Thursday, August 17th, Coleshill to Old Amersham, 10 miles, 11 ramblers, led by Richard and Wendy

It is so nice to go to an entirely new place, and this walk had everything. Good company, lovely weather, scenery, pretty villages and water. Oh, and blackberries!

We nearly fell at the first hurdle: within 200m of Coleshill Church, a Road Closed sign! We ignored it (as there wasn’t much alternative) and it was actually quite passable. We missed the small print ‘closed from 25^th August’

 So we set off, through a most magnificent field of cornflowers. Sue and Ruth tried to collect some seeds, but they were not ready yet. 

Shortly we reached the picturesque village of Winchmore Hill, which unfortunately had cars parked in front of every lovely cottage,  and continued to Penn Street for our banana break at the war memorial on the village green. The family home of William Penn (as in Pennsylvania) is near here.  He was given Pennsylvania by King Charles II as a thank-you for his support – not that it was the King’s to give. 

 We then walked through some woods, appreciating the shade as it was starting to warm up, and then 2km along ‘Toby’s Lane’, an old hedged footpath.   

 

This brought us to the top of a freshly harvested wheat field, and below we could see the flag on the tower of the church – lunch stop- poking out. The village is really lovely, old buildings, and has been used for Midsommer Murders. 

The church had 2 benches and a porch with seats, a good place for lunch, and we chose our seats according to sun worshippers and those who needed to cool off. 

We then went in the church. There was an informative video at the side. The core of the church is Saxon, with ancient wall paintings, and a Norman church was then built around it to extend the nave. The tower was later, in C14. 

 

Off again, this time along a river and some large lakes, part of the grounds of Shardeloes House. Under  the A413, then into the historic Old Amersham. There are some really old Tudor houses here, many nestling between the newer Georgian buildings. 

 

At one end is the old Town Hall and Market Place, and opposite a café that sold Ice-creams….. twenty minutes later…..

And we had the last mile to walk. Uphill with no shade for a short while, but then we were back in shade long the road to Coleshill again. This was quite a long way to go, but such a lovely walk. 

Track of walk, walked in clockwise direction