Length: 26.0 km (16.1 mi) [shorter and longer
options possible]
Ascent/Descent: 288/268m
Net Walking Time: ca. 6 hours
Toughness: 5 out of 10
Take the 09.20 Exeter St.
David’s train from Waterloo (09.27 Clapham J., 09.46 Woking), arriving at
10.42. Meet outside the station building in the car park, to the right as you
come out.
Return buses from Amesbury (outside Library) to Salisbury Blue Boar Row (from 19 mins journey
time): Lines Activ8, X4 and X5, between them with 5 buses per hour in the
relevant time window.
Return trains from Salisbury: xx.21 and xx.47 to 19.21, then 19.42 (to P’ton), 20.26,
20.52, 21.26 and 22.26.
This walk mostly follows the Avon Valley upstream
from the quintessentially English Cathedral City of Salisbury with its many
historic buildings, to Amesbury which claims to be the oldest occupied
settlement in Great Britain, having been first settled around 8820 BCE. En
route you rise out of the valley to the site of Salisbury’s earlier
incarnation: Old Sarum, with its impressive hilltop location, banks and
ditches, ruined remains of an earlier cathedral and supreme views across the
Avon Valley and to the modern town.
A meandering route to the lunch pubs then crosses and recrosses the Avon while passing through several twee villages, dominated by mills, thatched walls and cottages and several impressive grand homes.
You then bear away from the Avon Valley to enter the very evocative Stonehenge World Heritage Site with its numerous pre-historic monuments: barrow cemeteries, large linear or non-linear earthworks and wooden and stone henges. All but two of the fifteen most prominent monuments in the Stonehenge area, as well as many more minor sites, are either passed on, or can at least be spotted from, the main walk or the various extensions and shortcuts.
Lunch: The Wheatsheaf Inn
in Lower Woodford (10.7 km/6.7 mi, food all
day) or The Bridge Inn in Upper Woodford (13.4 km/8.3
mi, food to 14.30, light bites all day).
Tea: Pubs and cafés in
Amesbury and plenty of cafés and pubs in Salisbury at the central square on
Blue Boar Row and on Station Road. See the webpage or the pdf for
details.
For walk directions and all options to shorten or lengthen the walk, a map, a height
profile, gpx/kml files, and photos click here. T=swc.67
1 comment:
N=12 met outside Salisbury Station and after names, one group of 4 swiftly moved off for their own choice of walk options. We saw them again at Old Sarum, Stonehenge and (from the top of the bus in Amesbury) as they waved to ask the bus driver to wait for them – he didn’t. Hopefully, another bus came soon.
2 headed for the cathedral but were met again at the Upper Woodford pub, and two walked at their own pace but were seen in the pub in Lower Woodford.
Our group of four ignored the beauties of Salisbury and enjoyed the free views of Old Sarum and Stonehenge – though these are definitely worth walking there for. The countryside is mainly open, lots of pasture for sheep and very young lambs, cows and calves (not in the same field as the path) and in one place camels / dromedaries and alpacas. Lots of fields of winter or spring wheat, oil seed rape and a mystery crop – probably flax. Lots of bird song. Many trees are not yet fully in leaf but the little wood between Lower and Upper Woodford was full of May blossom.
We survived the A303 crossing as heavy east bound traffic meant that a car was prepared to slow down for us. Our group all had instructions and/or GPS but it has to be admitted that one of the group was familiar with the route so we didn’t always check the details. A thoroughly enjoyable walk.
Work is being done to the river bank on the way out of Salisbury so we were diverted on the main road for a while but the route was clear.
W=sunny-cloudy-cool.
Post a Comment