Pete's Walks- Watlington Hill, Nuffield, Russell's Water (page 1 of 7)
If you are considering walking this route yourself, please see my disclaimer. You may also like to see these notes about the maps and GPX files.
Google map of the walkDownload GPX file of the walk
UPDATE 30/10/2023: You now have to pay (£3 a day, I believe) at Watlington Hill car park, unless you are a National Trust member.
I did this walk of about 16.2 miles on Friday, 12th August, 2016. It was a new route for me, though the majority of it was on paths I'd walked before. There were three new sections of paths or bridleways that I'd not walked before, and a couple of sections which I'd only walked once or twice before in the opposite direction.
I started walking about 10.00am, from the car park on Watlington Hill (Grid Reference SU 709936). I immediately commenced one of those sections I just mentioned, by taking the path out of the back of the car park to go to the top of Watlington Hill - despite starting fifteen or more walks from Watlington Hill, I'd never done this before and had only come back along this path once or twice before, most recently in April 2016. The path led through a small wood and crossed a drive, then ran between bushes either side. It turned a bend to the right to reach a gate, where a lovely view opened up over the Oxfordshire Plain. Through the gate I continued along the path over the long flat top of the hill. It was quite breezy here and rather cool, as I looked in vain for Skipper butterflies as a sign at the car park showed that this was a site for Silver-spotted Skippers.
The path from the car park on Watlington Hill
The path from the car park on Watlington Hill
The path from the car park on Watlington Hill - you walk round a bend and suddenly get this stunning view
Watlington Hill
When I reached the end of the hill and the path started to drop downhill, I almost immediately forked left, only to fork right within a few yards at a fainter fork. I followed a very vague path downhill, aiming just right of a Silver Birch tree I remembered from when I came the other way in April. From that tree I just kept going straight down the slope, but soon a more obvious path came in sharply from my right and so I followed it down to the left (I guess if I'd kept right at the very first path fork, this path must have forked left further on). Anyway this path took me down to an obvious and level path going across the hillside, where I turned left. Soon this was running along a wide grass strip with bushes and dark Yew trees running across the hillside just uphill to my left, with more bushes a little way down the slope on my right. At the end of the grass strip, the path continued through more Yew trees to come to a T-junction with the path that I usually take (starting beside the car park).
Watlington Hill
Watlington Hill
Watlington Hill - I turned left along the path heading into the bushes. Swyncombe Downs are in the distance.
Watlington Hill
Watlington Hill, where the path goes through an area of yew Trees
I turned right, and followed the path for several hundred yards with thick hedges either side until I reached a drive, where I went a very short distance right to reach a road. Here I turned left and followed the road (it was heading from Watlington towards Nettlebed), there being a decent and recently cut verge to walk on. Just round a slight bend to the right, I took a footpath on the right that started immediately before a cottage name Dumble Dore on the OS map (nothing to do with Harry Potter, it's a little used alternative name for Bumble Bee). This path (the first one today that I'd never walked at all before) led between hedgerows, with occasional views out over fields, for about half a mile until it met a bridleway, coming from near Dame Alice Farm (a short distance to to my right).
The footpath from the bottom of Watlington Hill
The short road walk
The path from Dumble Dore
The path from Dumble Dore