Slinfold circular

By Eddie Start

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Slinfold is in the north of the county and a short distance east of Stane Street, now the busy A289. The village is a neat settlement with many old Wealden houses and a prominent church sitting at the centre. On this walk we head out west into the Low Weald across mainly level farmland and the occasional sheltering copse.

1.Turn off the main village street, beside the church of St Peter, into Clapgate Lane, which soon veers to the right passing cottages.

Keep to the main track for 300 yards and just after Clapgate Cottage, go left through a metal kissing gate into a field.

Follow the field track ahead for 250 yards to the left corner, passing between undergrowth and trees. In 25 yards take a few paces right to a left field edge path that in 200 yards bends to the right and goes left through a metal kissing gate to the roadside.

Cross and turn left up the road, keeping to the grass verge, proceeding with care for 250 yards to an off-road parking area on the right. Take the footpath through a field entrance on the left up the right field edge for a quarter-of-a-mile to a field corner. (Do not take the midway path signed to the right.)

Pass through a gate and turn left down the field edge for 200 yards to a kissing gate and across a bridge into woodland.

In 200 yards join a bridleway coming from the left. Continue ahead to a bridge and drop left to join the Downs Link trail.

Turn right under a bridge, along the former railway track, to a three-way path junction in half-a-mile.

2.Leave the Downs Link track on the left and in few paces take the bridleway that goes to the right, with hedgerow on the left and open meadow on the right.

The bridleway joins a level farm drive, Pensfold Lane, and continues to pass Naldretts Farm and in 300 yards arrives beside stables and a bungalow on the right.

Continue for a few paces, take the stile on the left, beside a gate for Quince Farm, and climb to the top of the field on an enclosed path. Walk across the top of the next field and descend the left edge to the bottom left corner, crossing a stile to the road at Colin’s Cross.

3.Turn right up the road, crossing to the left side and turning left, signposted to Garlands, just after an engineering yard with parked traction engines. In 100 yards, at a left road turn, take the farm drive ahead to Howick Farm.

After 400 yards, with barnstyle, timber-faced houses on the left, continue ahead to a gate and cross the next meadows along the right field edge.

At the field corner enter Howick Copse for 350 yards, leading to a stile beside a large meadow.

Turn left up the woodland edge for about 100 yards and then strike-off half-right across the field, keeping right of a power cable post, to a narrow strip of woodland in a further 150 yards. Pass through the trees, crossing a plank bridge, and descending a meadow along the left hedgeline.

Cross a track and stile and in the next field go quarter-right to a mid-way copse corner, going along its left side to a stile on to a track.

Turn left and at a crossing concrete drive in 50 yards turn left again.

Follow the main drive, passing Gibbons Mill Farm, to a minor road at Morgan’s Green.

Turn left up the road for a quarter-of-a-mile to a road junction.

4.Take the signed footpath on the right, along a left field edge. In 300 yards, enter Smerrick’s Copse, cross a plank bridge to arrive at a clearing. Continue over a second plank bridge into woodland and in a few yards, at a three-way junction, take the left turning.

Climb through woodland for 300 yards, over a clearing and plank bridge, to a minor road. Turn left along the road for 50 yards and then go sharply right at a fork, beside Ranvers House, into Marles Lane.

In 300 yards turn left into woodland. Follow the rising path, where fallen trees may force a short diversion, and in 250 yards take the signed left path to a field corner. At a twoway footpath sign pass through a hedge opening and turn right climbing to a left hedge corner.

Continue along the left hedge to a corner and enter woodland over a plank bridge.

Walk through the copse, turning half-left, then half-right turns and in 300 yards arrive at Haven Road.

5.Turn left along the road, to the opposite footpath in 100 yards and turn right. Keep to the path for 400 yards along left field edges, passing an open barn. At a field corner cross a stile and pass to the left over a gully.

Climb to a stile at a three-way junction and turn right. Keep to the right field edge to a right corner stile and plank bridge into woodland.

Follow the winding path to cross a substantial footbridge, climbing to a stile at the edge of a golf course. Continue along the left hedgeline for 350 yards, Park Farm is left, and pass through a gate onto a metalled drive.

Turn right along the twisting drive for half-a-mile to a crossing driveway. Go a few paces ahead and drop right, down onto the Downs Link track, beside the bridge we were at earlier.

6.Turn right following the former railway track and in a quarter-of-amile pass under the road bridge.

In a further quarter-of-a-mile, having passed by a caravan site on the left and arriving beside a white house on the right, on the site of the former railway station, turn left into Spring Lane. Follow the lane back to the main street in Slinfold.

Turn right along the residential road, leading back past the village school to the starting point of this walk.