08/06/26 - On the Trail of.... George Eliot

No Access

Considering I have never read any of her books, it seems strange that this is the second George Eliot themed walk I have completed. With Middlemarch coming in as the second-best book of all time - as voted by Guardian readers over the weekend - maybe this is something to be addressed.

Previously, I've traipsed around South London looking out for where she lived. Today, it's Nuneaton, her birthplace. Apart from being the most populated town in Warwickshire, they don't appear to have much else to shout about. The hospital and a pub named after her. The pub possibly responsible for putting people in the hospital. Strangely open - but with pumping music, so it cannot be a 'spoons - at 10am on a Tuesday.

Random St George's flags replacing a flat roof (with dog on) as a warning sign

The route is from a 1951 guide book. The maps, and associated descriptions, have always presented a challenge to decipher. The theme is where George (Mary Ann Evans) was raised and some of the real locations that became fictional places in her works.

The lass herself

She was born at South Farm on the Arbury Estate - which in the 1950s was open to the public. The map cuts through this estate and even discusses an obelisk next to the farm in celebration. Public access is no longer available, so I have to adapt the route significantly. I do manage to track down the aforementioned obelisk, moved to the one nice part of town, the riverside park.

Previously next to South Farm

Griff House was her childhood home. I would have visited this too, but the public footpaths I need take me away from what is now a Beefeater/Premier Inn. Progress, hey.

Closest I get to Arbury Park - inspiration for Cheverel Manor in "Scenes from a Clerical Life"

My (replanned) route takes me around the northern side of the estate. "Private" signs are in abundance in case I get any ideas. Dull road walking along Astley Road to a proper, ruined castle with connections to Henry VIII.

A first glimpse across a pool

Up close - maybe too close, as you will find out.

Astley Castle, near Nuneaton in Warwickshire, was originally a 13th-century fortified manor house and later the seat of the Grey family. It is closely linked to Lady Jane Grey, the “Nine Days’ Queen”, who was the great-niece of Henry VIII through his sister Mary Tudor. Following Jane Grey’s failed claim to the throne in 1553 and her subsequent execution, the Grey family’s influence declined and the estate eventually passed out of their hands. The castle also has a literary link to George Eliot: it is generally identified as the inspiration for Knebley Abbey in George Eliot’s novella Mr Gilfil's Love Story, part of Scenes of Clerical Life.

There are plentiful information boards, direction arrows and even a sign saying "please respect the residents' privacy". Which leads me to think I can investigate the ruins in a little bit more detail. I get as far as identifying that a modern conversion is housed inside the ruins and it doesn't take long before I am hollered at as to what I am doing. The cleaners are in. This is now a holiday let owned by the Landmark Trust.

And can't cleaners shout when they spy middle-aged ramblers approaching their patch.

I apologise and try to explain the misleading signage that suggests it's open for public access. I am still not entirely sure it isn't.

I beat a hasty retreat to the church next door, having done my research into alabaster effigies and medieval misericord paintings of the apostles.

It's "doors locked".

Back to the walking. The guidebook wants me to head south to Corley and ultimately Allesley. There is little in the way of interest and a lot of it is lane walking. This might have been pleasant in the fifties but a look on Google Maps shows no verge and a lot of traffic.

I can escape North-West, through a damp wheat field with a narrow path (hello wet trousers and socks) and a golf course.

A revisit to a quite bonkers nautically themed pub - the Lord Nelson - which is almost as far as you can get from the sea in England.

Gah! I had just dried out

Bass in the Lord Nelson - Good Beer Guide Regular

"Get it at sea, take a ship / I'd christen her 'Victory', she'd make it."

Walk Details

Distance - 8.25 miles

Geocaches - 8

Walk Inspiration - Fifty Weekend Walks Round Birmingham - Walk 5

   

21/04/26 - West Midlands Way - Stage 12 - Kingsbury to Meriden

I Finished Something!

