Mud, Old Rocks and a Brewery

We woke up to a grey foggy morning so different from the beautiful day we had yesterday. We emptied and filled our tanks before hitting the road.

Our first stop is Diddly Squat Farm Shop which was opened in 2020 by Clarkson to sell his farm produce. On arrival we were surprised to see a massive queue for the tiny shop - it’s amazing what a bit of publicity can do! We were directed into the parking field where I asked if the ground was ok to drive on - the guy said we should be ok…..

We drove in, stopped and began to reverse in next to another motorhome….. Oh dear, wheels spinning we were once again stuck in mud!

Fortunately car park man had a 4x4

Having been towed out of the carpark (which will probably feature on the next episode of The Grand Tour) we drove a “Celebrity Mud” splattered Kiki into Chipping Norton. Squeezing into a space along the outer edge of the free long-stay carpark we had coffee before setting out to explore the town.

There are some nice old shops and cottages in Chipping Norton and we spent a pleasant hour window shopping. We then drove a few miles north to the site of the Rollright Stones where we had lunch before checking out this unusual archeological site.

For the princely sum of £1 each we were able to visit the 2000BC stone circle called “The Kings Men” where I counted 78 stones and Emma came up with 73. A little walk away we came to the “Whispering Knights” which are actually a 3800BC Dolmen. Across the road is the “Kings Stone” which is thought to be a marker for another ancient burial site.

Trying to look like a standing stone

Leaving the stones we drove a short distance to The Gate Hangs High pub which has a small camping area to the rear. We were nervous about driving up the field so the owner let us enter through another (very narrow) gate at the top of the field. This meant that we were able to roll downhill to the pitch. Tomorrow morning we - hopefully - will be able to roll downhill to the bottom field gate which opens onto the car park.

After parking and connecting up our power lead (Emma will be able to have a long hot shower AND dry her hair tomorrow morning) we went for a walk into Hooke Norton.

 

This pretty little village has lots of quaint cottages and a couple of tiny shops

At the end of the village we came across the Hooke Norton brewery which has a little shop and a brewery museum. 

We spent a while in this tiny but surprisingly good museum before making our way back to Kiki for our evening meal. I popped into the pub to pay our £15 overnight fee before we settled down for the evening.