Pete's Walks- Cowleaze Wood, Chinnor, Ibstone (page 3 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.
The bridleway continued uphill, now alongside Venus Wood on my left (curiously the OS map seems to indicate that the wood across the field on my right is also Venus Wood). At the top of the hill the bridleway ended when it reached the lane through Sprig's Alley, where I turned right.
The bridleway to Sprig's Alley, climbing the other side of the valley
Looking back from the bridleway to Sprig's Alley
Reaching the end of the bridleway to Sprig's Alley
The lane at Sprig's Alley
After three or four hundred yards I turned left down a bridleway that immediately forked slightly left from the drive to Crowellhill Farm. The bridleway ran downhill through Crowell Wood - it was obviously an old bridleway as it had worn a deep groove in the hillside, which was surprisingly muddy even after all the dry weather we've had so far this year. Near the bottom of the slope I kept right at a fork, the bridleway then rising much less steeply up the other side of a small valley before flattening out. Still in Crowell Wood, it then dropped steeply down into another valley, crossing a track shortly before it reached the bottom of the valley.
The start of the bridleway going south from Sprig's Alley
The bridleway going south from Sprig's Alley
The bridleway going south from Sprig's Alley, just after I took the right fork near the valley bottom
The bridleway going south from Sprig's Alley
The bridleway going south from Sprig's Alley
The bridleway going south from Sprig's Alley
The bridleway going south from Sprig's Alley, just before it crosses a track
At the end of this bridleway I turned left onto another one, running along a good track in the valley bottom - I now had Crowell Wood on my left and Lott Wood on my right. A butterfly flew up from the track as I walked along it - the first definite sighting of a White Admiral that I've had on any of my walks in the Chilterns (though I think I've possibly had glimpses of them once or twice before). At the very end of Lott Wood (just after passing the start of a track on that side), I turned right and followed a footpath uphill, just inside the edge of Lott Wood.
The track along the valley bottom, between Crowell Wood and Lott Wood (on the right)
Near the start of the path up through the edge of Lott Wood
The path up through the edge of Lott Wood