What the New York Times wrote about
The Discerning Traveller Shropshire walking tour
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On the edge of the Long Mynd
(Day 3 of the Shropshire
Hills tour)
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‘There are few places on earth as pleasant for hiking as the British Isles. Shropshire, with more than 3,000 miles of footpaths, is one of the underrated locales ...
... we took a five-day walking trip that was organised by the Discerning Traveller Ltd ... More on our Shropshire hills and Offa's Dyke tour
... the villages and hills of south-west Shropshire, a relatively sparsely populated area dominated by high hills, moorland ridges and green valleys a little more than 150 miles from London. The place is full of sheep and history, from remnants of prehistoric settlements to castles built by Norman lords as fortifications against the Welsh ...
... we began our tour in Ludlow, a pretty town on the River Teme dominated by a crumbling mediaeval castle...among other things the town is an antiques centre ... Ludlow is also famous for its many half-timbered buildings...the Feathers Hotel and Castle Lodge, a principally Elizabethan house near the Castle where scenes from the 1965 film version of 'Moll Flanders' were shot ... the interior panelling and the exterior oak beams on these structures are alive with intricately carved structures ...
... one day we explored the Long Mynd, an escarpment 1,700 feet high, with a wild, desolate, landscape reminiscent of the Scottish Highlands. We were lucky enough to be there when the purple heather was blooming and we could see well into Wales. We walked along the ridge looking down onto a gentle landscape of rectangular fields divided by hedgerows and plucked clean by countless sheep ...
... less than a mile away were the remains of a prehistoric stone circle, a smaller, less intact Stonehenge ... these hills had clearly been alive to the earliest sound of human voices in Britain ...
... we were also not far from the remnants of Offa's Dyke, an earthen wall and ditch built all along the English Welsh border by an eighth century Saxon king ...
... the present was as pleasing as the past on these walks. There is nothing quite like coming down from a hill hot and tired and going into a pub in an unspoiled village, to rest over a pint (or two) of beer ...
... on a couple of occasions we ... were invited into peoples' homes for a cup of tea ...
... excellent lodgings include: [in Ludlow] we were allocated one of two guest rooms in a tiny Tudor cottage, complete with a private bathroom, a cozy shared living room and a flower-filled garden ... our lodgings stood literally in the shadow of the 13th century drum towers and portcullis arch of Broad Gate, the only survivor of seven mediaeval gateways ...
... a well-run inn in a hamlet [Wentnor] near Bishop's Castle, with good restaurant and a lively evening crowd ...
... a Georgian townhouse in the centre of historic Montgomery. The host is the town crier ...
.... where to eat ... another of the town's fine dining establishments, the Oaks on Corve Street, [Ludlow], a cozy set of rooms with centuries-old oak panelling ... the chef and owner had listed on a page of the menu the local sources - farms, dairies, fishermen - of his fresh organic ingredients ...
... in Montgomery we had an enjoyable meal at the Dragon Hotel, a 17th-century coaching inn on the Market Square ... a typical dish would be Welsh lamb in mint sauce...’
from ‘Shropshire's Rolling Green Carpet’, by Ann Crittenden, New York Times, 14 June 1998.
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