The weather forecast predicted rain and thunder storms which may explain why some potential walkers had removed themselves from the list but four walkers set off from Tresham. We walked down to the Kilcot valley where we picked up part of the Cotswold Way passing two groups walking in the opposite direction. We arrived at Alderley where James Lees-Milne, the diarist and biographer, had lived with his wife back in the 1970’s.

Here we lost the first of our group who made his way back to Tresham and the remainder of us began the steady climb back up the Cotswold escarpment where, towards the top we got views across the Severn Vale.

After a lunch stop we arrived at the entrance to the NT property, Newark Park, where the next walker shortening the walk stopped, to be collected later, and the two remaining stalwarts continued, walking through the Ozleworth estate. We passed Holwell Farm, another literary connection here, as Bruce Chatwin the travel writer and his wife lived here for some time. As we had been gradually dropping down to Ozleworth Bottom we began the inevitable climb back up the escarpment to Tresham.

This proved to be quite a challenging walk, particularly as it got very humid but the thunder storm held off until we were back in the cars.

Many thanks to John for leading this walk, a pity my lower dorsal fin (Winnie-the-pooh reference) wasn't up to the full distance.