Length: 15.6 km (9.7 miles). Optional longer morning loop via Albury Park where you can visit its isolated ancient church 18.0km (11.2 miles) Toughness ~3/10
9:41 London Victoria to Dorking service, change at Dorking and walk around the corner to Dorking Deepdene to join the 10.52 Reading service, ariving at Gomshall at 11.01.
There are several trains from Guildford to London each hour .
Buy a return to Gomshall (via "any route permitted" to be valid for journeys via Guildford or Redhill)
Leaving Gomshall you are soon in the pretty village of Shere. On through Albury Park where a recommended (but optional, 2.4km, 1.5 mile) longer morning route takes a loop through Albury Park instead of going along its edge. This takes you past an unusual Catholic Apostolic Church built for a new religious movement which originated in England in 1832. This is not open to the public, but in the middle of the parkland you can visit an unusual and interesting old Saxon church. After lunch in Albury Heath, the walk continues through the open expanses of Blackheath Common before heading into woodland until you come to the River Wey where you follow the river into Guildford.
Lunch: The William 1V pub in Little London 01483 202685 serves good food and good beer. We have found it fully booked before so if you intend to eat there please book. Note: if having a packed lunch, there is nowhere to sit at (or after) the pub - your options are to stop before the pub on Albury Heath, or earlier at the Saxon church on the extension loop to Aldury Park.
For post walk refreshment, there's a cafe in the foyer of the Yvonne Arnauld Theatre, a variety of cafes (including Gail's) in Guildford town centre and several pubs. The George Abbot, on the way to the station, is a Greene King pub that has proved popular with walkers in the past.
For full details and to download your copy of the directions see the L=1.14 web page.
3 comments:
I have made a lunch booking for four people for 12.45
I hear another table for four has also been booked, so that makes eight places altogether
We nearly missed the connection at Dorking due to an army of other walkers trying to squeeze through one ticket barrier. Once we got to Gomshall I reckoned 18, maybe 19, assembled on the platform. But there was at least one late starter, so let’s make it an even n=20. Cloudy in the morning but w=nice-sun-in-the-afternoon. Pretty much no mud despite this week’s rain, due to the sandy soils. So a good winter walk choice, I would say.
I think quite a lot of the group did the extra loop around Albury Park in the morning. There we encountered “sportsmen” massacring the local birdlife. We also visited the decommissioned church. Ten had booked tables for lunch at the William IV pub, which is now pretty upmarket. You needed a microscope to see the vegan dish but the burger (with “bacon jam”) was actually rather tasty. I hear the poussin was also nice (I have always thought him a fine painter).
Our table got its food rather slowly, which meant our meal was punctuated by the mumbling apologies of others - sandwichers, diners at the other tables - announcing they were going to walk on ahead and we would catch them up. Of course we didn’t, but our little party had a pleasant sunny walk across Blackheath, enlivened by the song of great tits and blue tits.
We got further split up after that and my contingent did not get to Guildford till dusk. There had been talk of reuniting in Gail’s, but we could see no walkers there and precious few cakes either, so we ended up in Caffè Nero, elbowing a laptop person out of the way to get space on a little table at the back. There we had a pleasant chat and got a crowded 16.49 (?) train.
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