Christopher Somerville

Clayhidon and the Culm Valley, Devon

Mar 092013

Wrapped like lifeboatmen, we left the Half Moon at Clayhidon to explore the steep valleys under the Blackdown Hills. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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No-one else was out braving the rainy winter morning; we had this beautiful green corner of the mist-shrouded East Devon countryside entirely to ourselves.

From the sedgy fields below Clayhidon we looked back to see the houses and church tower of the lonely hamlet stretched out along their ridge. The air struck damp and cold, pearling in our hair and in the stiff coats of the dogs who barked us into and out of Cordwent’s Farm. Grey veils of rain drifted through the valley below the farm, softening the stark outline of the skeleton woods and dripping from the leafless oaks in the hedges. It was a morning of steaming breath, dewdrop noses and many sniffs. At Barne Farm three glossy black horses with white foreheads looked over a gate, shaking the rain from their forelocks as they watched us go by along Applehayes Lane. Lines of raindrops edged the long gleaming leaves of hart’s-tongue ferns, and the nettle-like yellow archangel plants were already beginning to bud – testimony to the mild climate in this sheltered, south-westerly corner of England.

Down in the flat bottom of the Culm Valley the River Culm chuckled over rapids in its red earth bed. Against the sombre brown of bracken and black of the trees, scarlet shoots of dogwood and yellow bursts of gorse flowers made splashes of colour to brighten the late winter day. A cock pheasant, betrayed by the white flash of its neck collar, scuttled away through the sodden grass and squelching hoof-pocks. In a barn we found an ancient Ford Popular, its pop-eyed headlamps and elongated mouth of a radiator grille giving it the expression of a shocked schoolmarm in mid-shriek.

The rain slackened and went away eastwards, leaving a crack of duck-egg blue overhead. The first primroses of the year made a sulphurous splash in the hedges of Ashculme Farm. We climbed the slope of Clayhidon Turbary, an old common where the villagers once cut peat for their fires and furze for their animals’ winter bedding. Half an hour later we were out of muddy clothes and steaming boots, and in by the Half Moon’s fire. Proper job, as they say hereabouts.

Start & finish: Half Moon Inn, Clayhidon, Devon EX15 3TJ (OS ref ST 161155)
Getting there: 5 miles south of M5 Jct 26 (‘Wellington’), via A38, Ford Street and Hunter’s Lodge
Walk (5 miles, easy, OS Explorer 128): Leaving Half Moon Inn, left along road. In 150m, right (162157; fingerpost/FP) up steps. Follow yellow arrows/YA past Smith’s Farm. Left along track; in 100m, through gateway (164157) and right down fence. Cross stream (165156), up through gate and woodland (YAs) to track (166154). Right; in 100m, left (FP) up farm track. Through gate, past horse ring and on (hedge on left). Through double gate; on to angled corner of hedge ahead (170155); aim ahead for house and barn at Applehayes. Down left side of barn to Applehayes Lane (173155). Right for 700m, passing Barne Farm. At foot of lane, at house marked ‘Shepherds Hill’, right up path (171149; FP). In 100m, left along fence and follow path downhill. In 250m, left (YAs) downhill through bracken. Bear to right of wet woodland to go through gate; right through next gate, and left through one below (YAs); down hedgebank to lane at Bellett’s Farm (170145).

Right for 600m; left at T-Junction by Parish Hall (164143). In 150m, left (164142; FP) through gate opposite Clayhidon Mill and follow path on right bank of River Culm (YAs) for ¼ mile to Bridgehouse Bridge (160141). Cross lane, and on. In 2nd field, after 100m bear up bank and through gate on right (YA). Clockwise round field to YA on post, halfway up far hedge. Cross footbridge and stile; on up hedge to lane (155142). Right; in 20m, left over stile and on with hedge on right. Above Gladhayes Farm, in 2nd field bear right through gate and left along hedge. Through gate (150143, YA); down green lane. In 50m, straight ahead through gate and on past barn, down track to tarmac lane (149144); left downhill to road (148142).

Right for ½ mile, passing Tanhouse Farm (148147). Bear right at Middle Ashculme Farm (147149, FP); pass barn and keep ahead (don’t fork left through stockyard!); through 2 gates and follow concrete farm track. At end of 2nd field, right (148152, FP) across stream, through neck of scrub woodland and on up field (YA). Left through gate. Round left side of barn and over stile (151152, YA) in right-hand corner of field (NB very muddy hereabouts!). Up field to gate into trees (YA); cross green lane (152152) and on up slope of Clayhidon Turbary. Don’t try to follow footpath that bears right as shown on OS map, but follow clear path up to ridge and gate into lane (FP). Don’t go through the gate, but turn left along grass path by hedge. Through gate at end (155153, YA); up bank; through gate to left of barn; on through gate; lane to cross road (158154). On along bridleway (FP). Bear right around Glebe Barn, back to Clayhidon.

Lunch: Half Moon Inn, Clayhidon (01823-680291; halfmoondevon.co.uk) – excellent village pub
More info: Tiverton TIC (01884-255827); visitdevon.co.uk
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Kinver Edge, Staffordshire

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Mar 022013

The view from the sandstone peak of Kinver Edge on this brisk, sunny morning was utterly sensational. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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It was all there, spread at our feet like butter on a green and lumpy pancake – the Worcestershire plains stretching away south-east, the quarried prow of Titterstone Clee and the amorphous lump of Brown Clee standing up far to the west, and dead in the south the pale blue humps of the Malvern range floating on a surf of mist.

