16 to 19 January 2026 - A Visit to Home Farm Cottage, Napton, Warwickshire

                 L to R: Gerry, Peg, Lyn, Sue, Robert, Martin, Chris, Jim, Louise

This is the group who for many years have been visiting Center Parcs in Sherwood Forest at roughly this time of year. (See here.) During that time there have been a few changes in personnel, and this year we welcomed back Jim and Peg after a break of a few years. But we didn't go to Center Parcs, where the participation in activities has tailed off for several reasons over the past few years. We found Home Farm Cottages, blessed with a games room (table tennis, pool, table football and darts) and a hot tub to be most satisfactory, with accommodation better than that at Center Parcs.

We arrived on Friday afternoon, 16 January.

Catering was easy:
Friday: Martin and Sue – Beef Stew
Saturday: Jim and Peg – Chicken dish
Sunday: Chris and Gerry – Spaghetti Bolognese

Monday: Robert and Lyn – Chorizo and Butterbean Stew with baked apples for a dessert. 

That all went smoothly and we even managed to use the Aga. Here the beef stew is being demolished in the dining room, overseen by Henry, whose picture you can see on the wall just above Gerry's head.

Saturday 17 January 2026

After being introduced to parkrun by Sue and me at Sherwood Forest a couple of years ago, Robert has become a parkrun addict. Daventry parkrun was only 15 minutes away from the cottage, so Robert, Sue and I popped out to complete the one lap circuit around Daventry Country Park - a really nice route.

The narrow path at the start, and a couple of bottlenecks a bit further on, meant a short delay for those towards the back. It's not a race though.

After a while the woodland track emerged onto the top of a high embankment protecting Daventry Reservoir.

Later on, after passing a Visitors Centre and re-entering woodland, we arrived at a long bridge beyond which a volunteer marshall, Peter, was encouraging the runners. We had been told at the pre-run briefing that this was his 50th time as a volunteer, and we should offer our thanks. I did just that, and the picture found its way onto the run's website.

Someone kindly took a picture for us at the finish.

Sue took 26:12 in position 64, Robert was home in 28:00 in position 100, and I staggered round in 34:28 in position 228 out of the 311 finishers.

Here's the route:

On return to the cottage, a quick turnaround saw Sue and me joined by Chris and Gerry for a 13km stroll along canal towpaths and through muddy fields.

A walk down the road from the cottage brought us on to the Oxford Canal towpath. I think cyclists are allowed along here. With care!

On reaching a sort of t-junction with the Grand Union Canal, we could observe a huge marina from the bridge.

We dropped down and doubled back to join the Grand Union Canal towpath that was to be our route to the village of Stockton.

We continued to Calcutt Locks.

There was a fair amount of activity on the canal.

It was a pleasant stroll past more marinas, to Stockton Top Lock.

Soon after this, we paused on a convenient bench to enjoy our lunch. The towpath is on the right in the picture below. Its surface was a bit damp, but the mountain bikers who passed by were having no problems.

After lunch we descended past the series of Stockton Locks before leaving the canal and joining the Millennium Way footpath that rose up a narrow, muddy ginnel to enter the village of Stockton.

On the southern outskirts of the village stands St Michael's & All Angels church, dating mainly from the Victorian period, but partly Norman.

 

The cemetery is on the edge of muddy fields that the Millennium Way now had us ploughing through, with increasing deposits of sticky mud clinging to our boots, before a less muddy short cut got us back directly to the cottage.

Nice dry short cut.

Here's our route - 13 km with 60 metres ascent, taking us a little under four hours.

Sunday 18 January 2026

Mostly spent in the games room and hot tub, but Sue and I did venture out for a walk around Napton on the Hill, a nearby village within walking distance.

It was a dull, misty morning on which a short cut through a field led us across the canal and on to the path up Hackwell Hill.

Narrow paths led up the hill, past a supply of 'Witches Butter'.

We paused on reaching the Church of St Lawrence, which dates from medieval times. We could have made ourselves a pot of tea if we hadn't just had breakfast.

From the church, we took a path to the 160 metre summit of the hill, near a windmill shrouded in mist. There's a seat and a rowan tree on this site of a WW11 Observer Post.

A narrow descending path led us all the way back to the Oxford Canal, past an area that is marked on the map as an Industrial Estate, but which looks like it is being prepared for some sort of development.

Back on the canal towpath, we continued to the Grand Union Canal junction and turned up along yesterday's path to Calcutt Locks. We crossed the canal here and were soon befriended by a group of people enjoying the facilities at Daisy's Bakin' Butty. Nice coffee. It's a small world - until recently one of the customers owned the house next to my sister-in-law's property in Porthmadog. 

They had heard of  the 'Walton Perk' on the canal near our house - a very similar operation.

Here's our route - 7.5 km, 70 metres ascent, taking two hours.

Monday 19 January 2026 - A Visit to Bletchley Park.

Just an hour away from Napton, this was an ideal opportunity to visit Bletchley Park, home of the Codebreakers. All nine of us went, and we enjoyed a most educational day out.

From the Visitor Centre entrance we walked up towards the Mansion. After looking around there, we congregated for an hour's tour of the outside of the buildings. The tour guide, Neil, was most knowledgeable.

After the tour, we wandered around for the rest of the day.

Various vehicles were on display in the garages.

1940 Packard Six - used by MI6 after 1940

1943 Norton 500cc bike

1938 Austin 18 Ambulance

1947 Sunbeam Talbot - donated by Mick Jagger after it starred in the film 'Enigma' (2001)

We passed through the ornate entrance to the stables area.

 

The Polish Memorial is next to Hut 1.

Here's Alan Turing, Codebreaker extraordinaire.

4pm closing time, and it was back to base for our last evening meal together, and some exercise for Robert.

That was an improvement over Center Parcs for our current requirements, and we hope we can return next year, especially as the Bletchley Park tickets are valid for a year, and there was more to see despite spending all day there.