Middle Hill to Hindon

We'd managed to wrest a few day's walking on the Wessex Ridgeway just before the hour change made serious walking tricky. We'd travelled to Warminster yesterday, Sally coming on from a meeting in Birmingham, and meeting up with Richard in Bristol, then travelling on the Warminster together. We reached Warminster around 7.30pm and had fish and chips from 'Creme de la Cod' in the centre of the town, eaten sitting on a bench opposite. Our meals were freshly cooked and lovely, but be aware that 'medium' portions are huge; 'small' would have been more than sufficient. Stuffed full of fish and chips, we waddled our way back through town and along the road to Boreham and to Home Farm, just before Bishopstrow. We'd seen Home Farm on our walk back from Middle Hill to Warminster at the beginning of September and thought it might be a usefully placed and nice B&B - we were right on both counts! Tricia Legg welcomed us and showed us to an absolutely superb ground floor room, in what was once the farmhouse's dairy. We were off to an excellent start.

We slept well and after a lovely breakfast and a chat with Tricia (who has lived here for 40 years; her husband has lived here all his life) we left Home Farm. It was misty and atmospheric; it rained little bit around Heytesbury, but otherwise it stayed dry all day and the sun came out in the afternoon. We walked a short distance further along the B3414 then we turned up a lane which crossed the railway then joined the military road linking the Imber ranges to Warminster. A big tank came roaring past just before we joined the military road and there was quite a lot of Military traffic on the road running along the edge of the Imber ranges, visible to our left. We left all of it behind us and rejoined the route of the Wessex Ridgeway to climb Middle Hill.

We climbed towards the trees on the top of the hill, with strip lynchets just visible to our left and attractive misty views back to Battlesbury Hill and Battlesbury Wood. The two trees on the summit of Middle Hill are on a tumulus, marked with 'no digging' signs which became a familiar feature on the next mile or so. We descended to a patch of muddy woodland (most places were muddy today...) and then a road.

We immediately climbed again, now steeply through a field of sheep to reach the ramparts of Scratchbury Hill. We had some debate about how high we should go, and we definitely went higher than the signs on the ground would indicate, but it was lovely on the ramparts with good views back to Middle Hill's strip lynchets. We followed the ramparts round to the left for a while, then descended above a wooded hollow (more debate about the route) and crossed a stubble field to reach a slightly more distinct track.

We followed the route of the Imber Range Perimeter Path across a summit to a strip of woodland, then turned sharp right at the far side of the woodland, leaving the Imber ranges behind us for the final time. There were no signs but we were now sure of our route. We descended by the edge of newly ploughed field, stopping to don waterproofs. The guide book had alerted us to Heytesbury's 'remarkably large church' but somehow we were not expecting the squat, towered building that came into view beneath us. We later discovered that this is a Collegiate Church of Salisbury Cathedral and somehow that fits.

We turned left at the corner of the ploughed field then took a path down through the trees (again no sign) to the busy A36. After eventually managing to cross this, we took a path to the centre of Heytesbury. We looked around the church then stopped to take our waterproofs off (it almost immediately started to rain again but it didn't come to anything) and photographed the pretty village. We somehow managed to miss the 'tiny village lock up with its conical roof', but we did admire the attractive Hospital of St John (almshouses) before turning down to a pretty section on the banks of the River Wylye. Pretty maybe (an attractive river and adjacent thatched cottages) but somewhat complicated and not well signed. After passing behind and in front of an old mill we even managed to walk in a complete circle back to the mill!

From Corton we climbed, first up a sunken lane (passing a thatcher at work) then left along a road with good views back to the valley below, then right along a track which initially ran between hedges then emerged onto a stony agricultural road which continued to climb towards the woods we could see on the horizon in front of us. It wasn't an attractive road and when the sun came out we were walking straight towards it. However the landscape was glorious; undulating hills with a topping of trees!

Eventually we reached the woods. The track initially continued in its rather boring form, but we diverted from it and stopped in a lovely little spot for lunch, perched on a fallen branch which, deliberately or otherwise, was suspended a distance above the ground. We returned to the main track which took us through a mixture of deciduous and coniferous woodland, with perhaps the best bits being where the two were mixed up e.g an attractive oak tree in the middle of a track through conifers. The track swung round to the right and one interpretation of the signage was that the Wessex Ridgeway turned left; this didn't feel right, so it was time to get the GPS out, and indeed our route was straight ahead.

After half a mile or so of walking along an attractive wide ride, Richard clutching the GPS to keep an eye on our grid reference, we reached the correct track on the left hand side. Well, it was correct according to the map and the GPS and it had a nice little Wessex Ridgeway sign by it, but there was also orange plastic mesh, perhaps indicating that the route was closed. On the basis of the fact that someone else had already trodden this down, and that we had no idea as to alternative routes, we ignored the mesh and kept going. It looked as if they had tried to improve the path but in doing so had managed to make it extremely muddy. It was OK though, well signposted and through attractive woodland, and partway along this section we saw a large bird of prey of some sort. The relatively good signposting continued for a while and took us along another path through the wood and then along the edge of it, where we saw two deer. Then we descended to another busy main road, the A303 this time.

After crossing the A303 we ascended gradually, with superb views opening up behind us. We reached a road and descended slightly, then took a path which brought us out at the top end of Hindon, a most attractive place with a main street lined with pollarded trees and two inns facing each other across the cross roads in the centre. We were staying at the Angel Inn, and we were pleased to find that this was open although it was before 4pm. A friendly lady showed us to our room ('Guinea Fowl') where we had a cup of tea before going for a wander around the village.