The West Midlands Way - a fifty year old book, charting a route around the West Midlands - comes to an end.

Due to strange logistics, I have been forced to amend the second half of the route - for the life of me, I cannot understand why Ron and Eric, the route planners, missed out Lichfield and Tamworth. Fine towns but more importantly, public transport hubs.

It was Tamworth that I found myself finishing Stage 11 at. No matter how I planned it, I couldn't find decent paths to get to Kingsbury but there is a handy bus.

I've walked this part of the world extensively on the Heart of England Way and the Centenary Way. I have previously pronounced Warwickshire the country's most boring walking county. 

Two out of three ain't bad

Nothing today has prompted me to change my mind. Kingsbury Water Park offers occasional glimpses of bodies of water through the woodland. Shustoke Reservoir is hardly observed from the footpaths that circumvent it. There are endless agricultural fields - devoid of livestock and crops (at this time of year). One pub - The Swan at Whitacre Heath - so "chainy" that it wasn't worth stopping at.

The only chance to see Shustoke Reservoir

Distant views of Birmingham from a field in Warwickshire

The only item of interest on the map is Maxstoke Priory and this is a disappointment. The church is locked up and the remains of the priory - a couple of walls in a poor state of repair - are hidden from view on private land.

Maxstoke Church

Ideally, I would have liked to end things here. There are two miles of road walking to get back to Meriden. A bus would be handy but it only runs on a Wednesday - and then at 10am! Google Maps was checked for likely traffic and/or grass verges. It was safe enough to walk but I needed the Deserter Podcast to keep my spirits up.

Into Meriden - and despite the green, a memorial to the centre of England and a monument to British Cycling, there is no pub at hand. The Bull's Head another quarter of a mile on from the bus stop.

The Actual Centre of England is at Fenny Drayton

An underwhelming end to an interesting experience which started so well.

Walk Details

Distance - 12 Miles

Geocaches - 4

Previous Stages - Stage 1, Stage 2, Stage 3, Stage 4, Stage 5, Stage 6 (Part 1), Stage 6 (Part 2), Stage 7, Stage 8, Stage 9, Stage 10, Stage 11

10/01/26 - The Pubs of Henley-in-Arden

Geocaching in the Snow

There aren't many Geocaching trails published any more. There was a time when seemingly a multi-cache trail within my 25 mile home radius would be created monthly. Someone posted on the UK Geocaching Facebook group asking for a family friendly trail and one of the few responses pointed to Henley-in-Arden.

Starting at the railway station, it's a short 3 mile loop with 13 caches. I expected the snow and ice. I did not expect puddles the size and depth of small lakes. I am pleased to report that my aging Scarpas are still waterproof, but really, wellies would have been a better bet.

The terrain was familiar from the Arden Way, Millennium Way and West Midlands Country Way.

Station Start

Out into the Countryside

Henley-in-Arden was once a coaching town. The main high street runs for a mile and is unusually wide. It was the first stop from Birmingham to London and once there were 25 coaching inns lining this mile.

With a (kind of) new establishment being setup, I decide to tick off those that remain. Bar Trek suggests 6 locations, but we can discount the Bluebell and the Mount as restaurants only. The Black Swan a little too far to the north.

The Three Tuns

Starting with easily the best - a Good Beer Guide regular for the last four years. I don't really need the new advertising to entice me in.

Liquid Gold

The Best in Henley

12:30pm and I am the only punter. The bar staff are loading coals onto the open fire, so I know which seat in the house I will be taking to thaw out. A nice beer chat about how well the Bathams sells.  The locals need to get to the Exchange in Stourbridge. Paying £5.20 here, their minds will be blown at how cheap it is in the Black Country.

Show me a prettier sight?

The Nag's Head

All of Henley's punters appear to be in here. Most tables are full, with a mixture of diners and boozers. One gent on lunchtime whisky, which is always brave.

