Route Tips
If
your app provides notes on
the road surfaces etc. keep
in mind that they are automatically generated and only as good as the
underlying open source mapping.
The
1 mile run on the return leg from North Weston to the Thame
Roundabout, is on the busy A418, but you can use the dual use
footpath alongside.
The
Phoenix Trail is gravel and / or hard earth and
in my experience, even after wet weather, presents few problems for a bike with anything other than the
flimsiest tyres. The
start at Thame can be difficult to find. The last waypoint note covers this.
Zooming Out
The
Aylesbury Vale is the valley of the River Thame. It has been
suggested that this was one of several routes of the Thames, long
before Ice Age glaciation diverted it through the Goring Gap to its
present course. A lot of the valley floor is clay, with the low hills
and outcrops of harder stones that resisted
erosion.
For
early man, clay wasn’t easy to plough, and the heart of the vale
wasn’t a densely populated area. It still isn’t. As a result the 'enclosure' of the old open fields and their devotion to sheep started fairly early here while the return to arable use awaited the exigencies of the world wars and the arrival of stronger ploughs.
In contrast the land below the Chilterns scarp was rich and fertile, blessed with
streams emerging from the foot of the chalk scarp and access to the hills for grazing.
The result was the string of villages, of which Ewelme is an example.
But while the local agricultural economy did well in the centuries
immediately after the Norman Conquest, it went sharply into reverse
later in the 1300’s as the climate cooled, soils were exhausted and
crop failures were followed by the Black Death at a time when England
was almost constantly at war.
Marginal villages shrank or
disappeared, a process that continued for several centuries as the
country adjusted to changing economic and social circumstances, not
least of which were the increasingly better paid and footloose
agricultural workforce and the enclosure (privatisation!) of swathes
of the farmland. That gave us the ‘rationalised’ layout or rectangular fields with straight(ish) roads and field boundaries that you see today. It proved profitable, hence the well-built churches.
Meanwhile, as the hoi polloi struggled as usual, middling folk people started investing in their property, adding windows, storeys and staircases and leaving what are now those olde worlde cottages so beloved by biscuit tin makers.
If you want to know more about this, check the post on local Landscape History at (Link) Pootler : Other Stuff
A. Princes Risborough
Princes Risborough lies at end of a gap in the Chilterns that was once an important connection between the Icknield Way and the Thames. Now there isn't a lot to see. After 1066 the place passed from King Harold to Bill the Conq. and later still to the Prince in the name. He was the famous 'Black Prince' who was instrumental in the English victories at Poitiers and Crecy in 1346 while marauding around France and whose manor is now buried under the car park. He had a stud farm here, with horses with names like Grisel, Tankarvill, and Morel de Salesbirs. It beats Dobbin! The waypoint photo depicts his effigy in Westminster Abbey.
A spectacularly pitiful list of famous residents includes Jamie Kay of Jamiroquai (I can only remember his headgear).
B. Through Adwell & Postcombe
The land to the south of the road between Adwell and Postcombe, was one of the last with the medieval-style open field 'strip farming' referred to earlier. One of the strips was named Saltwey because the local Abbot partly paid the local folk in salt for helping to harvest hay. It is now 'Salt Lane.
Another legacy of the farming landscape is the ancient north–south tracks, linking the valley farming hamlets with the Chiltern Scarp and which were originally used to reach the hillside grazing.
Beyond Adwell, you climb over Clare Hill on the old road linking Thame to Wallingford, from where you could reach London by river.
C. Brightwell Baldwin & John Ye Smyth
Unusually, when the Victorians decided to ‘improve’ St Bartholomew’s church, they sublimated their proclivity for vandalism and kept many of the older features, leaving us a truly comely building shaded by an impressive ancient yew. The story goes that these ancient trees are often found in churchyards (and some pre-date the churches) because they were emblematic of eternal life and provided good rain cover for itinerant preachers!
In the North Aisle (i.e. on the wall facing the main entrance) there is a brass plaque to John Smith who died in 1371. Wikipedia reckons (so it must be right?) that this might be the oldest known inscription in English. It reads:
'man com & se how schal alle ded li: wen yolk comes bad & bare moth have ben ve awa? fare: All ?s werm?s yt ve for
care:—bot yt ve do for god ?s luf ve haue nothyng yare: yis graue l?s John ye sm?th god yif his soule hewn grit'.
