Maxey circular - via Peakirk, Glinton, Etton

Thu, 2013 May 16 9:46 AM Western European Time 

Led by me. With Barry and Eddie. Lunch at the Ruddy Duck. Very flat, dry underfoot. Good weather with a fair amount of sun. Around 10.5 miles [ I had a few hundred yards when garmin was switched off - hence my maximum walking speed of - 146 miles per hour!]

Tuckers Nook - an irresistible street name,  quiet,  somewhere to park unobtrusively, before booting up and crossing the High Street to Quarry Lane. We turn right to follow the public footpath, then take the clear track around the west and south sides of the quarry area. 

Maxey Quarry lies to the South of the village and now consists of lakes attractive to wildfowl, guarded by plenty of signs warning of quicksand, and the dangers of deep cold water. 

It doesn't look too inviting

We join the track which comes from Woodgate Road, just before the bridge over Maxey Cut. This track soon heads east past some  sand and gravel workings.

On the lakes we see grebe, coots, ducks and a vast number of swans, among half submerged willows.

The track crosses the minor road to Etton and arrives at the A15, where there is a choice of culvert-style tunnels below the road.

Just big enough to walk through upright.

The track continues to the east of the A15, and meets Lincoln Road, between Glinton and Northborough at the Nine Bridges Viaduct - road over water. We counted sixteen arches.  

There's a man in a car labelled Traffic Survey - the job doesn't look too arduous, and he's not even counting pedestrians. We turn right and immediately left, and pick up a permissive footpath which takes us to the side of the Cut. 

We turn right and walk as far as a bridge carrying a footpath. There's a heron fishing.

It really isn't bothered by our presence.  We turn right along the footpath, reach the Mile Drove Road, then turn along North Fen Road.  We walk as far as the bridge with a display board about John Clare. For a gentle introduction to his work have a look at this blog.  

A few hundred yards later, our footpath goes off to the left just before the first houses in Glinton. 

We walk along until the path turns right than left, and now we have a possible alternative route. It's that sort of day - we'll try the other path via the course of the Car Dyke.  We overshoot, then return.  We come out in Peakirk just by the magnificent, nay splendid, Old Rectory. A left turn along a narrow footpath brings us to St Pega's church, with its open bell-tower and medieval wall paintings.  This is very much a hidden gem, nestled among the trees, and with no tower or spire advertising its presence from a distance.

 We've walked about 5 miles by now.  Next stop the Ruddy Duck for a bite to eat. Then by street and pavement to Glinton, with a brief nod to Mary Joyce's grave. She was John Clare's first sweetheart. Their romance was thwarted because her family would not accept him socially.  Alas, she died single at the age of 41, in a house fire. Here's a poem Clare wrote about her - before her death.

I can take John Clare's poems in small doses, but he had strong ideas about the changing countryside and its people, and was very much against the enclosure of common land.  His tragic life and depression caused him to be locked in an asylum for some time.

Glinton church

Relaxed goat

On we stride along a street which leads directly to a footbridge over the A15.  This must be the highest we've been above sea-level all day.  We continue at the side of a field of yellow rape flowers, to the turn to Etton, a very small village, with a pub, a fair few horses, and the claim to have won the "Best Kept Village" competition at least three times.

Etton church

We've spied a route that looks better than tramping the hard road back to Maxey, and turn left along another dyke, near a road bridge.

With the help of our map, we wend our way back towards Maxey, meeting several dog-walkers - I think they are vital in keeping some of these paths open to the public!
We return to Maxey along Woodgate Road, and return to the car.

A day of wide skies, long views and plenty of water.  

Wildlife:
Grebes doing a bit of a courtship dance,  a heron staying obligingly still, terns, swallows and a very loud robin in Maxey.

A recent Countryfile programme includes a section on John Clare.  It's about 12 minutes into the programme.

Map and details

Peatling Parva Circular

Mon, 2013 May 13 9:51 AM Western European Time

Led by Barry. With me and Gordon. Fine, with a few showers. 11.6 miles. 433 feet of ascent. A small LR section.

We parked in Peatling Parva, which is actually quite big.  

The seat looks inviting, but we've only been walking two minutes!

Our route is out of the village on the road towards Ashby Magna for almost a mile. Then we turn left on a track to Gilmorton.  

These are less intrusive than the motorway noise.

This is the second track on the left.  We follow it due south for about a mile, before turning right, then left then curving round south west into Gilmorton , an attractive village. We walk through an alleyway and on to Turville Rd, turning left at Ashby Rd, across Main Street.

Gilmorton

 Soon we turn right along Church Lane.

The path turns right just after a house called Moatfield. In the field is - a moat.

The remains of the moated area.

We wander round it before following the path behind the big house and garden, through some trees to a corner of the Ullesthorpe Rd. Our route lies straight ahead, diagonally over a field, then turning right to folllow the hedge, past some farm buildings and into an open field.

Here we have some debate about the route. The paths haven't been remade, but with a little map and grid ref work we have a plan.  We turn left and follow the edge of the field and turn right at the end to join the proper route.

