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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.

Sunday 22 April 2018

Sunday Walk: Didcot Circular

SWC walk 44  20 km (12.4 miles)
Difficulty 3 out of 10.
Through an attractive part of the Thames Valley to lunch in secluded Dorchester-on-Thames. Dorchester Abbey (now the parish church) is one of the few large monastery buildings to survive the Dissolution and is worth visiting. There's old stuff a-plenty and, in the floor, near a medieval wall painting, a quaintly worded stone records the sad end of Sarah Fletcher. In the afternoon, Little Wittenham church is also worth a quick look. A little later, you reach Wittenham Clumps, a nature reserve surroundng two Iron Age hill forts.
Trains
Get the 10.05 Weston-super-Mare train from Paddington. Arrives Didcot Parkway 10:52. West Londoners might prefer to catch the 09:23 stopping train from Ealing Broadway to Didcot Parkway, arriving there 10:44.
Trains back from Didcot at xx:11, xx:29  with another at about xx:16 (time varies slightly each hour).
There’s also a slower stopping train, handy for Ealing Broadway etc. Normally at xx:52, except the 16:55.
Get a return to Didcot Parkway.
Lunch Dorchester on Thames still has a number of coaching inns and pubs, so there's plenty of choice. On past occasions, walkers have used the Fleur de Lys (01865 340502 ).
Tea  There is a Greene King pub, the Prince of Wales (01235 511380) opposite the station..
Otherwise there's a shop and refreshments in Didcot station.
Directions are here  At point 12, follow the directions back to Didcot, not Appleford. (There are no trains to or from Appleford on a Sunday). t=swc.44

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