The beer choice is good - Proper Job or Landlord. Having just got back from Cornwall, I chose the latter. Which was far too cold for cask.

Traditional Boozer - Henley's most popular

The White Swan / The Henley Mile

I've never warmed to the White Swan - the most gastro of gastros, where I experienced poor service on the Heart of England Way and have never forgiven them since. Not since I discovered the Three Tuns.

Yet, I was intrigued by a new tap room in town - The Henley Mile. It's hard to know where this starts and the White Swan ends - as it is housed in the same building on the opposite side of the courtyard.

Look carefully for the Henley Mile Sign

My chatty barman couldn't offer any advice. He stated that they were autonomous operations with shared infrastructure. The "Our Story" section of the website offers little more.

Several of their own beers on - Twice Hanged, Perkins Prescription, Run Charlie Run (chosen and very good) - all named after local Henley characters, with explanations on the beer mats.

Run Charlie Run - A Perfect Best Bitter

So, that's the Henley-in-Arden pub scene completed.

I only needed 90 minutes.

Walk Details

Distance - 3 Miles

Geocaches - 14

First Cache

20/08/25 - Claverdon, Wolverton and Norton Lindsey

Warwickshire's First Community Pub and Churches Aplenty

This is what I love. Finding ancient guidebooks and seeing what has changed and what still exists.

My latest eBay find - a 1951 book called "Fifty Weekend Walks round Birmingham". Walks will be tackled sequentially. Walk 1 is from Hatton. I can ignore the bus route instructions, as I don't have 1s 7d for the bus fare. I can adapt the hand-drawn map for my own needs.

North goes at the top - with little indication of distance

This is a good advert for completing research. The walk itself - through Warwickshire countryside and along rather too many roads (traffic not an issue in 1951) - would have been as dull as ditch water. By carefully reading the walk text and a little bit of googling, I was able to have something to look for at every turn. And there was even time for a spontaneous find.

Claverdon is the first sleepy village. Pinley Abbey was more interesting on the map than on the ground - as there was little to see of a nunnery founded in the reign of Henry I. In 2025, I was forced to concentrate on poorly maintained paths. On the village approach, there is an architectural oddity that looks out of place.

The Stone Building looks like a fortified tower. It was part of a grander building built by Sir Thomas Spencer, whose tomb can be investigated in the church. Once you pass the smithy, with its unusual horse-shoe front door.

Pubs, not the only thing to be converted to flats

The horseshoe fronted old Smithy

The Tomb of Sir Thomas Spencer - 1586

The guide book points out a grave with a wonderfully bleak inscription. Memorialising John Matthews, who lived during the reign of Henry VIII, and gave the land for the church to be built on. It's part of a longer sonnet that starts;

"Altho’ John Matthews under this stone lies rotten,

His deeds and name by us shall never be forgotten"

My book claims the text is still decipherable. The only other reference I can find on the Internet is from a C19th book - Shakespeare's Land - which states the tomb is near the South Porch. A good mooch around, but no success in locating it. The clue "Tomb" - and the fact he is the church benefactor - led me to believe it would have been one of the grander memorials. Maybe the text has deteriorated in the last 50 years.

South Porch, lots of text, sadly indecipherable

Wolverton is a very sleepy hamlet. A manor house and a very simple church, notable for its Norman origins and my observation, the walls are bowing outwards. No gaudy iconography here.

Wolverton Church

I'm back on the wider blog topic at Norton Lindsey. A village that has a pub. First the church, to see a Saxon font that is much older than the mainly Victorian building that houses it. Some fine stained glass windows.

The clock ticks very loudly, somewhat disrupting the internal ambience

Saxon Font - shaft wider than the bowl it supports

God is Love, Love One Another

I knew that the New Inn was Warwickshire's first community owned pub, sharing space with a shop and a cafe. I did not realise it is in the 2025 Good Beer Guide. Unexpected ticks are always the best. Especially when they are open at 2:30pm on a Wednesday afternoon.

