Ridgmont to Cranfield

Just two days ago Richard and his brother Phillip moved their parents from Sussex to a residential home near us in Norfolk (actually the same residential home where my mother lived from 2001-2005, but that was before JordanWalks i.e. prehistoric!) and I was in between two crazily busy weeks at work, even by my usual standards. We'd spent the Saturday and Sunday morning catching up a bit, but we were determined to get some exercise and retain some sense of normality, which for us on a Sunday afternoon means a walk prior to a Chinese take-away and an overnight stay at the Bedford South Premier Inn. OK, it wasn't as long a walk as we'd have attempted in more normal circumstances, but it was quite a warm afternoon, so a relatively short walk relatively late in the day was a good compromise. It was a pleasant and varied walk.

We left one car in Cranfield (in a lay-by opposite the new St Paul's site of Cranfield Church of England Academy on Braeburn Way (SP957426), with access via Flitt Leys Close) then drove to Ridgmont; it was one of those occasions where the drive was a lot further than the walk. We'd walked through Ridgmont about a year ago on the Greensand Ridge Walk (described here and here), so we knew where to park, on the verge at the north-eastern extremity of the village (at SP978363). In fact the route of the John Bunyan Trail leaves Ridgmont on the same route as the Greensand Ridge Walk, down a passageway from the High Street and onto Lydds Hill, and on this occasion we stayed on Lydds Hill whilst the Greensand Ridge Way took a right hand turn to skirt Lowhill Plantation. We meanwhile continued to Station Road where we turned right then followed the road away from the village, with good views back to it.

We were heading torwards the M1, and we turned right onto the A4102 which took us under the motorway and thence to a roundabout, the junction of the A4102 and the A507, with a sliproad leading to Ridgmont Station straight ahead. Meanwhile we left the road and we took a slope which zig-zagged onto a bridge over the A507. On the other side of the road we were in open countryside, though Amazon's distribution centre at Brogborough was not that far away to the left. We turned left at Brogborough Middle Farm and soon crossed a railway line; the railway is the Marston Vale line which runs from Bletchley to Bedford, though places such as Bow Birckhill and Kempston Hardwick (from whence I caught a train on a cold day back in January, en route to a friend's 60th birthday celebration). There were good views to the remaining four brickmaking chimneys in Marston Vale.

We had already noticed that the signposting of the John Bunyan Trail on today's walk was less than brilliant, with signs tending to crop up when we were on a clear track but being non-existent when the route was uncertain and immediately after crossing the railway line we must have taken the wrong route. We found ourselves crossing an area of open scrubland (probably overlying old brickworks, but it felt rather nicer than that suggests), were pleased with the photograph we took of the old plane that passed overhead (probably from the Shuttleworth Collection), and headed confidently down a slope...into a bramble patch with no way through. OpenStreetMap came to the rescue, we were too far east so we retraced our steps closely then cut across to a clear track - complete with signposts. Come on Mr Bunyan (or Bedfordshire County Council...), where was the signpost when we needed it?

The track took us to a group of ruined buildings where we turned left (now well signposted) on a track which took us to the former route of the A421 close to Brogborough Hill (which I remember well) then on a bridge over the new A421 (which I know even better!). There were good views from here to the Greensand Ridge to the south-west and to Lidlington Lake (very obviously a pit infill, again presumably linked to former brickmaking activity) and Marston Vale to the north-east. From here a clear track took us past a radio mast and some houses, with blaring music coming from behind a hedge at one point, though we couldn't see any people! We were passed by a car, then did a dog-leg right then left.

After a slightly more "industrial" walk up to this point, we were now into a delightful agricultural landscape, walking past fields of corn, wheat and broad beans to our left-hand side, with excellent views all the way back to Ridgmont, to the Greensand Ridge near Bow Brickhill and to the Milton Keynes Snowdome, whilst skirting Reynolds Wood and then Hulcote Wood to the right. By Wood End Farm the woods had ended and the track had twisted its way to the edge of the ridge along which we were walking, giving spectaular views over Marston Vale. We couldn't help but reflect on how much more pleasant it must be to live here now than would have been the case just a few decades ago, when there would have been the smell and view of brickmaking all around.

The track became a road and took us to be what I consider to be the nicer end of Cranfield, complete with an attractive church. We turned right onto High Street and followed this to Flitt Leys Close and so back to the waiting car.

Following leg