Bincombe to Whitcombe Circular - 3 August 2017

Driving to our agreed meeting place, both Jane and I separately had our windscreen wipers at full pelt to drive away the allegedly 0.3 mm of rain which threatened to put an end to our walk before it had begun. I willed the rain away and looked desperately for a break in the cloud. Nope, it wasn't there! So the forecast was wrong again. I tried not to feel disappointed; there was surely joy to be derived from walking in the rain, wasn't there?

I pulled into the small parking area at Came Wood- the only occupant unless you count the charred remains of an erstwhile traveller's vehicle. When Jane arrived and we shared rain stories. The rain had stopped now but we struggled to hear each other talk above the sound of the wind.

I'd warned Jane of the strong possibility of my route being thwarted by removed footpaths or overgrown stiles. She claimed she didn't care and that her recent reccy of a Milton Abbas walk had rendered her immune to fazability.

We began walking south on the Jubilee Trail towards the mast on Bincombe Hill. I could relax a bit about the gridsquares as I'd photographed most of them already. I love the descent into Bincombe Village and I'd love to see it in winter with snow.

Bincombe Village - SY6884

It is a village I have spent a lot of time in and written a lot about, it being the setting of Thomas Hardy's  The Melancholy Hussar, based on the tragic true love story of Phyllis Gould and her Captain Tina of the Hussars. We went to pay homage to the tiny church, chuckling at some of the book titles for sale there - In the Shadow of Death and Murder at the Vicarage. Jane was reluctant to touch anything after a bad experience in Iwerne church when she had put her hand against an inner door to push it open and set off an alarm. She had later been told that the alarm would have been heard at the local fire station. Oh dear! At least she could laugh about it now and, by the time we'd reached our fourth church, she'd regained her courage to push aside the curtain to the Bell Tower - without any alarm bells ringing!

Holy Trinity Church, Bincombe - SY6884

We continued on the Jubilee Trail/South Dorset ridgeway, heading east and under the great ugly pylons to Coombe Valley Road, where I always get confused with the plethora of footpaths. Not having seen each other for weeks, Jane and I had a lot of catching up to do too, and occasionally I had interrupt (usually at the exciting bit) whilst I consulted my map. Rude, yes, but it saved us going for miles in the wrong direction - and I always reminded her where we'd left off!

Bincombe Down - SY6984

Coombe Valley Road - SY6984

From Bincombe Down - SY6984

Having established our path, we circumnavigated Green Hill and continued on the inland south-west coast path until we reached the interesting bit and then we turned off. Sorry, Jane, but we've got three more churches to visit and they're all in the opposite direction!

So we turned away from the coast, waving it a farewell as we did so, and headed north at Northdown barn, by one of many tumuli on this ridgeway.

Tumulus near Northdown Barn - SY7084

I only had one photo of our next gridsquare - SY7085, and that was of Bank Barrow, a long barrow or burial mound in a field by the road. One day I'm going to have to go and explore this barrow and the Bincombe Bumps nearby. These are known locally as 'music barrows' and it is said that if you put your ear to the top of one at noon, you can hear fairy music. We were too late to visit anyway as it had past noon when Jane and I walked along the minor road after passing several travellers' vans on the track to Northdown Barn.

The track had joined Chalky Road, which is rather a nice name for quite a busy minor road. After a third of  a mile, we turned left towards Poor Lot, which presumably was a name given to a portion of land which was not deemed fertile enough for anyone of more means.

Poor Lot - SY7085

We chose this location for our first stop and then followed the edge of the wheat field rather than walk through on the designated (but now invisible) footpath.

We then walked through six more rather boring fields and two gridsquares before reaching the A352. The fields might have been boring, but we were not bored because we were constantly chatting and I was conscious that we were approaching my first 'new' gridsquare of the day ' SY7186.

Near Broadmayne - SY7186

I was getting excited now; because, although SY7186 was a new gridsquare for me, I had walked through it before, whereas I had not walked through the next gridsquare - SY7287. We had no trouble crossing the road and our footpath was immediately across the road - and it had an amusing sign for us.