Eventually we tore ourselves away and went south along the ridge, following the broad pebbly track of the Staffordshire Way as it wound between the mossy tree trunks, with tremendous views over the precipitous drop of Kinver Edge’s west flank. A side path brought us down through conifers, and on along a green lane by the balustraded Italianate tower of Blakehall House. Two horses with beautiful feathery legs went snorting impatiently by – ‘Irish cobs,’ said their owner, ‘they don’t like to stand still!’

Just here, hidden in the ground somewhere under our boots, ran the 3-mile complex of Drakelow Tunnels, ghost-haunted by local reputation, the remnants of a Second World War ‘shadow factory’ built well away from the bombed-out Black Country to manufacture Rover aircraft engines. Climbing back to Kinver Edge, we fancied we could hear the hollow boom of the tunnels. A northward stretch past the well-concealed cave called Nanny’s Rock – once home to a ‘cunning woman’ who could cure your ailments and tell your fortune – and we were dropping down towards the remarkable cliff dwellings of Holy Austin Rock Houses.

Burrowed into the rich red sandstone, their outer surfaces smoothed into house walls, windows and doors cut out, floors quarry-tiled, the Holy Austin houses have been dwellings since time out of mind, certainly since pre-Reformation days when resident Augustinian hermits gave them their name. At the turn of the 20th century Rose and Harry Shaw raised 10 children here – mostly boys, so boisterous that Mrs Shaw would banish them outside during the day. J.R.R. Tolkien knew the place, and it may have prompted him to imagine the tunnel homes of Hobbiton. The children playing Bilbo Baggins and Smaug the dragon around the rock houses this afternoon certainly seemed to think so.

Start & finish: National Trust car park on Compton Road, just west of Kinver, DY7 6DL approx (OS ref SO 836836)
Getting there: Bus 228 (networkwestmidlands.com) Stourbridge-Kinver. Road: Kinver is off A458, 3 miles west of Stourbridge.
Walk (4½ miles, moderate, OS Explorer 219): From NT car park, cross clearing with oak tree. Uphill to right – not path with red arrow, but with post labelled ‘Car Park’. At top of slope (834835), left (‘Viewpoint’ fingerpost, ‘Staffordshire Way’/SW) up path and steps to viewpoint (836834). Right (south) along SW (red and orange waymarks). In ¾ mile, go through barrier (829822). By seat, North Worcs Path/NWP continue ahead (fingerpost); but bear left downhill here (angled yellow arrow/YA). In 150m, right (831822, YA) on track through conifers. In 300m, 5 paths meet (831820) – there’s a seat on your right and a post pointing left to a path marked ‘Woodpecker, Nuthatch Trails’. Take path immediately to right of this one – i.e. straight ahead. In 200m, through barrier (831818; ‘No cycling, no horses’); in 250m, ahead (‘Cookley 1) to road in Blakeshall (831813).

Turn right; in 30m, right along green lane with houses on left, to road (829812). Right; in 50m, fork right on sandy track past lodge of Blakeshall House. On along sandy track. In 500m, right through barrier (825812; NWP), along path through conifers. In 500m, in a dip, right through barrier (825817; NWP). At top of slope. left through barrier (828817; YA, NWP, ‘Coal Tit Trail’). In 200m, at grassy reservoir (828819), right; in 30m, left (YAs, NWP). In 300m NWP meets SW at fingerpost (829822). Left here down slope; in 50m bear right (north) keeping parallel with SW above and passing Nanny’s Rock cave (830826). In another ⅓ mile (832831), ahead over crossing of tracks (not left downhill, or right up steps), up slope ahead, over brow and down to path crossing. Fork left (orange waymark). In 400m fork right (‘Rock Houses’/RH post); follow RH to car park. Rock Houses (836836) are just beyond.
NB Excellent directions of a very similar walk at walkingbritain.co.uk

Lunch: Bell & Cross PH, Holy Cross, Clent DY9 9QL (01562-730319; bellandcrossclent.co.uk)
Holy Austin Rock Houses Tea Rooms: 11-4, Thurs-Sun
Holy Austin Rock Houses: 2-4 Thurs, Fri; 11-4 Sat, Sun
More info: nationaltrust.org.uk/kinver-edge; enjoystaffordshire.com
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Great Bardfield, Essex

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Feb 232013

Wind and rain were set to bear down on the low-lying Essex countryside this morning. We clapped on all sail and scudded away out of Great Bardfield, stopping only to admire the handsome red façade of Brick House.First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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Here in the early 1930s the artist Eric Ravilious came to live and paint the village and the subtly undulating farming country in which it lies. Anyone who walks these fields will recognise the modesty and honesty of Ravilious’s local landscapes, the way a fence or a row of posts draws the eye to the curves and lines of the land. Like the Impressionists, this lively and life-loving man found his inspiration in quiet countryside.

The warm red brick and half-timbered houses of Great Bardfield, the outlying farms and fields and stream dips, give an impression of timelessness. We followed a bridlepath east through broad Essex fields. At Great Lodge stood a square-sided, slit-windowed brick barn, built in the 1540s for Anne of Cleeves as part of her divorce kiss-off from King Henry VIII. Here Ravilious painted a Frisian bull, head lowered, chained by the nose in a memorable attitude of animal strength in human bondage.

