Walking: Tiddington to Lewknor

I had today off work as well, so we walked the fifth (and penultimate) stage of the Oxfordshire Way; ten and a half miles from where we left off in Tiddington to the junction with the Ridgeway near Watlington, plus another two and a bit miles down the Ridgeway to Lewknor Turn to pick up the Oxford Tube back to Thornhill park and ride where we'd left the car to save having to travel into Oxford and out again both ways.



It was a glorious sunny day, but still much cooler than last week with temperatures in the mid-20s and a bit of a breeze. This section was much more interesting than the last couple; although we stopped just short of climbing up into the Chilterns proper, for most of the day we were walking through a gently undulating landscape that seemed to have a clear kinship with the hills ahead. After climbing out of Tiddington through fields (including one with a sign warning of the presence of a bull, though the only animal visible was a black and white cat) we walked through the woods of the Rycote estate and crossed a golf course before descending to the village of Tetsworth and crossing under the M40, then crossing more fields and following a long tree-lined lane into Pyrton. About a mile and half south of Pyrton we turned on to the Ridgeway, which at this point actually turned out to run along the bottom of the Chiltern escarpment, rather than the top. It was a particularly pleasant section, mostly through beech woods (whose shade was very welcome by that point), emerging into open fields as it neared the motorway where we turned downhill again to reach the bus stop.

Unlike the last section, this is one I'd happily walk again, and in fact the public transport links make it very easy (in particular, the trip from Lewknor back to Thornhill is incredibly quick). I'm also looking forward to the next and final section through the Chilterns to reach the Thames at Henley, although the public transport back from that is less good (changes at Twyford and Reading).

Reading: The Sibyl in Her Grave

The Sibyl in Her Grave is the fourth and, sadly, last of Sarah Caudwell's Hilary Tamar mysteries. Unlike the first three, it's not available as a Kindle edition, but cheap secondhand paperbacks seem to be in plentiful supply.

Like the other Tamar novels, The Sibyl in Her Grave is largely epistolary, with Tamar's detecting (such as it is) mainly taking place from the comfort of a Lincoln's Inn wine bar on the basis of their correspondents' descriptions of the events where they are. In this case, the main correspondent is Julia Larwood's Aunt Regina, whose village investment syndicate seems to be mixed up in a potential insider dealing case which is concerning one of Selena's clients. Tamar and the junior barristers of 62 New Square set out to try to work out what the connection is, and therefore which of Selena's client's suspects is the guilty party, a task complicated by a series of unexpected events in the Sussex village where Aunt Regina lives, beginning with the sudden death of Isabella del Comino, 'psychic counsellor' and one of the more difficult residents of the village.

Although I tend to think that, with the Tamar books, the detection is only an excuse for 300-odd pages of witty banter and arch observation, this one kept me guessing until the end, with plenty of red herrings and dead ends, and just enough clues dropped about some things for the reader to get there a few pages ahead of Tamar. Mostly, though, I simply enjoyed it for the wittty banter and arch observation, and the relationships between both the recurring set of characters and Aunt Regina's friends in her village. It's a delightful read; having read all four, the books are definitely going on my list of comfort re-reads, and to facilitate this I have secondhand paperbacks of the first three coming to join this one.