Everyone has their own idea of what ‘quintessential England’ looks like, but most would agree that the little towns and villages of North Wiltshire are as English as they come. Sandwiched between the rolling Cotswold hills and the Wessex Downs, this area was once home to a booming wool industry, and seemingly every small town has a grand manor house, while the villages are home to honey-stone cottages, duckponds on the green and venerable inns.
You can tour the area’s prettiest market towns and villages in a day, driving a leisurely loop that begins in the Wiltshire Cotswolds. Start in Castle Combe, which is often cited as England’s prettiest village. Those golden-stone cottages that are a Cotswolds speciality are particularly lovely here, lining the narrow main street that leads downhill to the packhorse bridge over the river Bybrook. Artists can often be seen at their easels trying to do justice to the ‘prettiest village’ in pastel and paint.
The 13th-century St Andrew’s Church is worth
