Wye Valley - Sep 2024

Testing our camping gear in the UK...
We had multiple goals this weekend - our first camping trip since moving to the UK: * Test the tent and other camping gear to make sure we have what we need, * Walk the Tidenham Tunnel, and * Find Underhill - a property where Rob and family visited often in the 70s and 80s. Spoiler-alert: We sucessfully met all goals including a 25 km hike as shown on this map.

We drove the short distance from home to Beeches Farm campsite in Tidenham Chase. For some it may not seem worth it to drive just one hour to pitch the tent for a weekend. For us it is perfect fun. Arriving at our campsite, the view did not disappoint.

We parked Percy in front of the tent and were happy to be able to do this without it raining on us. The weather had been miserable the week before, and it was miserable the week after. We were so lucky with sun that evening and all day Saturday.

One tarpaulin serves as ground sheet under the tent, and the lighter tarpaulin now works as an awning between the tent and Percy. With Percy's rear doors open it made for a perfect cooking and dining spot.

It didn't take us long to cook our dinner on the Trangia stove, followed by pancakes. A nice cup of tea made even better when it started to rain and we were nice and dry under the awning. The facilities at the campground were perfect for us including a sheltered bay to do the dishes. Our wonderful pop-up washing bowl is still with us from Canada.

Going to bed early meant we woke up quite early too. The weather was beautiful and we set off for our day-long walk. We had chosen this campsite because it is situated right next to several hiking trails in Wye Valley National Landscape. Our choice today was to first follow Offa's Dyke Path, South to Chepstow. Offa was an English king between 757 and 796. He had this giant dyke built to keep out the Welsh. Now that it is covered in trees it isn't easy to see how steep it is until you are walking along it, but it is now very good as a walking path along the top. It makes for an easy hike with very little up-and-down as opposed to what we experienced later in the day hiking north on the Welsh side of the River Wye...

The monks at Tintern Abbey used to walk along Offa's Dyke Path to their retreats and pilgrimages. We were also heading to Tintern Abbey - the long way around through Chepstow. At one point we could see the Abbey in the distance. Little did we know how tired we would be before we reached our destination in the afternoon.

Along the path we stopped by the Devil's Pulpit. Basically is an old tree that has grown through and around lots of rocks. Fun to look at, but surprisingly hard to capture in a photo. Legend has it that the devil would preach at the pulpit to tempt the monks that were walking past. It didn't work on them and it didn't work on us. A quick rest on the pulpit before we set off again. We wanted to find the Wye Valley Greenway so we could walk through Tidenham Tunnel.

The Tidenham Tunnel used to be a railway tunnel first for transporting people, and then later materials from the nearby Dayhouse Quarry. The last train ran in 1992. Now pedestrians on foot or wheels can travel through the tunnel.

The tunnel is 1.08 km long and you walk/cycle in near darkness. You mustn't bring a torch or use flash photography because bats now occupy the tunnel. We liked the bat-themed gates and a wooden crocodile at the entrance.

After passing through the gates, we had a spooky walk ahead. It was cold and knee-level dim lights helped lead the way. There is also a bend in the tunnel, so a few metres into the tunnel you cannot see daylight. Apparently, there is a chimney somewhere around the middle, but we didn't see it. We also didn't see, hear, or feel the bats. According to the sign they are Lesser Horseshoe Bats.

It was spooky going into the dark and wet tunnel, it was also fun to reach the end and find daylight again.

After the tunnel our trail started dropping down towards Chepstow. Quaint country roads (where quaint = narrow!), an iconic UK mailbox set into the wall of a house, and a sign welcoming us to Tutshill. Growing up Rob and family used to spend quite a bit of time in this area visiting a local boxer dog breeder. The first boxer their family took home was called Tuts, which is why it was extra fun to revisit the area and walk through Tutshill.

Crossing the bridge over the River Wye brought us back into Chepstow and Wales. "Croeso" is "Welcome" in Welsh. In the photo, Chepstow Castle ruins in the centre have more recent company from modern apartment buildings near the river.

Chepstow has several narrow and photogenic streets with cobble stones and stone houses. One particularly fun pub was called The Five Alls including: A soldier "I fight for all", a cardinal: "I pray for all", a queen "I rule for all", a judge "I plead for all", and a normal person: "I pay for all"... And as it happens the pub is closed and for sale. Things don't change much.

