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This Week's Walks - Archive

Please see the Saturday Walker's Club This Week's Walks page.

This is an archive of walks done by the Saturday Walker's Club. You should only need to use this page if the SWC website is down.

Sunday 11 September 2016

A gentle late summer amble in the Cotswolds

 SWC Walk 246 Kingham to Charlbury

Distance 17.6km (11m); toughness 2/10 virtually flat and completely stile-free.

Trains: London Paddington 09.35 (Slough 09.53 ) arrive Kingham 11.15

Return trains from Charlbury at 16,26, 17.26, 18.33, 19,29, 20.30, journey time back to London Paddington about 1hr 40mins.

Buy a day return  to Kingham

This Cotswolds walk mostly (but not exclusively) follows the Oxfordshire Way from Kingham to Charlbury and never strays far from the river Evenlode passing through a dreamy landscape of gentle rolling hills, woods and fields that were the inspiration for Tolkien’s Hobbitshire. It goes through two attractive Cotswolds villages, Shipton under Wychwood and Ascott under Wychwood which have the beautiful stone cottages in the traditional Cotswold’s style.

Refreshments
There is an early lunch option at the Wychwood Inn 6.4km into the walk but the pub favoured by previous trips is the excellent and recommended  Swan (01993 832332) at Ascott under Wychwood 8.8km into the walk and directly on your route. Ring ahead to book a table.

There are a number of pubs in Charlbury for a final drink -  see walk instructioins.

See here for the pdf giving further details about the walk and full walk instructions.


PS this is quit e an expensive trip so book ahead to get the best deal. Weather forecast  for area looking good (currently!)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

9:21 am from Ealing Broadway, change at Slough with 4 mins to spare (same platform)

Archiebald said...

Thanks, see you there.

PeteB said...

Another day another trip with the FGW! n=9 on this walk with one taking an the 8.35 train which managed to arrive 30mins late whilst the rest of us had to make do with arriving just 15mins late so that must count as a win for FGW so award yourselves a massive bonus chaps.

Anyway rant over: we set off in w=warm-and-sunny-with-some-cloud weather with the first part of the trail very muddy in one or two spots, mainly the result of the horse riding classes activities - there was a notice by a farmer asking them not to gallop along trails. The countryside looked lovely in the autumn light and this walk is just perfect for daydreaming as the route and trail are easy to follow. Its also really quiet, apart which is another bonus. Copious amounts of blackberries were also collected and consumed en route.

Four ate at the Swan whilst five of us lazed, lunched and sunbathed in a perfect little sun-trap in the church grounds opposite. We continued on to Charlbury where 3 set off to catch the 4.26 train whilst the rest of us had disasterous refreshments at the Bell which struggled to serve teas and coffees (poor quality) with seemingly just 1 temporary barman serving the whole pub. Lets hope the new managers starting this week can turn this place around because it has badly deteriorated over the years.
Finally we ambled on to Charlbury station to await the late arrival of the 5.26 train - just 9 mins this time; those new performance improvement measures really starting to bite
A lovely Cotswolds day out with Sunday walkers getting lucky with the weather once again.

(Just before lunch we got trapped on the wrong side of some new fencing crossing a field where new drainage pipes had recently been laid so I will need to tweak the directions a bit here.)