Cotswold Way

Wednesday 21 September: Painswick to Wotton-under-Edge (22 miles). Cloudy with a strong cold wind. Loud bells ring in Painswick's spired church just opposite my bedroom window and I'm up and ready for an early start, southwards bound. My first good views for days are across the Severn Estuary to Wales. The weather improves, it feels good to be back in the hills. There are wind-swept follies one of which I climb but loose my maps in the process along with my scribbled B&B address. So when I get to Wotton I'm a bit stuck, so ask a policeman and eventually get an accommodation list - they are all full but a kind couple at the last one take pity on me, phone round their contacts and drive me a few miles out of town to a fair-priced B&B at The Ridings and, joy-of-joys, another hot tub.

Thursday 22: Wotton-under-Edge to Wick (26 miles). Cloudy. Just before lunch I pass a funeral service in a hill-top church. It's a village church where I'd like to be interred when my time is up, Old Sodbury. It's getting late when I get to the pub in Pennsylvania, its closed and I realise I'm not going to make Bath for the night so I detour to Cold Ashton. The pub here has also closed down. Eventually I find a B&B at Wilkes Farm in Wick several miles away and another hot tub, I could get used to this.

Friday 23: Wick to Bath (10 miles). Cloudy with sunny spells. A short day, a long downhill stretch into Bath, several hilly lanes and paths through Bath and my first stay at a YMCA in the heart of the city centre, but no bath tub.

Photos of the Cotswold Way. I've now walked 1,002 miles.