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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.

Saturday 25 November 2017

Saturday walk - Dorking Circular

Dorking Circular (SWC walk 274)
Length: 16km (10.1 miles), 18.8km (11.6 miles)
Toughness: 4 out of 10 to 6 out of 10

9.31 train from Victoria (9.37 Clapham Junction, 9.59 Sutton) to Dorking, arriving 10.24.

There is also a 9.24 train from Waterloo (9.33 Clapham Junction, 9.40 Wimbledon), arriving 10.13, if anyone finds that more convenient, but note the information in the next paragraph

So long as you travel both ways by the Victoria trains, then you can buy a cheaper "Southern only" return to Dorking (if available).

For walk directions click here. For GPX file click here.

Autumn colours will probably be past their best by now, but the dribs and drabs lingering on can still be very pretty. This walk has plenty of woods, particularly after lunch on the main (ie slightly longer) walk.

I was initially attracted to it because it offered 9 and 10.6 mile option, but I see on closer inspection that the author has hidden in the small print a sneaky supplement to those distances by starting his measurements from Dorking West, a station with about three trains a day. Starting from Dorking main station bumps the distances up to the ones stated at the top of this post, but at the end of the walk a good 2km or more is through the streets of Dorking, so actually you have more like 8.8 and 10.4 miles to do before nightfall.

You don't have to choose which walk you are doing until after the Wotton Hatch pub, the only lunch stop on the short walk, one of two possible lunch stops on the main walk (the other being the Stephan Langton). If it is a big group and the Wotton Hatch pub is busy, it clearly would be useful if the main walkers ate at the Langton, but you would be advised to ring first to check they have space.

If anyone is feeling really heroic, there is also a 22.6 km (14 mile) long option. You get access to two other pubs on this walk, but will almost certainly finish in the dark.

Dorking High Street has various tea options. Allow 15-20 minutes after them to get to the station.

Trains back are at 26 and 58 past to Victoria and 4 and 34 past to Waterloo, with only minutes difference in journey times. T=3.274


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

N=25-30?, so many I lost the count. Lots came off the train from Victoria which was delayed, we met several at Dorking station who came from Waterloo train arrived earlier, then two more joined enRoute, W=sunny-all-day. A lovely day out with nice scenary and autumn colour in sunshine. Several opted for earlier pub lunch at Wotten Hatch. I am told food came very fast and was good. Eleven (one arrived earlier and had already finished when the later party arrived) ate at Stephan Langton, a bit of wait for the food but it was worth the wait, all enjoyed their dishes. We booked a table for 8, but had 10, the pub quickly added a extra table for us, when we left at 2:15pm the place was full, so recommend booking if a large party for the future. We saw ~10-12 walkers (mainly sandwichers who were ahead of us) in a tea room in Dorking but it was full, so eight of us went to another one (can't remember the name) down the road. Tea and cakes lived up to our high expectations. All left just after 5pm, we caught 5:34pm train back to London. A nice day out in good company, and no traffic noise either...

Anonymous said...

Two at Clapham Junction got the 10.03 train to Dorking as the 9.37 was cancelled. Did the Victoria train not stop at CJ? Didn't see anyone else at Dorking. Decided to do Dorking to Reigate walk instead. This was a lovely walk with countless crossings of the river Mole and lots of autumn colour mainly on the ground. We were enthusiastically shepherded into the church in Betchworth where there was a display of alternative Christmas trees made by local groups - all really inventive. A really enjoyable day