Introduction

 Hi!

We are Becky and Ben. I imagine about 95% of people reading this know at least one of us already, but if anyone new has somehow found us through the wonders of Google, then I think it's only reasonable to introduce ourselves. We live close to the English/Welsh border, love exploring the British countryside, and - in late 2022 - thought of something idiosyncratically daft to do with our holiday leave for 2023.

In 2019, Janice Hallett published The Appeal, an excellent book written in an epistolary format. 'Epistolary' used to mean 'in the medium of letters', but times have changed and The Appeal was largely written in the format of emails and instant messages. It was an excellent whodunit-type of book which we both enjoyed hugely and promptly bought copies for all our friends and family.

The follow-up book was the Twyford Code, and - in case you ignored the disclaimer on the front page - this is where the massive spoilers kick in. The Twyford Code was ostensibly about a twee and marginalised 1920s author called Edith Twyford, who was a thin pastiche of Enid Blyton. Examination of her work was supposed to lead to a treasure-hunt type code. However, Edith Twyford turns out to be a red herring, and the simple fact was that the 'treasure' was buried in the oldest graves at eight different churches in eight different villages, all called Twyford.

Thus were born our holiday plans: could we go in search of the Twyford Code ourselves? One of the most wonderful things about rural Britain is that every village has its own little architectural marvel in the form of the local church. Becky is a bell-ringer, and Ben just likes admiring nice things, so a trip to take in some lovely village churches was a most appealing idea.

Right, time for another big disclaimer. We are not Treasure Hunters! We are just doing this as an entertaining diversion and the opportunity to share some lovely English countryside with our small readership. One of the subtexts of The Twyford Code is to point out how faintly ridiculous the various book-based treasure-hunting communities are, and Janice Hallett has given interviews stating how appalled she has been by the behaviour of many famous armchair treasure hunters (The Golden Hare, Fenn Fever etc). So, just for the avoidance of any doubt: we are not looking for treasure, we certainly wouldn't exhume any graves to find it, and we mandate that you do the same. Anyone found calling on Janice's relatives as a result of this blog will make us very unhappy indeed!

There are a few things we've tried to go looking for at every Twyford:

1) The church, obviously.

2) The oldest grave, as mentioned in the book, BUT with due reverence and respect to the deceased

3) Any clues that there might be gold in the vicinity (unlikely!)

4) Any fish symbology. The fish is used prominently as a visual clue in the books

...and then a little tour around the village...

5) The name Twyford derives from the Middle English for 'two fords'. So can we find the two fords for which the villages is named?

6) Any other local attractions or places of interest

7) Of course, picking up a souvenir for each of our visits is mandatory

Ready to see how we get on? Our journey starts in Twyford, Hampshire.