As expected from a pub owned by 200 members of the community, the patrons were all locals. Three ladies laughing so hard they had to announce that they hadn't even had a drink. A couple of solo fellas on lout. A rather important looking fella - who I am convinced is the community ring leader - sat at the bar end on a gin and tonic. Further evidence that he is in charge from the Wi-Fi password - "haveagin", all lower case. He might have been responsible for commissioning the pub poem;

A ballard for boarded-up boozers

This lack of cask activity left me slightly concerned that the TV Screen showing the available ales, with a detailed description of each, listed six different choices. I wondered who was the last person to have ordered an Old Hooky.

I had nothing to fear. It was in fine condition.

Old Hooky

Having had my fun, I ensure I return home a hero. Carrot cake from the adjacent shop for Mrs M and the boy.

Walk Details

Distance - 10 miles

Geocaches - 10

Walk Inspiration - Fifty Weekend Walks round Birmingham, Walk 1

02/07/25 - Ebrington to Ilmington, via Foxcote

On the Trail of the Yubbington Yawnies

More folk tales from the Loreman Podcast. Episode 6 tells of the simple folk of Ebrington, known colloquially as the Yubbington Yawnies.

Most villages have an idiot. Ebrington is full of them, according to legend. Famed for;

• Caging cuckoos to stop summer ending
• Fishing for the moon in the village pond
• And most famously, attempting to make the church tower grow by covering the base in manure, prompting a poem.

“The Yubberton Yawnies be so wise

They mucked the tower to make it rise

And when the muck began to sink

They swore the tower had grown an inch”

This all happens to be in prime Cotswold walking country.

I start at a previously undiscovered car park hidden behind a new build estate and handily positioned for the pub, the Ebrington Arms. North, climbing hills to Lark Stoke. Some fine views in all directions. I am sure the OS Maps had a feature where you could use the camera and it would identify topological features and superimpose the data on the views. If it is still there, I couldn't get it to work in the field.

Lark Stoke Hill Views

And over Ilmington

A drop down to the edge of Ilmington. This is a village recently walked on the Centenary Way. This means I have crossed the border from Gloucestershire into Warwickshire.

Back uphill, over Windmill to walk the grounds of Foxcote House. 

A gap in the hedge to view Foxcote House

Nash's lane to take me back to the pub. Did I find any idiots? Walking back into town, I followed two late middle aged ramblers who stopped to start passionately snogging. I wouldn't have minded, but this took place at the spot where I was thinking of having lunch. For a moment, I was worried things were going to escalate but they spied me getting my banana out (not a euphemism) and scuttled off.

Oh, and the pub beer garden had two men in identical clothes (yacht shoes, pink knee length shorts, stripey tops), with identical hair (bald, beard) both drinking rosé wine. Do these people phone each other up first?  

The pub was labelled by the Times as the best Village Pub in England. It used to be owned by someone connected with the North Cotswold Brewery     and sold a beer called Yubbies. It has changed ownership since my last visit but still has beers from that brewery in the line up. Knowing it would be more than a fiver a pint, I asked for a sample of the Shagweaver first.  

Cotswold Village Pub - The Ebrington Arms

Cask beer in a summertime garden

Perfect condition. Just goes to show, you can have cask in summertime. If you pay £5.45.

Walk Details 

Distance - 7 Miles

Geocaches - 7

Walk Inspiration - Loremen Podcast and Harry Hargreaves The Third Book of Cotswold Rambles, Walk 3

Previous Loremen Walks - Churchill, Burford, Long Compton, Swinbrook, Minster Lovell

21/10/24 - West Midlands Way - Stage 3 - Henley-in-Arden to Alvechurch

Into Worcestershire

The problem with going on a discovery adventure is when there is nothing to discover.

