Christopher Somerville

Latimer, Chenies and the Chess Valley, Bucks/Herts

Jun 072014

Mr William Liberty of Chorleywood, nonconformist brickmaker, died in 1777.
First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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In his will he had categorically stated that he was not to be buried anywhere within the bounds of a church. His wife Alice was of the same mind. And so for well over two hundred years the freethinking and aptly named Liberties have lain in modest state in their brick-built tomb by the field path to Chenies Bottom.

Passing the tomb, I wondered whether Mr Liberty would have sucked his teeth at last night’s Midsummer Music Festival – celestially beautiful music, sublimely played, within the bounds of Latimer’s Victorian church. There were certainly wings to my heels and tunes at the back of my head as I followed the Chess Valley Walk through head-high grasses and champagne-scented elderflower blossom, past Mill Farm and on to Tyler’s watercress farm at the ford on Holloway Lane. The dimpling Chess, a gin-clear stream over a clean gravel bed, raises wonderful crops of cress, and a couple of pounds secured me a crunchy and eye-wateringly peppery bunch to chew as I went on over the fields to Holy Cross Church at Church End.

Maybe William Liberty could have found it in him to approve the craftsmanship, if not the location, of the 14th-century paintings under the dark timber roof of Holy Cross. Here are a slim young Virgin astonished before the angel Gabriel and his remarkable news, a shepherd carrying a lamb to Bethlehem, and a musical angel blowing a celebratory blast on a shawm with twin pipes.

Back down the field slope, and on west across the Chess on a lush wet path where every step was a squelch, then up under the green shade of hornbeam and bird cherry into Chenies village. History lies thick on the great Tudor mansion of Chenies Manor where King Henry VIII still walks at night, a limping ghost.

In the adjacent church, generations of Russells, Dukes and Duchesses of Bedford, lie entombed. I found something a little oppressive about the pomp and grandeur of the monuments looming in the Bedford Chapel. It was a relief to be out under the cool grey sky again, walking the ridge path back to Latimer and looking across the river valley to where the Liberties lay free and easy among the nettles and dogroses.

Start: Chalfont & Latimer tube station, Bucks, HP7 9PR (OS ref SU 997975).

Getting there: Metropolitan tube, or A404 to Little Chalfont

Walk (7 miles, easy, OS Explorer 172): Down station road; left along Bedford Avenue; right up Chenies Avenue (996976) to where it bends left into Beechwood Avenue (996981). Ahead here down gravel path into woods. Cross over waymarked junction; ahead downhill (yellow arrow/YA) to bottom edge of wood (998983). Right to kissing gate; left down field; across road (999985), then river (000986). Immediately right through gate (YA), to cross field and road (004987; ‘Chess Valley Walk’/CVW, fish waymark). Follow CVW east for 1¾ miles via William Liberty’s tomb (009988), Mill Farm (014988) and Tylers Watercress Farm watercress beds (026990) to road (031990). Right; in 250m, round left bend; in 70m right over stile (033989; ‘Sarratt Church’); follow YAs/stiles to Holy Cross Church and Cock Inn (039984).

Leave churchyard through south gate opposite almshouses; right through kissing gate; path down to valley bottom (035981). Right over stile; cross fields, then left (034984) across River Chess and stream beyond (NB path often flooded and muddy!). Before reaching woods, path forks 3 ways; take middle path to go through gate (032983, ‘Chiltern Way’/CW) and on along CW through Turveylane Wood and Wyburn Wood for ¾ mile to road (021980). Right into Chenies; cross village green; up gravelled path (ignore ‘Private’ notice) past church (016983). At Chenies Manor gate, right (‘circular walk’ YA). Descend into woods. In 200m, at tree with 3-headed arrows (015985), left along top edge of wood; on along ridge track. Dogleg right and left across Stony Lane (005982); ahead for ½ mile to waymarked junction (997981, BA, YA); left to Chenies Avenue and tube station.

Lunch: Cock Inn, Sarratt (01923-282908; cockinn.net)

Accommodation: Latimer Place, Latimer, HP5 1UG (01494-545500; deverevenues.co.uk)

Chenies Manor: tours 01494-762888; cheniesmanorhouse.co.uk

Midsummer Music Festival, Latimer: 13-15 June 2014; 01494-783643, midsummermusic.org.uk

Great Easton and Tilty Abbey, Essex

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May 312014

A late flight from Stansted, and half a day to kill – how better than to spend the previous night in the friendly Swan Inn at Great Easton, only a spit and a shout from the airport, and get out for a leg-stretch along the green lanes that thread the gently rolling landscape of this rural north-west corner of Essex? First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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Great Easton is full of lovely old houses, half-timbered and whitewashed, with some fine pargetting plasterwork on the walls of the former Bell Inn – a beaky gryphon, a sun in splendour, a bell enfolded by its ropes. Broad fields of rape surround the village, and crossing them felt like walking in a Sergeant Pepper-style dream of intense, opiate yellow, all the more sense-scrambling for lying under a sky full of sharply defined but still grey clouds from which issued the occasional grumble and whine of a Stansted-bound jet.

Apple blossom frothed in pink and white along the path to Tilty Mill, a witchy ruin caught with its curly-spoked flywheels in a thicket of ivy. In the field beyond stood the crumbling walls of Tilty Abbey, the magnificent rose window and chequerboard flint flushwork of today’s parish church the only reminders of the former glories of the 12th-century Cistercian foundation. ‘Allelu-alleluia,’ sang the congregation at their Sunday morning devotions within, their harmony floating us past and away over the billowing cornfields.

Sleek horses were grazing the paddocks at Brookend stables. ‘There’s wartime USAF runways hidden under these crops,’ said a man over his garden gate. ‘You’ll find a window to those brave young men down in Little Easton church.’

