We’ve been trying to make the most of the summer sun, while it lasts – we love autumn (the colours, the food…) but we’re not in a rush to see the back of the warm weather. What better way to enjoy the sun that a leisurely walk surrounded by some great scenery? Somerset (the land of cider, ooh arrr…) is a great place for it, and we found a great one this weekend.
South Bristol is a wonderful place to live – we can hop on a train at Parson Street or Bedminster station and in 5 minutes we’ll be in the middle of the countryside. It’s a really underrated part of Bristol, but don’t tell anyone – it’s quite nice to keep it quiet for a little while! Yatton station is a 15 minute train ride, and that’s where our walk started.
We followed the Strawberry Line for about an hour before lunch. The walk is as scenic as the quaint name – apparently given for the excellent strawberries of the south Mendips – would suggest. The path is extremely popular with cyclists (Fats loves cycling, Bird not so much – long story…) and they were out in force this weekend.
The walk we had found on the internet had suggested that we loop back round when we reached Congresbury and head back to the train station, but after sitting down for some sarnies (British for sandwiches – home-made white bread with local Somerset cheddar cheese and onion chutney) we decided to go on a bit of an adventure.
So we got our OS map out and plotted a walk that would take us through Ball Wood and up Cadbury Hill. This is an ancient late Bronze-age hill fort – about 3000 years old – though the last time it was occupied was during the Dark Ages. We fell in love with some of the houses on the way down, but thought it would be a bit cheeky of us to start snapping pictures! You can see the route we took below, so check it out for yourself if you’re ever in the area.
After wandering back through Yatton towards the station, we arrived on the platform just in time to see our train pull up – pretty fortunate since they only go once every hour!
After all the walking, we thoroughly deserved a hearty meal, so we threw together a really easy curry, using half a jar of Patak’s Rogan Josh curry paste, along with a couple of sweet potatoes, some frozen spinach, peas and cashew nuts. Divine! Check it out on instagram.
After last year’s wash-out summer in the UK the recent sun has been most welcome, long may it last!
Fats and Bird 