Christopher Somerville

Search Results : chiltern

Bledlow & the Chiltern Escarpment, Bucks

Feb 032024

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

An ice-cold breeze coming east off the Chiltern Hills stung my eyes with wind tears as I followed the puddled track of the Icknield Way out of Bledlow. The low winter sun topped the trees on the crest of Wain Hill and threw the medieval ridge-and-furrow of the fields below the slope into sharp relief.

The Icknield Way, ancient thoroughfare across these chalk lands, ran at the feet of the hills. Soon I turned off on a carpet of wind-blown beech and oak leaves, into a steep holloway that rose up the escarpment in the chilly shade of a yew grove.

Near the top a fat ginger tomcat on a cold tin roof yawned massively as he watched me go by with supreme indifference. A path at the crest of the ridge brought me to a wonderful viewpoint over the Vale of Aylesbury where the sun was sweeping up the last of the morning mist and spreading golden light like butter over thirty miles of low-lying country.

A flock of goldfinches, softly twittering, flitted away from the thistle heads where they had been feasting. I passed the Bronze Age burial mounds of Chinnor Barrows, smothered under juniper and bramble, and dipped down another slippery hollow to the feet of the scarp once more.

The Ridgeway, companion to the Icknield Way, ran here in a succession of snaky curves under beech and ash. Silver birch trunks, their heartwood rotted where they lay, were no more than empty cylinders of bark where spiders and tiny beetles lay in their winter inertia.

The pearlescent sun swam down between the bare treetops of Thickthorne Wood. I followed a footpath over the grassy billows of the lower slopes before setting back across bare, silent stubble fields. A red kite wheeled down to land nearby and pick up a worm, short commons in the hungry months of the year.

Back in Bledlow with its beautiful old Church of the Holy Trinity and charming cottages of brick and timber framing, I ducked into the Lions of Bledlow pub. Literally ducked – the place was full of scalp-scraping beams, a properly cosy pub for sitting and replaying this perfect winter walk.

How hard is it? 5 miles; easy, but muddy, sticky and slippery in places!

Start: Church End, Bledlow HP27 9PD (OS ref SP 778021)

Getting there: Bus 320 (Chinnor – Princes Risborough)
Road: Bledlow (NB – not Bledlow Ridge!) is signed off B4009 between Chinnor and Princes Risborough (A4129/A4010)

Walk (OS Explorer 171): Beside Lions of Bledlow PH, through gate (‘Footpath only’), across field, right along Icknield Way/IW (775017). In ½ mile at Hempton Wainhill, follow IW/Ridgeway between two houses and on (770012). In 600m fork left uphill (767009, ‘Bridleway, Wildlife Walk’). At top of rise, left over barrier (767002, ‘Chinnor Barrows’) and on. In ⅔ mile, back at Hempton Wainhill, right (IW). In 100m in front of house, fork right (770012, ‘Ridgeway/IW/Bridleway’). In ½ mile, just past track crossing, right (778011, gate, ‘Footpath’) across fields, soon with trees/fence on left. In ½ mile, just before crossing hedge, left (782006, gate). Right; in 20m, right (gate, ‘footpath’); cross field; cross Wigan’s Lane (784004). Down driveway; in 400m on right bend, left (787001, blue, yellow arrows). In 100m path bends left; in 300m, before waymark post (787004), left through hedge; recross Wigan’s Lane (785005). Follow fence; in 300m pass ‘Footpath’ gate; in 20m left (782006, gate); right along hedge. In 200m fork right through trees (781008); cross IW (781011); path by hedge to Bledlow.

Lunch: Lions of Bledlow PH (01844-343345, thelionsofbledlow.co.uk)

Accommodation: Inn at Emmington, Sydenham OX39 4LD (01844-351367, theinnatemmington.co.uk)

Info: chilternsaonb.org

Chipperfield, Sarratt & the Chiltern Way, Herts

Walks No Responses »

Jan 142023

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

A grey, cold and blowy day in south Hertfordshire, with the sky set to clear towards the end of the short winter’s day. We started out across the wide recreation ground at Chipperfield, where the village was going about its business – walls being mended, fences put right, young voices yelling in the school playground and a man mowing the damp green circle of the cricket field.

