Benthall Hall to Coalbrookdale and return

We'd driven from Milton Keynes this morning and hadn't left as early as we'd planned to, so it was 11am before we'd parked back at Benthall Hall, back where we'd reached in May last year. It being November, we knew it would get dark before 5pm, so we knew time was limited. The route we took turned out to be distinctly hilly, so we didn't get as far as we'd hoped. However, it was an absolutely delightful walk with lots of superb autumn colour, and the iconic iron bridge across Ironbridge Gorge neatly in the middle.

We both had our National Trust membership cards swiped in the car park at Benthall Hall, giving us free parking and meaning we could visit the Hall if we had time later in the day. For now, I took some photos of sheep in the field oppositie the car park then we retraced our steps from last year, following the track to the left of Benthall Hall Farm. There were good views to some of Shropshire's hills (probably the Wenlock Edge area, though I don't know Shropshire well enough to be sure) and we soon reached Benthall Woods.  As we went through the gate at the end of our track, I'd assumed that we were rejoining the route of the Shropshire Way here, but there was a Shropshire Way (Main Route) sign heading through the gate, which seemed a bit strange. Ah well. I'd been assuming that we would turn right here to take a path that descended steadily through the woods, eventually leading to Ironbridge. However, the path to our right was closed because of a landslip, as was actually the case last time we were here, but I'd forgotten.

The map showing the path diversion sent us left to another descending path through the trees which (according to this map) is the route of the Shropshire Way. Actually, I think there are two paths here; we took the upper one, which was the correct route. We descended steadily, down and down, taking care as we did so because the wet weather in the last week had made it muddy and slippery.   Eventually we could see the water of the River Severn below us, but our descent continued, interspersed with some more level sections and even an occasional slight climb. There were occasional Shropshire Way signs, though not many, and we sometimes had to work out the best route for ourselves. We noticed that there wasn't a Shropshire Way sign at  the point where we reached a level track closer to the River Severn, though it was fairly obvious we should turn right and continue towards Iron Bridge.

We were now following a disused railway line, apparently once the Severn Valley Line, which ran from Shrewsbury to Kiddeminster. We passed some old lime kilns in a former siding and, later, various other former buildings. We emerged at a picnic site by a road, actually the road we'd driven up when we were heading to Benthall Hall this morning. Then we'd approached this point after crossing the river further east and then following it to a sharp bend by the Iron Bridge. Now, we wanted to cross back to the ther side of the river, but because we were on foot we could use the Iron Bridge, the world's first bridge to be made of cast iron.  It was busy, as was the village on the other side. 

It was time for lunch! There were quite a lot of benches in the area overlooking the Iron Bridge, but there were also quite a lot of people sitting at them, and many more milling around, including a group of motorcyclists. Fortunately we found a spare bench, only slightly damp as a result of overnight rain, and we ate our lunch watching the activity all around, and then we moved on. We continued parallel to the river for a short distance, then turned left and climbed up Church Hill, passing behind the church that had been high above us at the place we stopped for lunch. We continued to climb, following the road round to the right, being rewarded by super views to the west, over Ironbridge Gorge and beyond.

We eventually left the road and soon found ourselves once again in lovely woods. We could see from the map that the route of the Shropshire Way makes a significant detour to the left to the site of a former rotunda, only to return back to a short distance from where the loop starts, and the "Walking the Shropshire Way" guidebook indicates that, if you are short of time, you can instead go straight ahead. If we were going to get far enough today to enable us to link up to today's walk after climbing over the Wreken tomorrow, we WERE short of time. However, we couldn't see a viable route straight ahead; it was very overgrown and steeply descending, so we dutifully turned left, as signposted. It was a delightful fairly level walk along to the site of the rotunda, on the summit of Lincoln Hill, and from here there were glorious views in all directions, though trees meant we could only just make out the Iron Bridge, far below.

From The Rotunda, a flight of very steep steps took us back down the hill we had just climbed. It felt as if we went down and down for ever. We eventually reached more level ground and another good path through the woods, though it climbed again before descending to houses and a track that went downhill more steeply to Coalbrookdale Youth Hostel and so to the road through Coalbrookdale. The Youth Hostel is only available for group bookings, but we noticed possible parking spots nearby and then we saw a reasonable-looking B&B, with parking. 

We continued along the road to Coalbrookdale's Museum of Iron;  by now we'd decided not to attempt to go far any further today, given the hills, the fact it would get dark early, and the Benthall Hall car park would be locked.  We'd rather enjoy the walking - and the leg of the Shropshire Way that we didn't manage to complete this weekend (which turned out to be from Coalbrookdale to Little Wenlock) can be combined with a visit, at some point in the future, to the Museum of Iron and the other museums that are currently in the Ironbridge Gorge Museums Trust. Even better, I discovered in writing this page up that the ownership of all the museums will transfer to the National Trust in spring 2026, so we will get free entry to the museums!

For now, all that remained to be done was to return uphill, downhil and uphill again to Benthall Hall.  We'd spotted a return route to Ironbridge along minor roads and it was very pleasant, up Lincoln Hill by way of Church Road, then steeply down the road called Lincoln Hill to Ironbridge. After crossing the bridge, we set off to retrace our earlier path through the woods to Benthall, but almost immediately after leaving the road we struggled to find the correct route; after wandering about a bit, we found it and fortunately we remembered the other turnings, even when there wasn't a Shropshire Way sign to help us. We very much enjoyed the walk back uphill through the woods. 

Back at Benthall Hall, we would have had time to go into the house before it closed, but we decided not to do so (we have visited before). This was to enable us to get at least part of the way to the Shrewsbury Travelodge before dark; we didn't know which way our maps app would send us. However, we had a quick potter around the grounds, taking some photos of the house. 

As we'd climbed up the track from the woods we'd noticed some Shropshire Way signs heading the way we were going, and before returning to the car, on a whim, I checked the field opposite the car park, where I had photographed the sheep this morning. Sure enough there was a Shropshire Way Main Rooute sign here pointing across the field i.e. in a completely different direction from the way we had walked. It turns out this section has recently been permanently rerouted, to "improve path conditions on the approach to Ironbridge". The route now heads across fields to the road we'd driven up this morning, then follows this down to Ironbridge. I was left feeling a little silly not to have spotted the signpost this morning, but very pleased that I hadn't, because if we'd gone the "correct" way, we'd have missed those glorious woods.