Sunday, 8 April 2007

The world's prettiest church?

In the morning, we visited the church at Prior’s Dean. From the outside, this is quite simply one of the most beautiful churches imaginable, and today it was near-perfect nestling deep in the folds of the English countryside and shaded from the sunshine by a 2,500-year-old yew tree.

We contrived to arrive just as the church warden was locking up after the Easter Service and we persuaded her to let us have a look inside where things were very plain and simple – just as they should be.

In the graveyard, covered with wild garlic, we photographed some family gravestones found on a previous visit, and then discovered one or two other graves of interest.

From Prior’s Dean, we hurried to St Peter’s church at High Cross and found some more records and graves of interest.

From High Cross, we went to West Meon for lunch at The Thomas Lord gastronomic pub displaying much cricketing memorabilia (Thomas "Lord's Cricket Ground" Lord). We enjoyed an excellent meal of local fare adn then paid a quick visit to the ruins of St Nicholas's chapel along the Meon valley.

The North Face of a South Down

Then we went for a walk through the staggeringly beautiful countryside. We started beneath the South Downs at Hen Wood and began walking up toward the ridge. The sun was blazing and the path was far steeper than it looked. And then the path disappeared, although we could still see the ridge above us. Jackie decided to rest with a book while I tackled the summit alone. It was exhausting and at one stage I just lay down panting, wondering if I would ever make it. But I fought off the worst effects of altitude sickness, successfully by-passed the glacier, traversed the crevasse and scrambled to the top.

I’d hoped to be rewarded with a magnificent view along the Downs and south toward the cost. But no. To the west and south were just higher ridges, and to the east the view was entirely obscured by trees. This bought home to me the utter pointlessness of mountaineering. When Sir Edmund Hilary said, “Because it was there”, he should have added, “and I couldn’t think of anything to do that was more interesting or useful”.

Anyway, the view northwards at least was good and I was restored to Jackie.

We paid a short visit to All Saint’s church in East Meon before enjoying a Cream Tea at Oxbourne.