In the margins of the beetfields big white swallow-tailed scarecrow kites jerked in the wind like shimmying ghosts. An intense sun turned distant trees into burning bushes of gold against a wall of slate-coloured storm cloud driving down from the north. The squall drove us to hide in a prickly hedge, then into the stable barn at Hunt’s Farm where we waited it out in the company of three politely inquisitive horses.

A red fox with a black-tipped tail went cantering off across the paddocks as we emerged. Beyond the farm the rest of the party, soaked through and chilled, set back to Great Bardfield. But I hadn’t yet had my fill of Ravilious country, and took to a skein of lanes hardly wide enough to admit a car. Between the dapple of brilliant sun shafts flickering through the hazels and the gleam of puddles it was hard to see my way.

The homeward path lay across meadows and under hissing poplars, below the white sails of Gibraltar Mill on its ridge and past the gently thundering sluice of Great Bardfield’s watermill, a coda to this walk through the countryside that so enchanted Eric Ravilious. The artist died on active service with the RAF in 1942, and his muted and intimate landscapes have subsequently gained a fame they never achieved in his short lifetime.

Start: Vine PH, Vine Street, Great Bardfield, Essex, CM7 4SR (OS ref TL675305)

Travel: Bus: Service 9, 10 (firstgroup.com) from Braintree.
Road: Great Bardfield is on B1057, between Finchingfield (B1053) and Great Dunmow (A120)

Walk (7 miles, easy, OS Explorer 195): Take road signed ‘Braintree’. Opposite church, left along Bendlowes Road (678303, ‘playing field’); immediately right (‘Bridleway’) on path among trees. Follow this (blue arrows/BA) for 1¼ miles (keeping ahead where track bends left for Bluegate Hill at 683299) to pass Great Lodge (695291). Continue to Park Hall. Don’t fork right through farmyard, but keep ahead (701287) with cottage on right. In 250m track forks right, but keep ahead past BA on electricity pole. At end of field (706287), left up hedge. In 200m, right through hedge (705289, BA); on to Hunt’s Farm. Right down drive to road (708289); left for 400m; at triangular junction, right (710292); in 400m, fork left (714293, ‘Redfants Manor Farm’). Follow lane past farm (714296); follow yellow arrows/YA past pig field on left. At end of field (711301), right for 30m; left through hedge and over wire (YA). Keep ahead (same direction) across field, then along its edge (709302) with plantation on right. Aim left of line of poplars and row of stables, and cross field to foot of lane at Ashwell Hall gates (707302). Cross lane and keep ahead along muddy track (YA). In 300m, fork left (705303), walking round edge of field on your left to reach road (703300) and turn right..

In 200m at junction (701302), Great Bardwell is signed to left, but keep ahead (‘Wethersfield’). In 600m, left at T-junction (698306; ‘Walthams Cross’); in 400m, by Chiefs Farm (695306), right past Whinbush Farm. In 350m, left over stile (694309, fingerpost, YA). Dogleg right and left round field edge; into next field (YA); across it, through hedge by stream (690309, YA); across next field and footbridge (689310, YA) into big field. Half right across field for 150m; at bushy reservoir tank (688311), bear more left (due east), aiming for electricity pole in a corner of the field. Just before you reach it, pass a YA in a hedge gap (686311). Ahead with hedge on left; across 2 fields, following electricity poles, to enter woodland strip by waterworks (682311; YA). On along next field edge (YA). At The Watermill, left at house (680311); in 50m, right past sheds and along green lane. In 500m, right across footbridge (676309, YA) to road; left into Great Bardfield.

Lunch: The Vine PH, Great Bardfield (01371-811822; thevine-greatbardfield.com)

Accommodation: Bucks House, Great Bardfield CM7 4SR (01371-810519; buckshousebandb.co.uk) – art-filled and comfortable

Great Dunmow TIC: 01371-872406/876599; visitessex.com

Ravilious In Pictures: A Country Life by James Russell (Mainstone Press)
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Silchester and Calleva Roman Town, Hampshire

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Feb 162013

We’d been longing for a day like this – bright cold sunlight, wall-to-wall blue sky across the Hampshire/Berkshire border, the recently rain-sodden ground frozen hard underfoot on Silchester Common.First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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The low sun struck glitters out of the frost crusts in the red bracken clumps. We descended towards a wooded stream valley, watching squirrels playing kiss-chase in the birch tops, and turned along a bridleway that threaded the edge of Pamber Forest.

The ancient woodland, a fragment of the once-mighty Royal Forest of Windsor, lay faintly whispering, its leafless limbs still a month or two short of any hint of leaf-break. Distant cars murmured like waves on a beach. We followed a ruler-straight old woodbank, and went on out of the forest to the frost-sparkled lane at Latchmere Green where the daffodil buds were just beginning to swell. In the fields beyond, hoof pocks left by cattle in the mud were skinned over with white ice. The animals themselves, Highland beasts munching at a rich-smelling hay feeder, looked round at us through thick ginger fringes that completely hid their eyes.

The woodland boundary near beautiful old Clapper’s Farm was labelled ‘Park Pale’ on our Explorer map. Back at the beginning of the 13th century the Lord of Silchester Manor gave King John a palfrey in exchange for the right to create a deer park inside a pale, an earthen bank topped by a fence. It was cunningly designed so that wild deer could get in but couldn’t jump back out. Opposite Clapper’s we made out the medieval fishponds and the moated site where the Parker or keeper of the park had his fine residence. What status the Parker enjoyed back then – far more than any of today’s gamekeepers.

