Lower Slaughter | Life in the English Cotswolds

So another year is almost over and it certainly has been a busy one for me. Living and working in the spectacular Cotswold countryside, a classified area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) is a great treat and one of which I never tire. It’s also nice to go off exploring other places so 2014 found me in other parts of the UK and Ireland too. One of the first places I visited, however, was only twenty miles down the road but light years apart in reality!

typical Cotswold countryside

Like many people that live close to tourist attractions I don’t often visit the ones on my doorstep but last January found me walking the streets of Oxford. I hadn’t come to explore the colleges but the covered market which dates back more than two hundred years. The history of the market and the building is fascinating and is well worth making the time to visit – especially if you like a bargain. To read more about it and to see other photos click here.

One of the fathers of ecological writing died tragically young and in February I matched quotations from his work to images I had taken (to see them, click here). My favourite was noticed by the Society that bears his name and reprinted in their journal. I felt very honoured!

Wild and rugged scenery is often best appreciated over cake and coffee and at Watersmeet in Exmoor National Park you can do just that. Two rivers collide spectacularly besides the Victorian fishing lodge that is now owned by the National Trust and run as a café. March found me walking through beautiful scenery as well as indulging myself and the link to this remote but very accessible place is here.

Dublin, the capital city of Ireland is a favourite place of mine and in April I visited the Casino Marino, one of the most impressive and perfect neo-classical buildings in Europe. Everything about it was designed to deceive so although you only see one window on each side you actually have – well, click here to find out what plus all the other deceptions the Georgian architect managed to fit in.

Planting trees is a long term project for they rarely mature during the life of the planter. Of all the hundreds I have done in my professional life none has given me as much pleasure as this particular one. I have waited for years for it to flower and in May it did so for the first time. I felt quite emotional – it was a case of finding a handkerchief. Take a look by clicking the link here.

The Cotswolds are world renowned for their ‘chocolate box’ village scenes and Lower Slaughter must be one of the contenders. Despite its name it is a beautiful and tranquil place to visit for it has everything from crystal clear trout streams to olde-world stone cottages to a mill complete with working water wheel. If you choose the right time to explore you can have the place to yourself. To learn more click the June link here.

Slaughter may not sound the most promising of names but Lower Slaughter situated in the heart of the Cotswold Hills is one of the prettiest and most unspoilt villages you can visit. Its unusual name is a derivation of the Old English word ‘slough’ meaning muddy patch but, if it was many years ago, it is certainly not one now. In fact, three years ago it was described in a poll as having ‘the most romantic street in Britain’.

Although there is some more recent housing discreetly tucked away most of the buildings date from the mid sixteenth to mid-seventeenth centuries. Its origins are even older for it was well established even before being recorded in the Domesday Book; this means that it has been continuously inhabited for over a thousand years.

Many of the oldest houses cluster around the the River Eye which, although shallow, is powerful enough to feed the undershot waterwheeel of the mill. This building, which now houses a small museum, is made from red brick – an unusual building material in this area – and was working as recently as the the late 1950’s. It is a comparatively modern building having been built in the 1800’s although a mill was recorded on the site in 1086. The tall chimney was built to give the mill additional steam power.

A similar tale can be told of the picturesque church with its tall spire which also dates from the ninteenth century. There are a few traces of the original building within it: an arcade of four bays dating back to the early 1200’s. The lichen encrusted gravestones in the churchyard also belie their age for burial rights were only granted in 1770 – before then villagers were buried in nearby Bourton-on-the-Water.

The countryside surrounding Lower Slaughter, and also the village itself, may not appear to have changed much in centuries but there is no doubt that they are very much ‘tidier’ than they once were. An old Pathe News clip shows the banks of the Eye overgrown – there probably wasn’t the same enthusiasm for cutting its grassy banks when it has to be done by scythe. Another change the film shows is the ‘locals’ sitting on the benches: nowadays, many of the houses are owned by the wealthy as weekend retreats and those exploring its lanes are visitors.

Lower Slaughter, despite its obvious attraction, has done very little to encourage tourism. It is still possible to sit there or cross its little stone footbridges or paddle in the ford and be transported back to a time when life ran at a much slower pace. It makes a very refreshing place for visitors to recharge the batteries after the crowds of its larger neighbours, Bourton and Stow-on-the-Wold or, for us lucky enough to live in the Cotswolds, to do the same after a hard day’s labour.