Out and about again, folks! This time, Dima and I went rummaging around Wantage: an old and well establish small town around 8 miles or so from where we live. Looking at the Ordnance Survey map before we went out, we found lots of "Gallops": not knowing why, we sallied forth. We were also looking for evidence of the age of settlements from the maps, how things that were green and speckly on the map looked in real life, how contours panned out in reality. The gallops are for racing horses. Newbury race course in near by and we came across the Valley of the Racehorse with all of these gallops in it. Interesting to see something I'd never even thought of before but it makes perfect sense once you've realised what's happening! The villages around Wantage, Letcombe Bassett, Lambourn and so on are all old and well established. Whilst some of the properties were a bit cheaper than I thought they might be, they were still expensive. It's also still the case that there are many 15th, 16th and 17th century working men's cottages that are now inhabited by very wealthy people. So the cottage that your great, great, great, great grandparents lived in as they tilled the soil or hew stones and drew water from is now occupied by an architect or an accountant or a race horse trainer and he's paid £500,000 for it! There is a very attractive Alms House building in Lambourn: it has a central water well, too, just like the better maintained Alms Houses in Ewelme. We found a new Dobbin: remember the sad looking, old horse we found in January? We found two lithe, younger horses this time and as we ran towards them shouting "Dobbin, Dobbin!", they hurtled towards us with love and affection in their eyes. We talked across a gap between two fences, barbed wire attached to one of them; but the mint I held out to them didn't hold enough attraction for them. They were nervous, perhaps skittish and they wouldn't take the bait! Our short lived but intense relationship was smashed when some aging mountain bikers stopped 5 yards away from us as they plotted their route: maps in hand, bikes between their thighs and loud voices spewing from their mouths. Who knows what Dobbin and I could have gone on to achieve? We drove along the Ridgeway: a dirt track that was wet and a bit uneven. Reminded me of some of the easier driving I did in Malawi. The Beemer coped though. Every time I got out of the car mud seemed to fly at the soles of my shoes and firmly attach itself there. Even when I took the time to wipe it off with sticks, grass, gate posts, the small step between clean and mud caked was simply never far enough. Have some cleaning to do today. DW