“Cotswolds Forest Scene” — Trees and spring undergrowth along a Cotswolds trail.
This spring, following our exploration of northwest Scotland and cities in Ireland, we made our way to the Cotswolds District of England, where we did a one week village-to-village walk. It was unusually hot on the day we arrived, but once we started walking the weather was more typically British, as in cloudy and rainy. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The cool, damp weather was generally great for walking, and most of the rain came in the form of brief, light showers. With that in mind, it is no surprise that we spent a lot of time in some very green landscapes.
“Cotswold Trail, Clouds” — Clouds build above a trail through agricultural land in the Cotswolds.
For a hiker like me, with a lifetime of wilderness hiking and backpacking behind him, a “Cotswolds walk” is a new and different experience. I am used to single-person-width trails, usually rocky, and sometimes ascending to quite high elevations. On multi-day trips I have carried everything on my back. But here the trails are gentle, often passing between and through fields and pastures. And you carry only a few supplies for the day’s walk — you simply stop at a grocery or a pub in a small town at lunch time and buy something to eat.
“Wheat Field and Building Clouds” — Thunderheads rise above a Cotswolds wheat field.
If you are following along, it may start to be difficult to follow the itinerary of our late-spring trip to the British Isles. We started in Scotland, spent time in Ireland, then headed to England for about three weeks. The first week in England was spent on a walk between villages in the Cotswolds. We had heard about people doing that, and it sounded fun — and we were able to meet up with relatives who live in Europe.