We are now on a bridle way leading almost due west as far as Cotes-de-val.   We ponder the meaning of the name - slopes of the valley/ sides of the valley -  both sound a bit contrived. It turns out that the place was once lived in by a Cotes family. By 1279 it was referred to as Cotes Deyvill.  It was depopulated between the Black Death (1348) and the early 1500s.

We don't detour to look at the moat marked on the map, as our route turns right here and north to the Gilmorton Road.

We turn left, and then right  and walk along the field boundary- but miss our turning to the right. Ok, it's nestled in the hedge, and not immediately obvious. The long and short of it is we notice that we're getting too close to the motorway, and have to retrace our steps, promising ourselves that we'll take a break as soon as we're back on track. We soon find a sheltered and sunny spot.

The path is clear now and we soon arrive at Ashby Magna.

Another timbered building

A post-break break

We go down to Gilmorton Road, turn right then left on Peveril Road, and then left along Old Forge Road. Our path is between Ashby House and the old Forge, and heads north along a track for half a mile or so.  When we meet the waymarker for the Leicestershire Round we turn right to go north east. 

We cross a field with horses in it, then go over a stile into Holly Farm Fishery. A man catches a two-pound carp which he returns to the water.

Not quite so colourful as last October

Another stile, another field and we arrive at the road. We turn left and walk for a few yards to the junction. Our path goes to the right of the hedge.  It's clearly marked and easy to follow, although there are cows there.  They think we want to herd them into the next field, but go peacefully enough.
We follow our route into Willoughby Waterleys along an alley with pansies and dustbins.

We go past the General Elliott of Gibraltar renown.

Our path goes past the church and old rectory.

We walk eastwards, slightly uphill over fields towards Peatling Magna. In a field ahead we think we spy a scarecrow -

but it's moving, and very deliberately. Light dawns - it's a metal detective.

We leave the Leicestershire Round briefly and detour to look at Peatling Magna church.

We take a footpath across the fields to rejoin the Round at the crossroads, and follow it again for a mile. We leave it for good today, by turning right across the stream, below Grange Farm. Almost immediately we turn left and follow the footpath through several fields and then behind Peatling Hall with its fine gardens.

Peatling Hall

the gardens

When we reach the road we turn left and downhill to return to the car.

Map and details

Offord Cluny, Paxton Pits and the Ouse Valley Way

Thu, 2013 May 9 9:27 AM Western European Time 

Led by Barry. Maureen, Eddie and me. Fine with a few drops of rain. Quite windy in parts. Lovely flat waterside walk - Paxton Pits and Ouse Valley Way. 10.5 miles. 71 ft of "climbing".

We set off from Offord Cluny, taking a footpath past the church, which is open, so we go in.

The church is fairly plain, but I like this window.

The window is dedicated to the memory of all those airmen and airwomen
who served with 35 squadron RAF Graveley 1939-45

The path continues across another field towards the mainline railway - a quick pause to say hi to this foal.

hoping for food no doubt - and disappointed.

We note that the light for the rail crossing is green, so we follow instructions and cross quickly. It's a pretty busy line.
Then a bridge over a couple of weirs, and over the locks to the narrow road by the Old Flour Mill and the road bridge, with views over some riverside bungalows.

We turn left and follow the footpath marked on the OS map as following Diddington Brook. It goes southwest for a while then turns left and heads south to the tiny village of Diddington.
We walk past a row of semis and a thatched cottage, before going diagonally left over a field then following the field boundaries,  right, left, right and walk south past the bumps and hollows of the site of the medieval village of Boughton.

medieval village – site of

Shortly after this we pass a farm with a dovecote and a collection of outbuildings.

Soon there are signs of a disused gravel pit - still plenty of gravel there.

We follow the path south through woodland with glimpses of watery ex-gravel pits, look around for woodpecker holes, and then go to the Visitor Centre for a welcome cup of coffee.

It's Little Paxton Scarecrow Festival on Saturday, and these characters are in evidence.

Ok, which ones are the scarecrows??

There are various exhibits in the centre, including this magnificent mammoth jawbone which was found in the quarry workings at Paxton Pits in August 2000.

We leave the visitor centre and make our way through some streets on the edge of Little Paxton - scarecrows are still hanging around.

We don't have time to look for Bo-bo the clown today, so we follow the footpath until it meets the Ouse Valley Way.

We turn left and follow the river Great Ouse downstream for three miles or so. All very peaceful, with a few water birds - geese (not sure if they were greylag or pinkfooted - I couldn't see their feet anyway!), and swans on the river.

Eddie strolling before he puts the hammer down.

Offord D'Arcy church

Unless we're prepared to swim, we have to go the long way round.

We were told that this heron spends a lot of time here.

We follow the Ouse Valley Way until it meets the road and we retrace our steps to Offord Cluny.

The road bridge

Brown Bonnet Cottage

Wildlife - lots of birdsong, including some very striking singing, just inside one of the woodland areas - quite a small bird, but it was against the light and high up, so I haven't much to go on. Should have recorded its song - that's what phones are for! Lots of birds on the lakes - tufted duck, geese, swans, a couple of great crested grebe - oh and the heron, who posed for ages, but was just too far away.
Map and details