John’s report: The first surprise of the day was when we arrived at the car park to find that around 2/3 of it had been roped off by a film company. (They wouldn’t tell us what they were filming!!). Anyway, there was enough room for us, the sun was shining, the sky was blue and 11 of us set off down the hill and past the Hell Fire caves. We then tackled the first (of many) hill which bought us up near a knight in shining armour mounted on his trusty steed. Was this a heroic member of the Dashwood family? In fact no, it was created for the filming of Carry on Cleo!! A down followed by an up took us to Booker Common where we made use of the plentiful benches for a mid morning break. We carried on and there was much activity at Booker airfield – we stopped to watch a light aircraft to take off. Onwards to lunch at Lane End where the tables outside are on common land so we could eat our lunch there while enjoying a drink from the pub. The next surprise was when we reaches Wheeler End and we were delighted by the display of bluebells. We saved the toughest two ascents to last – up from Piddington and finally up to the ridge at West Wycombe in time for the last flat half a mile or so. A good training walk as we get closer to Dovedale. Last chance for more training is Christmas Common on Saturday.
