Week 17 walk - Oxford

Today Eleanor had to hand in her PhD thesis at the Exam Schools on the High in Oxford - so Steven & I went along with her and made a nice day out. She had emailed her work over to the printers the night before - so when we arrived there were 3 large bound copies of her work ready to be handed in. After she had done the deed and felt a huge sigh of relief that all her work of the last 4 years had nearly come to an end - we went to explore some old familiar sights and also some new ones.

 St Johns college and the Eleanor Cross.

 The newly renovated Ashmolean Museum - we did not go in - it was too nice a day outside!

 The Observatory - the first time we had seen it up close - usually we glimpse it from the top of the bus!

 The Natural History building - one of my favourites.

The Rhodes Building.

 
The very posh Trinity College - the students were playing croquet on the beautifully manicured lawns.

The very nice Wadham College.

Outside the Sheldonian.

Oh and a bit of book buying at our usual haunt - 2 books on body language for me today.

Another view of Trinity College.

We enjoyed a lovely walk through Christ Church Meadows and ended up here at the head of the river. We don't take boat trips any more as I get too travel sick! Walking is the much safer option.

Dad and daughter in the peaceful meadows.

Magdelean College.

The Bridge of Sighs.

Week 16 walk - The Stiperstones, South Shropshire.

Today's walk took me back to one of my favourite spots - The Stiperstones in South Shropshire. It has a very unique landscape & geology. It is full of huge rocks - it looks a bit like a lunar landscape and some of these rocks have broken away so that the ground is covered in smaller rocks - making it quite difficult to walk on. Usually there are fab views from the top - but today it was rather hazy - so nothing to see. I was out walking in the hills for about 5 hours and I had a wonderful time. I was not the only person up there today - there were quite a few school parties climbing on the rocks and also a few other walkers.

This what Wikipeadia has to say about it:- The Stiperstones is a very distinctive hill in the county of Shropshire, England. It is aquartzite ridge formed some 480 Million years ago. During the last Ice Age the summit stood out above the glaciers and was subject to constant freezing and thawing which shattered the quartzite into a mass of jumbled scree surrounding several residual rockytors. At 536 metres above sea level it is the second highest hill in the county, surpassed only by Brown Clee Hill (546 m). Stiperstones' five-mile (8 km) long summit ridge is crowned by several rugged, jagged outcrops of rock silouetted against the sky

 I was out this way to pick up a new geocache - so it seems the right thing to do - but to carry on up to the top.

Week 15 walk - Tarren Ridge from Abergonolwen, Mid Wales.

I have had the best walk of the year so far. A good 12 mile walk up from Abergonolwen, up to the Slate mines and then on to Tarrenhendre and along the Tarren Ridge and then down to Dolgoch Falls.

The views over to Cader Idris were spectacular. We were so lucky with the weather - it was a glorious day - even on the very top we were not blown about as I usually am on top of mountains.

We stopped here at this little bridge to find a geocache. The setting was gorgeous - it was one of my favourite stops of the day - until I sat on an ants nest!

This the Tarren ridge which we walked along.

These are the Dolgoch Falls - very pretty to admire = not so pretty to wade in - stupidly going to the wrong side to find a geocache!

This where we started the day from the small railway station at Nant Grwenol - the end of the Tal -y -Llyn railway.

Just a few of the geocaching stops along the way.