Ralph leads the way

Sat 20 Sep ‘25. DH, RW, PC, PCl, JB, Ralph & Scrumpy

When I saw a few weeks ago in the Blackmore Vale magazine that Compton Abbas airfield were holding an open day, I put a note in the diary to arrange a walk there again to see if we would be lucky and have any aircraft flying around, as we did last time we came this way in September ‘23.

Parking again by the royal jubilee memorial at Compton Abbas on the A350, the five ‘old men’ were joined today by the youthful Ralph, now a strong six year old who completed this walk along with his two sisters earlier in the year. He had quickly reconnected with John on tne journey over and was confident that he would remember the way round, without the neeed of a map. Once we were booted up and mainly wearing waterproof coats in anticipation of some rain later, we set off down the path at the side of the church and into the edges of the village.

We admired more lovely Dorset properties again this week, from quaint thatched cottages to large Manor House’s before we followed Ralph as he turned right by a small stream and onto a small track leading south out of the village. John had already been asking him questions about his return to school on the journey up and so he seized the opportunity as he walked just behind Ralph to ask him a few more questions, and specifically trying to find out if Ralph had been in trouble with the teachers at all. From what I could hear Ralph denied everything and played his cards close to his chest and successful managed to change the subject whenever he could. There were a lot of fallen acorns on the path which provided a crunchy carpet above the mud as we slowly started to ascend and before long we were at the gate into the first field, from where we could clearly see the climb ahead of us and our route right around the top of the valley.

Ralph’s memory was spot on and he quickly asked me where I thought the two swans might be today who last time were in an adjoining field pecking at the grass looking for food. This small detail had certainly slipped from my memory (like many others I sensed my wife saying), but Ralph had the location spot on. He was already pointing out the route to the foot of the hill as we followed two foot trails up through the early morning damp grass. Once on the slope the climbing really started and Ralph was happy to get to the gate t first, although wisely John managed to stop him from attempting to squeeze through a gap under it and wait for it to be opened for us all.

As we slowly made our way up the side of the hill the question of the grassy mounds was asked once again. Unfortunately despite a plethora of educated gentlemen the answer was still sadly lacking, although there were a few plausible suggestions. Where’s a scientist when you need one?

The skies were quite grey and it was difficult to see the initial church in the trees as we stretched further up the hill,although I don’t think that was the reason for a multitude of stops as we stuttered our way up. Even scrumpy was getting confused if we were on a walk or a sight seeing trip today.

To make matters worse, there were a few drops of light rain falling and so sheltering behind a large hawthorn bush those who had started without coats on decided that it would be wise to add a waterproof layer before it got too wet, necessitating another couple of minutes breather. Once suitable protected against the elements we continued slowly putting one foot in front of the other and were rewarded when the steep climbing started to level out a bit. Ralph seized the opportunity to rest at the head of the group as he reached a parish boundary stone to perch on and you could almost sense he was tapping his feet inside his black wellies, as he waited for the rest to catch up.

A couple of black Scott’s dogs heading towards us meant Scrumpy was temporarily put back on the lead but once off again is was just the final few hundred metres up to the top gate where Fontmell Downs reaches the C11 between Shaftesbury and Blandford.

Our leader was concerned when we walked past the end of the track down which we descended last time and didn’t seem over impressed when we told him there was still two miles to walk, but as we started the descent alongside the road and turned onto Compton Down, he became more concerned that we were actually going to climb up Melbury Hill today which he could see looming large in front of him. It was no surprise therefore at the first available stile he quickly crossed it to start the steep drop back into the valley. We opted to stay on the grassy side a bit longer before also crossing and walking down a steep chalk track.

As the rest of us made our way down Ralph and ‘Great Uncle John’ decided to spice it up a bit by playing his hide and seek amongst the bushes. I’m not sure who actually won but by the time we had waited for them to reveal their positions whilst we looked up from the bottom gate, I’m not sure who had the biggest smile on their faces as they eventually came down the hill side by side, laughing all the way. We walked along the edge of the field and out into the 

eastern end of the valley in East Compton.

Just a few metres down the road we came to the ruins of St Mary’s Church, All that remains is the 15th Century tower and the remains of cross just in front of it. Between the cross and the tower, obscuring most of it, was a large pear tree absolutely laden with a great crop this year. The ruins including the whole churchyardare now owned by and in the care of the Society for the protection of Ancient buildings.

With only about half a mile to go we pushed on through the village and came to a small holding on our right with a farmer moving his cattle. It’s only when we looked closer that we could see the small ones looked a bit wobbly on their legs as they followed their mums into the next field. I asked the farmer how old they were and he said they were just over 12 hours, having been born overnight. Lovely to see.

We carried on along the lane looking up as a crow chased off a red kite above us, a bit different to last time when we stood on the road for a good five minutes as a Spitfire circled around, at about the same height as the avian dog fight today. A wonderful sound! Heading back to the starting point we passed the car restoration workshop which only had a Morris 1000 ‘Moggy’ van outside today and then on the narrow path through to the old church rooms and our cars parked by the obelisk erected for Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee in 1887, with later additions to commemorate Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee in 2012 and Platinum Jubilee in 2022.

We completed todays 3.25 miles in 1 hour 50 minutes, which considering the climb was good going for the older men, but more especially for Ralph.

A ten minute drive and we were parked up in Shaftesbury heading for breakfast at the John Peel cafe. The service today was a bit slow and random. Some of us made it back to our table at the top of the 1970s looking cafe with our hot drinks, whilst others had to wait for theirs to be delivered. After a bit of a delay we received our breakfasts and we’re soon getting stuck in. Ralph had help from John to get his sauce onto his sausage sandwich, whilst the pair also looked after Scrumpy, before she decided it was her turn to eat. Overall an average breakfast - good job were not scoring anymore!

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