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.

Wednesday 13 November 2019

Wednesday Walk Eridge Circular


Eridge Circular 

Length: 15 km (9.3 miles) 4 out of 10 T=swc.120

The morning section is an undulating route across typical High Weald territory. A choice of routes – along an open ridge or through a secluded valley – lead to Groombridge, one of many rural villages which developed away from the original hamlet with the arrival of the railway.


The afternoon section starts from Old Groombridge and goes past Groombridge Place, a beautiful Jacobean manor house surrounded by a medieval moat. You then follow the railway line a short distance up the Groom valley before turning into Broadwater Forest, the Broadwater Warren nature reserve. The Main Walk goes past one of the massive sandstone outcrops in the area, Eridge Rocks.

Trains: Get the 1007 Uckfield train (1021 East Croydon) arriving 1103. (From Victoria, the 0955, East Croyden 1011). Return trains are 1550, 1650, 1750, 1820, 1850, 1920

Lunch: There is a choice of pubs in Groombridge, after about 7 km on the Main Walk. In the main part of the village the Junction Inn serves food  3pm. At the other end of the village the 16thC Crown Inn serves good food to 2.30pm. The Crown seems to be the favoured choice.

Tea: The Huntsman next to the station is well worth missing a train for.


1 comment:

Walker said...

n=6 on this walk, though I saw a seventh just miss the train at London Bridge. We had w=sunshine-in-the-morning and then cloud in the afternoon, and the autumn colours were very fine - mostly oaks at this stage, but some beeches. Being the Weald there was some mud but on the whole it was not too trying.

Two lunched at the Crown, and the sandwich eaters sat on the bench in front of the pub. One pub luncher ate inside, but another outside, the air temperature being just about warm enough despite the disappearance of the sun at this point. We were briefly joined by the walk's author, who was doing researches.

The sandwich eaters, as is traditional, left before the two pub lunchers, and did the main afternoon route. The pub lunchers took the short cut via Harrison Rocks, which was very scenic. One suffered a footwear disfunction here and went straight to the station, presumably catching the 3.50 train. The other (me) wandered happily in the woods above the rocks, looking at the beech colours and dreaming of the wood anemones that grow here in spring. I then took a back way to Eridge - fabulous colours here - to meet up with the main group at the Huntsman pub by Eridge station. There the five of us enjoyed a roaring wood fire and took the 4.50 train home.