St Swithuns Way - Day 2 and North Downs Way Day 0

Alton to Farnham
Distance: 16 miles
Ascent: 180m
Weather: warm and sunny
Buzzards, deer, red kite, long-tailed tit, french partridge,  bunnies, horses that can't spell (or win), Austin Healeys 

As we left Alton this morning, a lady pulled up in her car to ask us something about the ramblers, not sure what as a truck went past, possibly were we looking for them, did we want to join them, or did we know where she could find them... It seems they are an illusive lot. We just said no.

Today's walk could potentially have been quite boring,  as it follows the side of the A31 road, but as it happened it was very pleasant and although we were in earshot of the road it was not intrusive and we rarely saw it.

We had a sit on Walter's bench, with views across the fields - buzzards were circling overhead and there was a small herd of deer. It was very peaceful.

A short distance on, we walked by a reservoir (or, more accurately, pond) and were passed by a horde of noisy ramblers, one of whom joked we were going the wrong way. Nope.

The path was mostly along and through fields,  with some woodland and a few bits along lanes through pretty villages.

In Upper Froyle we saw gnarly trees in the church yard, Hampshire sheep and very pretty thatched cottages. A wooded drive led towards the grounds of Pax Hill which  was once the home of Lord Baden-Powell,  now a nursing home.

The day was warm and still, and the butterflies were out in force - we'd not seen many earlier in the week.

At Farnham we stopped at the castle (worth the entrance donation to use the loos) and had a look at the keep and battlements,  and had a picnic.

St Swithun's Way ends in Farnham, which is a pretty little town with terrible traffic.

The North Downs Way begins near to the train station,  on a horrible junction with many pedestrian crossing buttons and many pedestrians taking their lives in their hands.

Thankfully we soon left the side of the dual carriageway, and walked down a leafy track where there is a commemorative bench for the start of the Way (not sure what was carved into it, possibly a thistle,  possibly something else) and up into a pretty nature reserve at Furze Hill. Here the footpath that we'd meant to take down to our accommodation stop had been moved, due to a landfill site, so we took the next one and had to walk down a very busy little road that was rather worrying for a couple hundred yards but from the t junction there was a pavement. Opposite the pub there is the end of the footpath that we would have taken,  and Rob had a bit of an investigate.  We shall attempt it in the morning to avoid the road.

We are staying at The Princess Royal, a Fuller's pub - they have Sky Sports so we were able to watch the end of the test match.