Chipperfield Common was a tangle of holly and laurel under pine, oak and silver birch. A natural saddle between two stems of an old oak had been polished black and shiny by the feet of countless climbing children.

A track sticky with the characteristic dark mud of winter led south by Hillmeads Farm where a horse snickered and hooves rattled on a hard track somewhere out of sight. This corner of Hertfordshire gives the impression of secret country, where farmhouses and barns lie hidden in clefts between two low ridges or behind a humpbacked wood.

Beyond Commonwood we joined the Chiltern Way path and caught a glimpse of red brick Great Sarratt Hall, surely the model for ‘Sarratt’, the training school and interrogation centre for well-bred spies that John Le Carré nicknames ‘the nursery’ in his George Smiley novels.

Irresistible, the thought of Old Craw the profane Australian lecturing the ‘monsignors’ and ‘your Graces’ in the bowels of the hall, or Jim Prideaux and his sniper’s rifle creeping through Rosehall Wood to take out the mole and traitor Bill Haydon.

In a field among horses in winter coats, we were struck still and silent by the spectacle of two foxes racing past, a vixen pursued by a big dog fox with a white tip to its tail. They crossed the field at an easy canter, the vixen slipping through the hedge and the dog turning away as though entirely satisfied with his entertainment.

Below Rose Hill Farm a tractor was cutting the leafless hedges into a wildlife-friendly A-shaped profile, well before nesting season. A jay gave out its harsh tearing complaint of a call from a copse before swooping away low to the ground with strong quick wing beats and a flash of white rump.

A gleam of weak sun slipped between the clouds, a crack of ice blue broadened across the sky, and instantly the hazels and field maples along the homeward path were a-twitter with goldfinches and long-tailed tits, making the most of the last hour of daylight.

How hard is it? 5½ miles; easy; waymarked trails

Start: Village green car park, Chipperfield, Hemel Hempstead, Herts WD4 9BS (OS ref TL 045015)

Getting there: Bus 352 (Watford-Hemel Hempstead)
Road: Chipperfield is signed from A4251 in Kings Langley (M25, Jct 20)

Walk (OS Explorers 182, 172): Cross recreation ground, keeping left of old chapel. Head south across Chipperfield Common. In 500m at far side, ahead through barrier (042011, ‘Sarratt Parish Footpath’). In 250m at lane, ahead (042008, ‘Commonwood’) past Hillmeads and on. In 150m fork left (042005); at road by Dellfield House dogleg right/left; up steps (043001, ‘Sarratt Green); on to road at Old Forge (040999). Dogleg right/left; follow Moor Lane for 400m, right (037997, ‘Chiltern Way’/CW). Follow well marked CW for 2¼ miles via Rose Hall Farm (031005), road at Bragman’s Farm (027006), right/left dogleg at Newhouse Farm (022007, ‘Flaunden’), road at Flaunden (018009), T-junction at Black Robins Farm (020011) and Lower Plantation. At Holly Hedges Lane (024016), right on Hertfordshire Way/HW for 1½ miles back to Chipperfield.

Lunch/Accommodation: Two Brewers, Chipperfield WD4 9BS (01923-265266, chefandbrewer.com)

Info: visitherts.co.uk

Saunderton and the Chiltern Hills, Bucks

Walks 1 Response »

Feb 232019

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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There weren’t too many leaves on view in ‘leafy Bucks’ this beautiful sunny morning towards the end of winter. But everything else spoke of the crack of spring; blackbirds and goldfinches loud in the woods, rook nests ready in the forks of the beeches, and a golden spatter of celandines in the hedge banks as we followed Slough Lane out of Saunderton.

This outer sector of the Chilterns is steep country, the chalky ground folded and sculpted into long valleys trending north-west. The path leaped across them like a hurdler, up and down, up and down; and we leaped with it, or that’s what it felt like, with springtime putting itches in legs stiffened by the long winter’s sloth.

From Bledlow Ridge we plunged down steep steps through hazel coppice where primroses and violets were already pushing up out of the leaf mould. Across a broad valley and up where a dozen circling kites built an aerial tower of red and white wings. Down from the next ridge to the bridleway at the bottom of Bottom Wood, a lovely stretch among leafless beech trees. ‘Doesn’t matter which path you take,’ said a man with a dog, ‘they all end up in the same place.’

