Ridgeway 5: East Ilsley to the Goring Gap

I did about 15k on the Ridgeway today between about 9 and 2pm. I had to hide in the undergrowth on one occasion when a heavy shower came by, keeping my backpack dry under an ivy-laden tee. I startled some fellow walkers when I hailed them from my hidden thicket. I didn't realise that two of them had been posted to keep guard in either direction while a third person did a wee on a tree. They apologised, but not very much. 

The walk today wasn't the most interesting part of the Ridgeway by any means, although it was the only day so far when I kept strictly to the signposted trail and didn't deviate at all. As it goes back into Oxfordshire from Berkshire, the path drops toward the Thames and turns into a general purpose track surrounded by hedgerows, losing the the sweeping views to either side of the ridge that I had seen on prior days. Once it nears Streatley-Goring, it becomes an actual road, although not like the busy B Road I encountered near Swindon. I made Streatley-Goring in the early afternoon, just in time to avoid the day's final rain-shower. I was a bit muddy and my pack is now covered in chalk and clay marks, but everything is dry inside, so I think I've done OK. 

Streatley and Goring (one town on either side of the Thames) are both excellent, and the main reason is the topography. The 'Goring Gap' is an unusual landscape feature. The Thames has carved a narrow valley between the Berkshire Downs and the Chilterns, which formerly would have been one range. At Goring, there is a place where the river simultaneously narrows and gets shallower. Numerous islands help to form a natural crossing point. Modern humans are not the first to have taken advantage of this. There is evidence of Palaeolithic hunters camping in wait here to catch large animals as they made use of the gap. The mesolithics and neolithics also knew of it. In the Iron Age it was the boundary between two Celtic tribes, most likely the Dobunni and Catuvellauni. The Romans built a road through here, and a villa next to it. The Anglo-Saxons made walled towns here, and for a long time, it was a major separation point between their kingdoms of Mercia and Wessex. The Danes did not prosper west of here. The Ridgeway runs through the gap, and so does the equally ancient Icknield Way, and the modern Thames Path, and the Swan Way cycle path, and a major train line and...basically, everything runs through here. Yet somehow it remains a pretty small and out of the way place. Probably because Reading is only about ten minutes drive away, and it's much cheaper...

Even in modern times there still seems a bit of cultural separation between the lands east and west of the Chilterns. Only a few day ago, everything still seemed a bit 'west', somehow. Now I've crossed over, I suddenly realise that Henley-on-Thames is only about ten miles away and I could get to Heathrow in 45 minutes on a train. Accents are different, and there are less people about in sensible shoes. And there is less cider on tap, although maybe I am imagining that last one...

Tomorrow, the Ridgeway follows the Thames for most of the way. I'm going to walk north to the walled city of Wallingford, and then I'm going to see a folk band in a place called Nettlebed tomorrow night. After that I am headed back to Tring, and my walks on the Ridgeway will be day walks done with car assistance. I will blog when I have time, but probably not tomorrow.