Field paths brought us back to Silchester by way of the remarkably complete flint walls of the Roman settlement of Calleva Atrebatum. Gridded streets, houses, shops, baths, an ancient Christian basilica and a steep-sided amphitheatre that could hold 3,500 seated spectators have all been excavated here. Stories say that Aelle, Saxon King of Sussex, sacked the place around 500BC, sending sparrows with flaming tails to set fire to the town. There were no sparrows in Calleva today, but we stopped by an oak to watch a treecreeper with curved back and beak picked hibernating insects from their refuge in the bark cracks – a fate perhaps as terrifying for today’s spider as a roaring Saxon warrior’s axe-blow for a cowering Callevite 1,500 years ago.

Start & finish: Calleva Arms, Silchester, Hants RG7 2PH (OS ref SU 627621)
Getting there: Bus 14 (stagecoachbus.com) Basingstoke-Tadley. Road: M4 Jct 11; A33 (‘Basingstoke’); in 300m, B3349 to Spencers Wood. Left to Beech Hill, Stratfield Mortimer and Silchester. Car park on village green.
Walk (6½ miles, easy, OS Explorer 159): Leaving Calleva Arms, left along Dukes Ride. In 150m, ahead (‘Brenda Parker Way’) along footpath. In ½ mile at foot of slope (618616), left for 700m to path crossing (621610; Pamber Forest noticeboard through gate opposite). Left across footbridge; ahead on bridleway for ⅓ mile to cross road (624607). Over stile opposite and on. In 250m path follows forest edge. Cross footbridge and keep ahead (yellow arrow) beside young plantation. At far end (630603), right down hedge; left at bottom to cross stile onto road in Latchmere Green (632600). Left to T-junction (634601); left up Ash Lane; in 150m, right over stile (fingerpost). Grass track for 500m to edge of Bramley Frith Wood (640603). Cross stile/gate into wood; in 30m, left across plank footbridge and follow field edge with ditch on left. In ½ mile, through gate and onto road (647608).

Right to T-junction (650610); left along Clapper’s Farm Road for ½ mile (NB gate into moated site on left). Pass Clapper’s farmhouse; at next right bend, ahead through kissing gate (651616, fingerpost). Cross footbridge; follow edge of north Copse, then ‘permissive path’ and ‘Silchester Trail’/ST signs through fields for ⅔ mile to road at St Mary’s church (643622). Right past pond; left through churchyard and 2 successive kissing gates (yellow arrows). Right (644624, ST); in 150m, left through 2 kissing gates (ST). (NB To view Roman amphitheatre, go through kissing gate/ST in 100m). Walk anti-clockwise half-circuit of Calleva Atrebatum Roman walls. On far side, cross end of track that bisects the site (637625) and keep ahead. In another 100m, right through gate (636624); on for ½ mile to cross road (629623). Ahead for 100m to cross another road; ahead for 50m; left to Silchester car park.

Lunch: Calleva Arms, Silchester (0118-970-0305; thecalleva.com) – popular, cosy, friendly; last orders 2pm.
Silchester Trail: hants.gov.uk/rh/walking/silchester-trail
Pamber Forest: hwt.org.uk
Silchester Roman Town: reading.ac.uk/silchester/

Tourist Information: visit-hampshire.co.uk
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Old Pale and Blakemere Moss, Delamere Forest, Cheshire

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Feb 092013

Flakes of snow in the chilly Cheshire air, and snow on the ground in Delamere Forest.
First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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Ghostly fingers of white crept along the black boughs of the trees, and snow blanketed the slopes where tobogganers went careering downhill, whooping their heads off.

There’s something liberating about being out in the snow. A sort of general loosening of the braces takes place. Dogs in knitted coats barked and scampered, their snouts whitened; grownups nodded ‘Howdo?’, and little kids came zooming by without thought for life or limb. Delamere Forest, packed with people at play, looked like one of those Frost Fair etchings from the Little Ice Age – a far cry from its Norman heyday as a hunting preserve of the Earls of Chester, when common folk entering the forest could expect to be flogged, blinded or hanged. Thank goodness for the Forestry Commission and today’s open-doors policy for all.

As we climbed the broad white track up Old Pale Hill, the cries and shouts from below faded to a faint babel against the gentle murmur of wind in the conifer tops, a sound paradoxically reminiscent of seaside holidays. Up at the summit we found the view obscured by flurries of snow. We scraped the snow off the topographical plaques and imagined the fair-weather prospect over seven counties and to all quarters, from the Berwyn Hills in Wales to the Liverpool skyline, and out east to Kinder Scout nearly 40 miles off, where Derbyshire slips over into Yorkshire.

We descended through snow banks dinted with fox and rabbit tracks and set out on the second half of this figure-of-eight walk, round the perimeter of Blakemere Moss. This big forest lake is formed of a pair of kettle holes, huge hollows left behind when trapped ice melted after the last glaciation 10,000 years ago. Cheshire is full of these ancient Ice Age lakes, and Blakemere is one of the biggest.

Today the moss lay as though under enchantment, a great scapula of glass-green ice scattered with snow patches and concentric lines of freeze ripples, the whole lake fixed and transformed. We walked its margin in a wintry silence, looking across to where a standing stone on Old Pale summit broke the skyline, tiny and sharp as a chip of black ice.

Start: Delamere Forest Visitor Centre, CW8 2JD – near Northwich, Cheshire (OS ref SJ549705). Parking £4/3 hrs, £6 all day.