That wasn’t the only memorial in the church. Beautiful medieval frescoes adorned the nave walls, and the south chapel was packed with magnificent monuments to Bourchiers and Maynards – ruffs and beards, armour and silks, faces lean or podgy, all lent authority and in some cases arrogance by their whiteness and immobility. Yet it was those young Americans, far from home, daily facing death, who filled my mind as we walked the fields under the growling airliners of the modern age.

START: Swan Inn, Great Easton, Essex CM6 2HG (OS ref TL 606255).

GETTING THERE: Bus service 313, Saffron Walden-Great Dunmow
Road – M11, Jct 8; A120 to Great Dunmow; B184 to Great Easton; left to church and Swan Inn.

WALK (7 miles, easy, OS Explorer 195): From Swan Inn, left up village street, left beside The Bell (607255; fingerpost), over stile, on across fields (stiles, yellow arrows/YA). In ¼ mile, at footbridge (604258), don’t cross, but turn right along right bank of stream, aiming for Duton Hill ahead. At top of field, left across footbridge with metal rails (604265); across stile; half right to stile into road. Right for ¼ mile. Opposite the right turn into Duton Hill (602269, ‘Lindsell’), turn left across ditch (fingerpost). In 200 m path bears left; cross stream and keep ahead to Tilty Mill (600267). Left through gate opposite mill; cross field and pass Tilty Abbey (600265) to road.

Turn right; in 400 m, 2 adjacent footpaths go left; take the first (597264, black wooden fingerpost) and follow Harcamlow Way (marked on map but not on ground). In ½ mile, at bottom of 2nd shallow dip, follow track to right (595256); in 200 m, left (YA) to cross road (594253). Over stile (YA); down track and through gate. Right (YAs and white arrows/WA) down right side of paddock; through gate at bottom (YA, WA); up field edge to road (594250). Right; in ½ mile, on right bend, keep forward (589245; fingerpost, blue arrow/BA) along green lane. In 100 m fork left and continue between stream and paddock; on between paddock fences. At Brookend stables (587242), bear left past house. Left along drive (YA) for just over a mile to Little Easton church.

Left by church gates (604235; fingerpost), through gates of Little Easton Manor; along drive with manor on left and barn on right; through gates beyond and on down field. Cross between two ponds (606239); ahead up fence with garden on right. Bear right round top of garden (BA); follow track to road in Little Easton (608241) with Stag Inn to your right. Left; right at village sign down Butchers Pasture, through gate at end (YA); cross footbridge and bear half left across field. Cross footbridge (610245); go straight ahead (not left) for 50 m, then turn right over another footbridge and stile. Bear left along right bank of stream (YA). Cross a stile (610247, YA); fork left, aiming for church; follow stream. In 300 m, by metal rails on left, turn right (608248) up right bank of a ditch. In 100 m, left across ditch (YA); follow path up to Great Easton.

LUNCH: Swan Inn, Great Easton (01371-870359; swangreateaston.co.uk); Stag Inn, Little Easton (01371-870214)

ACCOMMODATION: Swan Inn, as above

INFORMATION: Saffron Walden TIC (01799-524002);
visitessex.com www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

Compton Dundon and Collard Hill, Somerset

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May 242014

A hot summer morning with a hard blue sky, the mid-Somerset hayfields already cut and dried, the hedges murmurous with bees and hover-flies. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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The view from the steep slopes of Collard Hill was sensational – Glastonbury Tor to the north, Dundon Hill and Lollover Hill out to the south-west, yellow-green pastures spread out and shimmering in the heat of afternoon. I followed the ridge path west to where the Hood Monument’s sailing-ship crown rose above the trees on Windmill Hill. Vice-Admiral Sir Samuel Hood was one of those energetic, apparently fearless sailors who came to glory in Nelson’s Navy, and when he died in 1814 his brother officers raised the great column to his memory.

Down in Dundon churchyard I sat a while in the dense shade of a great yew tree, as thick as ten men belted together, far older than the ancient church it dominates. Then I struck out on the old cart track that loops round Lollover Hill. By the time I had made the circuit and got down into the flatlands north of Dundon, everything far and near seemed quivering in the radiance of reflected sunlight – cattle, ditches, hedgerow oaks, and the long dark whaleback of Collard Hill lying across the landscape to the north.

The wardens who welcome visitors to the National Trust’s Collard Hill Nature Reserve really know their stuff. I was lucky enough to stroll round with Matthew Oates, the Trust’s very own ‘Butterfly Man’, as he expounded the story of the Large Blue butterfly, a creature whose existence relies on cutting a deal with the red ant species myrmica sabuleti. The ants take the caterpillar to their nest, where they feed on a sticky juice it exudes; in return – notwithstanding this huge guest’s appetite for their own eggs and larvae – they look after it until it emerges from its chrysalis. They escort the brand-new Large Blue butterfly above ground, and wait for its wings to harden into flight before they part from it.

Small wonder the Large Blue’s existence is precarious. By 1979 it had become extinct in UK, but has been successfully reintroduced at Collard Hill and a handful of other places. I’d always longed to see one of these large and brilliantly blue butterflies, and it was a fantastic thrill when one flitted across the slope of thyme and scabious – big, blue and beautiful, as it wrangled with a common blue and then fluttered off and out of sight.

Start & finish: NT car park, Street Youth Hostel, Marshall’s Hill, Somerset BA16 0TZ (OS ref ST 488340)

Getting there: Bus – Service 377 (firstgroup.com) Yeovil-Wells, to Marshalls Elm crossroads. Road – B3151 Street-Somerton road; right at Marshalls Elm crossroads to car park.

