Abbots Bromley to Uttoxeter

This was a relatively short leg, walked before returning home (Richard to Norfolk whilst I went back to Milton Keynes for work) from our short stay at the Rugeley Premier Inn. After the final section of yesterday's walk, where there were overgrown sections and several stiles that were extremely difficult to negotiate, I wasn't particularly looking forward to it. There were a few similar issues today, but not quite so bad, and I very much enjoyed the walk through the Staffordshire countryside. There were very few landmarks, but that made us more able to focus on the walk on a pleasant summer morning.

Our room at the Premier Inn had again been rather hot, so we hadn't slept brilliantly. We had our breakfast and left the Premier Inn around 8am, driving both cars to Uttoxeter by way of a diversion via Quee Lane because the B5013 was closed to the south of Uttoxeter, and the added complication of a road-laying vehicle which we followed until it stopped at the end of Quee Lane. By the time we had parked one car in the Trinity Road car park (SK094333) opposite Waitrose and managed to pay our £5 (which we had to do online, and it took some time...) and were on our back to Abbots Bromley, they had started patching up holes in the road. With the usual route being closed, it did feel like a case of the right hand not knowing what the left was doing. However, despite reaching Abbots Bromley something before 9am, when parents were arriving to drop their children off at school, there was a parking place left for us on the Market Place (SK081246).

We set off walking at 8.57, heading up Schoolhouse Lane past the School along with all the children and parents, then along Swan Lane and out of the village. We were soon in attractive rolling countryside, and as we climbed, lovely views opened up behind us. All too often, there were stiles to negotiate, some a bit wobbly and overgrown, and many which assumed rather longer legs and more flexible knees and ankles than I have. The route around here has clearly not been much walked, although there was usually a path of some sort visible on the ground, and most of the Staffordshire Way signs were quite old. It was therefore quite a surprise to encounter a relatively new "Staffs Way" sign on the Bagots Park estate, and later there were signs reminding us to stay on the path. It was only when I looked up Bagots Park later that I realised that it is a "sporting [i.e. shooting] estate" which explains the wish to keep walkers on the path and also the presence of a narrow band of woodland by the path, presumably attractive to pheasants. It was also very pretty, though the path through Hill's Wood (a corner of Bagot's Forest) was rather overgrown.

Back in open countryside, we reached Hobb Lane then turned off by New Thorntree Farm, on a track around the farm that perhaps wasn't quite the right route. I was looking for somewhere to change my socks (a regular task on warmer days) and when we emerged, certain of the route again, into a field with cows sheltering by a tree in the centre, Richard found a spot in the shade at the edge of the field. However, I'm nervous around cows and was convinced they were moving in our direction, so we went on to the next stile. Once over it, the stile made a convenient seat on which to sit whilst sorting out my sweaty feet. There was an abundance of wildflowers in the field we were now in, one of several areas of meadow on today's walk, with the yellow of buttercups being particularly memorable.

We passed from OS Explorer Sheet 244 (Cannock Chase and Chasewater) to Sheet 259 (Derby) and realised that we were getting quite close to Uttoxeter. There was a lovely section along Timber Lane, a sunken tree-lined track, and we emerged from this into another meadow, near Field Head Farm, and there were signs of Uttoxeter in the valley below, with the houses of Balance Hill closer at hand. We stopped for an early lunch then walked down into the town. After rescuing the second car from Abbots Bromley we went our separate ways, though we were both initially directed along minor roads towards the A50 (to take us east) and encountered an unexpected (and unknown to Apple Maps) road closure as a result of yet more road resurfacing. I found a good way round, more by good luck than anything else; Richard was not so fortunate.

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