"From a remote station this walk climbs up low hills, soon with some attractive views across a steep-sided valley reminiscent of wilder parts of Britain. A gently undulating route along field edges, country lanes and wooded valleys takes you to the village of Speldhurst, where the parish church of St Mary the Virgin contains a set of notable pre-Raphaelite stained glass windows.
After a lunch the walk loops back through more wooded valleys and fields, skirts around Langton Green and descends into Old Groombridge. The remainder of the walk is the same as the shortest ending to the Eridge Circular walk (#120). This goes past Groombridge Place, a beautiful Jacobean manor house surrounded by a medieval moat, then follows part of the course of the heritage Spa Valley Railway
The soils in the High Weald do not drain well and you will need to be prepared for muddy or waterlogged paths after wet weather."
11 comments:
The George & Dragon at Speldhurst is definitely closed. The Hare at Langton Green, about 10.5 km on the main walk, is good, but booking is essential at weekends. The Crown at Groombridge is also good, but much smaller. Both pubs have outside seating.
But we cannot go into pub unless from same household?
Tunbridge Wells is a medium level alert area. According to gov.uk that means that "you must not socialise in groups larger than 6, indoors or outdoors."
So ok to sit round the same table as 5 others, but remember you will need to wear a face covering "except when seated at a table to eat or drink" and try to maintain social distancing of 1 metre if possible.
Just to clarify - the 5 others DO NOT have to be in the same household as you.
Sounds inherently wrong though, to go from a declared high infection rate area (London) to a medium infection rate area (the rest of the Southeast bar Essex) and do stuff you couldn't do at home. No? What are the locals supposed to make of that?
You expect me to make sense of this? A lot of people in Tunbridge Wells (although nowhere near as many as formerly) commute to London for work.
One possible solution would be to order, eat and pay outside. That way you keep both within the legal remit and spirit of the law.
Gov.uk website says "When seeing friends and family you do not live with (or who are not part of your support bubble), you must not meet in a group of more than 6, indoors or outdoors." So, no distinction here between inside and outside. I'm taking sandwiches.
As stated above the highest tier of where you live and where you are applies. In Tier 2 there’s no socialising allowed indoors. If you live in London you can socialise outdoors in groups of 6 but not indoors. So pub lunch outdoors in group of 6 is ok.
Picnic makes so much sense
See you outside with packed lunch
P Eckish
Around n=17 off the train, along with a couple of smaller walking groups. We departed hastily, but thinking about it should have taken a minute to establish who was doing the short route. A very enjoyable walk and w=perfect-for-walking-and-almost-for-sitting-outside. I was with a picnic group, but the short cut pub lunch people got a table without booking. Our little group managed two great views of a Spa Valley excursion train going to Eridge & then on the return before we crossed the railway. Perfectly timed, we had 50 minutes to enjoy good service outside the Huntsman, as did at least two others inside.
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