Getting there: Train (thetrainline.com) to Delamere Station (½ mile). Road: Delamere Forest is signed off B5152 between A556 (Northwich-Chester) and A56 at Frodsham (M56, jct 12)

Walk: (4½ miles, easy, OS Explorer 267; Forest Trail map available at Visitor Centre): From Visitor Centre, right along road. At far side of Old Pale car park on left, pass ‘Old Pale Woodland’ sign (547703). Trail ascends through trees. Pass Post 11 (‘Delamere Loop’); broad path uphill to standing stone at summit of Old Pale (544698). Follow fenced track east away from masts towards farm; in 150m, left (Post 7) downhill. Across track at forest edge (546698); on downhill. At Post 9 (552700), left through hedge, right along lane; in 100m back through hedge; fork left to road (552704). Left; in 100m, right across railway; in 50m, right on waymarked Blakemere Trail. At Post 16 (554708) left, anticlockwise round Blakemere Moss. In 1½ miles at Post 61 (546711) right on Delamere Loop. In 150m, left (‘Visitor Centre’). Pass Linmere Moss; in another ⅓ mile, cross railway (551705); right to Visitor Centre.

Delamere Visitor Centre (café, shop, toilets, info): forestry.gov.uk/delamereforestpark; 01606-882167 – open daily, 10-5. Café: delamerecafe.com
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Witcham and the Bedford Rivers, Cambridgeshire

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Feb 022013

If we’d come to Witcham in June, we’d have been watching out for flying peas – this out-of-the-way Cambridgeshire village is the venue for the annual World Pea-Shooting Championship. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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Today, however, it was the fen wind making our eyes water on a piercingly cold morning, a peerless midwinter day of wall-to-wall blue sky like a Ming bowl upturned over the land.

Like all the other long-established settlements in Fenland, Witcham is footed on an island. This almost imperceptible hummock of clay stands marooned among enormous, saucer-flat fields, reclaimed by constant drainage, labour and bank-building from what was formerly a fenny, marshy and flood-prone landscape. We slogged our way with clay-weighted boots along the margins of waterlogged fields, then turned north-east along the raised bank of the New Bedford River, a broad highway of steel-blue water rippled by the wind.

The twin Bedford Rivers, Old and New, were dug ruler-straight and half a mile apart for more than 20 miles across the face of Fenland in the mid-17th century, to prevent disastrous flooding and to drain the land for agriculture. We followed the New Bedford River for a couple of miles, the wind pouring into our faces as cold and sharp as glass, looking out over pale clay fields that suddenly gave way to a patchwork of chocolate-dark peat ploughland interspersed with winter wheat glinting green in the low sunshine. The exhilaration and sense of space were intoxicating, the views immense, especially to the east where the great central lantern and twin west towers of Ely Cathedral rose on the skyline like a celestial city.

At last we dropped down off the river bank and made our way back to Witcham by way of sticky black drove roads, the cathedral glimmering ghostly pale beyond the sunlit fields. A big flock of Bewick’s swans, over from the frozen Siberian tundra for the winter, was feeding on potato and sugar beet fragments, the white bodies and yellow nebs contrasting brilliantly with the dark peat soil. Their restless piping and honking followed us a long while, a haunting keynote of winter in Fenland.

Start: Witcham village green, near Ely, Cambs, CB6 2LB (OS ref TL463800)

Getting there: Bus Service 106 (dews-coaches.com) from Ely. Road – Witcham is signposted off A142 between Ely and Chatteris.

Walk directions (8 miles; easy; OS Explorer 228): North up village street. Where Mepal Road bends left (462803), ahead along Martin’s Lane for ⅔ mile. At bridge, left (460813, fingerpost) beside ditch for 1⅓ miles to New Bedford River (445817). Right along bank for ¾ mile to pass house at Witcham Gravel (456825). In another 1¼ miles go through fence (469841); down bank, left along path for 200 m; right (470843) through gate; ahead along drove. In 300 m, right (473840); in 350 m left (471837); in 200 m, right (472836). In ½ mile, bear left at fork (465832) for ⅔ mile to road in Wardy Hill (462823). Left along The Green, round left bend; at next bend (470820), ahead (fingerpost) through Vine Leigh Farm gate. Right beside house, through gate, on beside hedge to crossing of droves (471818). Ahead for ¾ mile to Witcham. At T-junction (466802), right through 2nd of 2 gates; left through kissing gate; path to road (465800); right to village green.
NB: Droves can be muddy after rain!

Lunch: White Horse, Silver Street, Witcham (01353-777999) – closed Monday; food Thurs-Sun, lunchtimes and evenings; opening times negotiable for groups.

Accommodation: Anchor Inn, Sutton Gault (01353-778537; anchor-inn-restaurant.co.uk) – cosy, warm and welcoming

Info: Ely TIC (01353-662062); visitcambridgeshire.org
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Crianlarich to Tyndrum, Strath Fillan, Scotland

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Jan 262013

Crianlarich in the rain. So what’s new? Iron-calved walkers and runners were setting off regardless up the forest paths.
First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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A huddle of sad French holidaymakers waited at the station, with a cheery local exhorting them: ‘Well, at least ye’ve escaped the midgies!’ From the hillside path above the village I watched the blue, pink and silver train bear the French away south to the compensatory tearooms of Glasgow. Then I followed the path, studded with white nuggets of quartzite, up through rowans and lichen-hung fir trees to Bogle Glen pass and the West Highland Way.

