view of the viaduct as we made our way back home.

Hockley Railway Viaduct, near Winchester, Hampshire

    

Rural Wandering: a cycle along the old Newbury to Winchester railway

With just a short period of time on my hands before I had to drive off to a family birthday party yesterday, I decided to take myself off on a more modest bike ride than my 57 mile epic of last week, and head out to the disused Newbury to Winchester railway for both some cycling and some rural wandering. Closed to passengers and then freight in the 1960's, much of this old railway has now been used to for the Newbury bypass, but there are some sections remaining which have been converted into footpaths and cycle paths, and fortunately some of these sections are close to where I live. This set of photos comes from the section of the line between Burghclere and Old Burghclere.

 

Approaching Old Burghclere station from the north

Platform at Old Burghclere station

 Looking north through Old Burghclere station

In this shot the platforms can still both be clearly seen, and the station building itself, now converted into a house. As I cycled past I caught a glimpse of people, presumably the owners, sitting at a table on what once was the platform, having a coffee.

Old Burghclere station

Just to the south of Old Burghclere station is an abandoned signal box. When I've cycled along here previously, the signal box has largely been obscured by bags of some sort of farm produce, but today these had been cleared away, giving a near perfect view. This signal box would presumably have been used to ensure safe movement of trains through the station and also into and out of the goods yard.

Abandoned signal box just south of Old Burghclere station

Abandoned signal box just south of Old Burghclere station

I even managed to sneak inside briefly.

Abandoned signal box just south of Old Burghclere station

This next picture is again of Old Burghclere station itself, but this time from the front.

The front of Old Burghclere station

 

And further along the bike ride, we have the somewhat confusingly named Highclere station, which is actually in Burghclere. This is also a private residence now and only the front can be seen from the road. A great place to live I should imagine.

The front of Highclere station

    

Ghost signs, abandonment and semi-abandonment in Wiltshire and Somerset

Last weekend I embarked on an epic, well epic for me anyway, bike ride from Newbury to Frome, a total of 57.5 miles. I had no idea where I was heading other than the fact that I decided to head west, and my wife kindly agreed to pick me up from wherever I ended up. The purpose of the ride was to reach the 250km challenge I'd set myself for May, and I'd not planned to look for anything to blog about here, so was pleasantly surprised to find a few ghost signs and other interesting places along the way.

This was a rather sad looking, former petrol station. As with many rural petrol stations and garages, they have closed down now, presumably unable to compete with the out of town supermarkets.

Abandoned petrol station, Milton Lilbourne, Wiltshire

I caught this ghost sign out of the corner of my eye as I cycled past, so looped back on myself to get a shot of J.R.FELLOWS. Looking at the white paint behind the name, I do wonder whether there was ever more to this sign than can be seen today.

Ghost sign for J.R.Fellows, Pewsey, Wiltshire

This next ghost sign is actually a collection of ghost signs. The clearest word, in white, would appear to be DRAPER, underneath which in black is

GODFREY'S

CASH STORE

REFRESHMENTS

but if that wasn't confusing enough, the Market Lavington Museum blog has old pictures with even more words which are not visible at all today but say 

WALTON

BAKERY &

SUPPLY STORES

M-LAVINGTON

Multiple ghost signs in Easterton, Wiltshire

This is another multiple ghost sign, this time in Lavington, or possibly West Lavington. Not very easy to read at all, but I can see the words HOUSE, VALUE and BOOKS.

Ghost sign in West Lavington, Wiltshire

My last picture is from Somerset and is of Frome railway station. Despite looking abandoned, and having just one platform remaining operational, and just one actual track, it is still in use and sits on a loop just off the main GWR line. Although there was not a single person on the station when I arrived early on a Saturday evening, the annual passenger numbers is close on 150,000, and in fact when I get the 07:08 from Newbury to London Paddington, it's a train which actually starts its journey at Frome.