Useless fact. When 'ye' means you, it is pronounced 'ye'. When it means 'the' like it does here, it has always been pronounced 'the'. Quite simply, the character originally used for 'th' was a 'thorn' and it looked like this 'þ'. People then often stuck the 'e' on top! Early printers couldn't replicate this and substituted a 'y'. Eventually, people started to pronounce it 'y'. Ignorant fools!
D. Ewelme - Chaucer & Jerome K Jerome
Ewelme (pronounced Ewe-ulm) is lovely and on top of that the shop in the village centre also serves as a café with a nice place to sit outside overlooking the 'oldest primary school in continuing use in England'. It provides a good bike pump, inner tubes and water bottle refills etc. Excellent.
Odd name. In the Domesday Book Ewelme appears as Auuilme which apparently means 'powerful spring'. For obvious reasons people like to settle where there was fresh running water and hereabouts this meant where the springs emerged at the base of the chalk escarpment.
Ewelme was a significant centre in medieval times, owing much to two families who grew from rags to riches. William De La Pole, later the Duke of Suffolk, was the Great Grandson of a wealthy wool merchant who helped to finance the wars of the early Plantagenet Kings whose devious and deadly doings inspired 'Game of Thrones'. William settled in Ewelme and married Alice, the granddaughter of Geoffrey Chaucer of 'Canterbury Tales' fame. He was her third husband, having been hitched to her first aged only eleven.
 |
| De La Pole. Posing. |
The family had more up and downs than the Blackpool Roller Coaster which, as you know, was until recently the tallest in the world. William's Dad was killed at the siege of Harfluer in the 100 Years War and his brother Michael copped it at Agincourt only a few months later. William himself survived long enough to be captured by Joan of Arc and imprisoned in France, but not before he had fathered an illegitimate child after a bit of nun-fun.
Once home he assumed a diplomatic career, negotiating the loss of England's French territories as part of a marriage deal for the useless Henry V1. People weren't too pleased with this. After a stay in the economy suite at the Tower of London, on a boat on his way into exile, William's head was forcibly detached by a rusty sword. It washed up on Dover Beach.
Alice herself was an intelligent and cultured woman who wasn't to be crossed! She was married to De La Pole at the age of eleven and later became the Castellan at Wallingford, was arraigned by the King, lent money to the King, opportunistically changed sides in the War of the Roses and had property in 22 countries.
Things didn’t get better for his brood. They were associated with the losing side in the Wars of the Roses and some also crossed the Channel. Their subsequent involvement in plots to invade England didn't endear them to Henry V111 and they never returned. The consolation prize came a century or so later when William got a major role in Shakespeare's 'Henry V1'. But the Bard didn't change the ending.
 |
| Suffolk's execution |
The Church here is almost 600 years old and hasn't been altered too much. Thomas and Alice are buried there, the latter in a tomb with a visible and gruesome 'stone cadaver' underneath her more conventional effigy. Take a look, as did Queen Victoria who apparently wanted to find out how a lady should wear the Order of the Garter. (See the photo here).
 |
| The Stone Cadaver |
Generally the De La Pole's seem to have been a treacherous, corrupt, generally unpleasant and infectiously unlucky lot. Alice was no angel. But they did fund the almshouses behind the church which are worth a look. At the same age as the church, they are reckoned to be among the very oldest dwellings in continued use in the country. If you want a bit more detail see: (Link) Fordsfarm : Ewelme History
Jerome K Jerome, the author of 'Three Men in a Boat', resides in the graveyard. He was also a self-made man but made a good living writing and ended up as a freeman of Walsall! The honour! The Glory! Jerome crops up again in my Goring Gap Route. Incidentally, the 'K' stands for Klapka. His siblings fared no better. One sister was called Blandina, his brother was Milton Melancthon and his Father's middle name was Clapp; not a good name for a Reverend in those censorious times.
Until 1988 the clear chalk stream through the village supported watercress growing. It likes the clean, flowing water coming from springs and wells, because that is less likely to freeze in the winter, and was traditionally harvested in time to serve as a supplement to the winter diet. The brick walled beds were restored by the Chilterns Society and, while they are rarely open to the public, can be seen from the road in places.
You go past the end of the runway at RAF Benson shortly after leaving Ewelme. In WW2 this was the base for Wellington and Mosquito bombers and Spitfires. Now, it is a helicopter base, with Puma and Merlin HC3 helicopters. That seems odd to me. How much space do you need to land a helicopter?
