Pete's Walks - Kensworth and Dunstable Downs (page 2 of 3)
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.
A short path led through trees to meet a bridleway, where I turned left (with Dunstable Downs golf course now over the fence on my right). I soon reached the road that runs over the top of Dunstable Downs, where I crossed over and went through a small car park. I went straight on across snow-covered grass to where longer grass usually appears, where, after taking some photos, I turned left. I followed this boundary between the shorter and longer grass for some distance, eventually having a fence on my right. On reaching a metal kissing-gate in this fence, I went through it and headed half-right to a similar gate.
The short path after I turned right from the path round Kensworth Quarry
Zoomed-in view towards Ivinghoe Beacon from Dunstable Downs
View from Dunstable Downs over the London Gliding Club and out to the Vale of Aylesbury
The path I followed over Dunstable Downs (along the left edge of this photo), from where I turned left
Looking back along Dunstable Downs
The path I followed over Dunstable Downs
The path I followed over Dunstable Downs (this is the short section between two kissing-gates)
The path now continued alongside a wire fence on my left. After a short while an old Drovers' Way (that had worn a groove in the hillside) went half-right and slowly descended. I followed it for a few hundred yards, remembering the wonderful orchids and butterflies I see here each summer. I heard and saw a glider being winched up into the air, I hope the pilot was well wrapped up in these cold conditions.
The start of the Drovers' Way I followed to the bottom of the Downs
The Drovers' Way I followed to the bottom of the Downs
The Drovers' Way I followed to the bottom of the Downs
Zoomed in shot back along Dunstable Downs
There was at least one glider flying today
At the bottom of the slope, the path levelled out, then curved slightly left and started to rise back up Bison Hill, again following another groove worn in the hillside by a Drovers' Way. It was a steady plod uphill, but not very long. The path steepened for a few yards immediately after it crossed another Drover's Way (I could have saved a bit of time and effort by continuing along the fence instead of going down the first Drovers' Way, as that path came in from the left here), and then almost levelled out as it contoured round the hillside and eventually reached another metal kissing-gate with the car park on Bison Hill ahead of me.
This is where the path turns at the bottom of the Downs and starts to climb back up Bison Hill
The path up Bison Hill
The path up Bison Hill, crossing another Drovers' Way
The path up Bison Hill
View out over the Vale of Aylesbury
The path continuing along the top of Bison Hill
Approaching the car park on Bison Hill