Painswick to King's Stanley via Cirencester: 21/04/23

 The bed and breakfast business in England seems to be largely run by elderly men with big houses, while their spouses go out and enjoy themselves. Greg provided the obligatory cooked breakfast while his wife popped in to say goodbye, and I met the other two singles staying there; an English man completing a walk that he had started in pre-COVID times, and a Canadian woman who is apparently doing the whole Cotswolds Way by herself. At ten to ten I walked up out of town to the Rococo Gardens, a nicely laid-out garden in a small valley with a plant nursery next door. And the obligatory second-hand books for sale in one of the pavilions. I was tempted by some Paul Temple paperbacks, but I decided that I didn't need the weight. Even with a car, there is some substantial hauling of luggage up and down stairs to be done. The gardens were nice enough, but the open-air cafe seating didn't look very inviting in what had become a moderate drizzle, so I returned to the car and drove to Cirencester, in the mist, to see the Roman museum there.

Quite busy roads, which I would have avoided had I been able to, but the GPS got me there and I found parking. I haven't violated any road rules that I know of, but I won't be too surprised if the rental company passes on a ticket or two for things that I have overlooked. The museum itself was officially opened in 1954 by GM Trevelyan -- probably Britain's best-known historian at the time -- but it's been recently modernised, and seems to be very popular, particularly with school groups -- although that might have been partly due to the rain. There are some excellent mosaics. 

I spent a couple of hours here -- Cirencester was the western capital of Roman Britain, and the largest city in England at that time after London. Then I stepped out in the rain to visit the Roman amphitheatre, just outside town. This is mainly just some large mounds of earth now, but underneath there is stepped stone seating, and there is skeletal evidence that gladiators fought here, both with each other and with some imported carnivores.

Back to the car and off again, with the rain easing, towards Kings Stanley, my destination for the night. The roads were much nicer, although there was an odd moment when two long streams of cars met in the middle of an apparently featureless plain, and did a complicated shuffle at the crossroads. I went up and down more hills that I would have thought possible, and ended up here at the B&B at last. Tom is the owner, and his book collection includes most of the Puffins that shaped my childhood -- Dr Dolittle, Bottersnikes and Gumbles, and E. Nesbit, among others. The room is spacious, but slightly musty, and my bathroom and toilet -- of which I get exclusive use -- are only reachable through the upstairs hall. And with only one power board under the bed, I had to do a lot of shuffling to charge things.

After a cup of tea I went out to see the locality; mainly residential, with some little footpaths running through it, and very oddly, in what looked to be the front room of a suburban house, a Chinese takeaway. I guess the people of King's Stanley have to eat too. I bought a quarter-bottle of wine from a well-equipped Tesco's, and went home to celebrate on Stilton and cheese rolls.