Amusing sign on the east side of the A352 - sy7287

Little Mayne Farm - SY7287

We didn't see the earthworks which were marked on the map at this farm, but we did see another interesting stile - this time one using a tyre.

Tyre stile - SY7287

We walked through a field of maize to West Knighton where I inspected a front garden with some burgeoning courgette. I wanted to see if they had more courgettes than me (they didn't!)

St Peter's Church in West Knighton looked delightful as we approached, but we resisted the temptation to have lunch here. I'd promised ourselves we'd picnic at Whitcombe, at William Barnes' church.

St Peter's Church, West Knighton - SY7387

Stained glass window in St Peter's Church, West Knighton - SY7387

Window in St Peter's Church, West Knighton - SY7387

The church was originally built in the 12th Century and underwent some reconstruction work in the 19th century under Thomas Hardy's supervision. My eye immediately glimpsed a circular painting on the east wall. There is an information sheet about this painting which apparently depicts a sun with Hebrew word for Jehovah contained therein.

Picture on the east wall - SY7387

Another nice touch in this church is the two stone mice in the squint.

Mice in the squint, St Peter's Church, West Knighton - SY7387

After leaving the church, we rejoined the Jubilee path and headed north for a short while. At the next junction I took a photograph of another footpath which continued north, just for the sake of being in another gridsquare.

Towards Lower Glebe Farm - SY7387

I was now revisiting territory I'd walked through before, but, for the time being at least, on different footpaths.

Jubilee path to Whitcombe - SY7288

We were in wheat fields again and getting a bit hungry. We both commented that usually we'd have succumbed to hunger pangs long before now (it was 1.30 pm). I blame good conversation and my good flapjack which we'd consumed at Poor Lot. Nevertheless, by the time we reached Whitcombe I suggested to Jane that we eat before going into the church.

Whitcombe Church - SY7188

This seemed a good plan at the time, but unfortunately the wasps thought so too. The moment Jane produced her infamous cheese and beetroot sarnies, the wasps swarmed in in their drones - OK there were only three, but that's three more than either of us were comfortable with. Then my hat blew off and over the wall. I managed to retrieve my hat before we decided to retreat into the church porch (was this why I'd done exactly the same thing almost exactly a year ago when visiting the church?)

We didn't last long in the porch either because the wasp followed us in, so we retreated into the church and managed to scare the wasp out and breathe a sigh of relief. After all, when you've looked forward to your cheese and beetroot sandwiches (ham and cheese in my case), you should be able to eat them in waspless peace!

I love the simplicity of this William Barnes church. It is no longer used for regular worship, but they definitely hold a Christmas service here every year which I think must be very evocative.

We continued on the Jubilee Trail, heading westwards towards Winterborne Came and our final church of the day. This is the final resting place of William Barnes, friend of Thomas hardy, minister and Dorset dialect poet. Despite this, it was our least favourite of the day as it is always so dark and feels a little unwelcoming.

Bible in St Peter's Church, Winterborne Came - SY7088

St Peter's Church, Winterborne Came - SY7088

William Barnes' grave, St Peter's Church, Winterborne Came - SY7088

We headed south on the last leg of our journey, past Cripton Cottage and Cripton Barn, through fields to the unwelcoming Came Wood with all the private and keep out signs I remembered from previous walks. They must have had quite a lot of unwelcome intrusions to warrant the amount of paint and barbed wire which daubed the trees and adorned the gates.

The final part of this walk is along a busyish road, but fortunately not for long. Then we were able to compare notes on socks, boots, butterflies and plan our next walk. Remarkably the walk had consisted of not one single wrong turn and had been almost exactly the length I'd said it was going to be, which is more than can be said of the weather. We'd had not one drop of rain all day since we'd been out of the cars!

Number of species of butterflies: 9
Number of new gridsquares: 4
Number of miles walked: 11.4
Number of churches visited: 4
Number of wasps: 3