Sheltered, wooded paths and open fields
Walk Six - 4 km (2.5 miles)

The wooded ridge route towards the end of this walk

This walk starts across fields which can, after rain, be fairly muddy. It includes a sheltered stretch along a wooded bridleway, which weaves along a ridge offering excellent views south towards Brookmans Park.

The bridleway is well worth the effort on its own and this walk was extended in May 2005 to make this part of the walk longer. The walk ends with a short stretch of lane walking towards the end, but the lane is quiet and more like a bridleway than a road.

The walk has the benefit of beginning and ending at the Woodman pub in Wild Hill, please check for opening times.

If you have any comments about this walk, please add them to the discussion thread running in this site's public forum.

Follow the red dots on the sketch map above (which is not to scale). A key has been added to help people follow the maps. To help you with this walk you might want to buy an Ordnance Survey Explorer E182 map for St Albans & Hatfield or click on www.streetmap.co.uk, or www.multimap.com and print the resulting pages. If you would like to comment on any of the walks for the benefit of others, please use the forum discussion thread on the walks.

1: If you intend to end this walk with a pint at the Woodman pub in Wild Hill, you can park in the pub car park, otherwise find a parking place on the road in Wild Hill.

2: When in the pub car park you will see that the parking area splits. The lower parking area, just beyound a few farm buildings, leads to an aluminium kissing gate in the south west corner, which leads to a field.

3: As you look beyound this gate you will see another kissing gate almost straight ahead. This field is often very muddy and churned up by horses. If it is too bad, you can skirt the field keeping to the left or right boundary and head for the aluminium kissing gate on the opposite side (often the lower route is best -- it depends where the horses have been gathering).

4: Go through this second kissing gate and head for a third, again almost straight ahead but a bit diagonally to the right. To help with navigation head in the direction of the Brookmans Park transmitter on the distant horizon.The path crosses a small plank footbridge before climbing left to the gate.

5: Go through this third kissing gate and you will find a wooden post with a yellow Hertfordshire County Council footpath sign pointing diagonally right. Turn right here and, keeping to the right hand boundary of the field with the hedge on the right, skirt the field and follow the hedge round as it veers left.

6: You soon reach a gap in the hedge and another post with yellow arrow, just after a small stream. The post suggests you go straight across the field, but the last time I was there it had been ploughed up, so the best route is to turn slightly right and then, keeping the boundary of the field, skirt the field keeping the field on your left and the hedgerow and ditch on your right and continue slighlty uphill as the path climbs to the woods ahead.

7: Depending on the season, the path sometimes heads diagonally to the right, through the crops towards a beech tree at the edge of the wood. Alternatively, you can continue skirting the boundary of the field keeping the field on your left and the hedgerow, ditch, and woods on your right, until you come to the corner of the woods. Here you can walk through a gap in the boundary of the field and continue walking with the woodland on your right.

8: At this point you will see the Brookmans Park transmitter to the south. Look back at this point for good views over to Wild Hill and Essendon. Keep walking, heading to a point slightly to the right of the distant transmitter mast until you reach a gate and broken kissing gate leading out to Grubbs Lane.

9: Turn right here and walk single file and against the traffic for less than a tenth of a mile. Soon after you past Westfield Lodge, look out for a footpath sign on the right pointing through the hedgerow and leading into a field.

10: Cross the fields walking diagonally left as the path goes through the crops heading to the left of the pilon and under the power lines. The path then continues diagonally left through another field of crops heading towards the woods and a wooden post with yellow arrow.

11: Keeping the woods on your right, continue straight along a bridleway. At the end of the woodland, another wooden post with yellow arrow points the way ahead. Continue along the bridleway as it weaves its way between two trees and on to Woodside Lane.

12: At this point you have a choice of a short cut by crossing the lane and heading up a bridleway, keeping the farm on your left and the cottages on your right and continue along the bridleway.

13: If you don't want to take the shortcut, turn left along Woodside lane walking in single file and against the traffic heading the short distance along the lane towards the house on the next bend.

14: When you reach the red brick house on the bend you will see two path to the right, one leads to private houses, the second (which goes alongside the wall of the red brick house, becomes a bridleway, and is your way ahead.

15: Walk along this tree-lined path as it bends and weaves through farmland. Ignore a bridleway off to the right (which is where the short cut joins the route) and continue along the ridge. As you walk you will see some excellent views across the valley towards Brookmans Park and Potters Bar.

16: This bridleway finally reaches a lane. Turn right and walking single file and against the traffic, follow the lane downhill until it reaches Woodside Lane in Wild Hill.

17: Turn left at the bottom and right into the pub car park.