Walk (7½ miles, easy, OS Explorer 141): From the NT car park, follow blue-topped posts; cross B3151 at Marshall’s Elm crossroads (485344; NB dangerous crossing – please take great care!). Through kissing gate opposite; follow Polden Way/PW (blue-topped posts) or other footpaths through Collard Hill Nature Reserve. At far side, make for NE (top left) corner of reserve by a prominent, solo oak tree (490339); follow track uphill; in 100m, right (KG, PW) to leave reserve. In ¼ mile cross road (494339); through KG opposite (PW) into trees. In 70m path forks; both lead to Hood Monument (496338).

From SE corner of monument, follow clear path west through trees. In 150m go through KG (497337; PW). Don’t continue to road, but go sharp right downhill on stony path to turn left along road (495337). In ¼ mile road forks; bear right to T-junction (493334). Left along Compton Street; in 50m, right beside East Barn; on through wicket gate and across following stile. Ahead along field edge. In 100m cross ditch (490334); half-left across field to cross pair of stiles in far corner (489333; YA). Cross field to B3151 beside house (488332). Right for 50m; left over stile (‘Hurst Drove’ waymark post). Ahead up field edge to go through gate (486332); left along 3 field edges with hedge on left. At end of 3rd field (487329), left along track to road; left to B3151 (489328); right past Castlebrook Inn (closed at time of writing – due to reopen summer 2014).

In 100m pass gate marked ‘Castlebrook Holiday Cottages’; in another 30m, right through hedge and kissing gate/KG. Follow path west for ½ mile along field edges. At end of 4th field, through KG (482325) and on along paved lane to road in Dundon (480325).

Left for 50m; just past foot of lane to church, right (‘Lollover Hill’, yellow arrow/YA) up hedged path. In 100m, up steps; left (478325); in 150m, right (478323; ‘Hayes Lane’) along stony lane. In ⅓ mile it starts to descend (473322); in another 250m, where it bends left, go right over stile (471321; YA). Aim up field, parallel to hedge; over stile on far side (468320); right along hedge, right through gate at field end (468322; YA); left along hedge and follow it for 2 fields. At top of rise, cross 2 adjacent stiles (473325); on along green lane. In ⅓ mile it descends to bend right; in another 30m, right down steps (478325) to return to road in Dundon (479324).

Left and follow road to foot of hill; cross (480327) into Hurst Drove. Pass Hurst Farm and continue. In 300m, just beyond gate into Lower Hurst Farm, left over stile (481335; YA); right along hedge; in 100m, right over stile, left along hedge (YA); in 100m, left over adjacent stiles (480337, YA) and right along hedge. At top of field, cross stile (480340; fingerpost) and on up hedged lane to road by gates of Ivythorn Manor (481342). Follow lane up Page’s Hill to Marshall’s Elm crossroads and car park.

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Lunch: Picnic. NB: Castlebrook Inn, Compton Dundon, currently closed – due to reopen shortly

Collard Hill Nature Reserve (NT): nationaltrust.org.uk; Large Blue blog – http://ntlargeblue.wordpress.com/; wildlifeextra.com/go/uk/collard-hill

Large blue flight season: Generally early June-mid July (check website!)

visitengland.com www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

Middle Mayfield and Cuckoo Cliff, Staffordshire

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May 172014

They dress their wells in the Peak District – always have, probably always will. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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The old springs and sources of Derbyshire are famous for the intricate way they are ornamented by the local people with pictures of flowers and seeds in high summer. But here in Middle Mayfield across the county boundary in Staffordshire, they’re proud to carry on this ancient pagan tradition, too, garlanding the village wells in June come rain, come shine.

On a close, steamy morning, with heatwaves and thunderstorms threatened, we passed three or four wells on our way up Hollow Lane out of the village, the dark still water concealed like a treasure behind gridded gates or wooden doors. Spatters of blue and white seeds and stones showed where they had been glorified only a month before. Now the dimpling sources lay in secret among the borage and comfrey, knapweed and moon daisies along Hollow Lane.

From the ridge at Ashfield Farm we had a view lent mystery by the thick grey heat – the misty woods and hayfields of the River Dove’s deep valley behind us, and the long bald head of Blake Low rising ahead. Then we plunged down through Gold’s Wood to walk the bank of the shallow, glass-brown Ordley Brook. The local geology seemed to be having an identity crisis – the houses were of beautiful sun-paled pink sandstone, but the abundant scabious where the butterflies were feeding spoke of lime beneath the soil. The knobbly old shaft of the medieval Ousley Cross beside the road was peppered with conglomerate pebbles – another puzzle.

A stony lane between fields of skittish cattle brought us up to Stanton, from where Flather Lane rose northwards under shady ash and hazels to leave us on the brink of Cuckoohill Wood and its steep little gorge. Here Ellis Hill Brook chuckled under giant hogweed and the sky-blue flowers of nettle-leaved bellflower.

After skirting Leasow and Ellishill Farm we dropped into the cleft and went south beside the brook through thickets of nettles and brambles. A stiff climb to the ridge once more, and we followed the ill-waymarked but lovely Limestone Way path across newly mown hayfields on the crest of the land, with a wonderful breeze to cool our sun-baked faces.