So they did, down among the barns and sheds of Ham Farm, an ancient holding. Steeply up again, kicking the complaints out of our legs through pastures of fat white sheep, up to a blowy ridge, over and down again along a flinty holloway to Chorley Farm.

Crossing the ploughlands by the half-timbered farmstead, we caught a glimpse of the tower of St Lawrence’s Church, high above West Wycombe down the valley. The golden globe moored atop the tower was once the gambling and drinking den of the Hellfire Club. Rich bored men with too much time and money on their hands, perhaps; but those randy Georgian rakehells left an enjoyable whiff of sulphur behind them all the same.

We climbed steeply up through the rough chalk grassland of Buttler’s Hanging nature reserve, and followed the ridge path back to Saunderton through beech-woods ringing with the songs of birds getting ready for their springtime manoeuvres in the great mating game.

Start: Saunderton Station, near West Wycombe, Bucks HP14 4LJ (OS ref SU 813981)

Getting there: Rail to Saunderton. Bus X30 (High Wycombe-Princes Risborough).
Road – Saunderton is on A4010 between Princes Risborough and West Wycombe.

Walk (7½ miles, easy, OS Explorer 172, 171): Right up Slough Lane. Pass Slough Bottom Farm entrance (811975); round left bend; right up green lane (fingerpost). At top of rise, right (805970) along Chinnor Road. In 650m, left (801974, fingerpost) by playground. From bottom right corner of field (799972), on down green lane. Pass farm; steeply down steps through wood to Bottom Road (798970). Left; in 300m, right (800968, fingerpost) across valley, up to road (793962). Left; in 100m, right (fingerpost) through wicket gate.

Across paddock; white arrow/WA across drive; right of barn at Ashridge Farm; through gate; green lane. In 200m ahead through gate (792958, yellow arrow/YA), down into Bottom Wood. Left along bottom bridleway (792957) for 1½ miles to Ham Farm (807944). Left between barns; stiles/YAs uphill. Just beyond summit, right over stile (810949, YA); left to go through hedge gap; right along hedge, down through Chawley Wood to Chorley Farm (816955).

Cross Bottom Road (stile, fingerpost) and fields; cross Loxboro Hill road (817957). Path across field; cross Slough Lane (817958). Green lane/path up through Buttlers Hanging nature reserve. At top, gate into Hearnton Wood (819961). Up steps; fork right at top; in 150m cross grass track; keep ahead through trees for 200m to meet ridge track (821962). Left for 1¾ miles to Saunderton.

Conditions: Steeply down to Bottom Road; steeply up through Buttler’s Hanging Nature Reserve.

Lunch: Golden Cross PH, Saunderton HP14 4HU (01494-565974, goldencrosspub.co.uk)

Accommodation: George & Dragon, West Wycombe HP14 3AB (01494-535340, georgeanddragonhotel.co.uk)

Info: Princes Risborough TIC (01296-382415)
visitengland.com; satmap.com; ramblers.org.uk

Christmas Common & Chiltern Woods, Oxfordshire

Walks 1 Response »

Dec 232017

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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A jaunt to Christmas Common with the festive season just around the corner, on the coldest and brightest morning of the year. Ice in the puddles, our breath like smoke on the still air, and a high-flying jet soundless ploughing quadruple furrows of pure white across the blue field of the sky.

From the edge of the escarpment we got one of those views that makes you want to come and live right here, right now – the steep wooded slope dropping away to run out into mile after mile of sunlit Oxfordshire plain, a wide world dressed in the pale colours of winter.

A green woodpecker emitted its sharp, quacking alarm call as it saw off two unwanted intruders, a buzzard and a red kite. The buzzard dived sulkily back into the trees, but the kite sideslipped and climbed to resume its graceful balancing on the cold air above the hills.

At the foot of the escarpment we turned along the stony track known variously as Ridgeway, or Icknield Way, or simply and accurately, the Old Road. Old man’s beard and scarlet bryony berries made witches necklaces in its hedges, fieldfares and mistle thrushes flew straight and level out of the scrubby trees, and the low sun laid stripes of green and gold across the ancient ruts and flints.

