The Shire

Tonight I returned from my weekend trip to the English countryside. I spent the last two days with my flatmate Dave in his small town of Hamptworth, located a couple hours’ drive west of London near Southampton and Salisbury and Stonehenge. So, Dad, that book about Sarum that you’re reading is about the country right around Dave’s house!

We arrived in Southampton at around seven on Friday. Dave’s mum (that’s the British equivalent of what we Americans would call a mom) picked us up and took us back to their house. Scattered along the road for miles on the way to Dave’s house are thousands of snowdrop flowers, apparently each planted by a local man named Jones, or just Yo. Dave says he’s only ever had one picture taken of him, and he has dedicated himself to planting these flowers along the road. I saw him at the pub we visited that night. Dave knew everyone. We played some darts while he talked to everyone. He beat me in darts, two out of two.

The next morning, we went with Dave’s very kind and accommodating mother to the New Forest up the road from Dave’s house. Dave told me the land used to be the King’s hunting ground, so there are all sorts of animals running around. There were pheasants all over the place (apparently Hamptworth is a major pheasant breeding area), and we saw a few wild ponies. One allowed Dave and I to pet it on the snout. It was interesting to be in a forest which hadn’t seen logging or intense management in at least five hundred years. Maybe it has never been logged, I don’t know. It was an open forest, the floor covered with dead leaves in all directions, and Dave and I meandered through it at an easy jog-walk, stopping to look for wild pigs and navigate around mud puddles from time to time. On the way back to Dave’s house, we saw a hen in the road, so naturally I tried to take a picture of it. It scurried under a gate into its owner’s yard. There were several enticing birds in the yard, so I started taking pictures of them, leaning on the gate. This lasted for about ten seconds before I heard a knock on the window of the house and a man came out wondering what the hell I was doing taking pictures of his house. So Dad, now I know how it feels.

When we returned, Dave’s mom was hard at work cooking a lamb roast for us to eat. It was brilliant to have a few home-cooked meals while I was there, she was very kind and fed us very well. We watched part of the England-Ireland rugby game (Ireland won 14-13) before heading into Salisbury for the night.

Dave had warned me beforehand that people in Salisbury loved to fight, and would punch you if you looked at them the wrong way. Furthermore, Dave told me a large family of ‘Pikeys’ was in town for a funeral, and they liked to cause trouble. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, a Pikey is what Brad Pitt played in the movie Snatch, essentially an English-Irish country person (I think). I’m not sure if the term Pikey is derogatory. If so, I hope I haven’t offended any Pikeys who read my blog. I guess the only person I know who lives in the English countryside is Dave, so, sorry Dave. Anyways, I was a bit apprehensive, but the night passed without violence. We did a sort of pub crawl, and at the end of the night ended up getting a ride back to Hamptsworth instead of spending the night at Dave’s friend’s house, so that was nice because I got to sleep in a nice big bed.

Today, we came back to London! On an uncomfortable bus. So here I am again, I hope you haven’t missed me.

Here are some pictures. Dave is petting a pony, and I’m holding a sign, and a dog is investigating us, and the infamous hen, and yet another funny British sign, found on a box of matches.