Robust Rambles

Section 28

Amberley Station to Sutton

Walk Details

Walk Instructions

Greatstone to Gillingham Robust Ramble

Section 28  Out

Amberley Station to Sutton

Map: OS Explorer 121 Arundel & Pulborough

Distance: 5 .5 miles/3 hours

Start: The Bridge Inn by Amberley Station

Comment: There is an attractive church in the village 0f Bury well worth a visit. The busy A29 has to be crossed so take care. There are some wet fields the other side and many stiles. West Burton, Bignor and Sutton are attractive villages set in splendid countryside. The Roman Villa at Bignor is not to be missed.

From the Bridge Inn and railway station, cross the main road and return to the river bank. Go forward with the river on your left. In 200 metres reach an impressive iron footbridge.

Cross and turn right still on the river bank. The SDW soon goes off left. Ignore this and keep forward on the river bank for ½ mile with the spire of Bury church in the distance.

On approaching the village ignore a path off left. Keep forward on the bank to cross two stiles set in wooden fieldgates. On reaching a bench seat turn left towards the church and cross a grassy area.

Pass a cottage and immediately turn right between the churchyard wall on your left and the cottage on your right, to find a hidden flight of steps. Climb into the churchyard and go ahead to pass the church porch (usually open and well worth a visit). Bear right onto the grass and stay close to the church to head up to the top corner of the churchyard and a step stile in the wall.

Cross and go up a concrete path by a house to meet a school drive. Turn left a short distance to go through a gate and on a little further to a sharp bend left. Here turn right into a sunken path and follow it up to a corner.

Turn left through a gap in to a field and go ahead along the edge with a hedge on your left. At the end of the field continue on an enclosed path again.

At a junction of paths, turn right on a gravel path with a stone wall on your left. Emerge onto a drive at Prattenden’s Farm and follow this drive to the left, down to a road.

Turn right on the road and follow it up to a main road (A29). Cross with care to a side road opposite. Turn left along it a few paces. Turn right off this road, by Coachman’s Cottage, over a stile into a wet field. Go down to a gateway.

In the next field bear diagonally right, uphill, to a stile near the top corner, with farm buildings over on your right (if the field is very waterlogged stay round the top edge). Cross the stile and go along the top edge of the next field. In a short distance pass a metal fieldgate into the farm. Just beyond find a tilted footbridge in the hedge.

Cross with great care into a large field. Walk almost straight up, just right of a telegraph pole by a lone tree at the top. Cross a tractor track to find a broken stile by a gateway and go through.

Bear slightly left down the field ahead to a stile at the far side. Continue down the next field to a stile and footbridge, and on again, past a telegraph pole, to a stile at the corner of a wood. Here there is a junction of paths.

Turn right, over another stile, to walk along the side of the wood, now on your left. At the end of the wood, cross a stile by a gateway. Turn immediately left (ignore a stile at the other side of the field) and follow the bottom edge of the wood.

In 10 metres find a stile on your left into the wood. Follow a path through the trees. At the far side exit over a footbridge and turn left up a path enclosed between a ditch and a field.

Soon reach a drive by a set back cottage and go on up it passing several detached houses to a junction with a road at the very top.

Turn right down this road for 25 metres. Just after a bend to the left (take care), turn left off the road onto a shaded bridleway. Stay on this for over ¼ mile.

The path seems to meet a dead end, but actually does a sharp left turn (there is a waymark post). Follow the path up by a telegraph pole and on between fields with telephone wires overhead, for 100 metres. Soon meet and continue by a tall wire fence on your right.

At the top of the rise, look for a tall wooden gate in the wire fence on your right. Go through. Walk down the side of a grassy area with a low wire fence on your left. Eventually pass a house on the left at the far end.

On reaching a wire fence dead ahead, turn left a short way, passing a garden on your left.

Now turn right between open fields and keep on in this direction for over ¼ mile. Soon reach a corner of a vineyard behind a tall wire fence on your left. Keep forward with the fence on your left.

Eventually reach and cross the entrance drive to Bignor Roman Villa and tea room (a must for a visit), to gates the other side. Go through the pedestrian gate and continue on a wide track. This becomes a rough road and eventually reaches a T-junction in the village of Bignor.

Turn right up the road. Shortly, the road swings left. Leave it, to go straight up a bank to a wooden kissing gate. Through this continue with a wire fence on your right. At the far side exit through a wooden swing gate, and cross a farm road. Turn right on a path enclosed between wire fences, to pass a barn.

At the top of the rise, go up a bank into the field ahead. Now turn left, uphill, on a grassy farm track.

Halfway up the hill, and well before two trees ahead, turn left by an old fence post, to cross between two open fields, towards trees and telephone wires. On reaching the trees, turn right alongside them, up the edge of the field.