Frome railway station, Somerset

    

Rural Wandering: a short bike ride through the Deverills in Somerset

I've managed to get a bit out of sync with my postings, and this is in fact from last weekend when we were away for a long weekend at Center Parcs, in Longleat, Somerset. I had not really expected to do much exploring, but was fortunate enough to manage to find time for a couple of bike rides outside the main complex. The countryside was beautiful, the roads were quiet, and on one of the rides the sun was shining. The only downside was on the second bike ride, where my rear disc brakes all but seized up, meaning that it was a tremendous effort to peddle at all, and on the down hill stretches I still had to peddle to keep going. I stopped a few times to take the wheel off, and adjust the brakes which seemed to free them up for a short while, but overall it was really hard going. However, going at this slow speed, I did spot this old AA sign in the village of Brixton Deverill, which marks the villages of Kingston Deverill and Longbridge Deverill both as being 1½ miles away, and London being 99½ miles away.

Old AA road sign, Brixton Deverill, Somerset

Tales of my Urban Wandering will continue later in the week, with a post about an Urban Wander over to the Pall Mall Deposit building in West London already in progress ... so stay tuned folks.

    

Rural cycling - Hampshire/Berkshire borders

The awful weather at the end of last week, plus the imminent nearing of the end of the financial year, meant that any plans for another Urban Wander last week were put on hold. Well, actually that's not strictly true as I did wander the streets of London after work, but it was wet and dark, so needless to say I have no pictures of that wander.

I did however force myself to get out on my mountain bike today, and despite the cold, damp and foggy start to the day I ended up having quite a satisfying 18 mile ride, and have hopefully burnt off some calories following last night's gastro-extravaganza at a friends house. As I mentioned though, the weather was not too great so I had pretty much given up hope of taking any photos, but a bit of brightness on the homeward leg allowed me to get this quick shot of the Hampshire-Berkshire boundary post. I was pleased that I didn't have any litter in this picture, which is sadly more than I can say for many of the lanes I cycled down, which were strewn with fast food wrappers, paper coffee cups, sandwich wrappers, crisp packets, and tin cans. To make matters worse, the hedge rows had been recently trimmed  and a lot of the litter was now shredded and sodden, making it a near impossible task for the parish litter wardens to clear it up.

County Boundary post between Hampshire and Berkshire

Also this week, on the days I have taken the train into London, I have been wondering more and more what it would be like to travel the other way which would involve taking the train to Taunton instead of London. In recent times I think I've only been west on the line as far as Hungerford, although more years ago than I care to remember we travelled from Paddington to Castle Cary for the Glastonbury Festival, but I don't remember much about the journey.

In other news, as a self-confessed slow reader, I am still working my way through both Brendon Chase and Lights Out for the Territory, although have not found enough time to make a lot of progress this week.

    

Waterways in the Test Valley, and Little Venice

Unfortunately this week has been a bit of a work related blur, with very little time to myself. I did manage to get out and about last weekend, on the day where it wasn't wet and windy, and completed a 41 mile bike ride loop down to Barton Stacey and back, exploring some villages, quite country roads and tracks that I'd not encountered before. When I left the house it was sunny but just a little chilly, but as the morning crept on, the weather became near perfect for cycling. I stuck mainly to quiet roads, with a few excursions off road, stopping every now and then to take in the scenery and soak up the ambience. The ride took me across several rivers where anglers were fishing for trout.

Somewhere in the Test Valley

Sunday was a complete wash out, and apart from wathcing the eldest son play football, and lose miserably, I cannot remember what else I did. As I mentioned earlier this week at work has been manic, and although I had hoped to go out in search of space last night in London, the rain and an invitation to some leaving drinks changed my plans. My only escape was at lunchtime today when I managed a half-hour walk around Little Venice before it started raining again. This first picture below is a curious little street called Bristol Gardens. It's on a slight hill, as can be seen by the slow but sure, continued elevation of the shop fronts. All the shops are in a similar style and immaculatly presented.

 Bristol Gardens, London W2

The second picture is of a couple of barges in the Paddington Basin, just off the main stretch of the Grand Union canal. I walk this way fairly often, but today was struck by these particulary barges. Just a shame that the Westway flyover spoils the view and the ambience.

