Ditton Priors Walk 7

1. Starting from the Village Hall, turn right along Station Road towards Middleton Priors and, after about 300 metres and the last house, take the waymarked footpath on the right. Continue straight ahead and in about 100 metres you will cross a grassed private airstrip -take care!

2. Continuing in the same direction, go down the hill along the field track to a stream. Do not cross this, but, keeping the stream on your right, follow it along to a gap in the hedge. Go through this and carry on, following the stream for a further 300 metres until you reach a footbridge, marked Plowden’s Bridge, an ancient crossing point named in medieval documents.

3. After crossing the bridge follow the stream again, now on your left, for a short distance to a stile. Cross this and go straight on through one field leaving by a stile on to the Middleton Priors -Neenton lane.

4. Upon emerging on to the lane turn left over the bridge, then right towards the Mill, the last survivor of several mills which once operated on this stretch of the Rea Brook. After crossing another bridge, go left over a stile, follow the right hand hedge until you cross a second stile into woodland, and then follow the sunken track up to the top of the wood. Continuing to the end of the right hand hedge, go right for 50 metres and then tum left along the track leading from a bam conversion.

5. At the first gateway the path goes diagonally right across the field, although it might be easier to stay on the track and follow the left hand field boundary. After crossing the footbridge over Pudgbatch, an ancient name signifying “valley of the toads “, go over the stile into the meadow and then turn left, aiming for a gap in the hedge to the left of a large tree. Here you will cross a sleeper bridge and a stile. The path then goes across the field diagonally right, although again it may be preferable to follow the right hand hedge, which will bring you to a track at the top of the field.

6. Here go right and after 150 metres, you will see that the track swings right by New Farm Bungalow. Do not take this track but keep straight on along the left hand hedge and continue along the grassy track, through a small coppice, to emerge into a field. Go left here, taking the path which goes diagonally right to the corner of the field, where you will cross the parish boundary (Ditton Priors -Neenton) into the next field.

7. Follow the right hand hedge for 250 metres to the gap, go diagonally left across the field and then follow the old track for 300 metres to the yard of Park Farm. Go straight down the track until the left hand bend just before the cottages and taking the track to the right, continue to the stile bringing you into a large field, where the line of the path goes straight across to a gap in the far hedge, again the parish boundary.

8. Go through into another large field. The path goes straight ahead, but you may prefer to follow the left hand boundary until you come to a stream. Cross by the sleeper bridge and stile and head straight across this very large field to cross the brow and join a hedge on the left-hand side. Continue along the hedge to cross a stile and then bear left to reach the drive to Middleton Mill, from where you will be able to reverse your outward route.