As a long-distance walk of 95 miles, from Glasgow’s outskirts as far north as Fort William, the West Highland Way offers a surprisingly stern challenge. But it’s also provided with very well-placed railway stations if you just want to try out a short section. I’d had the stretch from Crianlarich to Tyndrum in my sights for ages, so a day of dreich weather wasn’t going to put me off.

Between rain and wind the forest wept and roared. Hill trickles bounded down their suddenly swollen channels. The Way forged steadily up the flank of Strath Fillan under the trees, sheltered from the weather until it dipped to cross the loudly rushing River Fillan in the flat meadows of the valley. House sparrows flirted on the wetly gleaming garden walls of Kirkton Farm, and a wren ran along the mossy stones of St Fillan’s Church, a hollow ruin in a sycamore grove.

Robert the Bruce designated this modest foundation a priory in 1318, in thanksgiving to the 8th-century Irish missionary Fillan, the relic of whose left arm had helped Bruce to victory at Bannockburn four years earlier. Fillan seems to have had a way with wild animals – on one occasion a wolf, having killed one of the saint’s two oxen, then submitted itself to being yoked to the other beast in order to help Fillan finish his ploughing.

Beyond the priory the West Highland Way dipped close to the Holy Pool at the confluence of Allt Gleann a’ Chlachain and the River Finnan. Insanity sufferers of a more rugged era would be ducked in the pool, then tied up under a heap of straw on the old font slab in the church ruin and left there for the night – more tough love than psychiatry, perhaps.

I lingered on the river’s brink, watched the yeasty churning of the rain-swollen pool, and then followed the Way up into the trees again and down to Tyndrum and the rattly little train back to Crianlarich.
Start: Crianlarich station, FK20 8QN (OS ref NN 385251)

Finish: Tyndrum Lower station, FK20 8RZ, or Upper Tyndrum station, FK20 8RY

Getting there: Rail (thetrainline.com) to Crianlarich. Road: A82 from Glasgow

Walk (6 miles, moderate, OS Explorer 364): From Crianlarich station go up steps, cross A82 to small car park. Left up path (‘Access to West Highland Way’/WHW) through trees. In ½ mile, meet WHW (376251); ahead, passing deer gate on left; on up slope past ‘Bogle Glen’ sign. Follow WHW thistle symbols for 2½ miles to recross A82 (359278). Ahead to cross River Fillan. Pass Kirkton Farm, St Fillan’s Church (359284) and Auchtertyre to recross A82 (349288). Follow WHW beside river, then through forestry to Tyndrum Lower station (327301). Train back to Crianlarich.

Lunch: Real Food Café, Tyndrum (01838-400235; therealfoodcafe.com) – justly popular no-frills café.

Accommodation: Craigbank Guesthouse, Main Street, Crianlarich FK20 8QS (01838-300279; craigbankguesthouse.com)

Guidebook: The West Highland Way by Bob Aitken and Roger Smith (Mercat Press)

Information: Balloch TIC (01389-753533); visitscotland.com
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Brockweir and the Wye Valley, Gloucestershire

Walks No Responses »

Jan 192013

A beautiful day lay spread above the Wye Valley – sunny, blue and crisp as a new sheet.
First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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The River Wye ran dimpling through its wooded gorge, viscous with red-brown mud. Ramblers in beanies and thick scarves were setting out from deep-sunk Brockweir with a clink of sticks and crunch of boots. We left our own prints in the carpet of gold and toffee-coloured leaves under the oaks and beeches as we climbed steeply away from the river.

Five hundred feet above the Wye, St Briavel’s Common lay edged with a tangle of narrow lanes and a haphazard scatter of houses, witness to the encroachment of squatters 200 years ago when common land was being enclosed all across the country and poor folk driven away without means of support. However, if a family could build some sort of hovel between dawn and dusk, and get the chimney smoking by nightfall, they’d have the right to remain and scratch a living from the common and woods. Many did so in those tough old days.

Water trickled and gushed on the rain-sodden hillside. Among the former squatter plots we splashed along a twisting, rough-surfaced holloway, more of a stream than a lane. Close at hand, but smothered from sight under lush ferns and tangles of briar, ran an ancient fortified embankment, one of the component parts of the great 8th-century earthwork built along the Welsh Marches by mighty Offa, much-feared king of Mercia. Was Offa’s Dyke constructed to keep the warlike Welsh at bay, or to keep them under surveillance, or as a boundary marker? No-one knows – its builder didn’t bother to hand down his reasons to posterity. But the great Dyke endures in the Border landscape, and Offa’s name along with it.

Across the leafless treetops there were glimpses down the winding Wye, its woods steaming, tree trunks dully glinting under a cold milky blue sky. Then a long, steep descent down a slippery woodland path brought us to a wonderful prospect up the valley, the sides sloping more widely back as soft sandstone replaced the harder, cliff-forming limestone. Bigsweir Bridge spanned the Wye at its tidal limit, a delicate ice-green lattice bow among the trees.

Down at river level we sat on a log pile, tindery with age, to munch a sandwich of oatcake and chocolate mint (don’t knock it until you’ve tried it), and then turned back downriver along the blood-red Wye. The river was famous in times past for its locally built sailing barges, known as trows. When wind or tide were against them, the trows would be dragged along on ropes by bow hauliers, the pick of those Wye Valley men whose muscles were equal to the task. What a sight and sound that must have been.

