Event led by Khris R.
Attendance: 13 men.
Distance: 8.5 miles (13.7 km).
Time: start 11:05, end 15:26, lunch 49 minutes.
Speed: moving arithmetic average 2.4 mph (3.87 kph).
Terrain: pavement, unmade towpath, woodland track (broken hardstanding), footpath.
Elevation: low 119m, high 268m (as measured by GPS), start 133m.
Weather: overcast, long showers, later sunny intervals, 10°C to 12°C, 17-19mph south-westerly wind, still cold, humidity 81%
Number of sewage works: 0.
Number of churches: 1.
Number of golf courses: 0.
Number of gruffaloes: at least 1.
This was a circular walk of ~9 miles from Wendover, N to Halton, SW through Wendover Woods towards St Leonards, then NW to the start point.
Wendover is a small town that feels more like a village than a town. One member referred to the town as “Baby Harpenden”, which seems quite apt. The housing stock is a combination of old village housing mixed with modern in-fill housing, and the occasional small estate. The properties are relatively small, feeling more like Hertford than, say, St Albans, but with the usual flight of 1950s terraced housing that could have landed straight out of Stevenage.
After a route behind a sandwich shop whose kitchen extractor fan blew the glorious smell of cooked bacon on us, we saw the icon of Wendover, its clock tower, a grade II listed building.
We took towpath of the Wendover arm of the Grand Union Canal. Recent weeks of nearly-endless rain brought the water level almost at that of the towpath. The result was a fairly wet trudge until the village of Halton (village news site), the home of RAF Halton.
Shortly after Halton, we left the towpath and ascended into Wendover Woods. The elevation rose from 396ft (121m) to 879ft (268m), a gain of 482ft (147m) over 1.5 miles (2.54km), a nicely punishing way to remove the consequences any New Year excesses. This area is the highest point in Buckinghamshire. Well-established woodland shrouds the point, resulting in no views over the lowlands.
Lunch was at the visitors’ centre cafe. The cafe appears to have been refurbished within the past couple of years – a few of us vaguely remembered some sort of humble hut; this refurbishment has resulted in a bold, modern architectural scream at incoming visitors – and offers a modest range of family snack food (e.g. burger-and-chips to tea-and-cakes). Service is very fast. A few of us ate at the cafe. There was plenty of seating at the cafe for visitors to eat packed lunches.
After a pleasant meander through the woods – mainly all downhill, thankfully – we visited the sole church of the walk, St Mary’s Church. The church was open and we spent a few minutes inside. The interior of the church was refurbished in 2011 – complete with underfloor heating – and is finished to a high standard. The high standard extends to the church’s branding, visible on its website: the church has a corporate logo, being a portmanteau of a church’s typical cross-profile and an ECG printout (accompanied by the strap line, “At the heart of the community”, geddit?).
The walk ended a short distance from the church.
The optional pub stop was at the King and Queen, Wendover. 10 members visited the pub.
Words by Martin Thornhill. Pictures by Peter O’Connor.
