22nd May 2010
Another baking hot day so we set off as early as possible. We parked on the main road in Nuneham Courtenay and made our way to the start of the walk. I'm sorry to say the first direction had us both stumped. It said we had to walk towards the church - but we couldn't see a church anywhere! It wasn't until we were on the other side of the field that the church came into view - a little puzzling. This part of the walk was so relaxing. A stroll along meandering country lanes, past a lovely little lake and finally heading towards the Global Retreat Centre http://www.globalretreatcentre.org/. We then walked along the back of some woods where we could see bluebells amongst the trees. We even walked under another wretched pylon and didn't complain!
Then everything changed. We came out of the woods and in front of us was the Culham Science Cente. Our instructions told us to follow the concrete path bordering the centre and so we walked and walked, with no shade and scorching heat, around a high fence, unsure if we were even going in the right direction! We asked anyone we passed if we were heading the right way and kept our fingers crossed that we would soon come to the railway bridge to move towards the river. Directions were really sketchy here and the OS map didn't really help. We only found the railway bridge by chance and the heat was quite exhausting, it seemed as if that concrete path was never going to end! We were expecting the next part of the walk, along the River Thames, to be the most relaxing but a roaring noise was getting louder and louder and we were shocked to realise we were approaching a moto x racing circuit! It hit a crescendo as a race started just as we walked past it..... so noisy - we very quickly realised that we had come to the end of our lovely quet Sunday morning walk!
Once past the bikes, the last mile was stunning. The river was beautiful. We enjoyed waving to the passing boats and spotting the wildlife as we walked along. We soon reached Abingdon Lock - and then headed straight for the ice cream stall in the park because we were hot and exhausted!Overall we both really enjoyed this walk. It didn't feel like we had walked over 5 miles and parts of the walk were idyllic. We would both recommend the start and the finish.... but maybe not the bit in the middle!
