On Monday, 20th February, the Abingdon Thai Massage will move next door. Workpeople have been getting the new premises ready for a couple of months.

A new cake shop will open on Stert Street on Saturday, 21st, 2023. The business, established in 2019, previously traded from Bayworth, a village near Abingdon, selling cakes made for special occasions.

This is the first new shop to open in Abingdon in 2023.

Pictures of cakes can be seen on instagram.com/lottiesbakeaway.

The new Premier Inn, being built next to the Tesco Extra, has gone up fast since my last visit and will have 86 rooms.

In 2018 the Abingdon Oxford hotel became the Hilton Garden Inn and more than doubled in size with 84 new rooms in the four-story extension. So between them, that is an extra 170 hotel rooms since 2017.

The older, smaller Premier Inn is still there on Marcham Road, and I have not heard any news about it changing use.

The hotel business sector took a large dip in trade in 2020 and 2021 because of the Covid pandemic but is nearly back to normal trading levels according to Statista.

The waste collectors have had time off over Christmas, and as Christmas creates a lot of extra waste, they are working on Saturdays for three weeks to catch up.

There is also the usual range of post-Christmas Sales as seasonal stock is cleared in many shops.

The post-Christmas sales are a chance to buy Christmas Trees at 50% off.

Cards are also 50% off. (With the postal strikes and no local Scouts post, card sales are probably lower this year.)