Length: 15.5 km (9.6 miles)
Toughness: 4 out of 10
London Euston: 10-24 hrs West Midlands service to Northampton Watford Junction: 10-39 hrs
Arrive Tring: 10-57 hrs
Return Berkhamsted to Euston: 16-01, 16-23, 16-30, 16-46, 17-01, 17-24, 17-30, 17-46, 18-01, 18-24, 18-30 and later
Rail ticket Buy a day return to Tring
This lovely walk is especially enjoyable in late autumn when the beech trees in the Ashridge Estate display lovely leaf colour. Let's hope we have better luck with the weather than this time last year, when it poured with rain for most of the day.
The walk starts with a leg along the Grand Union Canal, before we head inland over fields and through a farm to Tom's Hill, for the short ascent through its woods before we enter the National Trust's Ashridge Estate. We cross a golf course and head up to the village of Little Gaddesden where we stop for lunch at the Bridgewater Arms.
After lunch we head down a country lane to the Golden Valley which we walk through before its uphill to Ashridge House, now an international business school. Having walked past the House we walk down through woodland then up a grassy field and through more woods to Berkhamsted Common, where we enjoy some fine views. As we head towards the town of Berkhamsted we pass some World War One Trenches of historic interest (fully explained in the Directions). The walk concludes in town, back along the canal, where two excellent canal-side pubs await our custom.
Enjoy !
T=swc.366
Walk Directions are here: L=swc.366
9 comments:
Hi, Sorry, new here... so I'm interested in joining this walk. Do I just turn up at the Tring station at 11am or do I have to sign up somewhere? Thanks, Shruti
You are very welcome. Either catch the specified train, or yes, meet at Tring station at 10.57. The group will assemble on whatever platform the train from London arrives on. You do not have to sign up, no.
Do read this information about our walks, as we are a bit different from other groups:
https://www.walkingclub.org.uk/swc/index.shtml
In particular note that you have to bring a copy of the walk directions or the GPX as there is no specific walk leader.
Can you tell us details of any shortcut please?
Anon- please read the Walk Options para in the Walk Directions. For a short walk you can stay on the canal tow path all the way to Berkhamsted - a bit boring after a while. Or armed with the OS Explorer Map, after lunch you can plot your own route back to Tring. But today's walk is not a long walk, so I'm not sure why anyone would want to miss out on its best bits but cutting it short.
For anyone interested in an earlier start or longer walk in this area, I am planning to catch the 9.24 train from Euston and do the start of the book 2 Tring circular which can join the main walk at various points. This would add 4-5 miles to the walk..
Aside from the blowing gale last year, it worked well and we met the main group at the lunch pub.
Those with packed lunches and "tech" or a map, might like to stroll up to St Peter and St Paul's Church (https://littlegaddesdenchurch.org.uk/ - about 400 m from the Bridgewater Arms) You'll find pleasant Church grounds and a nice vista towards the rear of the Church - weather permitting!
I have been delegated to do this walk report even though I was not on the main walk till lunchtime, being one of a band of seven renegades who got the 9.24 train and walked to Ivinghoe Beacon and then via the Tring Circular (book 2 walk 5) shortcut to the lunch pub. One was also on the 9.24 train but did the posted walk, and 20 turned up on the posted train to do the posted walk, so n=28 in all.
The beech colours were gorgeous wherever one went. You can try year after year and never get beech at its best, but this year we hit the jackpot. Everything was a riot of copper and gold. I have put some photos on the SWC group page on Facebook, but cameras never really do justice to the intensity of the colour. It was a pity there was no sunshine to heighten the effect, but you can’t have everything. Instead it was w=cloudy. The ground was on the whole very dry - weirdly so for November.
Some of the main group had booked at the Bridgewater Arms. Others of us squeezed in. They huffed and puffed a bit about so many of us turning up (you are supposed to go to pubs with four or five friends tops, obviously…) but they served the food efficiently enough. After lunch all were on the Toms Hill walk route as far as I know. Maybe some did something else.
Berkhamsted (no p!) was in a cheerful mood. Autumn dusks seem to suit it. There were a plethora of tea options - this seems to be what town centres DO these days; provide space for cafes - and at least six partook, probably more. Others went to a canalside pub and ten of us later ended up in a place called the Mad Squirrel, which served distinctly odd “craft” beer (I am not crafty enough, clearly…). Six of us then patronised the Platform Wine shop at the station for “supplies” for the train home.
Last time I did this walk a coronavirus lockdown was looming. This year the prospects look more cheerful. Cross fingers, anyway.
Being one of the 20 who did the main walk, which I had never done this very recommended version before, along the canal, lit with the aforementioned beauty of colours.
Then up towards the Bridgewater Arms. The group split at the space between the Bridgewater Monument and the massive Ashbridge Estate Building, so there were many anarchists around. I thought the meal I had was excellent, mushroom and ale pie. The local Rebellion Smugglers ale was really tasty.
On the way back over Tom's Hill, again never neen here before to the site where there were practice trenches for the first World War. Some including me, walked in the trenches, now green and earth had fallen in so they were not so deep. Slightly bizzare and earie to reflect on the actual horrors abroad.
Unusually, having walked in this area many times before I saw no deer at all. Last time I saw over 20 roe deer in a row.
The Rising Sun on the Grand Union Canal, although a favourite of mine, had been so busy they had not had the time to put more barrels on. So it was cold fizzkeg, or for me a lovely pint of Perry.
I joined the Mad Squirrel crowd, and the bar man lovingly put my pints in the microwave to heat the beer a bit, and help drive out the fizz- recommended. The wine crowd seemed quite happy with their lot though.
I had excellent fish cake and chips at the brilliant very busy Chippy by the station.
To add to the numbers, two renegades did the classic version of this walk via Ivinghoe, so numbers for the day were about 30.
N=30
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