01/03/10 - Thomas Hardy country

10.07 saw me on the train to Dorchester for a short stay with an old friend from Ripon Writers’ Group, now resident in Dorset.

Between lunch and dinner, we had a long walk past the Maumbury Rings, down the avenues of chestnut trees that mark the position of the Roman walls of Durnovaria and along the River Frome past Hangman’s Cottage. We also took a look at the remains of a Roman town house excavated in the 1930s in the grounds of Dorset’s County Hall.  A visit to Thomas Hardy’s statue was a must, even though it overlooks a busy road and is impossible to see properly without risking life and limb.

The monument to the Tolpuddle martyrs is more accessible and very poignant.