Thursday 22nd May Woburn walk led by Tony Roberts

The programmed walk for this day was only 3 miles in length so the Chairman offered a longer walk of 7 miles.  8 walkers started off from the Woburn car park 15 minutes before the shorter walk was due to start. We walked into the deer park, past Upper Drakeloe Pond & Park Farm before leaving the road to walk up the hill passing Stump Cross. We then crossed the road & followed the footpath to walk alongside the estate road. Here we saw a black bear on the other side of the safari park fence & also many stags. We continued to the cattle grid but instead of crossing it we turned sharp right following another footpath. We came to some large fallen trees where we stopped for a coffee break. After this break we continued past Berryend Plantation leaving the deer park at a tall kissing gate. On our right we noticed many newly planted saplings which replaced the trees felled a few years ago . We continued downhill to pass through another kissing gate and join Berryend Road. Here turned right & walk in single file downhill to join the main Woburn road. We walked along the grass verge before crossing over to join a footpath diagonally across a field. At the far edge of this field we turned left following the field boundary to join the Greensand Ridge track to Eversholt. Here we crossed the road & entered the cricket field where we stopped on some benches for our second coffee stop. We left the cricket field & walked through the churchyard, past the village school to join the Milton Bryan road. we followed this for a short distance before passing through a gate back into the Woburn estate.  Here we stopped for a group photo.

Jean, Anthony, Kate, Mike & Sheila Briggs, Diane, Geoff & Tony R.

We walked across a footbridge & after missing a turn we walked through a bamboo plantation & when we attempted to regain our footpath we encountered a very wet bog so we retraced our steps & soon joined our intended path. This led, following yellow marker posts, past much contractors equipment & works to pass Stew Pond.with its horse statue. We followed the footpath, still the Greensand Ridge path, where after passing through another tall kissing gate to the London road. We followed this back into Woburn village & hence our cars.  A 7 mile walk enjoyed by all.

Track of walk, walked in clockwise direction