Sunday 3rd March was a bright and sunny day, in stark contrast to the preceding days of heavy rain. Today we were leading an eight-mile walk for both our group and the Pang Valley Ramblers. Twenty-seven people (plus a small and friendly dog) in total.
There was a bit of a hiccup at the start of the walk as roadworks in Swan Street meant that we had to find an alternative route to get to the car park. This wasn't helped by diversion signs taking people a very long way around it. I knew the area, so found a much shorter route and was giving out the details of it to everyone that phoned me.
We started the walk some twenty minutes late due to the road closure. Two of the Pang Valley Ramblers decided to not to wait and set off after I'd shown them the route on their map. They'd said they were slow walkers and we'd catch them up, but we didn't.
So twenty-five of us set off along Cannon Heath Down heading towards Watership Down. We then crossed the gallops and descended on a diagonal path down the side of Watership Down, through farmland and into Kingsclere.
As we reached Kingsclere, it became apparent that one of us was experiencing boot trouble - the sole of one of his boots had broken away, making it quite impracticable to continue with the walk. Luckily, we weren't too far from the car park, so he decided to walk back to it along the road.
Twenty-four of us carried on the walk along Hollowshot Lane, which was quite muddy, and then across a large field towards Cottington's Hill. We stopped for lunch on the slopes of Freemantle Park Down, enjoying north-facing views. We could just make out the water tower at Tilehurst and some recognisable landmarks around Newbury.
After Lunch, another one of our members (and his dog) left the walk early, taking a shortcut back to the car park. The remaining twenty-three of us followed a roller-coaster path to Hannington village. We would have stopped for a drink at the The Vine pub, but it has sadly ceased trading.
Passing the church, we followed a footpath through farmland that joined with the Wayfarer's Walk - a long-distance path from Emsworth on the south coast to Combe Gibbet at Inkpen. This we followed, back to the car park, getting some good views of Watership Down just before the end of the walk. See our route on Google Maps.
This muddy and slippery walk also included over 1,100 feet (335m) of ascent in total, making it quite hard work, but even with the delayed start, we finished before 3pm.
Thanks go to Emma & Rob for leading the walk and to Kerry & Dave for back-marking.
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