Wheat and barley grow in the fields to the south of Abingdon.
Here the ground rises above the houses of the Tithe Farm Estate. A couple of buildings stand out above the trees from this vantage… There is the white control room of Abingdon Police Station …
and the bell tower and steeple of St Helen’s Church.
I was listening in to a conversation. The subject got onto old houses, and one chap said to the other…
‘The one with the timbers and removed brick infill on Stert Street says 1470. Do you think it can be?‘
The other one considered the matter, ‘Its possible’ he said, ‘But I think there is one older in East St Helen’s Street.
The one with the plaque..’
There are certainly some very old houses in Abingdon. Many of them are down East St Helen’s Street.
But the Long Alley Almshouses, originally built in 1446, would be hard to beat.
Or do you know better?
The poster on the bus shelter is to advertise the Alice in Wonderland Maize Maze at Millets Farm. The street furniture at this point of the Marcham Road, outside the Community Hospital, does have an Alice in Wonderland-ish look. The seat is so very far removed from the bin and both are so very far from the bus shelter.
When the bus shelter moved, as part of a road improvement, over a year ago, people might have expected the seat to follow.
I see from the Abingdon Diary that this is the week when the Swan Upping comes to town. It is also end of school term and there are the start of holiday activities including free swimming for under 16s in the Outdoor Pool. But one thing is different from previous years. There will be no caterpillars infesting the Spindle Tree near the Crown and Thistle. It got cut down last year, and this year there is a new, replacement, tree.
That Spindle Tree will be missed – particularly by those caterpillars.