Blandford Forum to Shillingstone to Ansty

We had travelled to Blandford Forum yesterday, by train to Poole (using our new 'two together' railcard) and then on the X8 bus. The journey was excellent apart from complete confusion in Poole, when we couldn't find either the bus station or the bus stop nearest to the railway station, then there was a heavy shower and we were drenched. We had plenty of time and sorted ourselves out in time for the bus an hour later; and we later realised that the problem was that we had left the railway station on the opposite side of the railway line from the one we were assuming. Anyway, we were in Blandford Forum around 4.30pm and we had an extremely pleasant evening and night, staying at Bryanston Cottage (with views to die for) and a lovely meal at Vecchia Roma, a small Italian restaurant.

We left Bryanston Cottage around 9.30am after a lovely breakfast, and we bought sandwiches for lunch from a baker's shop on the Market Place. We chose to walk back to the Wessex Ridgeway in Shillingstone, by following the North Dorset Trailway [note added 2023: this now forms part of the White Hart Link]. It's a former railway line, and it was hard on the knees in places (with a tarmac surface between Blandford Forum and Stourpaine). However it was generally at the better end of what I'd expected, with lovely wildflowers and greenery on the banks and good views - and the rain held off (for now - the showers came later in the day). The Trailway leaves the route of the railway at Stourpaine, and goes through the village itself, a pretty little place.

We left the North Dorset Trailway at the point where it crosses the route of the Wessex Ridgeway in Shillingstone and we were soon back where we left the Wessex Ridgeway in October. We crossed a field then climbed steeply past a few houses then through Eastcombe Wood. The guidebook describes this as one of the longest and steepest climbs on the whole path, but it didn't seem that bad. 

As we emerged from the wood, views opened up in all directions apart from behind of us (because of the trees). The better route, signposted in Wessex Ridgeway style to Okeford Hill (where we were going) seemed to be to the right, but there was a path across the field straight ahead, with a Wessex Ridgeway sign to 'the viewpoint'. The map definitely shows the route going in this direction, then right, back to the other route...so that was what we did. It didn't make a lot of sense (we later worked out that we'd correctly followed the Wessex Ridgeway walkers route, as opposed to the riders walk which goes the other way).

Our route went back into the wood, on a delightful little section, then emerged onto a road near a fire-basket-type beacon. The map shows a car park and a picnic place here so we were optimistic; however the first thing we noticed was what looked like a camouflaged tank, with soldiers running around it. It turned out to be a landrover, with an adjacent tent, so well camouflaged that it looked like a tank! We sat at another table and ate our lunch, as the soldiers un-camoflaged the land-rover and took down the tent and the adjacent aerial.

After lunch we continued along the edge of the escarpment, now with good views over Blackmoor Vale. The track descended and emerged onto a road - and we started a long climb up Ibberton Hill. We saw a fox in fields to our left and there were good views to the right. We could see rain in the distance but we didn't get wet at this stage.

We continued along the road past Woolland Hill, with yet more beautiful bluebells, and a different vista began to open up, with an attractive series of lakes beneath us to the left. We reached Bulbarrow Hill at about the same time as what looked like a sponsored walk in aid of breast cancer research. We, and the walkers, took a path to to the hill fort of Rawlsbury Camp, dominated by a large cross.

We sat down to sort out my feet (two toes were rubbing together and beginning to hurt) then descended. We passed through a field of sheep and stopped to pass the time of day with a  walker coming the other way, commenting on how fortunate we had been with the weather. Soon afterwards we put on our waterproofs for the third time today, and this was the first time that the rain persevered. The path was also puddly and muddy in places, from previous rain, so we were soon pretty muddy too. Paradoxically, we were happy to ford the stream, near Crockers Farm, because it provided an opportunity to wash the mud off our boots. We meandered our way towards what we assumed to be the Dorsetshire Gap, passing around the edges of two crop fields rather than across the middle, then turning left towards Breach Wood.