By Dame Alice Farm (named after Alice de la Pole, Duchess of Suffolk and Geoffrey Chaucer’s grand-daughter) and Dumble Dore (possibly not named after the Hogwarts headmaster) we made our way into the Chiltern woods that so thickly blanket these chalky hills. Fallen leaves of poplar and beech made a silver and gold carpet to shuffle through.

A winter silence fell over the afternoon. The chill air in the damp hollows of the woods nipped our fingers and noses. Long-tailed tits swung and squeaked from tree to tree, the only singers in these sunlit woods.

As the day began to darken into dusk we turned along Hollandridge Lane, an ancient packhorse route across the Chilterns, for a last brisk mile to Christmas Common, with thoughts of a Christmas noggin at the Fox and Hounds to spur us on.

Start: NT car park, Christmas Common, Watlington, Oxon OX49 5HS (OS ref SU710936)

Getting there: Car park is on Hill Road, 2 miles east of Watlington.

Walk: (8¼ miles, easy with some short steep climbs, OS Explorer 171): Right along Hill Road (please take care). At junction turn left; in 50m, left (‘Oxfordshire Way’/OW). In 2nd field, don’t turn left through kissing gate (712937); keep ahead downhill to turn left on OW. In ¾ mile, left along Ridgeway (703945). In 1¼ miles left off Ridgeway at Lys Farmhouse (690929) up driveway. Pass Dame Alice Farm; in another 250m, left (692922); ‘W11’ and white arrow/WA on tree) to B480 at Dumble Dore (698926).

Right; in 50m, left (stile) on field path with hedge on right. In 500m through gate (702923, WA, yellow arrow/YA); on through woods. In 500m ahead through 2 gates (705920, blue arrow/BA). In 100m fork left (‘W15, No Riding’). In 400m cross road at Greenfield (711919). Pass barn (BA) and on. Follow BA for 700m to valley bottom. Left here (713911, ‘W19’, WA). In 400m, left at path crossing onto Chiltern Way/CW (717910, BA).

In 150m fork right (bent WA) and follow WA and CW through trees. In 550m cross valley floor (722913); climb far slope (‘PS8’, CW, WA), keeping gully close on left, to leave wood by stile (725915). Forward to Hollandridge Lane (726916); left for 1 mile. At houses on left opposite Prior’s Grove, left (717929, Oxfordshire Way). In 30m fork right just inside wood (OW); follow WAs to road (714930). Right past Fox and Hounds PH; in 300m, left (714934, ‘Watlington’) along Hill Road to car park.

Lunch: Fox and Hounds, Christmas Common (01491-612599, topfoxpub.co.uk)

Accommodation: Fat Fox Inn, 13 Shirburn Street, Watlington OX49 5BU
(01491-613040; thefatfoxinn.co.uk)

Info: Henley-on-Thames TIC (01491-578034); chilternsaonb.org, chilternsociety.org.uk
visitengland.com; satmap.com; ramblers.org.uk

50 Great Walk In the Chilterns

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Jun 082015

Just published – ’50 Great Walk In the Chilterns’ (www.chilternsociety.org.uk) by members of the Chiltern Society. Excellent walks in beautiful countryside, written by walkers who really known the Chiltern Hills.

Chiltern Hills, South Oxfordshire

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Feb 212009

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

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A glorious blue sky and a damn cold wind greeted us as we set off from the King William IV through a crisp and crunchy winter landscape. Here in South Oxfordshire, between the western skirts of the Chiltern Hills and the broad valley of the River Thames, the long pale fields had a subtle dip and roll to them, with flint-built farms in the hollows and woods on the skyline – beautiful country to walk in. A pair of red kites rode overhead, their russet wings crooked at the elbows as they adjusted their stance in the buffeting wind. What a success story the Chiltern kites have been since their reintroduction in the early 1990s; nowadays some 300 pairs thrive and breed along the hill range a few miles north and west of London.

Strong and sweet whiffs of silage came from a clamp where the farmer was busy with his forklift, digging out the sugar-rich food for the cattle wintering in his sheds. Three horses in shaggy winter pelts put their noses over the fence at Woodhouse Farm and watched us go by. Half a mile more, and we were turning along the ancient Ridgeway track in the deep holloway of Grim’s Ditch.

