Walking: Charlbury and Wychwood Forest

After a week of grey weather and heavy downpours (frequently, and annoyingly, managing to coincide exactly with my attempts to go for lunchtime walks) we decided to take advantage of a warm sunny Sunday by re-walking a route we've done twice before: the Wychwood circular walk from Charlbury.



Although we'd done the walk before, both times were later in the year (June 2016, when it provided a little balm to our Brexit-battered spirits, and a blazing hot day last July when the lack of shade on the final couple of miles from Chilson back to Charlbury made it feel like rather a slog), so the glorious display of bluebells we encountered came as a delightful surprise. We also saw the Cornbury Park deer herd, skylarks in the fields between Chilson and Charlbury and the first swifts of the year darting above Charlbury high street as we were setting off. At nine and a half miles, it's no longer the longest walk we've ever done (as it was the first time we did it), but it's stil a decent length, and is far enough into the Cotswolds to involve plenty of small but occasionally steep ascents and descents.