Ascent/Descent:
146/140 m; Net Walking Time: ca. 4 hours [5 ¼ for the circular walk]
Toughness:
3 out of 10
Take
the 10.22 train from King’s
Cross to Peterborough
(Finsbury Park [Victoria and Piccadilly
Lines] 10.28, Stevenage 10.47), arrives Sandy 11.08.
Return
trains:
15.54, 16.20, 16.54, 17.19, 17.57, 18.32 etc. (from 43 minutes journey time, trains
leave Sandy 4 minutes earlier). Buy a Sandy
return ticket.
This
Bedfordshire walk, although leading through an area of large arable fields,
is no slogging through crops or over ploughed land . The walk is mainly flat
and before lunch mainly follows the Greensand
Ridge Walk. The route is a mix of attractive broad grassy tracks along
field edges and woodland trails. Along the way you will see a number of
information boards telling you about the animals, trees and plants you may
see around you. Binoculars are useful as the
area is rich in bird-life and a healthy population of muntjac deer and brown
hares. You visit two lovely villages – Northill and Old Warden – which both
have excellent pubs. Just after lunch follows a short climb into Warden Warren woods. There are no
stiles on the main walk or the long circular walk back to Sandy.
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Lunch: The Crown in Northill (5.3 km/3.3 mi) or The
Hare and Hounds
in Old Warden (12.1 km/7.5 mi, food
to 14.30). Tea: Various options,
recommended is the Surfin' Cafe .
6 comments:
hi,
I have been on a number of these walks with friends before, but haven't joined the SWC group before. I was thinking of joining this walk on the 27th, but would be joining @ Finsbury Park instead of King's X
I was just wondering if anyone else was planning on doing this walk, so I can try and connect on the train
There will be walkers, no doubt.
Weather is looking a tad on the soggy side :/
Id really like to come too so am hoping the rain clears off a bit
the rain's supposed to peter out at the time we're supposed to start walking, i.e.: no excuses!
Hearts leapt with excitement on the train out as somewhere around Welwyn the ground started to have snow cover, apparently thick enough to survive the thaw for a few hours. But somewhere north of Stevenage the white magic disappeared again.
So the n=8 walkers (incl. 2 exiles from the Capital Walkers) were left with just some shlush on the ground and more of the stuff still falling. The precipitation did peter out after an hour or so, so the weather can be best described as w=wet-start-then-dry-with-a-bracing-wind. As the write-up promises, there are no stiles and only one arable field crossing, but plenty of woods, tree-lined tracks and water-filled gravel pits with birdlife and a few pretty villages and churches. We had some far views of snow-covered hill sides, and - late on - a snowy field in the middle of a wood.
Lunch we had at the second pub, The Hare and Hounds, and the reviews of the food ranged from 'average' to 2/10 (admittedly the pheasant stood no comparison with last Saturday's offering at The Old Swan, but 2/10 is probably a bit harsh). Anyway, we made it to Biggleswade in time to just miss the 16.20, so settled in for tea at the Surfin Cafe, to catch the 16.54 stopping service.
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