Section 40
Kingsley to Binsted
Walk Details
Walk Instructions
FOLKESTONE TO FARNHAM ROBUST RAMBLE
Section 40 Out
Kingsley to Binsted
Map: OS Explorer 144 Basingstoke, Alton & Whitchurch
Basingstoke, Alton & Whitchurch
Distance/Time: 4.5 miles/2.5m hours
Start: The Cricketers Inn, Kingsley. Check the opening hours beforehand. Might be closed early weekdays and lunchtimes.
Comments: Open, sandy countryside with some climbs and maybe bracken. In which case check for ticks. Stiles, fields and farms.
(initial walk 18/11/07 ‘Poured with rain all day !’)
With The Cricketers Inn on your right, walk up the road, passing the entrance to the pub car park on your right. Soon leave the road and keep forward, down a wide rough track, to a car park by a lake on your right. There is a church high up on your left.
Keep forward, in the same direction, passing the lake on your right. Leave the car park onto a broad, sandy track.
Keep forward on this main track, in the same direction, for ½ mile (ignore several smaller paths going off right and left; do not follow paths going up, under power lines).
On reaching a broad cross track, go straight over, to continue in the same direction. Eventually reach a second broad cross track.
Turn left on this for a few paces, then bear off right, on a path going diagonally uphill (ignore another path turning sharply right, downhill).
The uphill path soon approaches a large white house and emerges into a car park in front of it. Turn left up the drive to soon reach a main road.
Cross with care to a stile and wide grassy path, between wire fences, beyond. Follow the path uphill, into a field, and on down to a corner.
Bear right, still along the field edge, to soon reach a stile on your left, by a pond on the right.
Turn left over the stile, and go forward, uphill, with a hedge on your left, towards a distant forest. Ignore a footpath going off left, and keep on, with a hedge on your left, for nearly ½ mile. Walk up a second field, to reach the corner of the forest.
Here go forward on a bridleway, enclosed between hedges. This is easy to follow. After a while it bears right, to go up to cross the trackbed of an old railway.
At the other side. ignore a field entrance on your left, and rejoin the enclosed bridleway. This goes on for some way, to eventually emerge onto a farm road at Wheatley Farm. Bear left through the farm buildings to reach a road.
Cross straight over to a gravel vehicle track. Follow this for a mile. First, pass a double metal fieldgate across the track (there is a gap at the side). Then keep on in a straight line.
The track begins to drop downhill (ignore a footpath going off right). At the bottom of the slope, by a barn and old quarry, follow the track to the right, and stay on it, to eventually reach a T-junction with a road, by Hay Place on your left.
… at time of initial walk the road was blocked by a massive tree which had fallen out of the bank and brought down power lines….
Turn right on the road and soon arrive at another T-junction. Turn left on the main road, to walk through Binsted village and reach The Binsted Inn (formerly The Cedars pub) on the left and the end of the section.
FOLKESTONE TO FARNHAM ROBUST RAMBLE
Section 40 Return
Binsted to Kingsley
Map: OS Explorer 144 Basingstoke, Alton & Whitchurch
Distance/Time: 4.5 miles/2.5m hours
Start: The Binsted Inn (formerlyThe Cedars)
Comments: Ups and downs and twists and turns enlivened by stiles and footbridges. An old railway to cross and a final grind across a golf course, rarely welcoming places. Lots of variety but be prepared for some damp places.
With The Binsted Inn on your left, walk downhill along the road for a short distance. Pass a very tall brick wall on your left. At its end, turn left, up a rough entrance drive, which soon becomes an enclosed footpath, with a yew hedge on your right.
Carry straight on along this path, to soon emerge onto a road, in front of a fine parish church.
Turn right along the road, following the churchyard wall on your left. At the very end of the wall, in a wiggle of the road, is a cast iron gate. Go through, and turn immediately right on the grass, to follow the hedge, on your right, to the top corner of the churchyard.
Emerge into a field; keep going, still by the hedge on your right, to eventually reach a broad, grassy cross track. Turn right on this for a few paces, then go left, downhill across fields, towards trees.
On reaching the treeline, go into the trees, down steps, to cross a footbridge, then up more steps the other side, to reach a broad, leafy track.
Turn left on this for some way. Where trees end, keep forward, alongside ponds on your left. Bear slightly right, into a field, but still forward, in the same direction, to eventually reach a deeply rutted byway, with a metal fieldgate opposite.
Turn right up the byway for a short distance, looking for a stile on your left, and steps beyond, going up a steep bank.
At the top, turn left, along the field edge, with trees on your left, for some way. Eventually the path meets, and goes forward, on a broad farm track.
This soon begins to descend. Do not go far along, but look for a path going off right, up and across the field, to meet a hedgeline at the top. Here, bear left, along with the hedge on your right.
Soon reach a stile on your right, by a metal fieldgate and a house. Cross and follow the drive, past the house, and between others, to eventually reach a brick wall ahead, with a pointed arched doorway in it. Here, turn left, down a rough track, through trees.
At the bottom reach fields. Go across to a wooden fieldgate, leading to grassy path between wire fences. This soon enters a wood.
At the bottom of the wood, bear left, into a field, and turn immediately right, along the field edge, to cross a ditch into a second field.
Immediately turn left, and walk along, soon with a lake on your left. At the end of the lake, turn left, over a concrete bridge, and go uphill for a short distance.
Soon cross a stile on your right, and go straight across a very large field, to a double stile and footbridge over a ditch.
Cross another field, to a further stile and footbridge, into a band of trees.
Go through the trees to a further field. Cross this, bearing right, to a gap in the hedge at the far side. This is a tractor exit over a ditch.
Enter another field full of power lines and poles.
DO NOT GO STRAIGHT AHEAD BY OAK TREES, but bear diagonally left, downhill, across the field to the far opposite corner. Find a stile under parallel power lines, leading to a road.
Turn right on the road and follow it past Kingsley Church, to a main road. Turn left on this main road, a few paces, then cross with care, and turn right up a side road.
Look for the second vehicle entrance on your left (by a quarry entrance). It is the private road to Kingsley Mill. Enter and follow this for some way, crossing an old railway line.
At the entrance gate to the mill, turn left, over a footbridge, and through a gate. Ignore the path on your right, and keep straight ahead, into a golf course.
Go uphill and bear right, over towards the Club House. There is a wooden fence to the left of the Club House. Where this meets a hedge, is a gap. Go through to join the entrance drive and turn steeply left, downhill, to a main road.
Turn right along the road (there is a pavement the other side), and soon reach The Cricketers Inn in Kingsley and the start of the section.
