2022/06/20 Ultra - Mike - 3 Cathedrals

familiar way over the Powick bridges, King’s End Road and onto Bransford.
Leigh, Brockamin, Alfrick and Longley Green, avoiding, , leaving plenty of umph in our legs for the minor-road ascent of the Fromes Hill ridge to Acton Green. Our reward is a gently undulating run down to our first alms stop at The Mulberry Café at Radway Bridge Garden Centre, Whitestone, north of Hereford.
Rested and refreshed, we head to Hereford Cathedral via Lugwardine and suburban roads, with the chance to see another, less formal, Elgar statue.
After we’ve seen what we want to see, we’ll head out of Hereford, joining the Hampton Park Road to Mordiford, then down to Fownhope, on quiet B roads, with a small selection of not-too-steep hillocks to vanquish. Having been lulled into a false sense of security by remarkably un-Herefordian smoothness of road, just beyond Fownhope we turn to join a few miles of grass-in-the-middle country lanes; very quiet and, notably, relatively well surfaced, which means we’ll all need to go slow and be extra alert for the odd chasm that lurks along the way, at random positions in the carriageway.
From the Arts and Crafts St Edward s Church in Kempley it’s down to Newent for lunch at The King s Arms Arms.
The revised Newent to Gloucester Cathedral route has been reccied by some of us, and is a pleasant journey, avoiding the main roads, with a bit of a hill at Hartpury, then a run down and along the river into town.
Leaving the cathedral, we’ll nod to the ruins of St Oswald’s Priory before leaving Gloucester and winding our way along quiet, flattish roads to Tewkesbury Abbey. We’ll tootle from there across the road and behind the main street buildings to The Riverside Café for our third imbibement.
Then a gentle ride to Bredon, Eckington and Defford, foregoing Pershore and, yay, The Holloway! A quick detour after Littleworth enables us to do a quiet, respectful pass of our second abbey of the day, Mucknell, home to an Anglican Benedictine community of monks and nuns.
Then we’re back through Norton, across Battenhall Park, over Bath Road

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