Bolderwood circular

Thu, 2013 Nov 7 11:23 AM GMT

With Harry. Dry, cloudy weather. Muddy underfoot in wooded areas. Just over 7 miles.

This walk from Bolderwood comes from a website called Aching Legs which contains lots of walks in the New Forest area.

The original is ten miles long, but we cut it down to seven by omitting part of it, including a section alongside the very busy A31 road.

The instructions given on the website are pretty easy to follow, especially if you have the OS map.

Today's walk was rather boggy in the woodland sections - to be fair it has been a wet autumn.

The promise of sun - not fulfilled

A nice gravel track

crossing Bratley Water for the first time

A fairy pony?

distant view of the Isle of Wight

under the A31

reflections and a hint of blue in the sky?

A tree-trunk to inspire Jackson Pollock?

Map and details

Hollowell circular, via Cottesbrooke and Creaton.

Mon, 2013 Nov 4 9:57 AM GMT

Led by me, with Barry, Maureen and Gordon. Cold day, but sunny. Some mud underfoot. Just over 7 miles. Quite rolling.

A problem to start the walk as planned which was to take in Hollowell Reservoir. One to investigate later?

Instead we start from Hollowell, and walk down to the bus-stop and shelter in the centre, then follow the Creaton Road out of the village until it bends to the right. A bridle path leads straight ahead uphill here.

The bridleway is pretty muddy.  From the top we catch sight of the reservoir. 

 We cross the A5199 and walk across the fields until we meet a sign which directsa is to our right, then into the next field and on our way down the hill into Cottesbrooke - a very picturesque and wealthy-looking village.

 The trees make a colourful, many textured tapestry as we walk down the fields.

 We turn right along the very small road through the village, passing the gates to Cottesbrooke Hall, which is hidden away.

The church is worth visiting - it is open, and contains lots of monuments and a couple of tombs with effigies, including the one below, where the small figures appear to represent the man's daughters.

From Cottesbrook we follow Station Road until we meet the Macmillan Way, opposite a driveway.  This leads us to Creaton, directly if you follow it closely - indirectly if you follow your nose, as we do today.

 At Creaton we find a bench on a playing field - just right for a break.

 These almshouses in Creaton were erected for Victoria's silver jubilee in 1897.

 They face this splendid village green.

 We decide to take the footpath, rather than the road to return to Hollowell - two miles instead of one.

It's been a shortish, but very attractive walk. A beautiful day, though the wind had a sharp edge to it.

Map and details

Great Bowden circular, via Caudle and Thorpe Langton

Thu, 2013 Oct 31 9:18 AM GMT

Led by Barry, with Maureen and me. Fine and dry, but cloudy. Muddy underfoot in places. Just over 11 miles in all.

Footbridge along Welham Lane

Wildmeadow Farm

Barry looks for archeological sites on the Caudle

We leave a lucky horseshoe at the trig point

Looking back across the valley to the hill

Would you believe this path is clearer than last time?

Another "cleared" public right of way.

Not the most scenic part of the walk

The sun is breaking through!

We had a break by the canal en route to Great Bowden

Yup, it's autumn.

Halloween

Map and details

Northants Round 3 - Castle Ashby to Salcey Forest

Wed, 2013 Oct 30 10.45 AM GMT

With Marta. Beautiful day, cool but very bright and sunny. Some muddy patches. Altogether about 10.5 miles.

We set off from Castle Ashby, and rejoin the Northants Round route at Chadstone, where we take the footpath across a field, and stray slightly as it isn't clearly marked. We manage to find our way and follow the path across the longest widest avenue of trees I've seen. It leads to Castle Ashby House.

The gateway to the avenue

From the far side of the avenue our path is easy to follow into the village of Yardley Hastings.

We cross the main road opposite the shop and the village sign, and walk along Chase Park Road, past some splendid houses.  The road bends to the right towards Chase Park Farm, and turns left just before the farm buildings. We walk past two large friendly pigs in an enclosure.

The bridleway takes us more or less southwest, over a disused railway,  and we are soon walking with woodland on our right. We follow the woodland edge round to the south. At the end we turn right, over a disused railway line. We turn right at the track leading to Manor Farm, then follow the road Past the Manor House, the Arches and into Horton.

The Arches

Fine tree near Ravenstone Road, Horton.

We walk through Horton,  then take a track leading towards Piddington - we emerge near Church Farm, and join the path labelled on the map as Midshires Way. This takes us to Salcey Forest and we make our way to the Cafe, where we have soup for lunch.

Sunset sky from Castle Ashby, just before the drive home.

Map and details

Castle Ashby circular via Whiston, Cogenhoe, Brafield on the Green, Chadstone

Thu, 2013 Oct 24 9:52 AM BST

Led by me, with Barry and Maureen. Sunny, little wind. Some mud underfoot. Altogether just ten miles - including our walk to the Gardens, and back via footpath to the village.  

The walk was a figure of eight, with the loops crossing at Whiston Spinney.

From the road near the shopping yard we turned right towards the Falcon Inn and War Memorial. We followed the road towards Whiston for a while, until it bent to the left.   The path continued straight across a field heading for Whiston Church.

 There's a fine view over the Nene Valley from the churchyard.

We walked down the steep path from the church and turned left at the road, then left when we reached the junction.  A short stretch of road walking took us to the point where our route, a bridleway, led off on the right hand side. We followed this alongside Whiston Spinney until we reached some farm buildings.

At this point we lost our path, but were able to cross a field and pick it up at the top of the Jerusalem steps.

From here we walked downhill towards the road into Cogenhoe. We turned left and walked uphill past the Royal Oak, into the village.  Just past the village sign we took the left hand fork, then turned left on to a footpath beside a playing field.

We followed the path over fields, clearly marked, until we arrived at Brafield church - and it was time for a break.  

We rejoined the path behind the church, and headed in the direction of Whiston once more.   We arrived back at the farm buildings before too long, and rejoined the bridleway for a short stretch.

When the Northamptonshire Round footpath crossed the bridleway we turned right, down some steps to a footbridge and up the other side.

We turned right and walked along the edge of the field, turning left at the boundary and heading for a minor road.  We crossed this and followed our path in the same direction.

We walked downhill beside a wood, then continued until we reached Chadstone Lodge.

 At the road here we turned right, and made our way to the hamlet of Chadstone, before taking the road left towards Castle Ashby, then right to the Gardens.  

We crossed the impressively wide and long avenue to Castle Ashby House.

We didn't have much time to explore the gardens today, so we made do with a quick peep at the churchyard before wending our way back to the car.

Map for part 1.

Map for part 2.