my wife and a friend plan a walking tour of the cotswalds in may 1998.... any suggestions would be most welcome, or suggested web-sites, or other sources of information. Too bad Fodor's don't have a feature on this, but I'm sure some of you do have valuable tips. Thanks.

I bought an excellent book called 25 walks in the Cotswolds by Ted Fryer. I bought it thru Wordsworth Books online. Its one of the better books I've seen on this subject. One "not to miss" place we visited last year in the Cotswolds was Snowshill. Happy walking!

In 1994 my wife and I spent a week walking in the Cotswolds with HF Holidays, an English rambler's association. The HF house is in Bourton-on-the-Water and we had a great time. I think you can find HF Holidays on the Web. If not, and if you'd like information, write to me.

This is in response to the thread, "How long have you been on Fodors?" I searched through and found this message from me in Jan. '98. What fun!

And you're still only 18!

C'mon, grumpy old flanneruk, lighten up. Let me tell you a cheery story: I started using Joe18 last year after making it on time from Munich to Jena on local trains and then relying on the kindness of cab drivers to find a great hotel at a good price. Jena being in the former East Germany, neither of the taxi drivers I found spoke English, but with pidgin German I was able to get across hotel and cheap. When I arrived at the hotel, rather grand and inexpensive, and wanted to post on Fodors, I realized that I couldn't remember my password. I re-registered and added the 18 to reflect my adolescent lightheartedness at the time. There, isn't that a nice, cheery story? Feel better?