Featuring the Ridgeway again today and starting at a small parking area where the road between Ashbury and Lambourn intersects this ancient track.
Setting off towards Waylands Smithy I notice how the range of colours in the landscape is subtly changing. There are woods on my right for much of this stretch and this is definitely a place where people come to camp, play and build shelters!
Wayland’s Smithy is a Neolithic long barrow which is over 5,500 years old. It is a magical place and one I never tire of visiting. Usually I am accompanied by about 25 children, having walked along from the White Horse!
Today no drawing, pacing, poetry writing or playing in between picnicking. Just me absorbing the sunshine on my solitary picnic. I was joined further down the barrow by a fellow traveller taking refreshment and two sets of dog walkers. A busy place considering how few people I often meet.
The route continues along the ridgeway before turning right down a track which is a continuation of the road up from the village of Knighton. Looking across, Castle Hill (White Horse Hill) can be seen as can the undulating fields off of the Lambourn Valley Way – see Walk 30.
The path has trees on alternating sides and at a gap the path leads SouthWest over Knightone Down and Odstone Down. Neat lines can still be seen on some of the fields , waiting to be ploughed and sown.
The path leads across cropped fields and is just discernible. Having reached the top the land is about to fall away again in a rather more dramatic way and the route should go just north of the spur of a convex hill. Route finding was difficult and I cut down across through long grass which was not very even underneath. Not quite on target but more or less in the correct direction.
No where did there appear to be an actual path until I reached the gate onto the road and looked back!
Coming down this interesting and steep slope it was easy to spot Ashdown House .
I had failed to secure myself a place on one of the tours for the afternoon – the house is only open on Wednesday afternoon – hence my original choice for this walk. The house was originally designed for Elizabeth of Bohemia, the older sister of Charles 1, in the seventeenth century. It now has Pete Townshend – an accomplished musician as it’s tenant. It is a Dutch design a little like a doll’s house.
Ashdown Farm is the site of a stable yard, now fallen into disuse and a wonderful wall which I guess once surrounded a garden.
The track I intended to take turns northward at the corner of the estate and heads back towards the ridgeway. More views of the house are afforded and it is good to see that there is a thriving woodland.
Once again the views are open and extensive with big skies. Before this final stretch there is a surprise. ‘Alfred’s Castle Settlement’ – a hill fort.
It measured about 450 metres in circumference and there were two main entrances but then one other on the east side. The article explains more.
https://www.bitlylinks.com/pfIiQCQJe
This was a pleasant walk, again really quite warm providing a real feeling of freedom. It wasn’t long before I’d reached the ridgeway and had about half a kilometre back to the car.
The walk today was 12.16 km – love the way it shows where I walked round Wayland’s Smithy and paced the hill fort!
Marion's 50 Walk Challenge 