Jevington to Upper Horsebridge to Boship

The Paddocks is a very comfortable B&B, highly recommended, but I’m not good at leaving anxieties about work behind and didn’t sleep well. However when morning came, I was delighted to see that it was no longer raining, and the Sun was shining. What a difference a day makes! Sheila prepared a lovely breakfast, with raspberries, strawberries and blueberries served with lovely yoghurt and followed by scrambled egg and bacon. After discovering that the other guest bedroom at The Paddocks is the former stable lad’s accommodation next to the stables, we met the other couple who are staying, complete with their horse and dogs. We left them (the humans!) eating their breakfast and set off.

To get back to the Wealdway we needed to head back past The Eight Bells, so to avoid the narrow section of road with no pavement, we started by heading back to the delightful Church. From there it is very clear just how much Jevington nestles into the Downs. We continued past the pub and, on the way out of the village, we turned left onto a byway. We found ourselves on a sunken rutted track which climbed onto the Downs then, somewhat to our surprise, descended again to the delightfully named Cranedown Bottom. The byway swung around to the west with occasional views to spectacular downland to our left and to the flatter Weald to our right.

We reached Folkington, which the guidebook reckons should be pronounced “Fowington”. The guidebook also sings Folkington’s praises as a hidden gem of a place and, from what we saw, I wouldn’t argue with this. Unfortunately the lovely little church, which is reputed to have box pews and intriguing inscriptions e.g. to one Catherine Thomas, “a widow before she died”, aged only 23, was firmly locked.

The byway continued through attractive woodland, then we took a track which brought us onto the open hillside, just below the scarp slope of the Downs. Soon Wilmington Long Man came into view and half a mile or so later, we reached his feet! We turned right and descended along a narrow path to Wilmington village, with good views back to the Long Man. The village is a pretty place, with plenty of interest of its own, including Wilmington Priory and a 1,600 year old yew tree in the grounds of the Church of St Mary and St Peter.

I'd hoped there would be a shop where we could buy lunch, but there was no sign of one and although the website implies that the Wishing Well Tea Rooms should have been open, Richard had seen something implying that the tea rooms might be closed. So we kept going, by way of a path out to the west of the village. We stopped to change my camera battery (thankfully I carry a spare) which appeared to resolve the problem I'd been having with the camera sometimes refusing to focus or take pictures. We reached a minor road, which I had naively assumed would cross the A27 on a bridge or similar, but in fact we had no such help. Getting across the fast moving traffic in both directions was a bit scary.

We continued to the north towards the railway, in the company of a flock of sheep which dashed across the field to the corner where we were heading, but thankfully they didn't attempt to get into the railway. Over the other side, we had good views back to the Downs, and soon we joined the Cuckmere River, which we last encountered somewhat further south, between Alfriston and the coast, on our last day on the South Downs Way.

Arlington Reservoir lies slightly to the west of the Wealdway and we could see people walking along the dam, and we were soon walking towards the spire of Arlington Church. After our disappointment over the lack of a shop in Wilmington, we’d resigned ourselves to making do with some of the snacks that we carry for lunch and we were hoping that there would be a picnic bench near the Church. There was, but another couple of walkers were sitting on it; thankfully there were two more benches, so we used one of those for our picnic, before having a chat with the other walkers (who were walking between two railway stations) as they left. Our onward path led directly from the churchyard, and we soon crossed then turned right alongside the River Cuckmere.

We came down into Upper Dicker and walked through the village, past Bede’s School (the Senior School; we passed the Prep School in Eastbourne yesterday). The Wealdway heads down a cut-through from the road, but just past this was the Village Shop - and cafe! We stopped for a delicious second lunch. I had carrot and coriander soup and granary bread and Richard had a toasted BLT...and chips! Our route out of Uper Dicker, by way of a passageway very close to the cafe. took us over Bede's School playing fields, with groundsman busily preparing the cricket pitch, and an event of some sort taking place outside the pavillion. The route goes close to Michelham Priory and a watermill, but I'm afraid to say that we didn't notice either of them. However the countryside was pretty; after passing a young woman out exercising her horse, we walked across a field then skirted woodland, first taking a short diversion so as to take some photographs of the wildflowers in the wood itself.

As we approached the A22, we stopped by a pond and realised that there were good views to what we thought at the time was the Travelodge across the road from the Boship Lions Farm Hotel, where we were heading, but on reflection we realise that we were looking at the rear of the hotel itself. But we took a somewhat circuitous route to get there. First of all we had to get across the A22, even busier than the A27 had been. We were then on the outskirts of Hailsham, indeed we found ourselves walking through a newly built estate that isn't shown on the OS map. We've had some serious route-finding issues in similar circumstances elsewhere in the country, but at least the signposting was good today - most of the way - and when the signposting petered out, we were able to work out the correct route without too much difficulty. We emerged onto the A271 in Upper Horsebridge. The Wealdway turns right here, but we turned left to walk to the hotel. We were very relieved that there was a pavement all the way, though getting across the A22 at the roundabout just before the hotel was again something of a challenge (though at least there was a refuge halfway across on this occasion).

When we booked the Boship Lions Farm Hotel we knew we were taking a risk as it has very mixed, though improving, reviews. The good reviews tend to be from people who were in “refurnished” rooms, but ours wasn’t. It was clean enough but old-fashioned, especially the bathroom, which had curious mix of green bath and pink and blue striped tiles. There were also signs of water damage from the roof above. Most worryingly, although the traffic noise from the A22 diminished when we shut the window, there was a lot of noise from other guests within the building. The whole hotel is an odd place. From the front it looks like what the reception building is, a former gentleman’s residence, but there are several accommodation blocks behind and reasonably extensive grounds, housing inter alia, bizarre statues, artificial lakes with a swan-shaped pedalo, and an enclosure of birds which are either emus or rheas.

The food choices in the hotel restaurant all looked a little heavy for people who had had two lunches, so we had an enjoyable meal in our room of cooked chicken and salads from the service station across the road, though crossing the road to get to and from the service station was again somewhat tricky.

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