<span class="hpt_headertitle">Welford</span>

Walk Leader: Janet Long

This walk is about 6 to 7 miles long.

Start at The Wharf public house.Turn right out of the pub car park and keep to the pavement along the A5199 and bear right and then take the footpath to the right just before the turning into West Street. Follow this path anti-clockwise past the sewage works and some allotments until it come out onto Hall Lane. Go straight over the lane and pick up the path heading away from the gateway on the opposite side. This is Shakespear’s Avon Way.

It’s not totally clear where the path leads from the gateway but if you stick reasonably close to the right of the pasture you will soon see a little bridge over the stream ahead. Stay on this path as it heads west through a series of fields and climbs a hill to give a magnificent view to the west. The path then drops down to meet the Grand Union Canal and you cross Bridge 38 and then follow the towpath south.

The footpath takes a number of deviations away from the canal as it meanders south but it’s probably better to stick to the towpath until it goes under underneath Cold Ashby Farm near Park Farm.

This is where you leave the canal behind (at Bridge 31) and head north-east on the Jurassic Way from Cold Ashby Road. You will cross a field and immediately walk into the cluster of contours known as Hemplow Hills. This tiny piece of wooded high ground is rather charming and when you emerge from the woods on the north-eastern fringe you will have wonderful views to the east.

There’s a picnic bench in the first grass field after the woods and this would probably be a good place for a coffee stop.

Follow the path until you reach the road where you turn left. This will take you past Hemplow Lodge Farm (still on the Jurassic Way) and then on to stretch of tarmac back to Welford on West End. Where West End becomes West Street you have a choice of going straight on or turning right into Church Lane and then left along High Street. Either way it’s pavement pounding until you get back to The Wharf to enjoy a bevvie or two.