Grim meant ‘mysterious’ in Anglo-Saxon; to the Norsemen who settled here, Grimr was the Devil. It was Iron Age Britons who built Grim’s Ditch in pre-Roman times, a defensive structure against … who or what? We’ll never know. What remains is a great groove in the Oxfordshire earth, ten feet deep or more. Old twisted thorn trees line its banks, blackbirds and wrens rustle the fallen leaves. On this cold morning it gave shelter, firm walking and endless food for the imagination.

At Nuffield we turned aside briefly to pay our respects to car designer and philanthropist William Morris, Lord Nuffield, who lies under a modest grave slab by Holy Trinity Church. I gave him silent thanks for those wonderful round-nosed cars, bulging with character, more like family members than vehicles.

Back in the fields once more the way led over stubble and ploughland to Homer Farm, its farmhouse of red brick and flint, its barn up on staddle stones. Then it was homeward along a classic country lane, potholed and puddled between coppiced hedges and mossy banks, looking forward to wrapping our frozen fingers round a piping hot bowl of soup in the King William IV.

Start & finish: King William IV PH, Hailey, Ipsden, Wallingford, Oxfordshire OX10 6AD (OS ref SU 642858)

Getting there: Train (www.thetrainline.com) to Goring & Streatley (4½ miles). Road: M4 (Jct 12), A340 to Pangbourne; B471 to Woodcote and A4074; minor roads to Ipsden and Hailey

Walk (6½ miles, easy grade, OS Explorer 171): From pub, right down lane; in 100 yards, right (‘Chiltern Way’/CW signs) past Poors Farm and through Wicks Wood (642870 – CW). Left along lane at Woodhouse Farm; right at Forest Row (636872); right along Ridgeway (636876) for 2 miles. At paths T-junction (666871), left to Nuffield church. Return to T-junction; ahead (footpath fingerpost); dogleg round Ridgeway Farmhouse (664865); on to Homer Farm. Keep ahead past farmhouse (663858 – footpath sign on tree) to lane. Right along lane by Bixmoor Wood for 1½ miles to Hailey.

Lunch: King William IV (excellent food, beer from barrel): 01491-681845

More info: Wallingford TIC (01491-826972); www.visitsouthoxfordshire.co.uk

www.christophersomerville.co.uk

Hambleden Weirs, Aston and the River Thames, Berks

Walks No Responses »

Mar 092024

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

A cold cloudy morning where the Chiltern Hills meet the boundaries of Bucks, Berks and Oxon. Not that the red kites were inclined to respect the county borders – they soared and wheeled indifferently over the bare woods and rain-sodden fields.

At Mill End the River Thames had forsaken its measured pace through the green meadows. The river, swollen by a whole night’s rainfall, came rushing and roaring, pushing a solid skein of sinewy grey-green water through the sluices. ‘She’s risen six inches higher than we expected,’ said the lock keeper as he pulled the sluice gate cable. ‘In for some flooding tomorrow, I should think.’

How did Thomas Caleb Gould, lock keeper here from 1777-1832, cope in similar conditions with no modern technology to help him? Gould was a celebrity in his day, famous for his many-buttoned coat and his daily diet of onion porridge. What his wife thought of that went unrecorded, but it kept him in good fettle till the age of ninety-two.

Heads reeling with the sound and energy of the seething water, we turned along the river bank and were instantly doused in peace and plenty. The Thames formed a broad, graceful bend, the water slow and wind-stippled as it slid smoothly past riverfront villas and their ornate wooden boathouses. Kempt lawns studded with fine cedars sloped up to Greenlands, a white wedding cake of a residence, built in 1853 for stationery mogul WH Smith.

A great crested grebe bobbed in the midriver flow, cautiously observing a nearby tufted duck with straggly crest and brilliant golden eyes. Black-headed gulls still sporting their white winter hoods screamed and squabbled over titbits, and a grey heron emitted a mournful shriek as it skimmed the water like a ragged umbrella on the loose.

At Upper Thames Rowing Club’s handsome premises we left the river and followed a snowdrop-spattered path to join up with the Chiltern Way that led across the winter wheatfields to Aston. From this elevated stance the Thames lay hidden by a fold of ground as though it had ceased to exist.

The Flower Pot Hotel at Aston exuded good smells of log fires. A venison pie (with juniper berries) and a golden pint of Boondoggle bitter here; then the final stroll beside the racing Thames towards the rumble and tumult of Hambleden weirs.