Start: Rose & Crown PH, Middle Mayfield, Staffs DE6 2JT (OS ref SK 148447)

Getting there: Bus 409 (arrivabus.co.uk) Ashbourne-Uttoxeter
Road – Middle Mayfield is on B5032 (off A52, 2 miles west of Ashbourne)

Walk (7½ miles, moderate, OS Explorer 259): Opposite Rose & Crown, up Hall Lane. Just past Old Hall, left up Hollow Lane (147449, fingerpost). In 500 m leave trees by stile (142448); ahead with hedge on left. Cross stile; bear half right, aiming right of Ashfield Farm, to cross stile (139448, 2 yellow arrows/YA). In 30 m, right through squeeze stile/SS (YA). Diagonally left, over stile beside right-hand of 2 gates. Follow right-hand hedge to cross concrete roadway (137447); in 50 m, right through gateway (no waymark); half left to cross SS. Follow hedge on your left. Through next SS; on past conifer plantation. At end, over wooden stile (133447); right to bottom of slope, left along wood edge. In 250 m, right through stile (132447, YA); down path through wood, curving right in 150 m to descend and cross Ordley Brook by footbridge (131448). Left along far bank for 700 m to road (126445). Ahead for 50 m to see remains of Ousley Cross on right.

Retrace path along Ordley Brook. In 200 m cross side stream; in another 50 m, left (128447) through stile gap (YA, ‘Weaver Walk’/WW). Follow path through wood to stile out of trees (128448, WW). Forward to stone wall; left along it (YA, WW). Soon path becomes grassy lane. In a little over ½ mile, at a gate by Smithy Moor Farm (131457), don’t turn right (YA), but go through gate ahead (fingerpost) and on up farm track for ¼ mile to road on outskirts of Stanton (130460). Left; in 150 m, right up Flather Lane.

In ½ mile, after passing silage clamp on right, continue along wide grassy lane. Descend to cross stile (131472, YA); then steeply down to Cuckoohill Wood. Cross stony gap in bottom left corner of field (131473); bear left along stream bank for 50 m; cross footbridge and up steps to cross stile into field. Bear left and follow line of electricity poles across field to cross stile/kissing gate into field just south of Leasow (132477). Right along fence for 100 m; right over triple stile (YA); half left to cross double stile (133477). Half left to go through SS by holed stone. Aim for Ellishill Farm across field, and through SS.

NB Path is currently being diverted to pass left of house – please watch for signs! At time of writing, path passes close to right of house (134474) and continues for 50 m to go through wall gap (135473). Ahead along ridge with hedge on left and valley on right. In 100 m (135472), diagonally right down slope to bottom edge of field. 100 m from end of field, right over stile into wood (135469, YA). Follow path (can be very overgrown!) south for ½ mile on left (east) bank of brook. Just beyond stile out of wood, pass well and standing stone (137464) to Stanton Lane (138462).

Left up lane, past Harlow Farm drive. In another 150 m, at top of hill, right through gate (142464, arrow) on Limestone Way (labelled as such on map). Through SS above farm and on; at next gate, through stile on left of it (143461). On with hedge on right, through gateway (YA); half left across field to stile (144459, YA); on with hedge on left to double stile (YA). Across field to SS (YA); halfway across next field, right through hedge (143455, stile, YA) and left along green lane. Cross stile by metal gate; same at next one. In another 70 m, left (142452, YA, WW on your right) up hedge, over ridge and down through stile in left corner of field (143451, YA). Descend with hedge on left for ¼ mile to lane by Old Hall (148449). Right into Middle Mayfield.

Lunch/Accommodation: Rose & Crown, Middle Mayfield (01335-342498; roseandcrownmayfield.com). NB Closed Sunday evening, all Monday; but B&B operates 7 days.

Middle Mayfield Well Dressing 2014: Sat 14 June, 11 a.m.

Info: Ashbourne TIC (01335-343666); visitpeakdistrict.com

visitengland.com www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

Dylan Thomas’s Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, Wales

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May 102014

A most beautiful morning of blue sky and crisp spring weather over Laugharne. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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Fresh flowers had been laid on Dylan Thomas’s grave in the sloping churchyard. Following the town trail map along the village street, we picked out the everyday waymarks of the poet’s life here in the 1930s and 40s – Brown’s Hotel where he drank (and drank), the green-faced Pelican house where his parents lived, the baker’s where Thomas came for bread each morning. Here we filled the backpack with welsh cakes and went our way, down past the big jagged ruin of Laugharne Castle and up Sir John’s Hill along a cliff path above the great dun apron of salt marsh that separates the village from the sea.

On his 30th birthday, Thomas said in ‘Poem in October’, he felt himself summoned out and over Sir John’s Hill by ‘water praying and call of seagull and rook / And the knock of sailing boats on the net webbed wall’. He had a rainy view that October morning in 1944, but ours today was laid out in sunlight – marsh, dunes, a crawling silver sea rough with surf, and Worm’s Head promontory a string of grey islets at the edge of sight.

The path soon swung inland, up and over a ridge of pastures, down into a green valley. A holloway stodgy with red mud brought us to the back lanes of Laugharne, from where stony byways led via the Wales Coast Path to the lonely farm of Delacorse.

Back along the edge of the Taf estuary we found the Boathouse where Dylan and Caitlin Thomas and their three children lived for the last four years of the poet’s life, and the tiny shed where he sat and wrote and looked out on a sublime estuary view.

Some have suggested that Dylan Thomas was not a great poet, just a brilliant wordsmith. You have only to sit on the Boathouse terrace, looking out over the estuary towards St John’s Hill, and read ‘Poem in October’ to give the lie to such nonsense. That’s why Wales is so fervently celebrating the Centenary this year of its national poet in all his wayward genius.