Start & finish: Brockweir Inn, near Chepstow, Glos, NP16 6NG (OS ref SO 540012)
Getting there: Brockweir is signposted off A466 Chepstow-Monmouth road, 1 mile north of Tintern
Walk (6 miles, moderate, OS Explorer OL14; click on Facebook “Like” link to share this walk with Facebook friends): Opposite Brockweir Inn, down ‘No Through Road’. In 400m, right up lane by Orchard Cottage (538015; ‘Restricted Byway’/RB). At top of rise, dog-leg right and left across lane (539018, RB) and on. In 50m, left to road (539021). Right to T-junction, where you join Offa’s Dyke Path/OD (OD waymark arrow on white post beside ‘The Paddock’. Left along road for 200m; right (540023; OD, RB). In 100m path runs between Chapel Cottage and Hilgay Cottage, then on up slope. In ⅓ mile at T-jct, left (540029; OD; yellow arrow/YA) up walled path. In 100m at T-jct, left downhill (539030; OD, YA). At house gate, right (OD, YA); through kissing gate, and follow YAs down across fields to road (537031). Right (OD); in 200m, left (538033; RB, OD) down stony lane for 300m to T-jct (538036). RB and broken fingerpost point left here, but go right along surfaced lane to tarmac road (539037). Left (OD); in 250m, left by Birchfield House (541039, OD) down gravel track, then steeply down through trees by paths and walkways (very slippery!) to gate (541043). Down across 3 fields (OD, YA) to driveway (540049). Left; skirt right of Bigsweir House entrance; continue beside River Wye for 3 miles back to Brockweir, keeping close to river all the way.

Lunch: Brockweir Inn, Brockweir (01291-689548; www.thebrockweirinn.co.uk)

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Newbridge Wood, Batt’s Wood and Dens Wood, East Sussex

Walks 2 Responses »

Jan 122013

The long, high waves of the East Sussex Weald lay under smoky rolls of grey cloud, through which a pale penumbra of sun came gleaming like a half-dissolved pearl. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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‘Wild boar, ostrich!’ promised the sales board at the entrance to Birdbrook Farm. ‘Bison, zebra, wildebeest!’ There were no signs of such exotic creatures in the small-scale hedged fields around Witherenden Farm – just cattle bellowing in the farmyard as they were passed across the scales in a welter of men and dogs before heading out for market.

We squelched along a track of sticky Wealden clay and came into Newbridge Wood, one of the coppice woods that have been tended in these parts since medieval times, when this now quiet and all-but-empty landscape was England’s ironmaking centre. The only hint that remains of the smoky, noisy, fiery industry is the large number of woodland ponds – they stored and released the water for the wheels that drove the ironmasters’ bellows and drop-hammers – and the woods themselves, harvested to produce the charcoal for the blast-furnaces.

Newbridge Wood, and Batt’s Wood and Dens Wood beyond, were thick with hornbeams, the smooth poles of their overshot coppice sprouts seamed with long runnels like withered and witchy arms reaching for the light. Each tree seemed lit from below by the millions of acid green and rich gold leaves that carpeted the forest floor. From the gaps among the woods we had wonderful views across the Weald – the sun-reflecting oasts at Bivelham Farm, thatched roofs among the trees, long low meadows, dark hedges and woods rising to high ridges like green ocean billows.

On the lane into Batt’s Wood, seven inkcap fungi rose in a ring beside the hedge, like pixie hats with upturned brims. Dens Wood and the landscaped slopes by Wadhurst Park Lake were full of deer – red stags chasing hinds, roe deer delicately bounding out of the trees, a big pale fallow stag stock still under the silver birches, giving us the wary eye. We shuffled hornbeam leaves in the lane to Dens Farm, and sniffed the sweet scent of applewood fires as we made back across the fields towards Witherenden Farm in the half-light of evening.

Start: Stonegate Station, East Sussex, TN5 7ER (OS ref TQ 659272). All day parking £4.50

Travel: Rail (thetrainline.co.uk; railcard.co.uk) to Stonegate.
Road: Stonegate station is off A265 Heathfield – Hurst Green road, just north of Burwash

Walk (6½ miles, easy, OS Explorer 136):
From station entrance, left to cross railway line; continue down verge of road for 400m. Right up Witherenden Farm drive (655270; fingerpost, ‘bridleway’). Bear left through farmyard, on down muddy track, through metal gate (651271), right round field edge. Where trees start, right into Newbridge Wood (649272, blue arrow/BA). In ⅔ mile pass Bivelham Forge Farm (640267); in 100 m fork left (BA) to road (637266). Left; in 80 m, right over stile (yellow arrow/YA), across 2 fields to cross road at Pound Bridge (633265).

Keep ahead along track (BA); in ¼ mile it turns right (629266) up hill past Gold’s Farm. At top of hill, opposite cottage with ornate porch on left, keep ahead by fence (630274) to cross stile (YA) into Batt’s Wood. At interpretive board turn left (YA), then immediately right (YA) along grassy track. In 50 m, left at T-junction (631275). Descent ride (can be slippery!) for 350 m to gate near Wadhurst Park Lake (633278). Right along track (boggy!). In 400 m pass sluice (636277); in another 150 m, fork left (YA) along path. In 400 m, left at junction (641277) for 20 m; at next junction, left to cross stile (YA) and stream.

