Robust Rambles

Section 30 Return

Shackleford to Farncombe(Broad Water)

Walk Details

Walk Instructions

With the door of The Cyder Inn behind, turn right towards the village centre. Just before a small car park near a road junction, turn right up a narrow sandy bridleway. Follow it uphill to emerge onto a road. Cross to Roker’s Lane opposite which is also a bridleway.

Follow this as it becomes a broad grassy way and keep on it for some way. At the end of the wood on the right (ignore a footpath continuing straight ahead), follow the bridleway as it turns right along the wood edge down to a road junction.

Turn left up the path by the fence on your left. Soon drop down to the road and follow it under the A3 dual carriageway. Continue on for a short distance looking for a bridleway (called a ‘Horse Margin’) going down to the right (the Squirrel Inn is over on your left).

At the bottom of the slope, turn right on a country lane. Pass Hartsmere Cottage and, at the end of the garden fence, reach a junction of ways. Here turn left on a bridleway, up by a wall into woods.

Keep up for some way eventually pass a footpath going sharply off right, and in a few paces, at a Y-fork, bear right, still on the bridleway. This soon becomes enclosed between hedges and at the end emerges onto a road. Turn right up the road to a T-junction.

Cross over to a path enclosed between a hedge and fence. After some way emerge onto a road and continue on in the same direction. Where the road swings right continue on down an enclosed path. In a little way the path drops steeply downhill.

At the bottom of the slope the path approaches the corner of a grassy meadow. Turn left by a large tree down into the meadow. Walk straight down the meadow towards houses in the distance. At the bottom of the field, leave by a metal fieldgate onto a short drive down to a road.

Turn right along the road for a few paces. Pass an old Quaker burial ground from 1659, on your left and immediately turn left up a vehicle entrance which soon becomes a footpath. Follow this to a road. Cross the road bearing slightly left to a footpath over a stile into a playing field. Walk straight down to another stile at the bottom onto a second road.

Cross and turn right along to a footbridge and stile on your left into a pasture. Walk down the edge of the pasture. Halfway down, by an entrance to a field on your left, turn right and walk across the field to a fence at the far side. Go through into the field beyond and continue along the edge with a ditch on your left.

At the far corner cross a stile into a stand of trees. Go through the trees to a drive and turn left up it (it is the original long drive up to Loseley House) for a short distance. Just past a lone tree on your right, turn off right across the grass to footbridge and stile into a field. Turn diagonally left up and across the field to the top opposite corner (can be waterlogged).

Leave the field at the corner and cross into the field beyond. Keep on in the same direction across the corner of the field heading just left of a house on the brow of the hill. Enter a wood through a fieldgate and soon emerge onto a drive. Turn right on the drive down to a road (Stakescorner Road).

Turn right down the road for 150 metres then turn left along the entrance to Brickfields Farm. After some distance reach the farm entrance gate. Turn right here to meet the corners of three fields. Go into the middle field and bear left down the edge with a ditch on your left.

At the bottom of the field, bear right to a stile leading to a railway crossing. Go over to a stile at the far side leading into a wood. Go forward a few paces then bear right on a gravelled footpath through the woods parallel to the railway line over on your right. After some way reach a junction with a public footpath. Turn right on this and follow it round to a road.

Cross with care and turn right a few paces. Go left down a side road for ¼ mile (there is a pavement). Pass the side of a crematorium, a school and the entrance to a rugby club. Eventually reach the entrance to Broad Water Leisure Centre.

Turn left in here. Join a tarmac footpath just over on the right and follow it past the gateway to the leisure centre then past a car park down on your left. Beyond this, drop down to a lake. Bear right then left to walk down the side of the lake on your left.

On reaching the bottom of the lake go forward to emerge onto a main road. Turn right for a short distance to return to The Manor Inn and the start of the section.