Pete's Walks- Christmas Common, Cookley Green, Russell's Water (page 3 of 4)
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.
After about three quarters of a mile I reached a bridleway junction, where I turned left and followed a bridleway quite steeply uphill to reach the hamlet of Russell's Water. I turned left and carefully followed the road through the hamlet a short way, before turning right and followed a gravel drive, with the village pond on my right (I stopped on a bench here to eat my lunch). Just past the pond, I followed the drive to the left, and where it ended a short path led on to reach the wide open space of Russell's Water Common. I turned left and followed a path through the grassy common.
The bridleway up to Russell's Water
The bridleway up to Russell's Water
The pond at Russell's Water
Russell's Water Common
On nearing a corner of the common, I took a path entering the trees that surround the common. This soon turned right and dropped gently downhill through the trees to reach a road in Pishill Bottom. Across the road a permissive path headed quite steeply up into Shambridge Wood, following a fence on my right for a while (this was the steepest part of the route). Towards the top of the slope the permissive path had always previously gone half-left, but now an arrow indicated that the path went half-right, staying alongside the fence. Near the top of the slope the path I turned left from the fence for a few yards to reach a bridleway, where I turned right. The bridleway, part of the Chiltern Way, led over the top of the hill, then turned left and dropped down into a small valley (another bridleway went left somewhere along here). It was a very short rise up the other side of the valley, then the bridleway descended gently with a fence on my left - at some point the wood became Greenfield Wood.
The path from Russell's Water Common
The path from Russell's Water Common
Start of the permissive path across the road in Pishill Bottom
The permissive path across the road in Pishill Bottom
The bridleway after I turned right, in Shambridge Wood
The bridleway continuing through Shambridge Wood
The bridleway continuing through Shambridge Wood
The bridleway continuing through Greenfield Wood
The bridleway continuing through Greenfield Wood
The bridleway continuing through Greenfield Wood