At 3-finger post, left (YA) up inside edge of Dens Wood. At top of rise pass Flattenden Farm (640282) and descend track. At junction by ‘Weir Cottage’ sign (641286), right for ⅓ mile to Dens Farm (646283). Right through farm gate/stile (YA); fork right between sheds and down stony lane. In 50 m, left (YA) through gate, along fence on your right. In 200 m cross stile; across next field, through one wicket gate (YA), then another. Cross stream by footbridge (648279) to gate; don’t go through, but turn right along hedge. Follow path for ½ mile by YAs across 4 fields to track below Witherenden Farm (651271); left through farm and back to Stonegate Station.

NB: Paths in Batt’s Wood often slippery/boggy!

Refreshments: Picnic

Hastings TIC: 01424-451111; visitsussex.org.uk
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Elsdon and Gallow Hill, Northumberland

Walks 3 Responses »

Jan 052013

The low-rolling Northumbrian hills enclose Elsdon in a loose embrace. First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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The plain and dignified stone houses of the ancient community stand scattered round their big diamond-shaped village green, which lies complete with a circular pound for stray animals (Elsdon was a famous stop-over for cattle drovers on the long road south) and the broad and handsome Church of St Cuthbert (the monks who were carrying the saint’s body away from Holy Island and its Viking marauders rested here over a thousand years ago).

As we set out across the sheep pastures on a brisk morning, yet more bloody and stirring Border history looked down on us from the stark stone battlements of Elsdon Tower, a grim pele or stronghold built when Scots and English raided each other and their own compatriots in a wild and lawless medieval era. Times have changed, however. We found a couple of contented coppers sitting outside the Elsdon Tea Rooms in the shadow of the pele, drinking tea and yarning with the owner.

Near Folly Farm a big brown hare leaped up almost under my boots and went away like a miniature racehorse, its long black-tipped ears erect as it sped off. We pulled up for a breather and to admire the blotchy tan-and-cream waves of heather and moor grass along the spine of the distant Simonside Hills. Frisky bullocks were cantering together in the fields at Fairneycleugh, and horses in red winter coats stood companionably nose to nose down at Soppit Farm.

This mid-Northumbrian landscape is all open country, big pasture fields, sedgy moorland and dark conifer blocks sitting together in a pleasing blend. You stride out more vigorously and breathe the clean air more deeply in such surroundings. Whomever the owners of Haining farmhouse may be, they are making a superb job of restoring their stone field walls, and they have planted a wide new woodland of native species – alder, rowan, willow, hazel, cherry and hawthorn.

Above Haining we crossed the ragged little knoll of Gallow Hill, looking down on a memorable view of Elsdon laid out below with the far-off Cheviot Hills standing grandly on the northern skyline. A notice board at Hillhead Cottage, warning of an application to build a clutch of wind turbines six times the height of the Angel of the North on pristine Middle Hill just alongside, was a sharp reminder of the views we can lose through simple lack of vigilance. It was a sobering thought to carry down the hill and back to Elsdon.

Start and finish: Village car park, Elsdon, Northumberland (OS ref NY938933).

Getting there: Elsdon is signposted off A696 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne to Jedburgh) between Kirkwhelpington and Otterburn.

Walk (6 miles, easy, OS Explorer OL42):
From car park, left into Elsdon. Cross ladder stile between Bird In Bush Inn and Elsdon Tea Rooms (936933, ‘The Folly’); ahead over fields (stiles, yellow arrows/YAs). In 3rd field, steer right of reservoir with mast to junction of tarmac lanes at stile (926940). Ahead (fingerpost) up drive past The Folly; in almost ½ mile, left off drive (920944; fingerpost) to Fairneycleugh farm. Go through gate across track (917940). Left down grassy track to Soppit Farm (920934, blue arrows/BAs), then on through trees to cross B6341 (922932, fingerpost) and on to Haining (YAs). Keep right of farmhouse; at yellow arrow post (925927) right for 50 m; left (YA) uphill through plantation on grassy track. Cross stile (926920). Left (BA) to cross road. On (fingerpost, ‘Hillhead Cottage’) over Gallow Hill (931919), keeping wall and fence close on left. 650 m after crossing road, go through gate (933919) and follow wall on right to Hillhead. At waymark post (939919, BA) go right; in 50 m, left through gate; cross cottage drive; through gate ahead (YA) along fence on left and through gate (940918, YA). Aim half right for Lonning House; cross next stile with 2 YAs; follow right-hand one towards Lonning House. Cross road; on down farm drive (943921, YAs). On across stable yard beside house (944921, YAs). In field beyond, aim diagonally left between electricity poles, descending to cross stile into lane at West Todholes (945925). Right to East Todholes. Just before farmhouse, left over ladder stile (946926, YA); in 50 m, at post with 2 YAs, keep ahead, descending beside plantation and through gate (946928, YA). Left along fence, follow YAs to cross Elsdon Burn (943929) and bear left. Aim for the corner of the fence on your left; turn 90o right here (941929, YA), aiming a little away from fence on your right to cross ladder stile in a bend of the stone wall far ahead (940931). Aim ahead for Elsdon Tower to return to car park.

Refreshments in Elsdon: Bird In Bush PH + B&B (01830-520804; Tues-Sat evenings, Sun from noon); Impromptu Tea Rooms (01830-520389); Coach House Tea Rooms (01830-520061)

Middle Hill Wind Turbines: middlehillactiongroup.com

Info: Alnwick TIC (01665-511333); visitnorthumberland.com
www.ramblers.org.uk www.satmap.com www.LogMyTrip.co.uk

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