Monday 1st January Harlington Annual New Year's Day Walk

16 ramblers met at Harlington village hall for the annual New Year’s Day walk
There were two walks, a short 2.5 mile led by Tony R and a longer 5 mile walk led by Tony P
Both groups left Bury Orchard & walked along Barton Road to the top of the Burrows Lane bridleway.
We descended this with difficulty due to the very slippery mud in places. Poles were almost essential.
In fact one walker left at this time as she felt too unstable in the mud.

Neil & Ruth enjoying the mud

The others trying to avoid the mud

Thankfully as we passed Willow Farm the mud ended.

Maureen & Sheila after the mud

We stopped on reaching The Bottoms to recover from the mud.

Anna, Neil, Kate, Ruth, Mike, Maureen, Sheila, An other & Malcolm

We turned left towards Lower East End Farm but just before reaching the farm we left the lane over a narrow well worn footbridge to enter a field. We followed the footpath past some apple trees to arrive at a modern footbridge with a "No Horses" sign. Once over the bridge we turned right parallel to the brook. On reaching the next bridge we halted for a break & a photo.

All the remaining walkers except for Tony P whose shadow can be seen taking the photo.

Here the 2 groups split, 11 walkers led by Tony P carrying on parallel to the brook & 4 walkers led by Tony R crossing the bridge, turning left & immediately crossing another bridge on a footpath which led back to The Bottoms. This was followed back towards Harlington until they reached a concrete bridge which was crossed. In the next field mud appeared again & everyone struggled trying to avoid the worst of the mud before arriving back at Bury Orchard
The larger group pressed on following the brook until the new bridge was reached, but instead of crossing it they turned right & followed the track past the site of the old hamlet with its fish ponds. This led back to The Bottoms, which was then followed back towards Harlington, crossing the concrete bridge as used by the smaller group. Everyone agreed that this was the most muddy New Year's Day walk ever but at least we kept dry.

Track of longer walk, walked in clockwise direction; shorter walk variation shown on brown dotted.