This walk gets filed under dull enough to listen to podcasts and rather annoying with paths that disappear and rights of way that are lost. I really ought to get onto the Ministry of Footpaths about High House Farm and their new fence laying equipment. Converted to a house, they almost had a disgruntled rambler climbing the barriers to their back garden.

Red is Planned, Blue is actual. Fences were jumped. Sheep laughed.

A functional walk. The 50 year old guide book has sketch drawings, so its a case of picking the best way out of Henley-in-Arden. The Arden Way long distance path seems as good as any, and makes route finding easy. Follow the markers.

26 Miles available - about 5 walked today

Ullenhall has the Winged Spur Pub... of course, its closed on a Monday Lunchtime.

Previously visited

Apart from that, its a few churches, vicarages nodding to more pagan celebrations and agricultural countryside, where occasionally, the farmer has left a path through the crops.

Tiniest church found - Chapel Farm

And the associated vicarage

The closer we get to Alvechurch, the more the views open out. On a clear day, it could offer fine views.

And we're in Worcestershire

An Adventure Lab Cache shows me the sights of Alvechurch - lots of Tudor framed buildings - including the chipper - and a fistful of pubs. The Red Lion a large freehouse. The Weighbridge a Good Beer Guide Regular that keeps old school hours of closing in the afternoons. The Swan, previously undiscovered but when you cannot tell from the outside if its open because of the lack of lighting within, its probably a better bet to make a bee-line for the soon to depart train.

Surprisingly, it was open.  One for another day.

Walk Details

Distance - 11 Miles

Geocaches - 5 and 4 Adventure Lab Caches

Previous Stages - Stage 1, Stage 2

03/09/24 - West Midlands Way - Stage 2 - Kenilworth to Henley-in-Arden

Ancient Mysteries In Between

No doubting this walk is spectacular at either end. Leaving the majesty of Kenilworth Castle and arriving at one of the finest high streets in the land at Henley-in-Arden.

Never tire of the castle views

The 12 miles in-between carry functional Warwickshire walking and OS Map mysteries that are vague on the ground. We have;

The Pleasance - A hunting lodge and pleasure garden developed in the 1300s and dismantled by Henry VIII. All that remains are earthworks and a moat.

The Pleasance

St John's Well - a medieval pilgrimage site, fabled to have waters with healing powers. Nothing to see on the ground but some internet sleuthing showed that it has been cement capped.

Wroxhall Abbey - some fine walking through maintained parkland. The abbey is just visible through the trees. Former home of Sir Christopher Wren.

Beaudesert Mount - A Motte and Bailey Norman Castle. When this is reached, you know that civilisation is close to hand. Just the hill remains, and to be fair, the view isn't up to much. The housing estates of Henley.

Other things - Rowington Church (locked). Canals. The M40 - which when the guide-book was written was merely a pipe-dream. The hand drawn maps show "projected line". Lets hope it didn't cause as much drama to 1970s walkers as HS2 has now.

Henley-in-Aden High Street flatters to deceive for the pub connoisseur. You would expect more from a lengthy high street that contains many fine Medieval half timbered and Tudor constructions. However, there is now a Good Beer Guide entry to (re)-explore. My advice - avoid anything with Swan in the name.

One End of the High Street

Today, with an hour to explore before the train home, I can investigate two.

The Nags Head - A C17th century pub with barstaff with a sense of humour. My request to have a Proper Job is met with "Don't we all need one of them". She found it that amusing she told all the other staff. And then made badges out of bar mats. Get the feeling that all future punters will get this treatment.

Half Timbered

Cue new Warwickshire Jokes

The Three Tuns - is Solihull's Pub of the Year and the GBG Stalwart of recent years. I have to say the Church End Brewery Goats Milk was in superb condition. That's award winning too.

A more modern Three Tuns

A settling Goats Milk - the Train won't wait

Walk Details

Distance - 12.5 Miles

Geocaches - 7 and 4 Adventure Lab Caches

Previous Stages - Stage 1