This afternoon I did a 2-hour walk with my brother Tim.
We started at the picnic site near Cobblershill (off the Wendover-Great Missenden road) and followed a bridleway uphill through Cockshoot Wood to reach the hamlet of Cobblershill, which I’ve passed through on both the Chiltern Way and the South Bucks Way. We then followed a bridleway north, soon seing a pair of Muntjac deer across a pasture. The Bridleway then entered another wood – it was marvellous walking amidst the trees in their autumn splendour, with the sound of the freshly fallen leaves underfoot.
We eventually turned left off the bridleway, remaining in the trees as we descended into a valley and then up the other side to reach Little Hampden (I’d walked this path in reverse on my walk from Coombe Hill a few weeks ago). We then took a pleasant field path (one I’d not walked before) that followed a hedgerow gradually downhill to reach a minor road in a valley. There was a T-junction a few yards away, and we too the road almost opposite forĀ a few hundred yards before turning right on a footpath.
This path followed ‘The Glade’, a long avenue between narrow strips of wood leading to Hampden House at Great Hampden, some distance behind us. We turned left on a path through a wood which took us back to the road we’d crossed earlier. We now followed Cobblershill Lane as it gradually went back up hill (this was the reverse of my recent walk from Pulpit Hill to Little and Great Hampden).
We turned left along a path that followed close to the top of a hill, running through trees with occasional views of the valley to our left. We then turned right on a bridleway that ran between fences, with pastures either side – we again saw a Muntjac deer, and their were four Red Kites here (the reason I took Tim for a walk here was I thought there was a good chance of seeing Kites). There were also three Microlights flying over.
The bridleway took us back into Cobblershill, and we retraced our steps through Cockshoot Wood back to the car. A very pleasant walk for an autumn afternoon.