Waldron circular

By Ben Perkins

Click here to view map

This is a short but varied walk on the gentle southern slopes of the High Weald, starting and finishing at the village of Waldron, near Heathfield.

The described walk follows official rights of way but is of particular interest where it passes through several areas where additional permissive public access has been granted under the umbrella of the Countryside Stewardship Scheme and there are several possibilities for varying or extending the walk.

To download, from the internet, maps indicating the additional access visit the Dedfra site and home in on Conservation Walks in East Sussex, then print out the maps for the sites named Blackdown Pastures, Brownings Farm‚ and Chambers, near Waldron, each of which are touched on or crossed by our walk.

1.From the road junction next to the Star Inn, leaving the village war memorial on your left, start the walk along the road which heads north-east through the village. Ignore a right turn (North Street) and, after a few more yards, just past the village hall on your left, turn left into the entrance to a recreation ground and playing field and go squarely ahead, passing to the left of two rugby pitches before veering half right.

At the far end of this area, a few yards to the left of the far right corner, enter a wide woodland path by squeezing to the left of a locked gate. The path soon bears right and is confined between fences within the right edge of a wood.

Leave the wood over a stile and head half-left across a field to a stile, soon in sight, which leads out to a lane next to a road junction.

2.Follow the lane opposite, signposted to Hawkhurst Common.

After a little over 100 yards, turn right through a gate and walk squarely ahead along a wide woodland path.

Leaving the wood through a gate, bear half-left along the left edge of a large field. In the field corner, go through a gate into another wood. After a few yards, fork left and, after a few more yards, where the path divides again, keep right, dropping down into a dip.

Cross a culverted stream, go through a gate and bear half-right, soon joining a left-hand fence which you can follow round a corner to another gate.

3.Through this gate, go ahead, along a wide woodland ride at first, then the right edge of a large arable field until you can go through a gate and pass to the left of a large storage shed to join a track.

Turn left and, after a few yards, go right along a wide grassy path with a fence on your left and a wood on your right.

About ten yards short of a gate, turn right along a path which burrows through a thicket to a stile. Continue along the left edge of pasture.

In the field corner, go through a gate into the Woodland Trust area of Brownings Wood and Kiln Wood. Follow a clear path through the wood out to a lane, ignoring all side paths, unless you would like to divert to the Blackboys Inn which can be reached via a path to the right, just short of the lane. Return the same way.

4.Turn left along the lane and, after about 400 yards, where it bends left, go sharply right through a gate with a yellow waymark on it and follow a wide grassy avenue, lined with mature trees, through to another lane. Turn left.

After 150 yards, where the lane bends right, go ahead along a narrow path between two house gateways, which squeezes to the left of bushes to a stile and continues along a right field edge to join another lane where you should turn right.

5.After about 300 yards, when opposite a turning to the right (Beechy Road), go left through a gate and head half-right across a field to join and follow the far field edge, with a wood on your left, out to a lane.

Turn left and, after about 100 yards, fork right along a wide unmade track, within trees at first, then along a field edge. In the field corner, go through a wide hedge gap and turn left along the left edge of the field beyond. Go through a similar gap in the corner and turn right to drop down gently with a hedge on your right.

After about 70 yards, veer half-left across the corner of the field, to a gate, cross a treeshrouded stream to a stile beside a gate and then maintain direction across rough pasture, through a hedge gap and uphill across a similar area.

Feed into a wide strip between low banks which takes you up to join a lane over a stile built into a gate.

The Vanguard Way, which you have been following from point 4, goes off to the right here but you should turn left along the lane.

6.After about 60 yards, turn right through a hedge gap, and along wide grass strip which doubles as a public footpath and a permissive equestrian route.

When the path opens out, veer half left across a cultivated field where a path should be trodden out through any growing crop.

On the other side of the field, go through another wide gap and forward along a left field edge until, after about 50 yards, you can go left into woodland.

Soon after a stream crossing, at a waypost where the path divides, fork right and, after a few yards, at a T-junction, turn left. Leave the wood, go forward along a left field edge to a gate next to the field corner and then veer halfright, walking gently up across a large field.

On the other side of this field, go over a stile to the right of a gate and follow a faint path up across the field beyond to pass through Waldron churchyard back to the start.