Cherry Hill Farm to Knotting

Today's walk on the Three Shires Way encapsulated some of the weaknesses and strengths of the whole trail. There was rather a lot of road walking (presumably because horses aren't allowed on ordinary footpaths) and the tracks and byways were sometimes rather muddy (possibly because horses have been along them, but also motor bikes, whose riders don't see to be able to read the signs that say that motor vehicles are only allowed between April and October!). We also realised just how complicated the layout of the county boundaries is in this area; today we started in Cambridgeshire and ended in Bedfordshire, but Northamptonshire was never far away - we passed within about half a mile of the "Three Shires Stone" (shown on the right) which celebrates the intersection of the boundaries of Huntingdonshire (now part of Cambridgeshire), Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire.

Most significantly, the walk took us through attractive undulating scenery, close to a reasonably direct route between home in Norfolk and my work in Milton Keynes. Both on foot and when driving, we passed through pretty villages with beautiful churches and it was all enhanced by interesting skies and low winter sunshine. It stayed dry all day (though it rained in the evening) and it was remarkably mild for late November.

We left home a little after 9am and followed the usual route past Huntingdon to the A14. However AppleMaps then directed us off the main road and up through Easton - that's the village where my Uncle Bill used to live and which we have already explored on an earlier leg of the Three Shires Way. The road through Easton is pretty minor and we continued on unclassified and B roads through more pretty villages including Stonely, the outskirts of Kimbolton, Swineshead and Melchbourne. Richard, who usually travels 5 or so minutes behind me, all but caught up with me whilst I was waiting to get past a pack of beagles being walking along the road. We were heading to the delightfully named village of Knotting, where I parked my car near the Church of St Margaret of Antioch (TL003635), which has an interesting history - in the 17th Century its rector was defrocked for allowing betting and cock fighting in the chancel. It is now in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.

In Richard's car we drove back to our parking place by Cherry Hill Farm (TL064723) to the north of Covington. He was using Google Maps and it sent us a rather long way round, via the A6 past Rushden then across on the B645). We had the space by Cherry Hill Farm to ourselves today and set off walking about 11.20. The route started by following the road we had just driven along, through the village of Covington. Not wildly exciting, but it's a pretty village, and by the time we had reached and crossed the B645 (thereby crossing the county border into Bedfordshire) we'd begun to notice that there were a few police cars about...

The first part of the route in Bedfordshire was on a track, but we soon emerged back onto a minor road near Lower Dean, and followed this to Shelton. By now we had been passed by quite a few police cars and one stopped to say they were looking for a badly damaged silver vehicle, still being driven, and if we saw it, could we dial 999. A little later, another police car stopped us to say they'd found the car, but if we saw the men who had escaped from it (description provided) please could we let them know. The number of police cars who were involved in the search and the sound of a police helicopter overhead, made us think that this was a major incident, but eventually things quietened down and we never managed to find out any more about what was going on.

We stopped for what we described as a very early "Christmas Lunch" in Shelton (chicken in a sandwich made from sage, onion and cranberry bread) then continued on past the lovely church. We swapped maps, from Sheet 225 (Huntingdon and St Ives) to Sheet 224 (Corby, Kettering and Wellingborough), with some confusion because what had been a road turned into a byway right at the edge of the maps. We continued along the byway to Yelden, passing quite close to a wind farm to our right. We were passed by some motor bikes (and I could have sworn it was November i.e. the part of the year when motor bikes are banned...), then no sooner had the byway become surfaced, with motor vehicles allowed, than we were passed first by two lorries containing something smelly and then by a car towing a caravan!

After the previous pretty villages, I had high hopes for Yelden and I was slightly disappointed. The route doesn't pass the Church and although there are plenty of old buildings, they are interspersed with modern ones. We took a well-made track past Rifle Range Farm and this climbed, with good views to Yelden and the Wind Farm beyond opening up behind us. Eventually we descended slightly to the road we drove along this morning from Melchbourne to Knotting, and we walked along the road to where we had left the car. We drove a much more direct and pretty route back to Covington, though we actually took a short diversion to the Three Shires Stone (which is right on a bend, so it was a challenge to find somewhere to park in order to take the photograph at the top of the page) before returning to the car we had left at Cherry Hill Farm and driving on to MIlton Keynes.

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