White Horse in the wind

Sat 22 Nov ‘25. DH, RW, TO, BFS, PCL, DL, Albus & Maisie

This week had seen the first couple of frosty days of this winter, with low temperatures but great visibility under clear blue skies so it was looking hopeful that it might last through to Saturday morning, but unfortunately for us the high pressure shifted allowing the southerly air flow to pull in warmer air with plenty of wind and rain forecast for Saturday morning. When I found out who was available for selection this week, I decided to rerun a walk that just four of us completed a few weeks ago, as it would be just Deryck and myself who would be re-walking familiar ground.

We left Wincanton with a light misty rain falling, but as we made our way up the A303 via Mere to the A350 there were a few heavier patches. By the time we rounded the top end of Salisbury Plain above Warminster it was a lot brighter and considerably drier than back home.

In looking for a suitable parking space to start from today, I contacted the new re-opened Pickleberry Cafe in Bratton where we would be having breakfast to gain permission to park and walk from there, but I also contacted an old military friend to enquire if he would like to join us on on stroll and allow us to park on his driveway, some 500 meters or so closer to our intended route. Thankfully Dave was more than keen and happy to oblige (despite it being his fourty five wedding anniversary) and so having initially met up at the White Horse viewing point car park just outside of Westbury, the car of three from Bruton tucked in behind the three of us from Wincanton to drive the last mile up to Dave’s house on the edge of Bratton. As we parked up on the drive, Dave was already putting his waterproofs and boots on and once we were also suitably dressed and the introductions had been completed, we set off for a anti-clockwise loop up a path running parallel to a narrow lane.

The park ran south across the side of some private gardens and at the end we turned right past a few large properties and onto a narrow path for a steady start to the climb. Dave, as a member of the local history group was telling those around him about the village which used to exist in the valley bottom, but which appears to have ‘collapsed’ during the great plague. On our last visit to The White Horse, we came down this path and Chris enjoyed an apple off of a tree, but this time as we climbed, all than remains were a heap of fallers on the ground. As we gained height, the view into the Coombe and back down to the village church opened up and then the end of the path as we joined the Portway road, the gradient inevitably increased and the pace slowed accordingly.

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