The Wednesday Walk 8th July 2009

The Plan

To meet at Beatrice and Tony's for a walk in the forest.

The Leader

Not too sure. Could have been Wendy or Trudy or Trisha. Let's call it a combined effort.

Who Turned Up

Wendy, Diane and Tony R, Trisha, Marion and Roger, Ros, Trudy, Beatrice, Pam (and friend) and David.

The Walk

It was a great day for a walk. It was also a special occasion because Marion and Roger had flown all the way from the United States especially to be with us on one of our Wednesdays walks. Well, maybe they did also plan to look in on Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London, but those must rank as minor attractions when compared with a Wednesday walk!

To start the day, we drove to Frogham and parked within smelling distance of the Forester's pies. Then we took a leisurely stroll across the heathland arriving back at the Foresters well before all the pies were sold. Wendy did mention seeing some flowers with some unpronounceable name, but they were sitting in a vase on the pub table. Someone swapped his shirt for a Mr Greedy tee-shirt before entering the pub, but what else can you expect from a committed pie lover?

It's worth mentioning that this walk was where Marion and Roger were introduced to the concept of a New Forest pony: an animal who thinks he owns the place. Actually, he probably does. Anyway, the ponies were, as usual, seen in abundance around the pub.

After lunch, we took another leisurely ramble, stopping at the Frogham church to see the forest animal window. Wendy wanted to show Roger an olde English country stile, but the best we could do was show him what we call a kissing gate. No, Roger, it's not an excuse for kissing your wife, it's a description of how the gate works! This was probably one of our shorter walks, but no less enjoyable for that. At the end of the day we returned to Beatrice and Tony's for tea and cakes. Many thanks Bea.

The Pub

It was the old faithful; the Forester's at Frogham. It's almost become one of our trusty old regulars by now. Surprisingly, only two people sampled the pie. Well done, Roger! Next time we'll convert you from Guinness to Real Ale.