15 miles and some blisters later...

We made it to the top of the third county top - Milk Hill in Wiltshire. We started at the Barge Inn, Honey Street.

Turning the corner to cross the Kennet & Avon Canal we saw the White Horse we were going to walk right by. Wasn't until we got home and uploaded pictures we saw it was prancing along the telephone wire!

St Mary's Church, Alton Barnes. A 12th century church built on the site of a Saxon church.

View from the top of the first climb - but only halfway to the County Top.


We came to this bit of seriously steep hill and our new walking boots got their first real test... no slipping!


The view looking back down.


Looking across the ridge of hills that we were going to walk along. On the side of some of the hills we could see lines caused by soil shifting due to ploughing over many generations, they are called Strip Lynchets.


Looking East, note the amazingly clear blue sky and no contrails as there were no planes flying apart from the odd light aircraft. Not a cloud in sight and we forgot the sunscreen.

The White Horse (this one was made in 1812, some are much older) - cut into the chalk downland.


View from the hill near the White Horse, if you look carefully at the middle of the picture you can see the Barge Inn where we started out.


Looking at the head of the White Horse which was last repaired in 2002.


Looking West from Milk Hill


Alan on the summit (or as close as we could get) of Milk Hill.


The Four Horses of the Apocalypse approached shortly after!


Looking North-West from the top of Milk Hill.


Heading West we walked along Wansdyke, possibly a neolithic earthwork. There were several gateways in the dyke which meant climbing up and down the embankment to follow the footpath.


Looking North to Silbury Hill, an ancient earthwork. You can see it in the centre of this photo if you look closely.


Home to a few rabbits on the outside edge of the earthwork ditch.


Looking ahead you can see how far this path and wall stretched.


Looking back to Alan, who had stopped to take a picture of me and was now catching up!


Having left the hills behind we walked across gently rolling farmland towards Bishops Cannings.


Turned a corner and saw this cottage. Some things just have to be photographed.


The church at Bishops Cannings.


The Bridge Inn, crossing back to the South side of the Kennet & Avon Canal for our trek home (another 5-6 miles to go)


There were several WWII pillbox defenses along the canal. I'm not sure why they were built, were the expecting the German invasion force to sail up the canal?


You can just see the White Horse in the distance on this picture! Only about 4 miles to go now.


Another glimpse back at the hills we had walked.


We saw plenty of quirky narrowboats but this one won on with "hippie factor" because it had the biggest wind turbine.


Another glimpse at the white horse as we walked along the towpath.

Eventually we made it back to the car, sore and blistered but very pleased to have managed the 15 miles! You can see our route here