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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.

Wednesday 27 December 2017

Wednesday Walk - Sandy to Biggleswade or Circular

Length:  19.6 km (12.2 mi)  [26.1/16.3 for the circular walk]
Ascent/Descent:  146/140 m; Net Walking Time: ca. 4 hours [5 ¼ for the circular walk]
Toughness:  3 out of 10 
  
Take the 10.22 train from King’s Cross to Peterborough (Finsbury Park [Victoria and Piccadilly Lines] 10.28, Stevenage 10.47), arrives Sandy 11.08.
Return trains: 15.54, 16.20, 16.54, 17.19, 17.57, 18.32 etc. (from 43 minutes journey time, trains leave Sandy 4 minutes earlier). Buy a Sandy return ticket.


This Bedfordshire walk, although leading through an area of large arable fields, is no slogging through crops or over ploughed land . The walk is mainly flat and before lunch mainly follows the Greensand Ridge Walk. The route is a mix of attractive broad grassy tracks along field edges and woodland trails. Along the way you will see a number of information boards telling you about the animals, trees and plants you may see around you. Binoculars are useful as the area is rich in bird-life and a healthy population of muntjac deer and brown hares. You visit two lovely villages – Northill and Old Warden – which both have excellent pubs. Just after lunch follows a short climb into Warden Warren woods. There are no stiles on the main walk or the long circular walk back to Sandy.

Lunch: The Crown in Northill (5.3 km/3.3 mi) or The Hare and Hounds  in Old Warden (12.1 km/7.5 mi, food to 14.30). Tea: Various options, recommended is the Surfin' Cafe .



For walk directions, map, height profile, photos and gpx/kml files click here. t=swc.264

6 comments:

Carrie said...

hi,
I have been on a number of these walks with friends before, but haven't joined the SWC group before. I was thinking of joining this walk on the 27th, but would be joining @ Finsbury Park instead of King's X

I was just wondering if anyone else was planning on doing this walk, so I can try and connect on the train

Thomas G said...

There will be walkers, no doubt.

Carrie said...

Weather is looking a tad on the soggy side :/

Lisa said...

Id really like to come too so am hoping the rain clears off a bit

Thomas G said...

the rain's supposed to peter out at the time we're supposed to start walking, i.e.: no excuses!

Thomas G said...

Hearts leapt with excitement on the train out as somewhere around Welwyn the ground started to have snow cover, apparently thick enough to survive the thaw for a few hours. But somewhere north of Stevenage the white magic disappeared again.
So the n=8 walkers (incl. 2 exiles from the Capital Walkers) were left with just some shlush on the ground and more of the stuff still falling. The precipitation did peter out after an hour or so, so the weather can be best described as w=wet-start-then-dry-with-a-bracing-wind. As the write-up promises, there are no stiles and only one arable field crossing, but plenty of woods, tree-lined tracks and water-filled gravel pits with birdlife and a few pretty villages and churches. We had some far views of snow-covered hill sides, and - late on - a snowy field in the middle of a wood.
Lunch we had at the second pub, The Hare and Hounds, and the reviews of the food ranged from 'average' to 2/10 (admittedly the pheasant stood no comparison with last Saturday's offering at The Old Swan, but 2/10 is probably a bit harsh). Anyway, we made it to Biggleswade in time to just miss the 16.20, so settled in for tea at the Surfin Cafe, to catch the 16.54 stopping service.