Yes! It took along time, despite being only 139 km! In fact, our efforts were spread over only nine days, with two or even three months between them; with only two sets of two consecutive days. Liz, living in Oxford, was in the throes of wrapping up a long and successful academic career, amid lots of adventurous travelling – by rail – to Istanbul, Southern Italy, France and Romania… and I was busy with book launches in Verona, expeditions in the UK, to Shetland, friends in Devon, the Isles of Scilly, the Isle of Wight as well as jaunts in Tuscany and destinations in Piemonte including Turin, plus stays on lakes Maggiore and Orta.
The weather has been tricky too. Though I dislike the expression ‘fair weather walkers’ it is accurate of us. Modest amounts of rain are tolerated; sustained downpours are not. And five heatwaves and associated hot spells made the summer of 2026 very difficult. We just managed to shoe-horn the final leg into the briefest of respites from the heat, on 19 August.
It was this beautiful book by Eric Jones and Patrick Dillon, illustrated by Anna Dillon, a neice, that insinuated the Ridgeway into my psyche. It caught my eye on an early winter outing to Marlborough and its White Horse Bookshop in 2016, and David bought it for me for Christmas. The text is extraordinary enough; serious academic work by two men (one of whom originated in Andover no less!) whose topographical perspectives are informed by lifelong erudition. But the illustrations are phenomenal. The examples below tell their own story. There are many more in the book. Achingly beautiful.
The Middle Ridgeway is deemed to be that ancient ‘high’ way stretching from Avebury to Streatley and the Thames crossing. The earlier section is thought to have stretched from the Dorset coast just beyond Lyme Regis to Avebury; the eastern trail goes from Ivinghoe Beacon to the Wash. The National Trail focusses on this middle section and the north eastern section, and so did we.
Liz’s instinct was to walk from north east to south west; in some sense for her this was ‘downhill’. By contrast, I could only imagine setting off from Avebury, and moving towards the Chilterns. In the end, we both had our way. We met at Avebury, left a car there, drove north east to Ogbourne St George, and walked south west back to Avebury. And with few exceptions, that was the pattern of our manoeuvres. We used Steve Davison’s excellent Walking the Ridgeway (published by Cicerone)
The two car trick was tedious but worked reasonably well. Frequently it felt that the direct walking route was well quicker than the tortuously slow and winding B roads we followed to rescue a car. It was certainly a lot shorter distance! Curiously, with one or two exceptions, we failed to take any photos, despite (or perhaps because of) the extraordinary beauty of the landscapes. The camera simply doesn’t capture what the human eye can see.
The schedule follows:
Sunday 27 April 2025: met at Avebury; drove to Ogborne St George; walked 16 km south east to Avebury on a very hot day; hard-going
Sunday 1 June 2025: met at Ogborne, drove to Ashbury Folly CP on B4000; walked 17.4 km south east back to Ogborne
Next Liz suggested a two-day adventure, nominating the north eastern section of the Ridgeway, based around the Red Lion hotel in Wendover; David was recruited as chauffeur to reduce the to-ing and fro-ing, which worked well on
Thursday 2 October 2025: met at the Red Lion, checked in, walked 18.4 km north east to Ivinghoe Beacon from where David collected us. Notice the chalk lion – symbol of Whipsnade Zoo behind Liz’s head in the photo below!
The next day was a wash out, and Liz returned to Oxford. We stayed in Wendover, visited the very obliging traditional men’s outfitters, Andrew Gardner, and then stayed with friends in Hambleden overnight.
29 March 2026: met at Bledlow, drove to Red Lion in Wendover (again) and walked 17.3 km south west back to Bledlow
30 March 2026: left car in Bledlow (again), drove to Christmas Common NT CP; walked 11.7 km north east back to Bledlow
6 May 2026: met at Christmas Common, drove to CABI at Mongewell; walked 13 km north east back to Christmas Common
20 May 2026: met at Mongewell, drove to Streatley Warren CP; walked 13 km north east back to Mongewell; stayed in Bull Inn in Streatley. Below is Liz cooling her feet in the Thames between Goring and South Stoke.
21 May 2026: from the Bull in at Streatley, left car at Streatley Warren, drove to CP on B3494 4 km S of Wantage, walked17 km north east to Streatley Warren
19 August 2026: with David, met at CP on B3494 S of Wantage; walked 18 km south west to Uffington Castle where David met us with a picnic; walked on to Wayland’s Smithy, and back to the NT CP at Uffington Castle (should have been Ashbury Folly CP)
Walking the Ridgeway was a wonderful experience. The landscape offered views which stretched beyond both sight and imagination; seemingly empty and barely touched by contemporary bustle, hustle and ubiquitous noise. And yet, in their times this ‘high way’ had carried generations of people – a busy route between busy places, sites of great industry, domesticity, sacred and familiar.
Our interrupted journey from Avebury along the Ridgeway, ended at Waylands Smithy which has lasted far longer than the people who built it; and will far outlast those of us who see it now. I really can’t get enough of the so-called pre-historic world.
