No, its not a spelling mistake, its the name of the Anglo Saxon goddess of fertility who was honoured @ the Spring Equinox each year - yep Easter is yet another celebration adopted by the Christian church to appease the non believers.

Whatever your belief system, we all like a bit of chocolate and even if the bunnies and eggs have more to do with a pre christian goddess than the death of an equally mythical chap from the eastern Med, don't feel too bad about it.

So, this week. Well the weather has been quite kind, early frosts have given way to low teens in the afternoons, there have been Eostremonat showers but its largely been bright and sunny here in the UK (i know its not been so clement further east but your time will come!). On Thursday i set out for an east bound ride to try to miss the showers which worked until lunch, the return had several falls of haitch two oh and even light hail! 110km at the GPS turn off.

Friday was actually quite good, the sun was out and i took the opportunity for an almost 11km walk/hike taking in the Stoke Park estate and Longleaze Down. Its not proper countryside but its better than walking the streets!

Saturday was to Imber Day. I've spoken about the ghost village of Imber on Salisbury Plain previously and Eostre weekend is the first public access of the year. There are four routes open to the public on such days, essentially one from each compass point, on my last visit by bike i rode three of them, this time i wanted to collect the fourth, the route from the North! I set off early to take advantage of the morning cool but even so, long before i reached Trowbridge, the hat and jacket were stowed, it was starting to feel quite warm by the time i started the climb up to the Plain from Bratton.

It's quite a long, shallow ascent up a narrow valley with a little kick near the top, one of the easier routes onto the MOD lands and i was soon at the access point. I wasn't really sure what to expect of the road, it has been described as difficult by some but it started out well metalled and with a downward tilt. Maybe a mile in the tarmac changed to gravel, Foxy wasn't quite so keen on the bits of looser stuff but we eventually reached the 'main' east - west road and headed down into Imber, still some 2 miles away.

I joined the throng at the church for tea and my sandwich lunch in the sunshine before taking the East route out to public roads to start the return leg. It was by now, not hot but pleasantly warm, the market at Castle Combe was busy and there were plenty of other bikes on the road, seems no one wanted to miss the good weather. Not only that but for a lot of the run back from Devizes the wind was in my favour giving me a gentle nudge homeward. And a good day's effort, almost 1100m across the 136km, a fair workout ahead of the Spreewald in a fortnights time.

And so to today, I cooked a roast turkey dinner earlier - the price of the traditional lamb skyrocketed in the run up to Eostre, well we've not had a roast for a few weeks and a holiday weekend is as good an excuse as any! Once i've finished here i'll galvanise myself into action and take myself for a short walk, short indeed, afterall today is my day of rest!

Of course there is new Gaby today, chapter 24 of Only Five Minutes, the Bond's finally make it to Schloss Harburg for the New Year celebrations.

In other news, i've actually nearly finished the first chapter of book 28, Patreon supporters should see those efforts tomorrow and i'll push on through the week. I have a last couple of trip jobs to sort out, currency and airport bus which i'll sort out midweek.

Thats it for now tho', i'll be back on Wednesday,
Tschuss,
Madeline Anafrid