Start: Church car park, Laugharne, SA33 4QD (OS ref SN 301114)

Getting there: Bus Service 222 (tafvalleycoaches.co.uk), Carmarthen-Pendine
Road – Laugharne is on A4066 (signed from St Clears on A40)

Walk (6½ miles, easy, OS Explorer 177): From car park, left along A4066 through Laugharne (Dylan Thomas Town Trail map downloadable at discovercarmarthenshire.com/dylan-thomas). Past Brown’s Hotel, left by Three Mariners restaurant (302109) up Victoria Street past the bakery. Right at bend past Sea View (another Thomas dwelling); straight ahead at corner to waterfront. Right past Laugharne Castle (302107). Follow Wales Coast Path/WCP and Dylan’s Birthday Walk/DBW along shore; right uphill (303104). In ½ mile, by Salt House Farm bench (306100), WCP and DBW fork left; but keep ahead here (‘To Laugharne over Sir John’s Hill’).

In ⅓ mile, at a fork (301097), go right uphill (WCP, yellow arrow/YA). In 50m, at top of steps, YA points ahead over one stile and on uphill towards another. But you turn left here from the top of the steps through a fence gap (unmarked). In 350m, cross stile into field (297098); ahead up hedge and down to lane in Broadway (295101). Left to A4066; right to pass Carpenter’s Arms PH; left here (296102) down lane. At end, over stile by garage (294103); right (YA) along hedge. At corner, right (YA) along path that becomes lane. In 700m, right at road (297108). At 30 mph sign fork left (299108). On right bend, left up Holloway Lane. In 50m fork right past cottages and on. Through gate at lane end; on across 2 fields to Horsepool Road; right to A4066 (301114).

Right; left up cobbled lane beside church car park. In 150m, pass entrance to the Long Lanes (302114) in ⅓ mile, pass entrance to Delacorse Uchaf, and at next T-junction right (302120, fingerpost) up stony lane. In 100m, ahead (WCP) for ½ mile to Delacorse (308122). Follow WCP markers through yard and fields, then along cliff path. In 1 mile, pass Boathouse and Writing Shed (306110). At road, right (304109) at gates of The Furlongs, up bridlepath. In 100m, at kissing gate (304110), bear left along lane to church and car park.

Lunch: The Boathouse (01994-427420) – snack with a view, exhibition; open 10.30-3.00

Accommodation: Brown’s Hotel, Laugharne (01994-427688; browns-hotel.co.uk)

Dylan Thomas Festival of Walks: 24-26 May (llanelliramblers.org.uk)

Info: Laugharne TIC at Corran Books (01994-427444); dylanthomasbirthdaywalk.co.uk

discovercarmarthenshire.com;
www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

Charlton and Goodwood, West Sussex

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May 032014

The Fox Goes Free at deep-sunk Charlton is one of my favourite Sussex pubs, especially when it’s warm enough to sit in the garden with a pie and a pint, looking out across the flint wall and over the grazing sheep in the meadow beyond to the double swell of Levin Down and North Down. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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Those seductive hills soon called Jane and me away, up along North Lane and past open sheds at Ware Barn full of hay bales and sacks of wool from last year’s clip. Old-man’s-beard hung soft and white in the hedges, and loose flints chinked under our boots as we climbed a dark holloway through an old yew grove.

From the broad whaleback of Levin Down we had a wonderful southward prospect across Singleton’s grey houses huddled in their valley, over to the flags and white pavilions of Goodwood’s racecourse and the round knoll of The Trundle, crowned with the ramparts of an Iron Age hillfort. It’s a view from a patriotic wartime poster, a landscape worth fighting for, thousands of years of history rolling out in plain view. And if this is one of southern England’s great views, it’s outdone by the panorama from The Trundle itself – Chichester Cathedral spire, the twin grandstands of the racecourse, the sails of Halnaker windmill, the silvery windings of Chichester Harbour, the Isle of Wight lying like a cloud along the smoky blue bar of the sea.

On the ramparts of the fort we sat and stared. At the height of summer the race meeting aptly nicknamed ‘Glorious Goodwood’ fills the downland racecourse with noise and colour, but today it lay quiet, a green snake of grassy track rollercoasting below us between its white railings. A childhood memory came to Jane – watching an excavation at the foot of The Trundle, a female skeleton being unearthed, and the archaeologist pointing out the woman’s excellent teeth – ‘Because there were no sweeties in those days!’

The Trundle’s embanked fort was built well over 2,000 years ago, but the remnants of an enclosure three times as old underlie the stronghold. It’s a resonant place with a stupendous view. Two sparrowhawks skimmed the ramparts, hanging with heads down as they scanned the banks, and a pair of lovers lay in the long grass at the summit, talking quietly, as lovers have surely been doing here since long before men fortified the hill.

Start: Fox Goes Free Inn, Charlton, West Sussex PO18 0HU (OS ref SU 889130)

Getting there: Bus – Service 99 (pre-book on 01903-264776; compass-travel.co.uk), Petworth-Chichester
Road – Charlton is signed off A286 Chichester-Midhurst road at Singleton.

Walk (7 miles, easy/moderate, OS Explorer 120): From Fox Goes Free, right along road; in 150m, right at crossroads up North Lane. In ⅔ mile, a footpath forks to right (891140), but you keep to track; in 200m, left (bridleway fingerpost). Track climbs through trees; in 350m, near top, you pass yellow arrow/YA footpath marker on left; in another 100m at T-junction, go left (889145, ‘Singleton’) through gate. Bear half right across open grassland of Levin Down between 2 woods to far corner of Lady Wood on right (886143); follow fence over skyline for ¼ mile to gate (883138). On for 100m; bear right past fingerpost for 300m to kissing-gate (880135, ‘New Lipchis Way’); descend to cross road in Singleton (879132).

