Maiden Newton to Beaminster

We slept well and had a wonderful breakfast at Aquila Heights (Joan thoroughly deserves her Silver Award and her Breakfast award). We walked back to Dorchester West Station and caught the 9.06 train back to Maiden Newton. Once there, we walked through the village to the Spar shop at the petrol station, where we bought provisions for lunch before setting off. After yesterday's glorious walk I had expected to be disappointed today but I wasn't; today was more about pretty villages and green lanes (though there were climbs and descents too) but it was again excellent walking, and very good weather. Bizarrely, given that we are aiming for the south coast, we actually ended up further north than we started - the relentless trend of this section is to the west.

We left Maiden Newton by way of the Church and a lovely walk alongside the upper reaches of the River Frome. We emerged by the pretty little church at Chilfrome, with views to the far grander church at Cattistock. We climbed up on a wooded road and then took a wooded bridleway to emerge on a country lane which we followed for a mile or so. The guidebook is somewhat damnatory of this stretch of road walking, but it was fine. The road climbed, then levelled out passing an alpaca farm.

We reached a more major road and turned left for a short distance before turning right onto an indistinct path across a field. We reached the gate we were going to go through and stopped to sort out my feet, being watched by the cows on the other side of the gate. We negotiated the cows and descended. A few fields later we reached Lower Kingcombe, which is advertised as having an information centre for the Dorset Wildlife Trust, but on the ground it looked more like a residential centre and it was not obvious where we might go. It didn't really matter, because much of the surrounding area is a nature reserve and it was all beautiful.

We climbed up a stony bridleway, which was in places more like a stream bed, to Kingcombe Coppice (more bluebells) then across a field with the 'radio masts' (which may or may not be radio masts now, they look more like half-built pylons) up above us to the right. We reached a road but turned almost immediately straight off it onto a track, and stopped for lunch.

We descended to Hooke, with a delightful pond and Hooke Court, now a residential centre running courses for schoolchildren. We cut across to another lane which brought us to Toller Whelme, with another large pond. The guidebook told us to look out for Canada geese; we had Canada geese and goslings! We continued past the manor house (very nice, but ice cream would have been welcomed!) and climbed up a track to the Beaminster Road, stopping just before the road for a rest in the shade of a lovely tree.

We turned left towards Beaminster, then right for a long loop round to the north. We were initially on a surprisingly busy minor road, then on a track with lots of large puddles that were sometimes difficult to get around, but the views down to Beaminster were excellent. We crossed one road then turned left onto another road and at the Buckham Down picnic area we admired the view then took a delightful if steep sunken track . The guidebook describes this as 'a good downhill gallop towards the down', but I wasn't galloping!

We reached a surfaced lane and continued downhill through Meerhay. It felt as if we were walking through the outskirts of Beaminster for ever, but we eventually reached the little square in the middle of the town. We pottered around for a while, finding postcards (at last) and investigating eating places for later, then we walked up to our B&B, Quigley. Dave Woodroffe welcomed us and we joined our fellow guests for tea and chocolate cake. In the evening, we had a pleasant meal (not steak!) at 'The Steak Out'.

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