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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.

Saturday 7 September 2019

Saturday Walk - The Arun and Rother Valleys, a stately pile in a landscaped park and some heathery Commons: Pulborough Circular via Petworth

Length: 23.4 km (14.6 mi)
Ascent/Descent: 385 m
Net Walking Time: ca. 5 ½ hours
Toughness: 7 out of 10

or longer (with a loop through Petworth Park)
Length: from 26.5 km (16.5 mi)
Net Walking Time: from ca. 6 ¼ hours

or shorter (finishing in Petworth)
15 ¼ to 18km (9.5 to 11.2 m)

Take the 09.36 Southampton Central & Bognor Regis train from Victoria (09.43 CJ, 09.53 EC), arriving Pulborough at 10.51. [Train splits at Horsham.]
Return trains: xx.24 and xx.55.
Return buses from Petworth to Pulborough (Line 1 from Midhurst to Worthing): 14.44, 15.49, 16.54, 18.04, 19.14, 19.44 [Note: the buses do not leave from the Market Square anymore (apart from the last bus of the day), but ‘On A283 Angel Street, near Sheepdown Drive’. You may have to ask locally where that is…]

Across the Arun valley and Greensand Hills to an attractive town with one of the National Trust's finest properties, Petworth House. Back to Pulborough on a more southerly route between the A283 and the Rother valley, with views of the South Downs along the way. This is a mixed landscape of farmland and wooded commons, with Hesworth Common being particularly attractive. The route passes two fine old churches at Fittleworth and Stopham, and crosses back over the River Arun on the medieval Stopham Bridge.

For summary, walk directions, map, height profile, photos and gpx/kml files click here.

Lunch: Angel Inn (food served all day) or The Star (food served all day) in Petworth.
Tea: Plenty options in Petworth and
The White Hart in Stopham (2.3 km from the end). T=swc.128.a

3 comments:

Mr Marc Ricketts said...

I Thought you take the Train from London Waterloo to Southampton. On that way?

Thomas G said...

Hi Marc, this one goes via the slower line to Southampton, from Victoria. The faster one from Waterloo does not go via Pulborough...

branchline said...

N=19 on this delightful walk. 18 were counted at the station and one joined us in the woods to do a circular walk from Fittleworth. Weather was w=cloudy-then-sunny.
Some people had lunch in Petworth Park, others in the Star, and at least one walker had lunch in the Angel Inn. Quite a few enjoyed a lovely drink at the White Hart at the end of the walk in mellow evening sunshine.
This lovely walk was enlivened by encounters with live stock – to wit a horse chewing away at a signpost, a bellowing bull and cows crossing from one field into another.