Bear half left across green; on between houses; in 100m, right (880131) along The Leys. At T-junction, dogleg right and left past houses, across end of recreation ground, past church gate to T-junction at end of churchyard (878130). Left (YA, ‘The Trundle’). Through farmyard, up steep grass path and on for ¾ mile to lane (880119). Right to cross road (880113); follow fingerposts up steps and path to The Trundle hillfort. From summit (877111), left/east past ‘Monarch’s Way/MW’ arrow on post, through wood to join track; left (MW) to road (882110) opposite Goodwood Racecourse.

Right along verge; in 250m, left (883107) beside road past racecourse on grass verges/woodland edge for 1 mile. 100m past end of racecourse, turn left (897114); hairpin back left along first track of several, through gateway (unwaymarked), following Chalk Road track for 1¼ miles back to Charlton.

Lunch: Fox Goes Free, Charlton (01243-811461, foxgoesfree.com)

Goodwood Racecourse: goodwood.co.uk

Information: Chichester TIC (01243-775888; visitsussex.org)

www.ramblers.org.uk www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

Blagdon Lake

Local Walks No Responses »

Apr 262014

A male blackbird, yellow bill a-tremble, was making tentative inquiries of a drab brown female on a bough in the New Inn’s garden as I started down the hill towards Blagdon Lake. The celandines were still curled tight and green along the high-banked lane, but there was a breath of warmth in the low sun, more than Somerset had felt for the past three months.

For well over a century Blagdon Lake water has been piped to Bristol’s taps, ten miles over the hills to the north. Crossing the broad dam of the lake, I heard the subdued roar of the flood-engorged weir where snowmelt and swollen streams were sending their waters surging down the spillway. I followed the fishermen’s path through the trees along the north bank of the lake, then struck out across fields thick with the winter’s mud to reach the lane by Bellevue Farm – well named for its prospect of water and hills.

A little way up the lane I was pulled up short by the sight of a large badger squatting on its haunches in a cottage garden. It shouldn’t have been out of its sett this early in the year, and it certainly should have fled at sight of me, instead of fixing me with a sleepy stare. It was I who walked away, leaving the badger master of the place.

The southward views grew better and better as the lane rose, until at the top of Awkward Hill I looked down over fields patchworked with green grass and red ploughland, out across the whole expanse of Blagdon Lake to the steep wall of the Mendip Hills beyond in early afternoon shadow.

The late winter light, already beginning to diminish, lay softly on the lake with a blurred sheen more like watered silk than the hard mirrored effect of a summer day’s sunshine.

Down by the lake once more, I squelched towards Blagdon over boggy meadows where wild geese went lumbering into the air at my approach, trumpeting reprovingly. It was almost time for them to be off to their mating and brood-rearing, 2,000 miles north of these green Somerset fields.

Back at the New Inn, sitting on the terrace with a cheddar ploughman’s and a kingly view over the lake, I heard the love-struck blackbird – or possibly another like him – still singing for spring.

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Start & finish New Inn, Blagdon BS40 7SB (OS ref ST 505589)

Getting there M5 Jct 21; A 371, A368; left in Blagdon opposite Live & Let Live PH to New Inn.

Walk (5 miles, easy grade, OS Explorers 141, 154): from New Inn, walk down Park Lane, along the reservoir dam wall. On the far side, go right (504603) beside reservoir for half a mile, then forward (511608) to Bellevue Farm at West Town (517604). Left for 10 yards to road, right for three quarters of a mile; 300 yards past the top of Awkward Hill (nameplate), right over stile (527600), following path over stiles, down across fields to road (529593). Left for 250 yards; just before industrial chimney, right (531591 – footpath sign) into damp fields. Follow the footpath close to the reservoir for 1 miles; 500 yards past Holt Farm, bear left (510591) on an uphill path back to Blagdon.

Lunch New Inn (01761-462475), superb lake views from garden; NB no children indoors.

More info Wells TIC (01749-672552); www.visitsomerset.co.uk

Glen Banchor & Fionndrigh Glen, Monadhliath Mountains, Scotland

Walks No Responses »

Apr 262014

It rained cats and dogs in the night, and on till mid-morning. So what’s new in the Scottish Highlands? First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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At last the sky began to brighten – enough to make a kilt for a wee sailor. I’d been looking forward so much to getting up high and wild into the back country of the Monadhliath Mountains, that a little bit of spit wasn’t going to put me off.

When the glaciers had finished with the Monadhliath, they’d created a hauntingly beautiful range with ice-smoothed flanks, deep side glens and thick moraines of rubble through which streams and rivers push. Today the River Calder in the flat lower strath of Glen Banchor and its tributary Allt Fionndrigh were rumbling and roaring, rain-swollen torrents shifting boulders and pebbles from their glacial banks by the ton. Rain moved in rippling curtains through the vees of the side glens, hanging in the throat of Fionndrigh’s cleft before moving away on the west wind to allow a gleam of sun through.

I passed the old cattle-raising and raiding settlement of Glenbanchor, now nothing more than mossy stones, and made north up the stony track where Glenbanchor’s cattle were driven each spring to sweeter grass high in the mountains. The Allt Fionndrigh came crashing down out of the hills, loud and chaotic over its boulders, and I walked upstream to find a footbridge. Red deer stags moved along the ridge a thousand feet overhead, only their antlers visible against the grey sky.

Under the rocky bluffs of Geal Charn I found a flimsy wooden bridge and crossed the river. Sodden and squelchy, a path led up and over a saddle of high moorland. I followed a line of old fence posts, descending a long slope towards the hissing torrent of Allt Ballach. On the far side the hills rose to hump-back peaks – Carn Dearg and Carn Macoul, with a jumble of darkly magnificent mountains to the edge of sight beyond.

Down by the River Calder again, I turned for home. A frantic squealing in the upper air drew my binoculars. A pair of slate-grey peregrines swooped down from the clouds and circled me, driving the intruder on and out of their private wilderness.