How hard is it? 6 miles; easy; riverbank and field paths

Start: Mill End car park, Hambleden, Bucks RG9 6TL (OS ref SU 786854)

Getting there: Bus 800 (High Wycombe – Reading)
Road: Follow ‘Hambleden’ from A4155 (Henley-on-Thames to Marlow) at Mill End. In ¼ mile, left into car park.

Walk (OS Explorer 171): Right along road (pavement). Dogleg right/left across A4155 (786850); follow footpath signs (‘Wokingham Way’) across River Thames via Hambleden Weirs. Cross Hambleden Lock (783851); right on riverbank Thames Path for 1¾ miles. Beside flagpole of Upper Thames Rowing Club (767836), left through car park to Remenham Lane. Right; in 50m, fork left (768835, fingerpost). In 50m, left (fingerpost, ‘Permitted Path); in 150m, left on Chiltern Way, Berkshire Loop (770834, fingerpost). In 400m left on Remenham Church Lane (774837); in 200m, right (773839, kissing gate, fingerpost) on Chiltern Way. In ½ mile, just before wooden gate across path, left (782840, ‘Permitted Path’) down to road (783842). Right into Aston. At Flower Pot Hotel (785842), left down Ferry Lane. At river, left (787845, ‘Thames Path’) to recross Hambleden Weirs and return to car park.

Lunch/Accommodation: Flower Pot Hotel, Aston RG9 3DG (01491-574721, flowerpothotel.com)

Info: Henley-on-Thames TIC (01491-576982)

Cadmore End, Turville & Fingest, Bucks

Walks 1 Response »

Dec 022023

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

A misty, moisty morning in the Chiltern Hills, with a wintry nip in the air. A group of hikers were enjoying thermos coffee and tupperware cake in the porch of the Church of St Mary le Moor at Cadmore End. Inside, strong colours glowed from the Victorian glass in the lancet windows, and a statuette on the font cover depicted a mother offering up her baby to the country in its hour of need – a very poignant memorial to First World War patriotic sentiment.

Mist hung in the trees and puddles made obstacle courses of the chalk and gravel tracks through the hills. A flock of starlings skimmed round in close formation before settling on a field to pick insects and worms from the sodden furrows. The countryside was a palette of washy greens, oranges and browns, pale and insubstantial in the moisture-thickened air.

In the margins of Hanger Wood a squirrel leaped overhead, knocking raindrops down to rattle among the hazel leaves. Acorns carpeted the path, none so much as nibbled. Maybe squirrels dine on caviar in the Chilterns.

Down in the valley by Harecramp Cottages a fleet of Land Rovers bounced towards their day’s shooting. I followed an old green lane among hips and haws, then climbed a steep little path to emerge at the crest of Turville Hill beside the white smock and skeletal sails of Cobstone Windmill, cleverly sited to catch every available wind.

Down below, Turville stretched along the valley bottom, picture perfect in mellow red brick. Here played out the extraordinary story of farmhand’s daughter Ellen Sadler, who fell asleep at home in Turville in 1871, aged 11, and could not be woken. Doctors, clerics, newspaper reporters and nosy celebrities attended her bedside, expecting to catch her out as a fraud, but nothing disturbed her Sleeping Beauty slumber until she awoke naturally some nine years later at the age of twenty.

There’s a gruesome fascination in the village inn’s name, the Bull & Butcher. The signboard displays a manically grinning butcher, cleaver in hand, with an apprehensive bull looking on. The pub itself proved warm, beamy, brick-floored and full of dogs – just the place for a nice pint of Brakspear’s golden nectar before the homeward plod by way of charming Fingest and the hollow bridleway through Hanger Wood.

How hard is it? 5 miles; easy; one short steep descent.

Start: Cadmore End car park, HP14 3PE (OS ref SU 786926)

Getting there: Car park is off B482 just east of Cadmore End school, between Stokenchurch and High Wycombe.

