Midsummer Madness

The sun rose on the longest day of the year, the Midsummer solstice, so I had to head somewhere special. Like thousands of others, I set off to Wiltshire to witness something very unique, not the rising of the sun through the key stones at Stonehenge, but my first Ailesbury.
This Ailesbury was in Burbage, near Marlborough, so I got a lift with my Dad to Chiselden near Wroughton, where he works, and made my way southwards via the dismantled railway tracks on my bike.
The morning was fresh, benefitting from some earlier light rain, the sun was shining and I made steady progress towards my goal. One thing did put me off, the copious amount of dog poo all over the path. Owners, please pick up your pooches poo poo. It smells disgusting, it contains parasites which can permanatly blind you. When you walk your dog, just pick the poo up after its doings and the silent majority will thank you. Cycling along sometimes you get stones and mud fly against your legs and back, you have very little way of preventing it, you do not want to smell dog poo there as well. I previously have written on the subject to find a solution. Go here to see. Horse poo is not nearly so bad nor are cow pats, just dogs with their insufferably smell mess from their pampered diet. Owners, if you can't be bothered to pick up the mess and show some social responsibility, teach your dog a new trick, dig the dirt, like a cat does.
I reached Marlborough and turned onto the Burbage Road to make my way through Savernake Forest up the hill.
CRASH!
I came off my bike and hit the road surface at around 10 Mph, luckily my hands and knees acted as excellent brakes, although the skin didn't hold up for very long and I was bleeding in 3 places. I dragged my bike off the road, luckily no car was following close behind, or I would have been even more seriously hurt, and no dog poo was in the offending place or I would have had a chance of being blinded. I lay by the roadside under a tree for a bit as the sickening feeling left me and had a drink. My hands and legs hurt a bit, however I was stuck halfway up a hill in a strange place, so needed to carry on whatever.
I made it through the forest, a bit wobbly, but now more conscious about gear shifting on hills and found Stibb Green and Burbage. The Aztecs used to effectively freeze dry potato as a way of producing marching food that was light and rich in starch and carbohydrate, then rehydated it when out in the field on their campaigns, I made do with crisps. I cycled straight through both villages and thought I'd missed Ailesbury Way. Luckily I stopped at the White Hart and read my map, which showed that Ailesbury Way was the next turn on the left. I looked through the back gate of the pub and thought 'typical, I bet that's it', knowing my sense of direction was a bit off. I went the long way round and found a beautiful road called Ailesbury Way.
There were people returning from shopping, the bins were being collected, (normal and recycling) and life was good. I got my pictures, (every time I take a picture of a sign, there is usually a house behind it, every time I wonder if the person living there minds. This feeling was especially strong as it looked from the state of the house, as if the inhabitant was elderly)

I cycled up to the end of the road and surely enough I saw the pub where I had been 15 minutes ago through the gateway, so went through on my return to Marlborough for some lunch.
What do you call a deer with no eyes and no legs?
Still, no Idea?

The centre of Marlborough, where the market used to be is cursed by cars. They surge and scrap for spaces which are sparse and care nothing for cyclists or pedestrians, it is as bad as London. However at the end of the High Street is an island of tranquility, St Peter's church. It divides the torrents of traffic and is a lovely place, an old, now redundant church, the building is used as a shop and cafe and presumably from the lighting rig, for concerts and recitals. A nice man let me park my bike in the porch and I enjoyed some good food, whilst trying to identify the images on the stained glass windows. They had two tablets with the 10 commandments on, a bit bizarre, I always was led to believe the 10 commandments were written on both tablets, one copy for god, one copy for humanity? This one had 1-5 on one and 6-10 on the other. I also found that Thomas Wolsey had come from this church and thought, interesting, I know the name but not the person, so will have research this at a later date.
I cycled through the maelstrom once again until I spotted a very interesting building 'Ailesbury Court'. Another bit of research will have to be done. The ride back to Swindon was uneventful, except this beautiful field of poppies and losing the track, so having to go by road for the final leg.
Once in Swindon, I headed straight to the station to find the third (properly 2nd) Aylesbury of the day and found it to be a one way street of light industry and small 1900's terraced houses with grafitti and some posters.
As it was getting close to 1500 (the time not the year), I decided to watch a World Cup match and found Italy playing and Ghana, USA simultaneously at Walkabout, I then made my way back to Dad's flat to spend the evening watching football as well. Tomorrow will be a lot harder with less rewards, however I can see that such a situation will become more common place.