Silchester

Last Sunday, Matt and I drove out to Silchester to see the old Roman town there. Here he is standing on the remains of the wall. Silchester is unique since, unlike many other Roman cities and towns, it was abandoned. It remained untouched for close to 2000 years and was only recently excavated. At the moment, it's surrounded by grazing land.

We walked along the walls, which are quite high! There were lots of other people out and about, walking their dogs, etc. It was a really nice evening.

This is the amphitheatre. I don't know if I was able to capture its essence, but if you're thinking 'parking lot' that's pretty close. Archeological aren't sure what the amphitheatre was used for. A few small bones were found in the area but little else. Interestingly, it's just outside the city walls. Either it wasn't worth protecting, or they wanted to keep the carnival and civic separate.

A designated organic farm, as per DEFRA and the EU. We thought the name might be a play on words!

The effects of the drought are pretty obvious in this picture. I'm not sure if this is a marsh or the water table, but as you can see, the cattle are pretty keen to graze on what little green grass there is.

View of pasture from the wall