Backup Only

This Week's Walks - Archive

Please see the Saturday Walker's Club This Week's Walks page.

This is an archive of walks done by the Saturday Walker's Club. You should only need to use this page if the SWC website is down.

Saturday 4 March 2017

Saturday walk - a gentle Wealden favourite

Book 1, walk 16 - Balcombe Circular
Length: 17.6km (10.9 miles)
Toughness: 5 out of 10

9.42 train from London Bridge (9.56 East Croydon) to Balcombe, arriving 10.23.

For walk directions click here.

This SWC favourite is a rambling and varied walk across one of the gentler parts of the Weald, passing the National Trust gardens and ruined house at Nymans (which is open today, if you want to visit it: there is daylight until 6.15pm, so you would just about have time to do this and finish the walk).

There are a total of four pub options for lunch, so hopefully one will squeeze you in. For tea you would have to be a heroically fast walker to get to the Balcombe Tea Rooms before they close at 4pm, but the nearby Half Moon pub sometimes does cakes.

Don't omit to do the pretty back way to Balcombe station as per the walk directions, if you have time: it is much better than the main road route and not much longer - maybe 20 minutes from the Half Moon versus 10-15 minutes for the main road route.

Trains back from Balcombe are at 22 past till 19.22, then 19.59, 20.59. t=1.16

3 comments:

Unknown said...

I can't comment on the numbers as started an hour late but I decided to order lunch for two with drinks at the Red Lion at around 1.30. To no avail. To say the staff were (just the one jerk behind the bar actually) uncooperative would be an understatement. There was no attempt to acknowledge potential PAYING CUSTOMERS and so we left. This pub is a disgrace and I strongly recommend that SWC walkers give it a wide berth as they obviously don't need our custom. The only way to get the message across in this sadly backward country when it comes to service is to VOTE with our FEET. Luckily the Royal Oak 150m or so down the road was more than accommodating even though by then it was nearer to 2pm. Good food (plenty of it!) friendly staff (they appear to be under new management with nice staff, beautiful sheep dog (?) with good range of drinks and lots of table space. There was a whole bunch of visitors from the Far East who seemed happy. Why the Maple Leaf of Canada fluttered outside was not explained. Anyway, it was a nice change from the Chequers further along the route. But still, roll on sandwich weather!

JohnL said...

N=20 ish? plus six freelance from Hong Kong and another couple. W=remained_mostly_dry. Fields were saturated and paths in woods very muddy. One dropped off at Nymans for tour of gardens with the walk inspector. Eight of us had lunch at the Chequers Inn. This is no longer a gastro-pub and was more or less empty with only one ale on tap, a rather odd dark mild with cherry! Menu is rather limited although the dish of the day moules and sweet potato fries was very good. It seems the pub is between tenants with a temporary landlord. It is larger than I remember and has pleasant views from the extended dinning room. I noticed three pairs of boots outside the Balcombe Tea Room but most of us arrived close to 4:00 pm and continued for the 4:22 train without even trying the door.

Bill S said...

Three of us did indeed make it to the Balcombe Tea Room in time for refreshments, and in the spirit of fraternity we each ate two (different) portions of cake, the second for those who were unable to attend. Interestingly, all agreed that the second was not as nice as the first.

For future reference, you can buy cake to take away which may be an option for slower walkers who are happy to take it without a hot liquid accompaniment.