9.45 train from Charing Cross (9.48 Waterloo East, 9.54 London Bridge) to Stonegate, arriving 10.56
Buy a day return to Robertsbridge.
This is a good walk for signs of spring - primroses, celandines, hornbeam catkins, maybe some lambs. While it has its share of fields (and so potentially mud...) there are reasonable stretches on harder surfaces. It has been done in winter before without trouble.
It is not the longest walk in the world, but it is decently hilly and usually seems to fill the day. In particular it has a short (2.2 miles) walk to lunch, which passes through quite a pretty little wood which might have some early wood anemones.
However, you can lengthen the morning a bit by doing the Stonegate Circular walk either as far as the railway line, or all the way to Burwash. After lunch it is a decent 6.5 mile walk to Robertsbridge.
Lunch is in Burwash at the charming Rose & Crown, with the nearby Bear Inn as a back-up. There is also the Blacksmiths tea room and coffee shop. Batemans, the National Trust-owned former home of Rudyard Kipling is 1 kilometre beyond Burwash: National Trust members can access its tea room.
Approaching Robertsbridge you pass through the rather strange Darvel-Bruderhof community. Tea is usually at the quirky Ostrich pub by the station, but in the nearby village centre there is also the George Inn and a couple of convenience stores (also a bakery/cafe, but it closes at 4pm)
Trains back are at 14 past the hour.
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N=11 on this walk on a day of w=lovely-warm-sun. The sun was not a surprise to me but the warmth was, given all the talk in the weather forecast about cold winds. It was basically a lovely spring day. Some gloop underfoot in places (especially on the waterlogged final few fields) but mostly paths are drying nicely.
Confirmation that spring had arrived would have come from hearing lots of chiffchaffs (our first migrant bird arrival of the year; they sound like their name). I counted three but they are not quite everywhere yet. I reckon they will be in the next week, however.
I offered walkers the option at the start of the walk doing all or part of the longer morning of the Stonegate Circular, but everyone just followed their GPX, so we did the standard short two mile morning. No complaints from me, as I wrote the walk and think it is very nice.
This got us to the pub at midday. Someone had kindly booked a table for five, but it was in a gloomy (if atmospheric) corner of the interior. He was with difficulty persuaded by the rest of us to instead sit outside in the lovely sun. The lovely sun responded by going behind a cloud, causing a ten degree drop in the temperature. But luckily it soon relented and seven of us had a very nice alfresco lunch with tasty food (mine was nice anyway…) and cheerful service.
In the afternoon we saw two peacock butterflies. An earlier wood anemone wood had not been out but there were several nice clumps later in the walk. Also plenty of celandines, primroses and a few adventurous cuckoo flowers (aka ladies smock). Plus an even more adventurous bluebell or two. Some hornbeam catkins but not as many as I expected (admittedly a bit of a niche interest….).
In the afternoon we got a bit strung out. Some may have got the 16.08 train. Five back markers thought they were just time for the 16.14 train, before discovering their error. That meant we had an enforced layover in the quirky Ostrich pub, whose locals-heavy vibe I find a bit intimidating. But they were friendly enough and cheerfully boiled a kettle for three of us even though tea was not formally on the menu. You can’t ask more from a Brit than that.
We got the 17.14 (ie this one WAS at 14 past) and either chatted or slept all the way back to London as the golden sun sank into the landscape. At Stonegate one of our longest standing walk creators and posters joined us after completing a recce of a new walk. Watch this space!
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