Only a couple of days holiday left so helen and I thought we would make the most of it. It seemed to be much brighter today the sun was threatening to come out. I was charged with planning a route while Helen when to church. We had already discussed going to Chesham (Waxwings outside Waterstones) and perhaps along the river Chess, so I streetmaapped that are looking for possibilities. I settled on driving to Chorleywood then underground to Chalfont and Latimer then walk back along the river Chess. There is a much longer walk between Chesham and Rickmansworth, details of which can be found here.
Actually getting walking proved to be the hardest part of the day. We set the sat nav to get us to Chorleywood, but I suspect I chose shortest rather fastest because the quality of roads we navigated were narrow and rural. We finally got to Chorleywood and parked up on the common next to the Amersham road, then headed across the common towards the underground station. As we approached the underground station a BMW estate drove pas and my hand clouted it’s wing mirror, he/she did not even stop to check I was OK, if it had got me higher up my arm if could have done some damage.
Once at the station we god our tickets (£8) and headed onto the platform, only to find the gate to the tunnel was locked and we needed to be the other side of the ticket barriers, but the ticket machines would not let us back in. I managed to force open the barrier, which set off the alarm. Helen refused to squeeze through so we waited until someone opened the gates so she could nip through. During which time a train came to the station and departed, meaning a 30 minute wait for the next one.
Whilst waiting for the train I thought I would get some video footage for a small montage of our walk, but even that was not to be as an Aylesbury train came along before I had a chance, we had to hop on. At Chalfont and Latimer we again came up against locked doors trying to leave the station, but once out we headed through an old housing estate, and eventually came to a woods where the Chess valley walk was sign posted.
Finally we were out in the country side, much to Helen’s relief. It was all down hill to the bottom of the valley where the river was. We joined it level with Latimer house, where there is a lake a a large weir. As we crossed the bridge there where at least 6 large trout in the river. The footpath follows the side of the hill which can be a bit muddy and annoyingly awkward to walk on, but it soon levels out. We were walking with the river flow so the walk would be all down hill, in fact looking at the map it was all of 15 meters (from 78 at the bridge to 63 where we turned off).
We saw quite a few birds on the way highlights were flocks of Redwing/Fieldfare and a single Bullfinch (female). Eventually we came to a very large cress bed farm at Sarratt Bottom which looked that it was a going concern. I wouldn’t mind returning later in the year to buy some. Along the way we also passed the tomb of William Liberty (died 1777) who was the local bridge builder, apparently he wanted to be buried alone so that his bones would not get mixed up when he got to heaven. Seems other people had different ideas as the plaque explains how his wife and possibly another family member were also buried there.
Finally it was time to leave the river valley and head up the hill to the car park. The walk had taken about 2 and a half hours and I reckon we walked about 5/6 miles. We will certainly return another day perhaps to make a day of it and do the full length 10 miles.