SWC Walk 251 – Fine views in the undulating Upper Nadder
Valley, Wardour Park and its ruined Castle, a long ascent to Win
Green, views to the coast and nearby valleys, White Sheet hill and ridge, a
rough descent, a jump over a boggy brook, a bluebell wood (at least one, anyway)
Length:
26.3 km (16.4 mi) [shorter option
available, see below]
Ascent/Descent: 710
m; Net Walking Time: ca. 6 ½ hours
Toughness:
10 out of 10
09.20
Exeter
St. Davids train from Waterloo (Clapham J. 09.27, Woking 09.46), arrives Tisbury 11.06.
Buy
a £15 day return to Tisbury on the SWT-website or at the
station ticket office (but not the machines) before midnight the night before.
Returns are at xx.01, last train 22.03.
The
walk explores parts of the Upper Nadder Valley (also known as the Vale of
Wardour) in the south westerly parts of the West Wiltshire Downs Area of
Outstanding Natural Beauty, which is spectacular walking country with some
breathtaking views. Heading west from Tisbury, initially it broadly follows the
valley, while never being flat for long, before routing through Wardour Park
with its large neoclassical mansion and romantically ruined 14th
century Castle to then bypass the Donheads via a hill crossing.
After
lunch in Ludwell it is a long and steady ascent to South Wiltshire’s highest point:
Win Green Hill, providing for 360°-views to the coast and the inland valleys.
After a stretch along the Cranborne Chase ridge a steep descent into the Chalke
Valley is followed by a re-ascent up Berwick Coombe to White Sheet Hill,
followed by a steep and rough descent from the chalk escarpment. A few woods, a boggy brook crossing and some
smaller copses are followed by the descent back into Tisbury, a remarkably
unspoilt village.
A
Shortcut (17.2 km, 440m ascent), limiting the effort to 5/10, is described.
On
the full walk the lunch stop is The
Grove Arms in Ludwell (10.6
km/6.6 mi), just before the ascent to South Wiltshire’s highest point.
On
the short walk the lunch stop is The Forester Inn in Donhead St. Andrew (7.3 km/4.5 mi), an excellent yet welcoming pub restaurant. Pre-booking is advised.
Back
in Tisbury the options are the highly
recommended Beatons Tearooms and Bookshop for
tea, or one of three
pubs – in (my) order of preference:
The Boot Inn, The South Western or The
Bennett.
For walk directions click here.
For summary, route map, height
profile, photos and gpx/kml
files click here.
Get
Hill Fit for Ullapool – The Schedule
23/04 – SWC 251 Tisbury Circular (via Ludwell and Berwick
St. John)
30/04 – SWC 239 Halnaker to Chichester (via
Cass Sculpture Park and Goodwood)
07/05 – SWC XXX (New Walk) Haslemere to Midhurst
14/05 – SWC 068 (Revised) Rowlands Castle Circular
T=swc.251
4 comments:
Short cut version of this walk for me (and a few others) with lunch at The Foresters Inn. Very nice walk, and not too challenging, for those who don't feel like doing the the main walk. We say good bye to the main group at the first lunch pub, and will be back in Tisbury to have a drink with them at the end, if they are not too tired.
22 off of the train and then 2 at the early pub having lunch as we arrived so n=24 w=sunny-spells-quite-mild.
There were some occasional small bluebell patches and primrose displays on the short option on this walk
7 of us only did 10.7 miles lunching at The Forester Inn which was okay but nothing to shout about.
Lots of firm mud underfoot churned up by cows so it was ideal break a leg country and thankfully none of us did but we were all so elated to get off of a particularly steep slope that when we came to a very muddy track ( say 400mm deep and full width ) one of our party took a dive into it and had to wash off with bottles of water and then wait for the mud to dry on the clothes. Not sure of it was done for a laugh or just lack of concentration.
The long walk people met us at the pub at the end having tea - how did they do that ?
A lovely walk, though even the short version wasa bit too long for me.
Muddy Brown
n=25 w=cold-with-sunny-spells
21 off the train, 1 had driven from Windsor, 3 on an earlier train (the intention of those haveing been to taste both the short walk and the long walk lunch pub).
The total includes a couple of first-timers and a couple of very occasional SWC-Walkers, who usually hang out with Met Walkers.
6 did the short walk, and reported a disappointingly average experience at The Forester lunch pub, let's hope the kitchen just had a bad day...
Standard length walkers were treated to decent if not outstanding pub food at The Grove Arms and superb far views all day, best I've seen on this route: from Win Green all the way to Bournemouth and the Isle of Wight, 50 km away ...
Else it proved again to be a challenging and very varied walk in beautiful and remote countryside (no villages were walked through, no church passed, no other walkers encountered). Strenuous yes, but with so many visual delights to keep you going, that both the short walkers and the majority of the standard walkers caught the 18.01 train.
6 others hung around in Tisbury for a drink or two at the South Western, then working their way up the village for another one at The Benett, and then for a meal at the Boot Inn. 21.01 train for those...
Bluebells were not as far 'out' as they are in closer-by parts of the Southeast.
Mud in the main nothing too serious in the scheme of things of this 'wettest winter on record', but for the one pretty shocking stretch of deep, gooey mud along a longish stretch of deeply rutted farm track close to the end. This was passed almost without incident though.
Lovely walk through beautiful countryside and all the walkers I have spoken with at the end of the walk were of the same view. Many thanks Thomas!
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