Walk (OS Explorer 171): cross road and green; left along lane. Opposite church (784925), right on track (‘Bridleway’). In 250m fork right by spinney (782925). In 450m at foot of slope, fork left into trees (778926, white arrow). In 700m cross road (773923); cross field to style (770925); left down lane. In valley bottom, left on green lane (767924). In ⅔ mile, nearing road, hairpin right (774917, yellow arrow/YA); in 50m fork left uphill to road (770915). Dogleg right/left past Cobstone Windmill; steeply down to Turville. 50m before road, left (769917), kissing gate/KG); half left to KG (771911); on to cross road (774910, ‘Chiltern Way’/CW). In 100m fork right (775911, YA, CW) to road (777910). Left; left up Chequers Lane; right by Sundawn * house (777911, fingerpost). In 100m fork right. In 250m, KG (780913); ahead up lane; in 300m fork left uphill (783914, blue arrow) to Cadmore End.

Lunch: Bull & Butcher, Turville RG9 6QU (01491-638283, thebullandbutcher.com) or Chequers PH, Fingest RG9 6QD (01491-756330, chequersfingest.co.uk)

Accommodation: Chilterns Fox, Ibstone Rd, HP14 3XT (01494-504264, thechilternsfox.co.uk)

Info: chilternsaonb.org

Warburg Nature Reserve & Nettlebed, Oxon

Walks No Responses »

Apr 292023

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

It was a glorious sunny morning in the Oxfordshire Chilterns, with a slight nip in the air and the prospect of a day’s unbroken blue sky. A green woodpecker’s cackle followed us down the lane.

Behind a screen of trees stood the ruin of St James’s Church, its narrow Romanesque windows blank and open to the wind, Saxon doorway arches rising from a nave strewn with nettles. Fat 18th-century brick buttresses bore witness to the centuries-old struggle to prevent the church collapsing before its final closure in 1874.

From the church the rutted track of the Chiltern Way Extension bore away west between flinty fields and among the beech trees of Wellgrove Wood. Strong sunlight silvered the beech trunks and cast a green glow on box bushes, but nothing could penetrate the pink-grey gloom of the yew grove on the slope before Nettlebed.

A lively place, Nettlebed, a village of immaculate houses and gardens, with a famous folk club whose fixture list reads like a Who’s Who of musical heroes.

This area of the Chilterns is a patchwork of farmland and woods interspersed with old stretches of common land, some still carefully tended by people who enjoy common rights, others neglected and run wild. Primroses and cowslips grew in the mossy verges of Nettlebed Common, where a tree creeper scuttled up a beech tree with bowed back and bent head, intent on levering insects out of hiding with its sharp hooked beak.

There were bluebells under the trees of Berrick Trench, and a dark-edged bee-fly, like a bee with a long sharp proboscis, busy pollinating the primroses. Steeply up to the grassy saddle of Russell’s Water Common, and then down through the quiet glades and flowering slopes of Warburg Nature Reserve.

Warburg is an absolute jewel in the Chiltern crown, a clutch of sheltered chalk valleys where orchids flourish, rare gentians bloom in autumn, and herb paris with its sinister black whiskers grows under the trees in spring. The three Wildlife Trust members we met were installing deer fencing; they had been coppicing and weaving hazel hedges earlier in the week. Such voluntary labour and skill safeguards and enhances this wonderful remote spot.

How hard is it? 6 miles; easy; field and woodland paths

Start: Warburg Nature Reserve car park, Bix Bottom, RG9 6BL (OS ref SU 721878)

Getting there: From A4130 (Wallingford-Henley) to Bix village (signed). Left along Rectory Lane; follow ‘Bix Bottom’, then ‘Warburg Reserve’.

Walk: Back along road to pass St James’s Church ruin (727869); right (‘Crocker End’) for 1 mile to Crocker End (711868). Ahead along road, then left side of green for ⅓ mile to road (706868). Ahead into Nettlebed. Right along Watlington Street (702867); in 100m fork right (Mill Road). At electricity substation (703872) left into trees. Follow white arrows to 2 houses (703876). Right before first one (yellow arrow/YA). In field beyond pond, half left to gate (704880, YA). Ahead through trees. At Westwood Manor Farm, cross byway (708883, YAs); across hill to metal gate (708887, YA). Through trees; across byway (708889); right up hill (kissing gate/KG, YA) to road (711890). Right past 5 Horseshoes, then Russell’s Water Common. At left bend, ahead (718886) beside hedge, then along track. Opposite Lodge Farm Cottage, right on track (723882, unmarked). In 25m, left (KG, YA, ‘Nature Reserve’). In 400m at gate, ahead (722881) downhill to car park.

