In September 2020 Pat & I finally arrived home after 6 months away. Not quite the trip that we had planned.

While, technically, we were forced into lockdown 200 miles from home and the first couple of weeks were a little fraught, the stay in Oxfordshire turned out to be extremely enjoyable.

For those who don’t know, we intended to go on a 6 month trip to Central America and west coast USA. We had let our house and then someone in China licked a bat.

No. Not that kind of bat.

The timing could not have been worse. The situation regarding the pandemic moved very quickly in those days of mid March 2020 and we faced the prospect of being homeless. We couldn’t go home (let), we couldn’t stay in our temporary cottage (booked) and neither could we move in with our son (living in RAF on-base accommodation) whose house purchase was in limbo/doubt as the property market closed down.

We even considered flying to Costa Rica and hunkering down on a beach there. How mad does that seem in retrospect? As it happened, and like many of the decisions we had to make, this one was dictated to by the actions of others.

Costa Rica banned foreigners. Thank you. Boris introduced lockdown, which amongst other things meant holiday homes could not take any new bookings. Thank you. The developer building our son’s new house went into overdrive to get him in by 31st March. Thank you.

British Airways eventually refunded our flights via the travel agent, our holiday home landlord offered us the opportunity to stay throughout the summer at a much reduced rate and our son moved in to his new home.

Pat was sent a text message advising her to shield as she was on the list of c2 million at risk.

“If they think I’m staying in, they’ve got another think coming.” Her only response; or at least the only response that can be repeated here.

We were in Alvescot, a small village just outside Carterton, the town built around the RAF base at Brize Norton. It had a pub, The Plough, which looked inviting enough, as did many others that we would encounter over the next couple of months, but it was closed.

Alvescot, we were informed was home to Gary Barlow of Take That. Indeed he lived about 6 doors down. His pile a little larger than ours. Clearly, his tax adviser was better than mine! We also learned that Pam Ayers had once lived in the cottage next door. There may be something in the air of this village that inspires the wordsmith, although, single-handedly I may be proving any theories along these lines to be false.

No pubs, no restaurants and no tourist attractions open. This was going to be no holiday. What to do La?

Walking was the answer.

We set out to discover our rural idyll. With Google Maps we checked out the footpaths and bridleways connecting the neighbouring villages. Over the weeks ahead we built quite a portfolio of ‘different’ walks encompassing various routes across fields, along old railway tracks and on the by-ways of this part of West Oxfordshire. Averaging 5 or 6 miles meant that we were technically breaking the rules and guidelines of only going out for an hour’s exercise each day. But, throwing caution to the wind, we donned our walking boots and cocked a snook at the Three Wise Men, and a woman who appeared daily on our screens advising and admonishing us , in equal measure.

We are not country people, although I do like Countryfile. “What’s that plant?” A refrain often heard from one or other of us. I downloaded an App called Seek.

What a wondrous world that opened up. Point phone at plant and hey presto! name of plant. We now both know our celandine from our groundsel, scabious from our campion. Who knew? The hedgerows of England are full of life!

On and on we walked. Passing and passing comment on the lovely village pubs, the majority called The Plough or The Swan, with their inviting gardens. Perfect stopovers for the thirsty walker. Alas we would have to wait. We would also have to bide our time in the immediate vicinity until restrictions were lifted. The one saving grace was the weather, which had been glorious.

When those restrictions were lifted we expanded our horizons; North to the far side of the A40 and discovered beautifully landscaped walks around Burford and The Barringtons amongst others; to the South at Faringdon and along the Thames Path near Lechlade, Buscot, Kelmscott and Radcot; to the West at Bibury, visited without the crowds and East Leech and last but not least, to the East, Bampton, used to represent Ripon in Downton Abbey.

We were cooking on gas now. The world our Lobster. The Pub our refuge.

Andy had been our support when slots for online supermarket deliveries were like hen’s teeth. We gave him our first shopping list and he duly arrived at the front door, left the bags on the threshold and socially distanced, while we thanked him, took in the groceries and started to unpack.

A pack of Beck’s Blue not the best start. “Sorry, I hadn’t noticed it was alcohol free.” Forgivable.

Just two bottles of wine. “Are you coming again tomorrow?” Totally unforgivable.

We signed up to two online suppliers of wine as soon as he drove off!

As a “shielded person”, Pat was entitled to register on the government website to enable priority delivery slots from the major supermarkets. She registered. What we didn’t know was that this, as well as advising the supermarkets, also alerted your local Council of a vulnerable person and our tenants were soon e-mailing us to ask what they should do with the “Red Cross” parcel that had arrived! Three boxes later we were able to put a halt to this largesse.

Is this what a shielded person, assumed to be of a ‘certain age’, requires for one week’s sustenance? Tinned peaches were my late father’s favourite. But no Werther’s Originals.

The summer was spent fully engaging with village life. We clapped the NHS workers, we lamented the cancelled “Wimblescot” village tennis tournament, unofficially judged the Scarecrow competition, although no one but us knew we had done this and most importantly we experienced the growing of the barley, wheat, oats, rapeseed and mung beans (just one field on a distant walk). We said good day to the lesbian dog walkers. The walkers not the dogs were thus inclined. We even marvelled at how quickly the flies and insects turned a freshly laid pile of manure to dust.

On and on we walked. Shipton under Wychwood and Woodstock.

We arranged to have 3 weeks in France and booked accommodation for the first two weeks, leaving the third free, to keep our options open. The middle week was to be at the Holiday Property Bond in the Dordogne. We have had an investment in this since 1993. For the first weekend away we had booked a Chateau in the Loire at which to celebrate our Ruby wedding anniversary. Where did those years go?

The FCO advised against all but essential travel, thus voiding our travel insurance and requiring us to self isolate on return. This was not an issue as we felt we had plenty to do around the house after 6 months away. However, the HPB decided to close down. France looked as if it was on an upward trend as far as the virus was concerned. We aborted the trip.

So, we carried on walking. Kidlington and Abingdon to Oxford. And we ventured further afield to meet up with old friends in Chalfont St Giles (1 hour and 10) and Cheltenham (50 minutes).

Desperate to have a holiday, we booked to go to Lulworth Cove over the Bank Holiday weekend and our anniversary meal was had in a local hotel restaurant. Nice but it ain’t no Chateau.

On the way back we visited Stonehenge. I had seen it from the road on many an occasion but Pat had not. She was quite underwhelmed at how small it is. “FFS. The poor ancients had to bring them stones from Wales on one donkey” She’s more impressed now.

A final weekend was arranged near Bath and a walk along the canal from Bradford on Avon to the spa town was ticked off.

We spent the last couple of weeks, when not visiting Dorset and Somerset, house sitting at Andy’s. He was on a temporary overseas posting (I can’t say where or I’d have to shoot you) in Cyprus. Doh!

And of course we went on more walks. On our last evening we added up the steps/mileage and discovered that if only we had made a little more effort (60 miles) we would have walked the distance from Land’s end to John O’Groats (815 miles).

We loved Oxfordshire and Pat says that we should move there. We may do, if only I would make more effort in winning the lottery.

The past year and a half has been spent in Knaresborough and apart from a 3 week break in France in September 2021 we have had our travels curtailed…but not any more.

In May we will be off to the USA for just shy of 3 months. Let the fun begin.