Start & finish: Shepherd’s Bridge car park, Glen Road, Newtonmore (OS ref NN 693998)

Getting there:
Rail (www.thetrainline.com) to Newtonmore.
Road: A9 to Newtonmore. From village main street, follow Glen Road to Shepherd’s Bridge car park.

Walk: (8 miles, hard, OS Explorer 402. NB Online maps, more walks at christophersomerville.co.uk): Continue across Shepherd’s Bridge; on for half a mile, passing abandoned cottage. Just before footbridge to Glenballoch (681993) turn right up Allt Fionndrigh river to join track up Fionndrigh glen. In 2 miles, descent left to cross footbridge (659019); follow track up cleft for 500m. At top (657015), more easily visible track swings right, but continue 50m, then bear left up faint grassy 4 x 4 track, aiming for Creag Liath peak. In 100m, track swings right; in 200m it reaches old fence posts (657012). Follow them to right (tricky underfoot – keep well left of the posts till past peat hags). Follow posts down to Allt Balloch river (652005); left beside river for 1 and a quarter miles to confluence with River Calder (652986). Left by river to Glenballoch and car park.

NB: Trackless and boggy from footbridge in Fionndrigh glen onwards. Take map, compass, GPS, hillwalking gear, stick.

Refreshments: Picnic, or Pantry Tearoom, Newtonmore (01540-673783).

Accommodation: Greenways B&B, Newtonmore PH20 1AT (01540-670136)

Info: Wildcat Centre, Main Street, Newtonmore (01540-673131)
Aviemore TIC (01479-810363); http://white.visitscotland.com
www.ramblers.org.uk www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

The Langtons, Leicestershire

Walks 2 Responses »

Apr 192014

Where to walk in the Leicestershire Wolds, that rolling landscape lying east of the county capital, so beautifully maintained by its farmers and landowners, so overlooked and undervalued by the walking community at large? First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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A glance at the map showed a ring of villages all named ‘Langton’ – Tur Langton, Church Langton, East Langton, Thorpe Langton – each with its own prospering pub. ‘I’ll drive,’ Jane volunteered, unselfishly. Right, then. Half a pint in each, and a damn good walk to link them up and shake the ale down.

Tur Langton sits on the roof of the Wolds, handsome, settled and comfortable with its houses of dark gold stone and its Victorian Italianate church. Glossy horses cropped the Manor’s paddocks and shook themselves for pleasure – ‘Glad to be rid of their winter jackets,’ said the woman tending them. We followed a path through fields of young wheat and of oil-seed rape so intensely yellow under this morning’s sun that it hurt the eye to gaze on it. A yellowhammer sat on a wire, giving out its characteristic chatter and wheeze. Its head and breast were yellow, too, but of a shade so subtly rich as to put the brashly glaring rape to shame.

In Church Langton, a half of Old Golden Hen outside the Langton Arms, to the nostalgic chime of church bells. At East Langton, a half of smoky-flavoured, locally brewed Caudle Bitter, in the garden of the Bell, to the intrusive splutter of a microlight overhead. Never mind – the beer was great, and so was the walking, moving on over ridge-and-furrow fields where medieval villagers ploughed and sowed before the more profitable sheep usurped them. At the Bakers Arms in Thorpe Langton, a tasty half of Bakers Dozen from the village’s own Langton Brewery, and we went floating along the lilac-fringed lane that led up to the high spot of the walk, the summit of Langton Caudle hill. A view to take your breath, a view to all quarters – a landscape sailing and billowing with yellow rape and green corn, patched with thick brown ploughland under a huge blue and white sky.

Down in Stonton Wyville, grassy lanebanks showed the layout of an abandoned medieval village. In a sheltered hollow near Tur Langton we found the square-mouthed well where in 1645 King Charles I, in flight from disastrous defeat nearby at the Battle of Naseby, stopped to give his horse a drink. It was poignant to picture the beaten man in bitter contemplation by the pool, a fugitive from his own subjects in the wide land where he was no longer king.

Start: Crown Inn, Tur Langton, Leics LE8 0PJ (OS ref SP 713946)

Getting there: Bus service 44 (centrebus.info), Fleckney-Foxton
Road – Tur Langton is on B6047, 1 mile north of Church Langton (signed off A6 Leicester – Market Harborough road)

Walk (8½ miles, easy, OS Explorer 233): From Crown Inn, right (west) along street. At right bend (710946), ahead down The Manor drive (fingerpost). Immediately right over stile; follow yellow-topped posts (YTP) and yellow arrows (YA) through paddocks and round farm buildings. In field with chapel ruins, cross stile (708945), then ahead down right side of field. Path bends left along field edge past moat. At bottom of slope (704941), blue arrow points left along left bank of stream; this is wrong! Ignore, and cross stream; right along right stream bank. In 400m, left over footbridge (704937, YTP, YA); up field with hedge on right, following YTP/YA towards Church Langton church tower.

Cross road in Church Langton (722932); by Langton Arms pub signboard, enter pub car park. In 30m, right over stile; left to cross next stile (YTP); follow YTPs to road (725931). Right to T-junction (725929); cross road and stile (fingerpost); at bottom of field, left through gate (726928, YTP); on to reach road opposite Bell Inn, East Langton (727927). Left for 50m; right (fingerpost) up path beside Yew Tree Cottage. Cross stile (728927); across field to cross stile (YTP, YA) by last house on left. Narrow hedged path to road (728926). Left; through kissing gate and follow ‘Leicestershire Round’ (LR) for nearly 1 mile to pass church in Thorpe Langton. At T-junction beyond church (741924) left to road. Right; just before Bakers Arms, left (741925, LR) down lane. At ford, keep right over right-hand bridge (743930, LR); follow LR for ¾ mile up to trig point at summit of Langton Caudle hill (795942).

