Rolling Hills and Homity Pies

Last weekend M and I escaped the Big Smoke for the Wiltshire/Dorset border.

St Catherine's Chapel - Abbotsbury

Boy, am I fan of that area. It's just so incredibly...British. Think gently undulating green hills and the most picturesque villages. I could practically hear my old school song, Jerusalem, playing as we drove around. I'm pretty much sure that Jerusalem is everyone's school song; M tells me it was his.

In this region time seems to have stood still. Not in a rubbish dated way, but in a perfect unspoiled kind of way.

Abbotsbury is one such perfect village. Nestled in the bottom of a valley, right on the Dorset coast, Abbotsbury is an idyll of thatched cottages and high hedged lanes. It helps that the coast against which it lies is a famous UNESCO site, an 18 miles long stretch of Jurassic coast line called Chesil beach.

We walked along the pebbled beach before climbing up to take a closer look at St Catherine's Chapel which sits at the top of a high mound, overlooking the village.

Just look at that sky and those clouds. Simply perfect.

After that climb, of course it was time for lunch. We walked back to the village and went for an explore.

We visited the Old School House which was quite frankly a bit of a shambles; our food took forever to come and we could hear some pretty sharp words being exchanged in the kitchen, but we took it all in our stride. After all we had nowhere to be any time soon, and, after the hustle and bustle of London, it actually made a welcome change.

As we like to try new things, both M and I chose the Homity pie - a regional dish made from wholemeal pastry, potatoes, garlic, and onion.