I only had time for a quick walk without the opportunity to stop and take photos along the way. I took a couple of photos towards the end of my walk.

Over the month I walked 346,227 steps (139.51 miles).

My afternoon walk was in Attingham Park, always a lovely place for a walk.

I enjoyed the walled garden in glorious sunshine whilst the rainclouds floated ever closer. As I left the garden the clouds started to release their watery content leading me to walk the woodland paths so I could keep relatively dry.

It was a beautiful refreshing walk, listening to rain and birdsong along the way

I entered the Mines of Moria through Durin’s door. I then navigated my way through the mines meeting hazards along the way, to face one last hurdle where to my dismay a wizard went over the edge at Durin’s Bridge. Once on the other side of the bridge I was able to claim my medal.

Then after a brief rest I started on the next part of my journey, ‘The Eye of Sauron’…

My medal for the second stage of my Lord of the Rings challenge has arrived.

I travelled from Bree  to Rivendell where I accepted the challenge to carry the One Ring to Mordor, At Rivendell a Fellowship, the Fellowship of the Ring was forged to help me on my quest.

The Fellowship has now arrived at Durin’s door. The doorway leads into the mines of Moria. Gandalf is figuring out what magic is needed to open the keyless elven door.

Whilst enjoying a leisurely breakfast, we were treated to another early morning river view. After breakfast, we stopped at the hotel reception area to request replacements for the essential items that had gone missing when our room was serviced the previous day.

Supplies suitably replenished, we returned to our room and gathered what we needed for a day visiting Brooklands museum which is home to the world’s first purpose built car-racing circuit and an aerodrome. Mr C was particularly interested in seeing the historic steep banked car racing circuit dating from 1907. On arrival he was able to sit in the cockpit of a racing car and drive along a simulation of the track.

As we made our way around the museum we were lucky enough to be treated to personal guided tours by museum volunteers. The first such tour took us around what is known as the Loch Ness Wellington, the only known surviving Brooklands-built Wellington. This Wellington, N2980, developed and engine problem during a training flight in 1940 and ditched in Loch Ness. In 1976 the Wellington was located in the Loch by a team of American Loch Ness Monster hunters and subsequently raised.

Later we were given a detailed explanation of the Stratosphere Chamber, designed to simulate atmospheric conditions such as snow wind and ice where planes, boats, clothing and other equipment were tested out for vulnerabilities in order to improve their design.

After our personal tours it was time to board Concorde with our complimentary boarding pass. Our tour guide, a former flight attendant on Concorde, shared both technical information and anecdotes. Suitably seated and ready for flight, the pilot, via video, gave us additional information as we reached Mach 2.02. We were told not to look outside the windows at it might spoil the illusion. When we reached our destination (right where we started) we were given a complimentary flight certificate to commemorate our flight on Concorde.

I have only touched the surface of the things we saw during our visit to Brooklands and there was so much more to see, but we ran out of time.  This meant that our planned visit to Runnymede later in the afternoon had to be postponed for another occasion.

Back at the hotel, we had time to relax and freshen up before dining in the Cote Brasserie which is located just on the opposite side of the Thames, via Windsor Bridge, from the Hotel Christopher Wren. Then it was back to the hotel for a nightcap in the bar, which on this occasion, was still serving when we retired for the night.

We set off later than we intended, stopping at Warwick services for lunch. The place was heaving, so we picked up some sandwiches and drinks for an in-car picnic before continuing on our journey, which took us to a small village called Brill. Brill was Tolkien’s inspiration for the village of Bree in Lord of the Rings.

Much to the bemusement of the locals I had my photograph taken with my Shire medal from my recently completed walking challenge. Afterward, as we we were driving along the motorway a Red Kite swooped down, swooping back up only just in time to miss hitting our car. Phew!

On arrival in Windsor we found the Hotel’s offsite car park then made our way to the hotel, Sir Christopher Wren to check in. We took our suitcases to the room before setting off for a cuppa and a walk around Windsor.

Back at the hotel we freshened up before dinner at The Boatman, a place we had dined on a previous visit to Windsor. We had a pre-dinner Prosecco whilst waiting for our food to arrive. Unfortunately the waiter got Mr C’s order wrong and the Roast Beef he ordered arrived as a Roast Chicken portion which he particularly did not want. There were no more roast meals left so he settled for fish and chips instead. There was no real apology, discount or sweetener for the error.

We returned to the hotel bar in order to use the free drinks vouchers we had received for making our hotel reservation direct with the hotel. The bar staff said the bar would be shutting early because it wasn’t very busy that night. This was to the dismay of at least 10 people who turned up just before the bar shut at 10 o’clock.

We headed off to a local garden centre with lunch in mind. We enjoyed browsing around the garden centre but the lunch options did not tempt us. After paying our respects to Her Majesty we drove to Wightwick Manor only to find that the car park was closed because it was full.

We eventually found lunch in a garden centre at Gailey. I thought I would choose a healthy sandwich option until I saw the calorie content was more than I would consume for an evening meal. Instead I opted for a piece of ‘naughty cake’ which was half the calories of the sandwiches. When Mr C’s sandwich arrived I understood why, the bread was doorstep sized.

Next we visited Shugborough allowing me to complete my target for day 3 of my June walking challenge. On arrival we walked up to Hadrian’s arch, a place the Mr C had not been before. It was rather blustery on top and as we turned to descend the incline we noticed that we had set a trend and several other people were now ascending the incline.

Back at lower levels we visited the walled garden before walking to the house so that we could see the formal gardens. We will be back to explore some of our other favourite features of the estate when we have more time.

Later we dined out with family; all dressed in Red, White and Blue in honour of the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.