Pete's Walks- Deacon Hill and Pegsdon (page 2 of 2)
If you are considering walking this route yourself, please see my disclaimer. You may also like to see these notes about the maps and GPX files.
At the bottom of the hill, I crossed the B655 road and went over a verge to continue down an old bit of road. At a junction I went left (almost straight on), then turned right and followed a road through the small village of Pegsdon. Maybe a couple of hundred yards after passing the 'Live and Let Live' pub, I turned left down the very long drive to Pegsdon Common Farm. I could clearly see the Knocking Hoe nature reserve and burial mound ahead of me. The drive turned left and then right. A short distance further on I turned right onto a footpath, which crossed a field of green corn. It continued up some steps, and then followed the edge of trees on my left as it rose uphill, with views of Deacon Hill over to my right.
Looking back along the road through Pegsdon
The drive to Pegsdon Common Farm, Knocking Hoe on the right
The drive to Pegsdon Common Farm - I'd soon be following a path along the edge of the trees on the left skyline
The path from the drive to Pegsdon Common Farm
Looking right to Deacon Hill, from further along the path
From the same spot, looking back to Pegsdon
The path continued along the right-hand edge of a field, then turned left along a broad strip of grass now heading straight towards the Knocking Hoe nature reserve. When it met the fence around the reserve, it turned right, following the fence to the gate at the entrance to the reserve. I stopped to eat my sandwiches on a bench a few yards from the entrance where the path met a bridleway - I had a stroke of luck, as a gentleman happened to leave the nature reserve while I was there, and he was not only able to tell me where to find the Burnt-tip Orchids I wanted to see, but also where there were Pasqueflowers on the reserve and about some White Helleborines near the car park where I'd started.
The path after it turns left, heading towards the Knocking Hoe nature reserve
The path after it turns right, running alongside the Knocking Hoe nature reserve
A close-up shot of the Knocking Hoe burial mound
Looking back along the path from near the entrance to the nature reserve
I then spent about 40 minutes looking round the reserve, and successfully found both the Burnt-tip Orchids and the Pasqueflowers (I knew these grew here, but I thought it would be too late in the year to see them). On leaving the reserve (it only has one entrance and exit), I went the few yards back to where I'd had my lunch and turned left along the bridleway. After two or three hundred yards, I turned right along a path that followed the left edge of another green corn field. This took me back to the B655, where I crossed over and went right for a few hundred yards to return to the car park where I'd started (the car parked behind me had a smashed window where some one had obviously broken in). Before going home, I carefully went a few yards along the road and saw some of the White Helleborines I'd been told about in the wood opposite the car park.
Burnt-tip Orchid, Knocking Hoe nature reserve - I think they are absolutely stunning
The bridleway going east from near the reserve entrance
The path (another bit of the Icknield Way long-distance path) going south from near the reserve
The path approaching the B655 road (behind the crossing hedgerow)
I only did such a short walk because I'm still struggling with the post-viral fatigue or whatever it is that I've had for a couple of years now, and because I wanted to include a visit to Knocking Hoe nature reserve. But it was a delightful route, in a fabulous part of the Chilterns. There were good views almost throughout the walk, and the path between Deacon Hill and Pegsdon Hill has to be one of the best in all the Chilterns (the continuation to Pegsdon is pretty good too, if you're going downhill as I was today).