Having been to Bibury, we decided to continue our tour of the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) by going to the village of Bourton-on-the-Water. I was intrigued by the capitalisation of the letter W in Water. As far as I can tell, the Water here refers to the River Windrush, but I still can’t quite explain why the village isn’t called Bourton-on-the-Windrush then.
Anyway, that’s the sort of thing I tend to wonder about when I visit places!
The village itself was full of people when we got there, perhaps encouraged by the beautiful weather that day. We took the opportunity to dip our feet in the River Windrush; contrary to appearances, the water was ice-cold. I read on Wikipedia that in summer, a game of medieval football is played here with goalposts set up in the River Windrush itself. Sure sounds like a whole load of fun.
What is difficult to capture in both my posts on the Cotswolds AONB is the simple pleasure of driving around in the region. I have this dream of cruising in an Aston Martin in summer, visiting charming little villages built with that yellow limestone so characteristic of the Cotswolds region. Too bad I don’t have an Aston Martin, but who knows, one day…
Imran Idris 