British Camp Reservoir

Saturday
Yesterday we drove down from Roger's family in Appleton, Cheshire to my sisters, near Gloucester, with a detour enroute to have lunch with Roger's sister and family between Cirencester and Malmesbury. The drive down was dreadful, taking us about an hour longer than usual, largely due to accidents on the M5. Laura drove all the way, being the first time she had driven in England, and the first time she had driven at all in over a year, since being in Macedonia. So it must have been quite a challenge for her, particularly to start with before getting on the motorway, but she handled it very well.

My brother Peter and his wife, Judy were supposed to be joining us at Janet's today, but unfortunately Peter had come down with a bad cold, so they were staying put for the time being. Colds always affect Peter really badly, going straight to his chest, and usually hanging around for a long time, so we were afraid we may not get to see them at all. After breakfast, we all went for a walk on the Malverns, together with Janet's dog Wispa. We always go walking on the Malverns when we are at Janet's, but this was the first time in a number of years that we had seen the views in the sunshine with good visibility! This is the view over British Camp Reservoir as we were climbing up Herefordshire Beacon. In the distance you could see the River Severn, in several places out of its banks and flooding the surrounding land.

Mid to late afternoon, Roger, Laura and I went out walking again, this time on the flat, along a cycle path beside the River Severn near Maisemore. This is an area that often floods, but at present the cycle path and adjacent road were open. We walked along to the Telford bridge at Over. Thomas Telford (1757–1834), one of Britain’s greatest engineers, designed a new bridge to replace a Tudor one that had been damaged by ice in 1818, and whose narrow arches had restricted river traffic. The new bridge, based on the 18th century bridge across the River Seine at Neuilly, built by the French architect Perronet, was opened in 1830. At the time it was the lowest practicable crossing point of the river. Despite early subsidence problems, the bridge withstood the increasing volume of heavy traffic passing over it until the early 1960s, when the present dual carriage and new steel bridge were built to the north. As we were walking we passed several horses tethered on the land between the path and the river, and I was hoping that their owner or person responsible for them was checking on them regularly, as it wouldnt take much increase in the river level for that land to be flooded. I asked my sister about them when we got back and she told me that they were checked on regularly and moved when necessary. However, she also said there had been an incident a few years ago, where the person responsible for the horses at that time was out of the country, and the horses were standing about knee deep in water before concerned citizens called it in to the RSPCA,

One year ago: Bluebell Creamery