Book 2 Walk 14. Effingham to Westhumble.
Length 14.3km (8.9m); toughness
5/10.
Trains: 10.00 London Waterloo (Clapham Junction 10.09) to Surbiton arriving 10.22 Then 10.32 from Platform 4, Surbiton
arriving at Effingham Junction 10.50.
Slow stopping return trains from
Box Hill and Westhumble to London Victoria
are at xx:18 and 48.
A day return to Effingham Junction should be ok but as you will be returning on a different line from
Boxhill and Westhumble two singles may be safer.
The idyllic estate of Polesden
Lacey, a fine country house nestling just behind the North Downs
escarpment, is the highlight of this walk - a landscape of hidden valleys,
pretty woodland, and gentle pasture that seems lost in a golden yesterday. The
walk has something to offer at almost any time of the year. In spring, it
passes through a number of fine bluebell woods.
Lunch is at the self service restaurant at Polesden
Lacey.Tea is usually taken at Denbies Wine Estate Visitor Centre but
there is now a nice café right outside Boxhill station which hopefully should
be open until 5pm .
Don’t use Book 2 for this walk; instead download the pdf
file for the updated instructions which can be found here
2 comments:
n=8. w=Fractionally-cold-but-no-rain.
I contrived to miss the appointed train and so followed on on the next one, encountering about five regulars leaving Polesden Lacey just as I arrived.
4 out of 5 for roast potatoes at the restaurant there. I chanced to sit facing the serving hatch, and was able to witness the production line involved in plating the food to order, from which my education was broadened about the trade-off between throughput (the place was busy) and the fussier attitudes to food hygiene. I can report that the gravy was untouched by human hand.
On leaving, I found two more plus a dog who had chosen to take their lunch in the cafe and seemed slightly wounded by the news that the rest of the group had departed some time before without finding them.
Tea at Denbies which was satisfactory as usual. Back on 1648 train; presumably the majority were earlier as there was no further sight of them.
Some of the GPS is off by a few tens of metres in places.
Can people stop saying that it is "slightly cold"?!? It is FREEZING. It is February temperatures in late April (look up the London climate averages if you don't believe me)
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