In 100 metres, by a seat on your left, turn sharp left, down into the wood. Follow this down for some way on a narrow path through wild garlic. Reach a wooden kissing gate at the bottom and continue down a pasture to the bottom corner.

Find and cross a footbridge, and climb the bank at the other side up into a field. Bear very slightly right to go up the centre of the field towards a house chimney just visible at the top of the hill. Pass the mansion of Bignor Park over on your right.

Emerge onto a tarmac drive by houses. Turn left along a drive marked ‘No through road’.

Reach a gate across the road. If not open go through a wooden kissing gate at the side and turn immediately right along the field edge with a hedge on your right.

At the end of the field cross an excellent stile (good height of steps, good width and good condition) to meet a bridleway. Cross to a wooden kissing gate. Go through and turn sharp diagonally left down the field to a second kissing gate in the far hedge.

Continue on in the next field, down, then up, to the hedge at the far side. Go through a muddy gap, then on, up the side of the field ahead with a hedge on your left.

The path soon becomes enclosed and sunken between trees. Keep on up to emerge on a road in the village of Sutton. Turn left and soon come down to The White Horse pub and the end of the section.

Greatstone to Gillingham Robust Ramble

Section 28  Return

Sutton to Amberley Station

Map: OS Explorer 121 Arundel & Pulborough

Distance: 5 miles/2.5 hours

Start: The White Horse pub in the centre of Sutton. Difficult parking so ask at the pub.

Comment: This is an attractive return mostly on the West Sussex Literary Trail. Take care crossing the A29. Because of the lack of river crossings there is no choice of paths beyond Bury so the last stretch back to Amberley Station is along the outward route. There are many stiles to cross.

With the front door of the White Horse pub behind you, turn right a few paces up the road towards Barlavington. Almost immediately, turn left, off the road, up the entrance to a house called The Orchard. Again, immediately turn right onto a steep path enclosed between fences.

Soon cross a boardwalk into a field and go straight ahead, downhill, across the open field. At the foot meet a wire fence where the path goes through a gap in the hedge. Here turn right along the hedge for a few paces to find some steps an a stile into the field below. Cross and rejoin the original path to continue steeply downhill.

Reach a stile by a wooden fieldgate. Over this cross a plank bridge and turn immediately right uphill, then soon left into trees (this is the West Sussex Literary Trail).

Cross a narrow footbridge and continue to soon cross another. Continue uphill to emerge onto a garden lawn. Keep up the edge below a house, to reach a gate onto a road. Turn right down the road.

Ignore a path off on the right and stay on the road as it swings to the left, then uphill past a thatched house. At a road junction go straight ahead towards West Burton.

In 100 metres, well before a white house, bear diagonally right, off the road, across the centre of a large field, to the hedge at the far side. On reaching it, bear left, along the edge of the field, to eventually cross a plank bridge, then a proper footbridge in the corner. Enter a new field below the South Downs and bear left along the bottom edge.

In 100 metres, bear left, out of the field, down into trees, and continue in the same direction as before. Keep on through the trees for some way, soon by a stream and over a plank bridge. Emerge onto a roadway by houses.

Continue forward (ignore a bridleway off right), to reach a road junction.

Here turn left, uphill. Soon turn right along the first turning right. At a T-junction at the end, turn left, uphill a short way, past a farmhouse on your left, to reach Coke’s Barn on your right.

Here turn right onto a gravel drive between a thatched timber-framed cottage on your left and Coke’s Barn conversion on your right.

At the end of the drive continue on a sunken path by an electricity substation. Cross a stile by a metal fieldgate and join a path enclosed between wire fences. Cross two stiles midway and keep on down to cross a third into a field at the bottom.

Bear diagonally right across the field to a stile and footbridge below trees at the far side. Cross two more stiles and join a path climbing steeply up through woods.

At the top bear left along the ridge for a good way. Finally cross a stile into a field and continue forward in the same direction under power lines to a metal kissing gate in the corner.

Go on down the side of a house to meet a side road with a main road ahead. Bear left a few paces then right to cross the main road with care and patience.

At the other side join a narrow path enclosed between fences going uphill. At the top go forward on a gravel drive between houses to drop down to a road. Turn right down through the village of Bury to reach a crossroads at the bottom.

Turn left into Church Lane for some way. Just past ‘The Vicarage’ and school entrance on your left, turn right up an enclosed footpath.

At the end go through a metal kissing gate and straight on (ignore a path off right), to a second kissing gate in the bottom corner. Through this bear left to a third kissing gate (very wet field). Go through and on in the same diagonal direction to a fourth kissing gate by the River Arun.

Climb the bank and turn right for ½ mile to reach a large iron footbridge (the SDW comes in just before it). The return now follows the outward route.

Cross the bridge and turn right along the bank. Ignore a path off left and stay along the river bank back to the main road at Amberley Station. Cross to return to the Bridge Inn and the start of the section.