🥾 Walk 119 - Silchester and Mortimer West End

On Sunday 24th September, thirty-six of us met up in the English Heritage car park near Silchester. This large number was the product of a joint walk with the Surrey Area Weekend Walkers (SAWW), the Surrey and Beyond Ramblers group (SABRE) and us. About half of the people there were our group plus one from the Berkshire Walkers 20s & 30s group and two newcomers.

We set off heading north, toward Mortimer West End. A combination of byways and lanes took us to main road between Aldermaston and Mortimer. We followed this west for a short distance before entering Benyon's Inclosure, an area of managed forest north of Silchester.

After passing the picturesque Kiln Pond, we emerged from the forest into Silchester, just between the cricket green and the Calleva Arms pub. We stopped to have lunch at some picnic tables and benches by the green before gradually migrating to the pub in small groups so as not to cause gridlock at the bar.

Suitably refreshed, we left the pub via a footpath leading into Pamber Forest. Navigating through the forest, first westerly then southerly on footpaths, we left it heading easterly on a quiet lane. This lane ended at Bramley Road, where we took to footpaths again, through a number of fields. The first was a wheat field and the second was a pasture containing some cows and calves.

The cows and calves seemed content to ignore us as we followed the edge of the field. The next field also contained a herd of cows and calves, but they were far from contented. They charged around, repeatedly crossing our path and then followed our route into the next field, where they continued to charge about in an alarming way.

We often pass though farms and pastures on our walks but it is very rare for us to see cows behaving like this. I'm not sure what was wrong. Anyway, we were relieved to leave them behind in the field as we reached the remains of the walled Roman Town of Calleva Atrebatum.

We followed the city wall for a short distance before reaching the West Gate and taking the path through the middle of the town. We passed the site of an archaeological dig before reaching the (relatively) more modern 12th century church of St Mary the Virgin at the East Gate.

There was a tea and cake sale on at the church so we stopped for tea and cake. This is the second walk in as many weeks that has had a tea and cake stop as well as a pub stop. We're in danger of gaining more calories than we lose on these walks!

We left the church and followed the road to the nearby Roman Amphitheatre, where we stopped for a look around before following part of the city wall back to the West Gate. From there it was a short walk back to the car park where we had started. See our route on Bing Maps.

Thank you to Sue for providing three of these photos and for leading the walk!

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