Why not have a go at this five mile Dorset woodland walk this weekend?
This varied walk follows clear tracks along shallow valleys and over chalk hills and wide-open fields with lovely long-distance views.
Click into the photo gallery above to see a full-sized map of the route.
There are also clear paths alongside or through several woods, many with coppiced hazel and ancient oaks.
The number of separate woods passed by or seen dotted about the landscape remind us that most of England was covered in forest until early settlers started clearing the trees to cultivate the land.
As you go, look out for red kites wheeling overhead, and listen for cackling jays around Pimperne Wood and skylarks lifting into the skies around Pimperne Long Barrow, even in October.
At 370ft above sea level, Pimperne Long Barrow is one of the finest surviving burial mounds in Wessex.
Built between 4000 and 3500 BC, the early-Neolithic barrow measures 330ft long by 65ft wide and still stands 9ft high.
The east side ditch is 40ft wide by 4ft deep, but the west ditch has become narrower and shallower.
The Walk
1 St Peters Church in Pimperne was completely rebuilt in 1873-4. It still has its 15th-century tower, but this was extended upwards above the higher 19th-century nave roof. From the church, walk north along Church Road past the stump of the 15th-century stone cross. Then, on the left, the elegant brick and flint house is The Rectory which was built in 1712. Next is Manor Farm, also brick and flint, built in the first half of the 19th century and with several farm buildings of the same period.
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Continue past right St Peter’s Close and left Home Field and, when the road bends left for ‘Stourpaine’, keep straight on into Newfield Road. Passing right Pimperne Primary School, the lane becomes hedged on both sides and rises imperceptibly along a shallow valley with fields behind the hedges. At a ‘Jubilee Trail’ signed left-fork track, continue along the lane past a left wood. Becoming hedged both sides again, continue to a long line of trees at right-angles to the lane. At the bridleway-sign post with a gated track ahead, follow the lane around the right bend.
2 Past ‘Newfield Farm and Holiday Cottages’ notices the lane becomes a wide hedged track in another low valley. Walk up and, after cantilever gates either side, continue to left brick built early 19th-century Newfield Farm and its converted barn holiday cottages. Keep straight on up past a right signed footpath. Now narrower and grassy, the track is still hedged both sides up to a bridleway T-junction with cantilever gates forward and right. Turn left along the grassy, hedged-enclosed ¾ mile bridleway, rising slowly again.
Keep straight on, later through a concrete-block barrier and levelling along right Pimperne Wood’s coppiced hazels and ancient oaks. Left is mostly coppice and scattered trees with high fields outside. When the wood ends at a bridleway-posted crossing with a facing field’s cantilever gate, turn right along the narrow path, still with Pimperne Wood right.
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3 Keep to the widening and meandering path, generally heading east and passing a ‘Private Woodland’ track right. Past a ‘Nesting Birds’ sign, the wood ends at right and left field gates with long views forward left. Descending now, but slowly and banked a little on both sides, this is May Lane. Continue down the meandering sunken path with coppiced edges and fields outside. Then, into a more open nettle-strewn area with a bridleway-signed fork, keep on down your grassy path, becoming less shaded. Don’t go all the way down to the road where May Lane ends left of Home Farm shop. Instead, before that, take the right bridleway-signed grass track. Up into the right field, follow the field’s left edge wide border round clockwise (just in this field, not the next left one) to the wood’s right corner. Go through the nearby field-edge gap and over the bank and ditch into the higher next field.
4 Bear left to the wood’s edge and follow the green path up alongside it. Past the bridleway-arrow post at the wood’s end corner, continue between two open fields. Past another bridleway-arrow post, walk down to the facing wood’s left corner with another bridleway-arrow post and go right, in the field, along this wood’s edge. When the wood ends, turn left, still following its edge. Past a track which goes into the wood at a backward-pointing bridleway-arrow post, continue to the facing hedge’s wide gap with a two-way bridleway-arrow post on the corner. Through, walk due south across the field, aiming for the far long barrow’s end close to the distant right hedge. Alternatively, if the field has vulnerable crops growing, turn right along the hedge into the corner and then go left around the right trees and along the hedge, still aiming for the long barrow. Either way, cross the line of a grubbed-out hedge into the second field and continue to Pimperne Long Barrow.
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Keep to this track, called Down Road, all the way down and past the right corn-drier barn. The right footpath begins the path back to Newfield Farm which we passed earlier. Past right asbestos World War II sheds and brick workshop, continue down, wide verged now, and pass the right Lo’s Coffee Shop and Fitness Studio. Through the iron-pillared gateway, continue down the road into Pimperne. Don’t follow the road left at Down Cottages. Keep straight on down Arlecks Lane. Down into Church Road, opposite Shire Cottage, turn left back to St Peter’s Church where you started.
Compass Points
Distance: 5 miles/8 km
Time: 3 hours
Start: St Peter' Church, Church Street, Pimperne (Grid Ref: ST904095). Park thoughtfully nearby
Exertion: Not too strenuous. Slopes are long, not steep. No stiles
Map: OS Landranger Sheet 195
Public Transport: Damory 20 Blandford to Salisbury
Dogs: On leads, there are signs everywhere. Abide by The Countryside Code
Refreshments: Dog-friendly Lo’s Coffee Shop for breakfast, lunch and cakes
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