Monday December 19, 2005

Alonso to make shock switch

Just read that Alonso will join Mclaren in 2007. I think its a smart move by the Ronster. He is now covered if the monster fails to deliver as he did in 2005. He is also covered if Kimi jumps ship to Ferrari for lots more wonga. At Renault they will be saddened but they have a rising star ready to join them in 2007. Heikki Kovalainen joins them to test in 2006 and had all but been guarenteed a race seat in 2007 before todays announcement.

Two walks by a modern day battlefield

Make no mistake this battle was hard fought. The modern day battle was to prevent large amounts of woodland and farmland being swallowed up by the Newbury A34 bypass. The town has always needed a route to take the busy A34 away from it and when the decision came to build it, the protesters did a good job of delaying things. But the road is now built and the area peaceful again. A saturday night party at the Dundas Arms in nearby Kintbury had us do two walks in the Newbury area. Both had us cross the busy A34 road but on both occasions we were soon away from the busy road and its traffic noise. The first walk had us start in East Isley. The name comes from the Saxon Hilde-laeq - meaning battlefield. The village was once known as Market Isley in the days when it was an important centre for sheep sales. The fairs here received a charter from James 1st in the 17th century and discounting London's Smithfield became the biggest sheep market in England. We had lunch at the Swan pub, on its wall it had a decorative plaque where more East Isley history was revealed. The village claims to be the site of the Battle of Ashdown in 871 where Alfred defeated the danes. The plaque says that on market days twenty four taverns were open, many would have been houses converted for that purpose over the fair time. The walk took us out of the village and under the busy A34 road. The first half of the walk was over large fields thankfully of grass but with a bitter wind in our faces. Half way round we turned around and enjoyed the walk as it went into woods, under tunnels of trees and beside hedges. All these offered much needed shelter from the cold wind. In the hedges was lots of Old man's beard with its seeds producing a lovely display of silver. We then followed the path back to the village and then drove the Kintbury and checked into our room. Here is a picture of the pub.

The Dundas Arms did an excellent meal we had a starter of dressed dorset crab, followed by fillet of beef 'en croute' with much liquid refreshment. In the morning a strong frost left the air temperature still below freezing as we drove to Wash Common just outside Newbury for our second walk of the weekend. The first battle of Newbury was held here in 1643. The two sides were Charles 1st with his royalist army against the army of parliament led by the Earl of Essex. 6,000 men died during the battle. We followed the road out into the countryside from the pub, and soon passed over a footbridge over the busy A34 again. This time the views were better, more trees, smaller fields and slightly hillier. There was plenty of frost on the ground and the ground itself was frozen solid after the harsh overnight frost. We followed the path as it went further away from the A34 and then turned around to go back to the footbridge. A quick pub lunch in the Gun pub and we headed home.