Devizes to Salisbury

Busy, busy day today, starting with the Quaker's Walk parkrun.

My sister says that this would make a good Instagram photo, but really I was just trying to show off my new teeshirt and wristband on my 251st run.

After a quick breakfast and checking out of our hotel, we set off to try and find a fairly dry route to get to Salisbury.

We wasted quite a bit of time riding down a lovely long track that appeared to end at a farmhouse, and I found the farmer who had just climbed down from his tractor.

'Are we trespassing?' I asked him and he boomed 'get off my land' and then burst out laughing and said that he had always wanted to say that. He then kindly explained that we were on the right route, but it now set off across his fields, and that although the first field looked not too wet, the next one would be like porridge to wade through.

Disappointed we retraced our steps and followed the road through a host of picturesque villages, non of which had any coffee shops.

Part of our problem was that we had to cycle around the huge Salisbury Plains military area, although we found lots of interesting street signs.

We didn't encounter any tanks, but did hear lots of gunshots in the distance.

By the afternoon we were really tired and had to decide wether to cycle on a 4 kilometre detour to see Stonehenge. In the end we thought it too historic to miss, so cycled and pushed the bikes up a big hill and along the side of a very busy and fast A road.

Stonehenge is in the far distance and we enjoyed it from afar before turning around and speeding back down the hill and on to Salisbury.

Next stop was a look at the cathedral, and we got fairly close to this ancient building.

By now I was cold and quite exhausted so we dragged ourselves to the Premier Inn not far out of town.

We just had time to drop off our kit, as we had booked to see a starlight string quartet in St Thomas's church back in the centre of Salisbury that started at 6pm. After a very fast dinner at the Golden Arches we speed walked back into town, and then Darren checked and found that the concert actually started at 6.30.

This was actually quite welcome news as we were first in so bagged a front row pew and a glass of wine from the in church bar. The concert was excellent and was mainly the music from the TV series Bridgerton and The Crown.

It only lasted just over an hour, we were back at the hotel not long after 8pm and I am now going to bed.