On our way out of Chepstow we caught our first sighting of the car brand Cupra. This is funny only to us and our friend JR who regularly used to watch UK television series together. To our great frustration, every advert seemed to be for this car brand that we had never heard of before: Cupra. And suddenly there it was, plain as day, in a car park in Chepstow.

Our next goal was a picnic lunch in Piercefield Park near the Chepstow horse racetrack. This was where Rob and family used to go to the Chepstow Agricultural Show back in the day. There wasn't much going on when we walked by, except a worker who was trimming the hurdles for horse racing. We think he did a good job as seen in the before and after photos below.

We hunted around for a picnic table in Piercefield Park but found only ruins and derelict old buildings. The grass was too wet for a traditional picnic on the ground, so we hopped up on a low wall in the ruins. From there we enjoyed the view, our sandwiches, a chocolate treat, and a cup of tea. Another shout-out to JR: Rob was finally able to do a direct comparison of a KitKat bar and a Swedish Kex bar. Earlier this year, Hild received two Kex bars from JR after his visit to Sweden. Sadly Rob was not around so Hild ate both bars and saved non for Rob. The error has been rectified!

After lunch we had to hunt a bit to find our hiking trail agaib, but with Hild on the case it wasn't too difficult. Soon we were treated to several spooky-looking caves in the cliff side combined with great views of the valley below.

Because of Hild's wimpy nature, we avoided going into any of the caves - except one which we had to walk through to continue on the path. It was called the Giant's Cave. While it was impossible to take meaningful photos in there, it was fun to have a look around. Rob emerged out of darkness and we were ready for more ups and downs along the cliff.

There were oh so many ups and downs: muddy paths, rocks to skip between, tree stumps to wobble across, narrow passages (needing Rob's support), and a 100 metre climb up 365 steps to the Eagle's Nest. We were thankful that we did not have to come down the unevenly sized, wobbly and slippery stone stairs.

Once we got to the top and the Eagle's Nest, we were rewarded with fantastic views. The photo below includes both the (old) Severn bridge and the (new) M4 bridge across the River Severn.

We were getting increasingly tired and more impatient about reaching Tintern Abbey. "Could it really be this far?". A sentence often spoke just before Hild realizes she had messed up navigation. Where we should have turned right, we turned left! This meant we spent way too long walking up and then down a path aptly named "Cold Well Spring". Very wet, very rocky, very wobbly, but also very conveniently leading straight to the Abbey (after we figured out the mistake). In Hild's defense, it must be pointed out that a frozen Google Maps image was the real cause of the error - from now on we are carrying a REAL compass as well as our phones!

Tintern Abbey was a welcome sight and a relief for our legs! Hild had no prior knowledge about Tintern Abbey and was surprised to find ruins rather than something more "Downton Abbey"-like. Still, the ruins and surrounding area looked like fun to explore. We'll save it for next time because all we could really manage for now was a bio-break and a cup of tea.

On our way back out of the town of Tintern we got to enjoy beautiful buildings, marketplaces, and even a group of Morris Dancers.

One house had a garden full of different kinds of chickens. It reminded us of Hege's collection of chickens in Norway. One sign warned us about these tiny raptors! But, we didn't get close enough to experience the wrath of a chicken. One of the chickens looked more like a ball of fluff, but she is a Lavender Silky. We have since learnt that people here keep a Silky in with their "normal" chickens. Apparently the breed is very good at brooding and she will collect abandoned eggs and try to hatch those too. Handy to have around the chicken coop, we reckon!

At long last, we reached the bridge that would bring us back across the River Wye and back to our tent.

The hike back up the hill to Beeches Farm was longer and steeper than we had hoped, so we kept ourselves busy by looking for odd things. This spiky chestnut was painful to pick up but fun to dissect when we got back home. It is edible but the horse chestnut is also green with (fewer) spikes and it is poisonous. You guessed it: we did not try to eat them - just in case.

We enjoyed a evening cooking and relaxing in our tent. The next day we went searching for the property Rob and his family visited many times in the 70s and 80s. Rob had searched satellite images and tried to remember left and right turns and going down steep hills, but it was a long time ago.... We also knew it was called "Underhill" so once we got there, we figured we would know were at the right place (given what else might have changed in the meantime). However, after some driving around, we successfully found the gate to the property. Hooray! The gate looked a lot better than it used to, so we figured we couldn't just drive up, but at least we found it. Here is a 3-minute video of the final approach so Martin and Liz can remember too. Pardon Percy's dirty windscreen.

We are ready for many more UK adventures.

September 2024

Back | Top of page | Forward