Headlines
I Invent My Own Breakfast
Shopping in High Wycombe
Hellfire Caves
Lunch with the Dashwoods
A Short Way in the Chilterns
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Stream of Consciousness
I Invent My Own Breakfast
Breakfast is all you can eat, fixed price. Neither of us is particularly hungry. Deb has cereal and fruit and yoghurt. I have waffles and berries and bacon and scrambled eggs, all together. Delicious.
Shopping in High Wycombe
We're in the tiny village of West Wycombe. High Wycombe is a town nearby. I'd read up on (High) Wycombe. Read about the gang battle in the street. The shooting on the dance floor. The exercise in anti-terrorism which supposedly turned up potential terrorists in the town and weapons in the woods.
We go to the Eden Shopping Centre, it's quite nice. We miss the carpark on the first try, I just do a U turn at the next roundabout. Then we drive up a spiral ramp -- round and round and round -- to get to the parking above the shopping level.
There are not too many shoppers, perhaps it's still early for the English shopper.
We go into a "man things" shop, full of clever and gimmicky stuff, much of which even Deb appreciates. I like the book called "Bike Porn"... It's full of pictures of push bikes: the gleamy, lightweight, high speed sort that cyclists drool over :-) We go into a bookshop and buy some children's books.
We look into a couple of other shops... then we're off again. The shops are different to the ones we're used to, the items for sale are a mixture of familiar and what on earth is that?! Even the carpark is easy -- now that we have a supply of English coins.
We drive back to West Wycombe. Do a bit of souvenir shopping. And on to Hellfire Caves... Which are amazing!
Hellfire Caves
There was a small cave, perhaps a chalk quarry, on a hillside. In the 1600s, the local lord helped the local peasants -- who were suffering from drought and failed crops -- by paying them to mine chalk. Not just dig it out -- but dig the mine in a pattern which the lord then used for club meetings.
The caves are a long, narrow, winding tunnel which occasionally opens up into large chambers. "Large" being the size of a small room. Except for one "banquet chamber" which would be five to ten metres across (I'm guessing) and three times that in height. The "club" was a group of rich and powerful men who gathered for debauchery... so they say... but no-one ever told stories. They met regularly. The AGM lasted a week...
It's a man-made cave. With fake stalagmites. A river (Styx ! ) which I think is a natural underground stream, diverted to suit. An amazing experience just to be in there. (The first paying visitors, in the 1950s, paid a shilling for entry and a candle... That would have been scary.) The history -- of the digging and of the restoration -- are a combination of eccentricitry and brilliance.
We enjoy the caves!
I also enjoy browsing some books for sale. One is a series of walks in the Chilterns, each walk passing at least one tea house :-) Another is called Hubbub, it's about the noise and filth and disease etc -- the down side -- of English life in the 1800s.
Lunch with the Dashwoods
We drive out of the village and stop at the first pub that we find, The Dashwood Arms. Share a fish finger baguette. The fingers seem to be freshly cooked! All very nice... including the very pretty (though chubby) waitress showing a sample of very deep cleavage.
A Short Way in the Chilterns
From the Dashwood we turn south -- on a random drive through country roads.
We're in the Chilterns, another officially declared "area of natural beauty". Rolling chalk hills, farms, fields, villages... Over lunch we read The Chilterns, a newsletter of the related conservation group. One article argued that the area had no specific theme, nothing recognisably unique. Just peace and beauty...
Deb suggests that they need a "Way"... Then we find a map of the Chilterns Way, 134 miles of a loop walk track. Next visit... :-)
We drive through this beautiful, peaceful countryside. Past villages, each with a pub. I think, we could do a pub crawl here... It seems to my memory that that pub crawl concept is the traditional young gentleman's country outing, from "old" English books. The Chilterns newsletter suggested that walking along roads was the done thing... until the 1970s when the roads became too busy... which was a big incentive for development of all the public footpaths through fields.
We reach Henley-on-Thames, park by the river, photograph what looks like a good stretch of river for a regatta, drive on.
A pleasant drive home. Relax. I sleep a bit.
Dinner at home, at the George and Dragon.
Tomorrow, a relatively early start... We're off to Birmingham airport. To return the car then to catch a plane to Dublin. On on on ! Tomorrow :-)
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Dr Nick Lethbridge / Agamedes Consulting
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"I feel that my enemy is anyone who would, given the power to do so, restrict individual liberty." … Chuck Pratt, 1965
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