Length: 11½ km (7.2 miles). Toughness: 3/10
10:21 East Grinstead train from Victoria (Clapham Jct 10:28, East Croydon 10:39), arriving Oxted at 11:00. See below for a late start option.
Trains back from Oxted are at xx:29 & xx:59.
This short walk was last posted on a thoroughly wet day in January when the only report was from two ‘walk inspectors’ who'd driven to the lunch pub. If the weather gods are more favourable this time you'll enjoy a mix of open and wooded sections going up and over the Greensand Hills, returning via the Carpenters Arms on Limpsfield Chart. This rarely seems able to offer walk-ins Sunday lunch but you could simply carry on to Limpsfield and Oxted after a quick pit stop. There are several other pubs and coffee shops here, with the Wetherspoons next to Oxted station being a convenient watering-hole.
* Late Starters: Anyone taking the train half an hour later should be able to catch up the main group at the Carpenters Arms by doing the ‘morning short cut’ (§C instead of §M, making a 10 km walk).
Please bring the directions from the L=swc.63.b page. If you're printing them from this page, clicking 'Short' on the Walk Options line will include both Short Walk options and save 4 or 5 sheets of paper.
2 comments:
Carpenters Arms has gone very up market food is very good but pricey. Definitely need to book for a table on Sunday and Saturdays as well now.
11 met on Oxted station - except we later found out that three newbies somehow did not manage to meet us and did much of the walk alone, until some of the group met them at the end. So N=14. (Possibly a few more, says the walk poster, but I did not see them and suspect an attempt at vote stuffing, which I shall resist….)
The skies were w=grey, half promised breaks in the cloud not materialising. We barrelled along, getting spread out. At the point of decision the group I was with did the shortcut, insisting it was the correct route, and thus reducing the walk to six miles. At least four, including the walk poster, did the proper route, which involved descending the hill.
The short cutters got to the Carpenters Arms at just after midday. It being Christmas there was no room at the inn. Or was there? One of our number asked for a table for one and apparently got it. The rest of us shivered in the garden with drinks and did or did not surreptitiously eat our sarnies.
In the afternoon there was talk of making it a pub crawl by stopping at the Bull. But instead we made it a mad dash by carrying on to Oxted. By this point we were shedding walkers like extras in a war film, various people disappearing to get this or that train. Five of us persisted to the Wetherspoons by Oxted station, where three had a late lunch. The walk poster and another regular also joined us after a while, plus the aforementioned three newbies.
But not for long our drowsy ease! Car drivers shuffled off to get their cars and the cry of “Shall we get the 14.59?” rang out. Suddenly the prospect of curling up with a cup of cocoa in front of the Sunday after Christmas TV was too much, and so get it we did.
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