Castle Ring to Weeford

The weather forecast was again better for this morning than this afternoon so we made an early start from the Rugeley Premier Inn; we actually had a few spots of rain in the morning but it didn't come to anything and the day was otherwise dry, if a little damp underfoot at times as a result of yesterday's rain. We'd had some difficulty finding a suitable end point with parking, but we eventually spotted a suitable-looking lay-by opposite the Church and close to the School House restaurant and wedding venue in the little village of Weeford (SK142038), close to the junction of the M6 Toll (Junction 4), the A38 and the A5, even closer to the B5404 (Watling Street), and about a kilometre from the route of the Heart of England Way (or half a kilometre as the crow flies). We left one car here, parked as far our of the way as possible (in case or hordes at either the church or the restaurant), and drove back through Lichfield to the Castle Ring car park at SK045126 and we started walking at around 8.45am.

We turned left out of the car park, with the wooded area adjacent to Castle Ring to our left and a pub and then the houses of Cannock Wood to our right. At the end of the road we took a path around the Gentleshaw (covered) Reservoir (and actually there seems to be some doubt as to whether it's a reservoir at all) and this brought us to the hamlet of Gentleshaw - I say hamlet because of its size as shown on the map, but the place does have a school and a church, both of which we passed, so perhaps it's a village really. We were looking for the correct route onto Gentleshaw Common and, bizarrely, the route of the Two Saints Way and the Heart of England Way seem slightly different at this point; we followed the Two Saints Way signs onto the Common just opposite the Church and initially (until the Heart of England Way joined us perhaps) it was a bit overgrown. After that, we followed a pleasant path down the wooded north-eastern edge of the Common, close to the road, but it's quite a small area so there were good views over the open heathland (including pretty heather, as yesterday on Cannock Chase) to the town of Burntwood to the south.

We left the Common at a cross roads and took a path over a stile on the other side of the road. As we descended through fields we passed a local woman, out walking with her little dog. Getting the dog over/under/around stiles was clearly a bit of problem so she let us past before we negotiated the double stile at the bottom, and from here we followed a stream and out onto a road. We passed Green Lane Farm and took a muddy track past a camp site and a fishing lake. The track emerged by the Nelson Inn at Creswell Green.

As we crossed more fields we passed some horses...then suddenly there were lots of horses, and small children, and horseboxes, with a loudhailer announcing that the event was about to begin. It appears that we had arrived just before the start of a gymkhana. Later, when I Googled appropriate words to try to find out more details, I found a wonderful new-to-me walking webiste, "The Rambling Owl'", actually accounts of the walks of two brothers. When they walked the Heart of England Way, back in 2013, they had an almost identical experience when they encountered a gymkhana in the same place - read all about it here.

After a short stretch on minor roads we left the road at Keeper's Cottage and crossed fields again, stopping for Richard to put on his sunhat and for me to put on suncream. Our experience in this section was not really the same as The Rambling Owl's as they were surprised by an early view of Lichfield Cathedral whilst we were frustrated by half obscured and unphotographable views of the spires in the distance, a consequence of walking in the height of the summer perhaps? We emerged onto Abnalls Lane, curious in that we were walking past cliffs. We continued past some grand houses, including the Maple Hayes School for Dyslexics, somewhere in the distance between the closed gates. We took a path shortly after the School and looped around an attractive common to Pipe Green, now definitely with glimpses to Lichfield Cathedral (though still unphotographable because of the trees).

We crossed the A51 and continued towards the centre of Lichfield, on a path around the edges of parkland. The route at this stage was not entirely clear, as is so often the case in towns, but we reached the Cathedral by exactly the expected route. It was a Sunday morning and a service was in progress, but Chapters Cafe in the Close was open so we stopped for a cup of coffee, reading up on Lichfield's history as we drank. Bizarrely (or so it appears to those of us who have lived "up north"), the founder of Lichfield Cathedral was Bishop Chad, who was born of noble parents in AD623 and was a pupil of Bede. The guidebook informed us that Chad insisted on walking everywhere, and so suggested that perhaps he should be the patron saint of the Heart of England Way!

We continued through Lichfield, past Stowe Pool (originally a Medieval mill pond and now a reservoir), along Dam Street and through the Market Square, past St Mary's Church and the statue commemorating Samuel Johnson, perhaps Lichfield's most famous son. We continued through the centre, with its attractive mix of modern and older black and white buildings, then climbed through a modern shopping centre, over the railway and up through housing estates, now with the good view back to the Cathedral that had eluded us on our way into the city. Actually the views were to four spires - three on the Cathedral and one on St Mary's Church, on the same line of sight.

We reached the A51 on its way out of Lichfield. The instructions were to turn left here and to follow the main road for a kilometre out of town, crossing the busy A38 en route, so we were delighted to find Heart of England Way signs clearly indicating a different route: we crossed the A51 andwalked down onto the tow path of the Lichfield Canal, currently being restored by the Lichfield and Hatherton Canals Restoration Trust. There is only a short section here, and it didn't all have water in it, but some did - and there was the added advantage of a picnic bench where we stopped for lunch. We continued along the tow path, past work being done on the canal, then climbed back to the A51 and crossed it back on the original route of the Heart of England Way, across the A38 bridge and on to the Horse and Jockey Pub. Here we crossed the A51 for a final time and turned right at the end of a long brick wall.

We walked through the farmyard of Buck's Head Farm and turned right onto the B5404, which I guess used to be the route of the A5 and even longer ago it was Watling Street. The route of the Heart of England way very soon turns left down a track, but we went on for another 500 metres or so, before turning down the minor road to Weeford. We were soon back at the car, though the lay-by was now full, as was the car park of the School House restaurant and an overflow car park...it's clearly a popular place on a Sunday.

Following leg