Grand Union Canal, Paddington Basin, London W2

    

Not sure what this weekend has in store for me, other than a trip to Winchcombe tomorrow and another hour or so on the football touchline on Sunday afternoon. If I'm lucky and the weather holds, I'll try and get out on the bike on Sunday morning.

More vintage petrol pumps

Since my last post I have been out and about within the UK, although that all changes tomorrow when I go to the Netherlands for the rest of the week. My main trip last week took me down into Kent, a county I visited frequently as a child as my grandmother lived in Deal, but it's not somewhere I've been to much since. As a bonus for me, I was travelling by train rather than driving, and I was also taking the slow train. I did consider going via London and using the high speed link down to Ashford, and whilst that probably would have been a bit quicker, I was keen to travel cross-country, at least on the journey there, partly inspired by the book On the Slow Train. My journey was in four legs and took me from Newbury to Reading, Reading to Redhill, Redhill to Tonbridge, and finally Tonbridge to Ashford. I have travelled to Reading countless times, and Redhill a couple of times before, but the journey from Redhill was all new. A lot of the track seemed to be in cuttings, or so tree-lined that the view was obscured, but when the track did open out, the unrestricted views of the Sussex and Kent countryside were stunning, especially the oast houses, which are a distinctive memory from my childhood. On my return journey, time was a little tighter so I took the train to Victoria, crossed London by tube to Paddington, and then headed home from there, quite tired and looking forward to the weekend.

Determined to get some more exercise this weekend, I set off on another 30 mile bike ride, in search of new sights, roads and trails. My ride took me out through Ashmansworth, Faccombe, Linkenholt, Upton, Wildhern, and then back up through St. Marybourne, Stoke and Crux Easton. During the ride I was looking for something out of the ordinary to photograph. Don't get me wrong, the scenery was spectacular throughout most of the ride, but this disused petrol pump, on the Finkley Road to the north of Andover, fitted the unusal requirement quite nicely.

Vintage petrol pump, near Finkley, Andover

Vintage petrol pump, near Finkley, Andover

    

An unexpected weekend treat on the River Kennet

What a great weekend we've just had here in the southern UK. More spectacular weather, and fortunately I found the time to enjoy it. My original plan on leaving work in London on Friday afternoon was to pay a visit to Harrow-on-the-Hill, but on leaving the office and heading towards the tube, I could not bear the thought of squeezing myself in, even for the relatively short distance, and then having to get a later, busier train home to West Berkshire. So, my plans changed and I left my search for space to Saturday and Sunday.

On the Saturday I managed a 35 mile mountain bike ride down to Whitchurch, where I was forced to stop and seek comfort in coffee and cake after having managed to fall of my bike earlier in the ride.

After having eaten myself better, although sore and bruised, I continued my ride down towards the staggering beautiful Long Parish (which has a couple of excellent looking pubs that I need to make a note to visit some time), and then headed back up through The Wykes, St. Marybourne and Crux Easton.

So Saturday was my planned space but I had some bonus space on the Sunday when I managed to fit in a walk along the River Kennet, looping back along the Kennet and Avon canal before watching one of the boys playing football. This particular walk west from Newbury is one of my all time favourites. I love the way the transition from road, to rough road, to gravel track, to muddy lane, to footpath happens. It always reminds me of the line in the Neil Young song, Thrasher, "Headed out to where the pavement turns to sand". The only thing that spoilt the image was the sound of the traffic thundering along the A34 bypass. If only the railway line that used to run over this bridge was still running (admittedly it only went as far as Lambourn, but the sentiment is the same).

Disused railway bridge on the Newbury to Lambourn line

River Kennet, just west of Newbury

 River Kennet, just west of Newbury

River Kennet, just west of Newbury 

River Kennet, just west of Newbury

So that's it for this week I suspect. I am going to be finding some space in Kent later in the week so check back on or after the weekend to see what I found there.