From the hill fort

A busy, busy day today. Our friend Jane, widow of our dear friend Jerry from London, is staying, and I wanted to show her Stroud at its finest.

Unfortunately the weather had other ideas. The rain had started before we even got up, and there were few breaks between showers. Jane and I drove to town and went round the farmers market, where we bought Gloucester brewery beer, Godsells cheese, Cotswold pudding company sponge puddings (Gluten free now) locally made falafels, local cards ... you get the picture! I also tried on a non-local tailored coat that was embroidered in Malaysia, and a snip at £150! It was delightful, and felt wonderful on. So after that I went and bought a lottery ticket....

We came home and bumped into CleanSteve, and the skies still showed no sign of improving. So we set off anyway, to Prinknash Abbey, a monastery that overlooks the plain of Gloucester (when you can see it) with the Severn and Wales behind. I worked there, in the gift shop, for six months in 2005/6. At that time the Benedictine monks lived in a purpose built modern monastery that was completed in 1972. We called the building 'the telephone exchange' because it did have a very 197os rectangular-block feel. The monks have now moved back to the former monastery building, the one they moved out of in 1972. It is more secluded, which I think is good from a Benedictine point of view.

Jane and I wandered around the monastery garden, which is being restored, (a massive undertaking) and to the gates and immediate grounds of the monastery. All was verdant, tranquil and dripping. I'd wanted to find the cemetery, but the driveway past it had been closed off. By chance, I spotted a pathway that led us there.

The graves are very simple, all identical, so it feels a bit like being in a war cemetery. Anyone who is an oblate of the Benedictine order (a sort of layperson who supports the work of the order in their own way) can be buried there. Wild bugle flowers grew around the base of the graves. The skies began to clear. This was a welcome development.

Back we went to the teashop and monastery shop, which has been completely revamped since my brief time there. It is now much smaller and more homely, with fewer fridge magnets on sale. I had gluten free lemon polenta cake, and Jane bought a Cd of some monastic chanting from Prinknash's 'twin' abbey, Pluscarden, in North East Scotland. My mother used to go to services there, when she lived in Aberdeenshire. I found myself wising, while in the tea shop, that I could bring my mother there. She'd like it, but she lives in Argyll now and doesn't visit too often, because she finds walking up and down hills hard work, and I can't drive.

On the way back to Stroud, we took a detour up to the top of Painswick beacon, one of our local iron age hill forts. The sun was shining by now, and the view over seven counties clearly visible. (Gloucestershire, South Glos, Worcestershire, Herefordshire, Warwickshire, Oxfordshire, and Gwent, I think). I took some panoramas. This one looks a bit fish-eyed, maybe I was standing on a curve...

After taking a scenic wrong turn and ending up in the Gloucester suburb of Matson, we eventually got home and had time for a drink in the late sun in the cabin, while watching a ginger cat face off a fox in the long grass.