Cotswold stone houses in Bisley

I helped Helena take some of her ‘Learning Circle’ colleagues to their regular classical Sunday music concert in Nailsworth. The mini bus they normally hire was unavailable so I took three people there and back. While I waited to return I decided to go for a drive with the thought in my mind of finding a kingfisher on the upper reaches of the River Frome . I drove across the commons to Frampton Mansell and then dropped down through the small village. Then it was on to the rather steep slopes on single track lanes down into the Golden Valley between Chalford and Sapperton.

How stupid could I have been? It just never occurred to me that the heavy frosts would not have melted on the north facing valley sides down which I was about to descend. Not only that but at regular intervals the local geology consists of layers of carboniferous limestone and clay, which create copious springs at the junctions of the clay and limestone layers. Normally water oozes out onto the roads and lanes so of course these became ice sheets on steep slopes. No gritting trucks go along these roads.

As I drove down the slope increased and suddenly the car’s direction started to twist sideways as I tried to brake. Occasional patches of gravel allowed me to arrest the skids. I was now going downhill in a single track lane between very high hedges. How I got out of the situation I’m not sure. Even when I reached the valley bottom down a  very narrow hollow lane with thirty foot high banks, the road was completely iced over.  I then crossed the narrow bridge over the remains of an old lock on the I go along the valley bottom, or up the very steep far side, which hopefully might have been warmed by being on the south facing side. I thought that up might be best even though it meant driving a rather long way round  to return to Stroud via Bisley.

Then I met a BMW coming dow towards me on a steep part of the lane. There was ice here too but not impassable.The BMW had to reverse uphill for about a hundred yards, and when I passed them I managed to warn the driver who didn’t know these local roads about the ice that lay ahead of him. He turned around. The same things happened. A bit further up the lane The same thing happened and the young VW driver also turned around.

I eventually reached Bisley and as I approached the High Street, (there is one shop and two pubs there) I thought I must park and grab a blip. I walked down the road towards  the village centre and grabbed these two pictures. This larger house is now likely to be a weekend home that looks out over the head of the valley across from the church and the famous Bisley Wells. It is a lovely village but not for the poor anymore. The three cars in front of the house are a Porsche ‘Chelsea tractor’, an Alfa Romeo and a fairly new convertible Aston Martin. 

The other houses seen in the ‘Extra’ are actually a former British Legion building according to the etched name in the stonework over the big doorway. I only had my little camera which has a fixed 35mm equivalent lens, so no wide views were possible in the narrow lanes.