Tuesday 4th June - Pylle walk

As I had limited time today, I decided not to range too far from home.  I thought that, instead of trying to see whether I could actually find the West Mendip Way over Milton Hill this time, I might go to explore Biddle Combe, having walked along the edge of this wood the day before.

The first part of the walk would be along easy, well-known paths, along Golf Links Lane to join Old Frome Road.  In fact, they were so well-known that I forgot to turn west into Old Frome Road at all, but continued south down Old Bristol Road to join the A37, as if I was walking to work in Shepton Mallet.  On the spur of the moment, I decided that there was no particular reason why I needed to go to Biddle Combe today.  I could simply continue south past Shepton, and see if I could get to – oh, why not Pylle?

I texted PDB11 to tell him about the change in plan.  He texted back to ask whether, if I was going in this direction, I could drop into Thorner’s Farm Shop and pick up some apples, as we had run out.

I proceeded through Shepton and down Compton Lane, and there I saw something amazing: a caterpillar stocking.  A moth (or, more likely, a whole colony of moths, since it’s hard to imagine one small insect containing that much silk) had woven, on a branch of a thorn bush (which had virtually broken under its weight) a long, cylindrical silk nest filled with eggs.  By now, some of the eggs had hatched, and there were a few hairy black caterpillars crawling around on the outside.  They had already munched almost to nothing the leaves on the surrounding branches of the bushes.

According to the Woodland Trust’s caterpillar identification guide, these were small eggar moth caterpillars.  I took some photographs, which unfortunately I can’t post here.

I passed through Compton, crossed the A361, and, on the other side of the road, took a path south-east across the fields to Beard Hill Farm.  I hoped that, after crossing the A37, I could take paths across the fields and woods on the eastern side of the road as far as Higher Bagborough Farm, since there wasn’t a pavement along the road at this point, and walking along a busy main road didn’t look appealing.

I had a little trouble finding the track east from Beard Hill Farm towards Yew Tree Farm, and even resorted to climbing over a barbed wire fence into the small patch of woodland.  There, I blundered about until I found a signpost to the public right of way leading across the fields to Higher Bagborough Farm, where, even if there wasn’t a clearly visible path, I could simply follow a compass bearing.

By the time I got back onto the A37, it had a pavement again, and Stockwood Farm Buildings, the complex containing Thorner’s, wasn’t far off.  I went in, bought my apples, and wondered whether to go to the café next door for a sit-down and a cup of tea, but resisted.  I had a Village Hall Committee meeting in the evening, and ought to be back by 4.30, or 5 at the latest, if I was going to map my route, get washed and changed into clean clothes, and decide whether I was in a fit state to walk to Ashwick & Oakhill Village Hall.  

It was nearly 1pm, and taking the most direct route back, along the Fosse Way, looked more appealing now, even though the Fosse Way was the A37 here.  Quite a bit of it had pavements, and the rest had grass verges.  I made my way north, periodically retreating against the verges to let cars pass.  

Soon I was passing through Shepton, where a sign at Dobbies Garden Centre advertised ‘hot tubs, swim spas and endless pools’.  This fascinated me, as I wondered what an endless pool looked like.  Perhaps it was ring-shaped?  Or a simple circular pool could qualify.  It just mustn’t be the conventional rectangular pool with a deep end and a shallow end, where you could count how many lengths you had swum.  At any rate, it was unlikely to be endless in the sense that, once installed, it would last for all eternity.

I passed under the Charlton Viaduct, and up the familiar Fosse Way.  By now, it was starting to rain, and I had to consider my route.  If I walked through Harridge Wood, even the light drizzle might have turned into something heavy enough to make the terrain muddy and sticky.  By the same token, if I turned west at Tanyard Farm and decided to come home by the lanes through Oakhill, then the steep hill of Ash Lane could be wet and slippery.

I turned east at Tanyard Farm instead, onto Fosse Road, and followed the lanes around the outside of Harridge Wood and home.  My feet were aching enough that I picked up a branch from the roadside as an impromptu walking stick.  I had, I discovered when I mapped the route, done 16 miles, and if I walked to the Village Hall Committee meeting and back, this would add another 3 miles to my day’s total.

After a short rest, a mug of tea and a bath, I felt recovered enough to do this.  The café is still struggling for volunteers, which made me feel a bit guilty about taking so much time off this month.  Caroline said she had more or less got it covered for Wednesday 5^th June, but looking up at the rota later, I notice that they still need someone to wash up.

So I’d better do that.  It’s a bit of a delay, especially as, when I looked for the camera to post the pictures of the moth nest, I discovered that I seem to have lost it.  I can’t find it around the house, implying that it fell out of my bag somewhere on the walk after I photographed the moths’ nest.  I’d better go out and try to retrace my steps to look for it – but I ought to do my shift at the café first.

Still, I’ve found that I can combine a good day of walking with other tasks like attending a meeting, which is encouraging in itself.  19 miles today brings me up to 73 so far.

Another member of the committee, Kim, was amazed when I told her that I had been averaging 18 miles a day.  She said, ‘I’ve just done a 12-mile sponsored walk in one day, and that was exhausting enough!’

I promised to sponsor her, and asked her to send me a link.  After all, the point of a sponsored event is that it is a personal challenge.  I’m lucky in that I have enough free time to do something like this – and that I work somewhere 4.5 miles from home and don’t have a driving licence, and that the Village Hall Committee had raised the money for outdoor gym equipment as well as a café, so that, between walking to work and pedalling on the exercise equipment at the gym, I had time to get fairly fit before starting.  But that doesn’t make the cause Kim is fundraising for, Crisis, a charity that helps homeless people in Britain, any less worthy than my fundraising for Tree Aid, the UN Refugee Agency and the Woodland Trust.  If you're interested in sponsoring Kim, you can click on this link to donate to her appeal.