On Thursday 11th April, the largest ever group of u3a Amblers met at Old Windsor Memorial Hall car park to commence our amble.
We walked up Church Road, all the way to the historic church of St. Peters and St. Andrews. We explored the grounds, but next time we enjoy this amble, I hope we can look forward to a guided tour of the church building from another knowledgeable member, who was unavailable on this occasion.
We then backtracked to the junction with Ham Lane, which we took around two sides of the extensive grounds of the “St. Georges Farm” property.
Upon almost reaching the bridge across to Ham Island, we turned right – taking the access road to Old Windsor lock, which also curves around another side of the ‘farm’. The lock itself was undergoing a maintenance project to replace the post and rail fences, which restricted the lock views somewhat. However, this was a minor inconvenience as there was no river traffic to view at this time of the year.
Mud caused by recent excess rain precluded a ’round-trip’ route for our amble, so we had to retrace our steps back to Ham Lane, where we noticed the giant baubles on a fir tree.
Continuing to retrace our route out, most of us enjoyed a hot chocolate, coffee or tea at the Toby Carvery. Some even had breakfast there before setting off!
The whole amble was the usual 4 km or 2.5 miles and took about 90 minutes. I intend to repeat this amble in the summer, when we can take a circular route there should be plenty of boating/lock action to view and I can hopefully arrange a viewing of the church interior. This time, we found the traffic on Ham Lane, without a pavement, was quite a distraction to peaceful ambling – and having to do it twice didn’t help.
Please enjoy the photos above and below, taken by Eileen Harris and the author.
Dave Humphries
Logged in members can see details of next month’s meeting here with convenor contact details.