Walking on from trig point, ignore YTP ahead and to right; keep to left-hand hedge in corner of field, left through gate (BA, YTP), follow BA, YTP for ½ mile down to lane (738946). Right to cross road (737948); ahead (‘No Through Road’) into Stonton Wyville. At right bend, left (736951, YTP) through iron gate; half left across field to YTP; right along hedge. At far end of lumpy ground of Stonton Wyville medieval village (735949), aim half right for YTP and cross footbridge (733949). On to go through hedge gap (YTP); left (YA) up field edge with hedge on left. Follow YTP past King Charles’s Well (722949) and on to Tur Langton. Cross road (715946); down road opposite, to reach Crown Inn.

Lunch: Crown, Tur Langton (01858-545264): Langton Arms, Church Langton (01858-545181); Bell Inn, East Langton (01858-545278); Bakers Arms, Thorpe Langton (01858-545201).

Accommodation: Nevill Arms, Medbourne, Leics LE16 8EE (01858-565288; thenevillarms.net)
www.ramblers.org.uk www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

Bramley and Thorncombe Street, Surrey

Walks 1 Response »

Apr 122014

Quite a bunch of us set out from The Jolly Farmer at Bramley. We felt remarkably jolly ourselves. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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This is just what you want a village pub to be like – cheerful, bouncy, well-kept, a bit eccentric, the sort of place where the landlord tends the flowerbeds and the bargirl talks of herself unselfconsciously as a member of ‘the Jolly Farmer Family’.

You know you’re in deepest stockbroker Surrey when the wind-vanes on the stables are topped, not by foxes or cocks, but by bonus-friendly helicopters. This is beautifully maintained countryside, the fields all smooth green grazing, the woods coppiced, the driveway gates enormous, the paddocks full of glossy thoroughbreds – and one or two horses, too. The secret glory of this corner of Surrey is its ancient lanes, old trackways winding through the woods that have never known a tarmac-spreader. Hooves and boots have worn them hollow down the centuries. They lie deeply sunken into the sandy landscape, a network of shady holloways dappled with sun filtering through the beech and hazel canopy.

We went west from Bramley along a lane bordered with white stars of stitchwort and bells of pungent wild garlic. The spring sunlight reached down out of a china-blue sky, fingering sycamore leaves so intensely green that the woods appeared lit from within. Brick gables and the tall stalks of ornamental chimneys poked out of the treetops at Catteshall and Thorncombe Street, telltale signs of splendid houses hidden away amongst their private greenery.

On the steep hillside above Thorncombe Street we sat in a row on a weather-furrowed beech log to gaze around the valley with its string of old millponds and lakes ribboning south to the treasury of trees at Winkworth Arboretum. Horses grazed broad paddocks between copses of hornbeam and oak, all cradled in a perfect bowl of green hills.

We dipped down through a bluebell wood with a floor more blue than green, and found a straight holloway leading northward back to Bramley. Up on the crest, in the paddock at Hurst Hill Farm, a young god in a pink shirt and a warrior topknot cantered by on a gleaming steed with two other horses on loose reins as outriders. Watching the careless grace of the youth and his beautiful animals shiny with health and exercise, I could understand why men of old believed in centaurs.

Start: Jolly Farmer PH, Bramley, Surrey GU5 0HB (OS ref TQ 008448).

Getting there: Bus service 53 (arrivabus.co.uk), Guildford-Ewhurst. Road – Bramley is on A281, Guildford-Horsham (M25, Jct 10).

Walk (7 miles, easy/moderate, OS Explorer 145): From Jolly Farmer, left along A281. Cross junction with B2128; in 200m, left (007451; ‘bridleway’). In ⅔ mile, cross road (997447). In ½ mile, on Farley Hill, descend to meet T-junction of holloways with ‘Fox Trail’ waymark (990445); right to 5-way staggered junction of tracks (987446). Take 2nd left, uphill with field on right. In 200m, at T-junction (986444), on past houses. In 250m, at The Old Cider House on left, turn left (984442). At gates of Catteshall Manor, left (‘bridleway’). In nearly 1 mile, cross Munstead Heath Road (990430). Ahead (fingerpost); in 300m, over path crossing (990427). In another 300m (991424), left along road for 150m; right (fingerpost) through wood. In ⅓ mile, leave wood over stile (994419); follow field edge down valley towards house. Just before house, right through kissing gate (996418); left (yellow arrow/YA) to pass house; before reaching road, left by garden shed (997417, YA) up steps and on. Follow field edges for ⅓ mile to road in Thorncombe Street (999422).

Right to junction; left (‘Bramley’); in 100m, right (fingerpost, ‘Organic Farm Trail’) up lane. Through gateway; follow left-hand hedge uphill to cross stile at top (003422); on along fenced path. Follow YAs through wood. Down field to cross stile; left on bridleway (011423) past Upper Bonhurst. At a barn conversion, bear right at fork (011431). In 50m cross road; at 3-way ‘bridleway’ fingerpost, don’t turn left, but keep ahead up woodland track. On past Hurst Hill Farm (012438); continue for ½ mile, descending deep holloway to cross road (010444). Ahead to A281; ahead to Jolly Farmer.

Lunch/Accommodation: Jolly Farmer PH, Bramley (01483-893355; jollyfarmer.co.uk) – cheerful, characterful, family-run pub.

Winkworth Arboretum: 01483-208477; nationaltrust.org.uk

Information: Guildford TIC (01483-444333)
www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

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