Wiltshire Day Trip – Part Three – On to Salisbury.

The bus was not as peaceful as the one that brought me there but it was a nippy ride along fairly minor country roads and soon we were in Marlborough, another well known town that, because it is not on the railway network, had previously eluded me. I believe that there is a famous public school here and certainly the place exuded wealth with a magnificent wide main street and several old and interesting buildings. Signposts here pointed to Hungerford, a market town on the River Kennet and the Kennet and Avon Canal and within the North Wessex Downs are of outstanding natural beauty. It has seen numerous events in history, the most recent being in August 1987 when a local resident went berserk with a gun and killed sixteen people at random. Our bus climbed out of Marlborough, once again affording magnificent views in this attractive countryside and we trundled through places with village pubs and churches standing amidst thatched cottages and barns and rolling hills.

We descended into the small town of Pewsey and here the bus terminated but with a connection to Salisbury expected within five minutes. Shame really because right opposite the bus stop was a bric-a-brac store that even advertised the sale of scarecrows! The bus to Salisbury was a double decker again and the front of the top deck afforded good views of more beautiful villages and hamlets – Manningford Bohune, Upavon, West Chisenbury, Enford, Netheravon, Figheldean but then the character of the villages changed and we arrived in Bulford. Bulford serves an army camp and to my amazement the schools were already turning out at quarter to three. Now, I am NOT a fan of travelling on buses with schoolkids and my heart sunk when the bus stopped outside a school where probably thirty kids were fighting to get on board. One girl decided that some perfume she had obtained was worth spraying over virtually every one of her friends and there was general mayhem with the driver stopped periodically to come up the stairs and to yell at them in his west-country accent – now, bloody sit down, the bleedin’ lorra yer!” to a response of jeers etc. But they weren’t a terrible lot really. More alarming was the way that residents here and in neighbouring Larkhill took their lives in their hands as they darted across the road without so much as a glimpse at oncoming traffic. Eventually the kids were left behind and we descended towards Salisbury. This bus journey (all the way from Swindon to Salisbury) covered approximately fifty miles of mostly glorious countryside and cost less than a fiver. Brilliant value by any standards. And your reward at the end is Salisbury. One of my favourite places on earth with its cathedral and water meadows and historic centre. The photo above was taken in a quiet backwater in the centre of town and so typifies the feel of the day with its beauty and colour.