The location has some history. The Anglo Saxon Chronicle recorded that in 777:
'her Cynewulf & Offa gefuhton ymb Benesingtun & Offa nam pone tuun'
Just in case your Old English isn't up to scratch, that means that the King of Mercia, Offa of Dyke fame, duffed up the West Saxons hereabouts; a victory that resulted in Wessex recognising Mercian overlordship.
F. Chalgrove Village, Airfield & Manor
If you are interested in those old churches, detour into the village where St Mary’s dates back to the 1100s. It has a full set of medieval wall paintings that miraculously survived the vandalism of the reformation to tell the story of Christ from King David to the Day of Judgement.
The Airfield itself was the site of the Battle of Chalgrove Field in 1643 where the Cavalier Prince Rupert, Charles 1st wingman, defeated a Roundhead army.
In World War Two it was used by the US Army. Now it used for testing the ejector seats that are supplied to air forces around the world. So if you fancy buying a really unusual component for your bike.....
G. Ickford Bridge & Ickford - You are now leaving Oxfordshire
At the bridge you leave Oxfordshire for Buckinghamshire. Boundary stones inserted into the Bridge attest to this and suggest that it was built in 1685. And take a look in the river where you can. There are reputedly Roach, Perch, Tench, Bream and Pike in it. There used to be Eels too.
The village itself is a bit further along the road. It has shuffled about a bit over time and if you look at the fields beyond the church, you can see some 'ridge and furrow' ploughing patterns left over from the medieval open fields and the mounds which is all that is left of the hamlet that farmed them.
After the Civil war the local bigwig was a parliamentarian named Thomas Tipple. He probably arranged the prebend and its attendant income for the equally wonderfully named Calybute Downing. But following the Restoration of the Monarchy the boot was applied to his backside and the prebend was among the goodies that passed to the more boringly named Gilbert Sheldon, who already had several livings to his name and eventually became Archbishop of Canterbury and presumably a lot richer still.
Even during Cromwell's reign the niceties of class were not lost on the denizens of Ickford. In the Church the strange rectangular opening low down on the north wall was probably a 'hagioscope', inserted when the posher members of the congregation don't want to be seen by the plebs.
The road from here into Thame is busy but bikes can use the footpath. You can then either follow the cycle route that runs through the sports centre (watch out for the signs - they are small and not always clearly visible), or visit Thame (see below) which is worth a look.
I. Thame - Grossteste & a threat
Thame, like Thames, is a Brythonic name meaning dark river. As I understand it, in the early days the town centred on the area around the church and the bridge over the river on the road to Long Crendon.
The church itself is suitably ancient, having been rebuilt at the behest of Bishop Grossteste 1250's. The name Grossteste means 'big head'. He was quite a character, described by some as a medieval Dr Johnson, a philosopher and a wizard, and by others less charitably.
The Church itself must have been quite wealthy judging by the size of the 500 year old Tithe Barn adjacent to it.
Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees is buried in the cemetery. If you are lucky, you will be too young to remember them.
As part of his project Grossteste was also responsible for creating 'New Thame' on adjacent fields the early 1200's. The market square was laid out in a boat-shaped pattern with the Buttermarket on the shadier north side, the Cornmarket on the south side and Middle Row.......you can work that out.
Lots of old pubs here. The Birdcage pub in the middle of the square is 700 years old and was used as a prison for 'other ranks' in the Napoleonic War. (Officers were stuck in the Royal Oak). Slightly later, Thame's most famous brewer, a Mr Boddington, left for Manchester to capitalise on the growing population there.
Don't let the Georgian appearance of much of the high street lead you to conclude that the rest of the buildings only go back a couple of hundred years or so. Look closely and you will see that many of them are just 'modern' facades on much older structures. Full detail can be found at Thame's Museum at 79 High Street. You can check opening times here:
Mind that you behave yourself while you are there. A Statute from 1405 required every town to maintain a set of stocks to punish layabouts and drunkards on pain of being downgraded to a mere hamlet. In 2016, the Town Council were investigating bringing them back.
When leaving Thame keep a careful eye out for the route onto the Phoenix Trail. It is easy to miss and if you reach what was the bridge over the old railway line, you have gone a bit too far.
J. Pheonix Trail
This is a flat trail, around seven miles in length, along the route of a closed railway line. It is mostly well-compacted gravel which drains well even when it is wet, excepting the extension south of Lower Icknield Way. There are various art installations along the way which I believe were created by staff & students of a local college.
Keep an eye out on the way for Red Kites who often hover around looking for scurrying beasties to devour. A swooping kite is an impressive sight! You can spot them by the tail shape.
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