Wardour Castle is described by English Heritage as a 'romantic
ruin'. It certainly looked it yesterday evening as the sun slipped west
lighting the tops of the crumbling masonry. A Toyota Landcruiser from
Switzerland with a roof tent joined us for the night. We were in a secluded
part of Wiltshire in total silence with not even the call of a bird or the cry
of a wild animal.
After some light rain first thing, the sun broke through just in
time for breakfast. John wandered up to the castle which was now open, and was
able to take a photograph of it minus the porta loo which obscured the view
yesterday evening. A member of staff gave a potted history of the castle and
the building. The rain returning, we decided to pack up and begin our onward
journey, with Marge having to negotiate some very challenging narrow lanes back
to the main road.
As we headed towards Salisbury, we stopped to photograph the Cap Badges carved into the chalk hills of Fovant Down. They were constructed by regiments as they passed this way en-route to the front in the first world war. Originally there were twenty, but only eight remain now. More rain as we arrived in Salisbury, but by the time we'd found a suitable parking space for Marge the weather had settled.
A walk around the town and the cathedral, a
place we never tire of took up a couple of hours. At the cathedral we looked
through the lens of a spotting scope at the peregrine falcon and kestrel that
sat high up on the stonework.
Our plan was to stay overnight at Old Sarum on the edge of the
city, but after twenty minutes of listening to loud music from a car nearby
Angela knew it was not the place for her, so we drove on for an hour to Milford
on Sea, hoping to be able to park after reading thirty plus vans had stayed
there last night. Result, plenty of room, around twenty vans here tonight.
