Pete's Walks - Great Kimble, Buckmoorend, Green Hailey (page 3 of 3)
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.
On reaching a bridleway junction at the corner of the wood, I went right and followed a bridleway just inside the wood with another field close by to my left. By the end of the field I went straight on at a slightly staggered path crossroads. The bridleway now dropped gently downhill, now just inside Ninn Wood with Sergeant's Wood to my right. On reaching an apparent T-junction, the bridleway goes a few yards right and then turns left, to continue in roughly the same direction as before. I then followed the bridleway for about another half mile to reach a road.
The bridleway just inside the edge of Sergeant's Wood, after I turned right
The bridleway continuing through Ninn Wood, after a very slightly staggered path crossing
The bridleway continuing through Ninn Wood, after I turned right at a path T-junction and then immediately turned left
The bridleway continuing through Ninn Wood
The bridleway continuing through Ninn Wood
The bridleway continuing through Ninn Wood
Over the road, a bridleway went half-left (initially with the Pulpit Hill car park to my left). There were woods on either side, the one on my right sloping steeply uphill. After a few hundred yards, just after the wood on the left ended, I came to gate on the left that was an entrance to the Grangelands and Pulpit Hill nature reserve. I sat down here to eat my lunch, then spent half an hour or so exploring the reserve (this was why I chose this route and why I did it in this direction). There were lots of Chalkhill Blue butterflies and a few Silver-spotted Skippers, the species I was hoping to see. It was very warm now, so the butterflies hardly ever settled but I did eventually get some photos. There was a group of four or five people also here, and I spoke briefly to one of the men, when he was on his own, and then a woman spoke to me and said "We've met before, haven't we?". I immediately remembered her, we'd met here briefly last year! Rather frustratingly, it later transpired that one of her friends, who I didn't get to meet, was actually a fellow butterfly enthusiast that I'm friends with on Facebook - it would have been nice to have met him in the flesh. I only made this connection when he posted a photo on Facebook taken at the Grangelands and Pulpit Hill nature reserve and I recognised the man I'd spoken to in the background.
The bridleway after crossing the road (by the Pulpit Hill car park)
Further along the bridleway
Further along the bridleway
View over part of the Grangelands and Pulpit Hill nature reserve
After half an hour or so, I returned to the same gate and continued down the bridleway. It soon crossed the Ridgeway, by another gate into the nature reserve on my left, and further on joined a surfaced drive. I spotted a Jersey Tiger moth along here. At the end of the drive, I turned right and followed a road for about a quarter of a mile to return to the lay-by where I'd started.
Further along the bridleway, just before it crosses the Ridgeway
Further along the bridleway
Jersey Tiger moth
The bridleway shortly before it reaches the road
The road, after I turned right, heading back to the lay-by at Great Kimble
The walk took me two hours and 55 minutes, 5 minutes longer than the last time I'd walked it in the opposite direction (at least partly because there was one steepish uphill in this direction). I'd enjoyed the walk, and the short visit to the nature reserve near the end had worked out well. I'd be happy to walk the route in this direction again, but I think I prefer it in the anti-clockwise direction because of the fine views at the end as the route drops downhill to Great Kimble.