Lunch: 5 Horseshoes, Maidensgrove RG9 6EX (01491-641282, thefivehorseshoes.co.uk) – closed Mon, Tue.

Accommodation: White Hart, Nettlebed RG9 5DD (01491-641245, thewh.co.uk)

Info: Warburg Nature Reserve (01491-642001, bbowt.org.uk); nettlebedfolkclub.co.uk

Great Hampden and Lacey Green, Bucks

Walks No Responses »

Oct 012022

First published in: The Times Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window

A cool misty morning, muted and grey across the Chiltern Hills, the grass of Great Hampden’s village green striking cold through my boot soles. The muddy track leading south through Hampden Coppice was carpeted green and gold with fallen beech leaves.

In Monkton Wood walkers had trodden a path through the copper-coloured bracken to avoid the stodgy dark mud of the bridleway. A typical autumn walk in the beechwoods, all glorious colour at eye level, all black and sticky down where the boots go squelching.

It was quiet and chilly under the trees. A great tit and a robin sang out, each asserting sole ownership over the forest, the tit with its two-tone call as clear as a glass bell, the robin with treble bursts of musical chatter. Round a rotting beech trunk clustered a host of parasol fungi, perhaps a thousand of the tiny grey umbrellas.

The path led steeply down to the old lane of Highwood Bottom. At the corner two big ragged chunks of puddingstone stood in the hedge, markers for the resting place of John Cooper, a highwayman buried here together with his bulging treasure bag – so stories say.

Whimsy hereabouts is not confined to hoary old tales. A rope ladder in a holly hedge led up to a little wooden house. ‘Elf lookout’, said the nameplate. ‘little people very welcome.’

On the outskirt of Lacey Green stood the village windmill, white sails akimbo, smock body black and tall, the oldest of its kind in Britain. Skylarks sang over the maize stubble. The woods exuded a rich earthy smell as I followed the Iron Age embankment known as Grim’s Ditch through the trees towards Hampden House.

The Hampden family lived on this spot from pre-Conquest times for a thousand years. One of their 14th-century scions, more choleric than wise, forfeited lands and favour at court by punching the Black Prince in the face during a bout of jousting. Another lost most of the family fortune in the South Sea Bubble investment scam of the 1720s.

Their ancient house stands among great cedars and beeches, a house with a weighty history, but a twinkle in its eye.

How hard is it? 5½ miles; easy; well-marked woodland paths

Start: Village green, Great Hampden, HP16 9RQ (OS ref SP 846015)

Getting there: Buses 333 (High Wycombe, Tue & Fri), 334 (High Wycombe, Mon-Fri)
Road: From A4128 (Great Missenden–High Wycombe) follow ‘Bryant’s Bottom’, then ‘Great Hampden’

Walk (OS Explorer 181): From bus stop, walk down right side of village green; stile and yellow arrow/YA into woods; straight ahead for ¼ mile to road (844011). Right to crossroads; bridleway opposite (fingerpost/FP) straight ahead for ¾ mile to Highwood Bottom (833005). Right (‘Restricted Byway’); in ½ mile beside gates of ‘Datcha’, right (826004). In ½ mile at metal gates (822006), left to road (821005). Right; at bus shelter, right (819007, kissing gate/KG) on Chiltern Way/CW. In nearly 1 mile at Lily Bank Farm (831015), dogleg left/right across drive and on. In 50m, at 4-finger post, fork left (CW); follow CW through trees, crossing 2 roads (833019 and (835022). Ahead (‘Whiteleaf, Redland End’) along lane. At next road at Redland End (835022) cross into hedge; left; in 30m, through KG; follow CW (white arrows) through trees and over field to Hampden House (848024). At church, right through churchyard and south gate; path south (YAs) for ½ mile to Great Hampden.

Lunch: Hampden Arms, Great Hampden (01494-488255, thehampdenarms.co.uk)

Accommodation: Nag’s Head, Great Missenden HP16 0DG (01494-862200, nagsheadbucks.com)

Info: High Wycombe Visitor Information Service (01296-382415)

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