🥾 Walk 414 - Woolley Green and Shottesbrooke

On Sunday 19th January, we were invited to join the Windsor and District group on an 8 mile walk around Cox Green, Woolley Green, Shottesbrooke Park and White Waltham. It was a crisp winter's day with clear blue skies and some crunchy half-frozen puddles.

There were twenty-three of us on the walk, a good mix of members of BWW and W&D groups plus a few people trying out the Ramblers. When we have this many people on a walk, it's a good idea to have a back marker, and I volunteered for this role. I was furnished with a copy of the route given to me by the leader, Joyce, before we set off. (I don't think I was an exemplary back marker, as I found myself gradually migrating to the middle on more than one occasion. Sorry!)

We set off from Ockwells Park and passed through Cox Green by following several roads before getting into open countryside. Then it was footpaths through fields taking us by Woolley Green and Littlewick Green to Shottesbrooke Park.

Passing the manor house, we stopped to admire the church of St John the Baptist, which has a tall, slender spire, reminiscent of Salisbury Cathedral. (We didn't go inside the church as it wasn't open.) Passing the pond, we left Shottesbrooke Park and made our way along a rather muddy footpath to White Waltham.

Here we stopped to eat our packed lunches, taking advantage of the benches by the cricket pavilion. A few of us took advantage of the pub opposite the cricket green. After lunch, we we followed some more footpaths that varied in degree of muddiness.

Although the scenery was quite varied along the way, much of the time was spent watching our feet to avoid a slipping over. There had been a lot of rain during the preceding week and it had left its mark on the landscape.

The last part of the walk had to be modified. Joyce had checked this part of the route before we set off and discovered that a footbridge we would have taken was partly submerged. So instead we retraced part of our outward route on the road, which was still icy in places. See our route on Google Maps.

Quite a few of us stopped at the cafe in Ockwells Park for a cuppa before going home. Joyce had made a ginger cake, cut into small pieces, which she'd passed around during lunch, and there was enough left over to have with our tea and coffee.

Thank you to Joyce from the W&D group for leading the walk, bringing the cake and for inviting the BWWs.

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