Difficulty: 4 out of 10 for the main walk, 2 and 3 out of 10 for the shorter options.
Trains: Catch the 10.07 Uckfield train from London Bridge (East Croydon 10.22) arriving Hever 10.49.
Return trains from Ashurst run hourly at xx.56
Buy a return to Ashurst.
If you plan to start the walk in Cowden, it is one stop beyond Hever. A later train could be taken.
This walk takes in a quiet part of the High Weald on the border of Kent and East Sussex. The route passes several attractive old manor houses. This is a surprisingly remote area of low hills and wooded valleys.
Lunch: The only pub on the walk route is The Fountain (01342-850528) in Cowden village, 7¾ km from Hever (4 km from Cowden station). This is an attractive village pub with a new conservatory and a secluded beer garden. It serves good home-made food up to 2.30pm (later on Sundays).
Tea: There are few refreshment places in this remote countryside, but the route to Ashurst passes the Perryhill Orchard Farm Shop & Tea Rooms (01892-770595) in mid-afternoon. The Farm Shop is open daily to 5pm and sells a tempting range of local ciders. The tearoom closes at 4.30pm. Allow at least an hour to reach Ashurst station, 4 km away. There are no refreshment options after this.
For walk directions, map and GPS click L=swc.175
#2026-06-10T10:00
1 comment:
N=18 on this walk. That’s 50% more than on all three Saturday walks combined last weekend, despite the fact that the forecast was almost as iffy for today. (We may soon have to rename ourselves the Wednesday Walkers Club…) But in fact the weather today was much better than expected. A couple of showers after lunch but sunny in the morning and later afternoon. So w=a-bit-of-rain-but-quite-a-bit-of-sun.
It is ages since I did this walk and I recognised none of it. I thought it made a lovely outing for June - plenty of grassy meadows, some woods that I could see would have been good in bluebell time, pretty old manor houses.
Entering Cowden all the talk was of finding the church - so heartening in this godless age to see so many of the group keen on practising their Christian faith! Four of us went to the pub instead, which had some kind of function on but was able to accommodate us. My companions all had halloumi sandwiches. I had the steak and ale pie. It was the pie of the century. Never have I had such a delicious one, with crunchy pastry and proper chunks of meat.
The Christian contingent came in for drinks and then abruptly announced our departure. I was slightly slow off the mark and so got left behind. But an obvious shortcut suggests itself on the map as you leave the village and so I took that. This was a delightful little walk down across allotments, all dotted with wildflowers. I am not sure what the proper walk route has to match this.
Surprisingly the fast walkers did not overhaul me until near the Orchard-Cider-Tearoom place. I think most or all stopped here and most had tea rather than cider. I had a slice of gooey dessert with ice cream and enjoyed it despite my fellow walkers regaling me with how its cholesterol and sugar would lead to my early demise. We were the only customers as far as I could see.
At 3.15 one of the party abruptly said he was going to rush for the 3.56 train. I thought this ambitious, given there were 2.5 miles to go. You know what happened next. One by one everyone else in the group, gripped by FOMO, also dashed off on the same quest. I set off at a much more leisurely pace, enjoying the sunshine and the lovely scenery, dawdling to look at butterflies (all meadow browns…). Again, maybe it was the sunshine, but this last (and rather hilly) part of the walk seemed especially nice.
Approaching the station I could see no one on the platform, and wondered what heroic feats had been performed by the others to get the earlier train. But then I found the little shelter on the up platform, with its awkward and uncomfortable seats, crammed with ten walkers (it was raining a bit by now). They had got to the station to find the train in the platform…but unfortunately on the opposite platform, reachable only by a footbridge. So to be fair they almost made it. Maybe if they hadn’t wasted time listening to me…
We got the 4.56 and back at London Bridge a plan was hatched by six of us to go to the new Weatherspoons under the arches. Alas the entire population of London had the same idea, so we all went home instead.
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