Ride report

It was fairly cool but sunny to start, with a cross tail wind. I ride across the Vale of White Horse and over the Downs got me to lunch at the cafe on Lambourne. As elsewhere, many places had flags and pictures of the late Queen, outside on the pavement was a statues of a dog with a black hat on its head, so the dogs were mourning too it seemed. On the way, the clouds were lined up in lines, quite unusual. After lunch at was a short ride to Marlborough ie, a bit early for afternoon tea. That didn’t stop me from having tea, though at £8.50 not the cheapest I’ve had. Surveying the expensive cars parked along the main street sort of explained the price of the tea.I avoided a stretch of main road leaving Marlborough by using a quiet stretch of Sustrans route,
after which it was narrow scenic but hilly lanes to the Bull Inn west of Pewsey. It was a camp site I have used before, and it was quite fine (pub doesn’t do food though, if you are thinking of going there). The original camp site/pub I was going to use didn’t reply to various e mails/phone calls/messages, so I played safe and went to the Bull (who did answer the phone). I was asked to camp somewhere “in the middle” to avoid using the powered pitches – I was hoping to camp near the edge under the one big tree to reduce the amount of dew and condensation on my tent over night, however, he must have read my mind, as he then said “or near the big tree”. The big tree also had the benefit of being covered on lights, so I had plenty of reading light when it was dark. A nice rural area, with a good dark sky making the Milky Way easily visible.