Walking on English National Trails around The Chilterns.

Hiking guides for several National Trails such as The Ridgeway, The Icknield Way and The Oxfordshire Way plus walks along the Grand Union and Oxford Canals.

Below you will find descriptions for a variety of English walks (around 21 of them) which might be of interest if you are on holiday in England or visiting our local area - there are many photographs from around the Chilterns on our pages which might be of interest and wish to go sightseeing (even if you are not a walker).

These walks generally work out around 8 to 12 miles - although there are a couple of heavys described too - and are mostly circular and often incorporate hiking along parts of several National Trails. These include hiking on The Ridgeway, The Oxfordshire Way, The Icknield Way and The South Bucks Way as well as parts of the eternally wandering Grim's Ditch and of course the River Thames and it's 185 miles of Thames Path.

The walks visit amongst other places Blenheim Great Park, Woodstock, Thame, Goring, Henley, Islip and Rycote Chapel and some are on The Grand Union Canal and also several which use the The Oxford Canal. By definition of course these long National Trails go somewhere so walking their whole distance involves two sets of transport or alternatively walking circulars and accumulating parts of the routes over a period of time - unless you plan on camping along their routes. We have in fact organised our various walks so that you can cover quite reasonable parts of the various trails simply by following the circular walks descriptions.

Everyone has their preference for what to have on their feet when out rambling but certainly some of these walks really do require walking boots or at least wellies rather than simply trainers. For instance the Oxfordshire Way Trail is quite often really wet in places - it just seems to be the way it finds underground springs on it's route - so sometimes you can be walking through deep slippery mud patches.
It is also of note how quickly the weather can change especially in the winter - we have set out on The Ridgeway in reasonably warm conditions, then ended up being snowed on a few hours later so again taking a bit of gear is worth while - that ridge is quite isolated in places.
The instructions for the walks are for guidance although we believe them to be accurate however of course a good Ordnance Survey Explorer map should be carried/utilised as well. We have taken quite a few GPS readings on the way round these walks because it's great fun to load a map into the computer and plan a route, load it into the GPS, then when the walk is finished load the actual tracking back into the PC and see the results on the map.

GPS is setup on British Grid and to OSGB rather than Latitude/Longitude since our U.K. maps are designed and most easily followed using this setting. Quite apart from the lovely countryside around the area when walking it is always worth slight diversions to look at the churches in the various villages, some of which are very old. In addition at the appropriate time of year we have the "pre-Spring warning" of snowdrop displays followed by the massive displays of bluebells doing their thing in the woods - for example up at Christmas Common; then there are the fantastic autumn leaf displays for which Wendover Woods is justifiably famous.
As far as wildlife is concerned our area is full of all sorts to enjoy - particularly we have a thriving population of Red Kites - for instance around Thame it is very unlikely that you will fail to see at least 5 or 6 and quite often many more of these wonderful birds flying around often at tree height. Other locations to spot these kites is around Christmas Common and up at Stokenchurch and if you are happy to go walking then another good place to spot Red Kites is around Stonor deer park where you often see hawks and buzzards as well as owls and woodpeckers plus many other bird species.

The Complete list of English Walks described on our Sites (each link below will open a new page containing the walk)

Our Home Page has Travel and Holiday Guides, Walks and Photos for Cyprus and for The Algarve. For England we have pages and topics concerning English Church, Wildflower and Toadstool Photos. Having recently walked the Oxford Canal we have at least one photo of every lock and bridge on this beautiful English Canal - also similar photos for the Grand Union Canal and several of it's Arms.
Our Far East pages have items on Hong Kong, India's Goa plus photos from Singapore and Thailand.

On our Islands site we have Holiday Guides for the Canary and Greek Islands of Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, Lesbos, Symi, Skiathos, Lefkada, Thassos, Crete, Samos, Naxos, Skopelos, Alonissos, Andros, Patmos, Mykonos, Corfu, Sikinos, Kos, Lipsi, Rhodes, Santorini, Paros and Paxos.

Go to the Top of this Page For Links or to Email us or for any comments on our website please visit our Home Page.

External Resources
Let's Stay Chilterns Chilterns accommodation and tourist guide.
Let's Stay Cotswolds Cotswolds accommodation and tourist guide.
www.chilternsaonb.org
www.chilternsociety.org.uk
Chiltern Experience Risborough Area Community Action (RACA) - Chiltern Experience website
Walking Routes 100's of links to UK web pages which detail 1000's of on-line walking routes, hiking trails, route directions, route maps etc
Southern Walks Many walks on this site covering the South of England including walks using the Test Way, New Forest, South Downs Way and so on.
Holiday Cottages in England Choose from our huge selection of holiday cottages in England and rent your holiday home direct from the owner.
Travel Drama Directory Directory
United Kingdom Directory
Goring Gap Health Walks Their goal is to provide useful information about their Health Walking group and the area in which they walk.
Abingdon Walks Walk and Historical Walk Ideas - Abingdon Town, River, Country and Boar's Hill Walks

www.foxysislandwalks.co.uk