Drove circuit, Bishopstone

The sun had come out around the rain, even the woodpecker was hunting for ants in the lawn again. The puddles were also disappearing (for the moment).

The ridge to the south looked inviting in the sun, so Sue and I chose to do a circuit that way, using the drove lanes.

The river was full and flowing very fast, but still under the bridge.

Cutting behind the "new" houses formed out of the old flint farmhouse, and up the track curving behind, and along to the ridge above.

The track turned into the roman road and headed upwards along a beech tree avenue.

Looking down to the village

Once up on the ridge everything flattened off and opened out into large fields. We headed off along the field edges (unfortunately missing a turn but caught up again at the end of the next field.

Eventually the path across the fields came out on the drove lane ... this started out as a gravel track with a few puddles, but soon got very badly cut up by the off road enthusiasts creating deep mud swamps. However it was easy to escape into the next door field for a less cut up path.

The option now was to continue on the drove road - did not look like it was improving, or cutting up a farm drive heading over to Broad Chalke.

The straight lane ended up at a farm and the path continued straight on, and back into the fields.

The drop back into the valley was quite steep, before coming out on the broad flood plain fields at the bottom.

We followed the path beside the river back to Bishopstone and home.