Pete's Walks- Bledlow Ridge and Lacey Green (page 4 of 6)
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.
Google map of the walkDownload GPX file of the walk
When a wood started on the left, I turned left on a bridleway, rising slowly uphill just inside the edge of the wood. At the top of the slope it continued between hedges. Beyond a crossing track, the path continued between more hedges to reach Monkton Wood. Here I turned left, and followed a path just inside the edge of the wood for about half a mile. This was very pleasant walking between the beech trees and holly bushes, the best woodland section of this walk. At the end I turned left, joining the route of the Chiltern Way, following a gravel drive to reach Lily Bottom Lane.
The start of the bridleway after I turned left from Kiln Lane
The bridleway from Kiln Lane
The bridleway from Kiln Lane
The bridleway from Kiln Lane
The path through Monkton Wood
The path through Monkton Wood
The path through Monkton Wood
I went left for a few yards before taking a bridleway on the opposite side. This rose slightly, with tall trees and holly bushes either side (it runs along a stretch of Grim’s Ditch). After only 100-200 yards I went half-right across the corner of a field of stubble, then continued across a recently mown meadow (aiming for the far right corner). I then followed a track between a number of paddocks. When I reached the last paddock on the right, the path went over a stile and went half-right across the paddock (containing a solitary horse).
Where I turned right from Lily Bottom Lane
The path after I forked right
Further along the same path, I just aimed for the far right corner
The track through the paddocks
The path continuing across the last paddock on the right
The path then crossed a large field of Maize (where I spotted more Field Pansies), with Lacey Green windmill in view ahead.
When I did this walk in 2008 I got talking to a walker coming the other way, and it turned out he came from Markyate, one of the neighbouring villages to Kensworth where I live (I sometimes go through it on my local walks). A year or two later I bumped into the same walker, Martin, on one such walk just outside Markyate. We've since been on two or three walks together and are still in touch (as well as walking we're both interested in wild orchids). It's just occurred to me that the lady I mentioned before, that I'd also met a few days earlier near Parslow's Hillock, and Martin are the only two people I've ever met twice on my walks - and I happened to meet each of them on this same walk in 2008.
Beyond the Maize field the path continued alongside a hedge on my right, through a cattle pasture then a small meadow, where Lacey Green windmill was to my right.
The path continuing across a Maize field (Lacey Green windmill on the right)
The path continuing across a Maize field
Approaching Lacey Green
Lacey Green windmill
Approaching Lacey Green