Short summer solstice stroll

Sat 21 June ‘25. DH, DL, JS & Albus

The sun had risen over Stonehenge a few hours earlier and was climbing into the mid summers morning sky as just the three of us from Wincanton arrived at Pen Selwood village hall for a slightly shortened walk around Pen Pits. With the forecast for another day of temperatures in the mid to high twenties, the aim was to stay in the shade as mush as possible and be back home before it got too hot. During the late summer heat of 2023 three shady men also walked this same route, although in the opposite direction.

Ensuring we had our hats on and were carrying some fluids we set off in a clockwise direction and past a wonderful barn conversation before finding some good shade under the overhanging trees. Previously we have headed into the fields on the left and then swept around to the woods but today we stayed on the track to Pear Ash and then left down to Gasper Lodge to join up with our longer route again. We turned right onto a narrow path and it was soon pretty obvious that this is a well used horse walking route, and that we had been preceded by at least one of the said animals earlier that morning. The ground was surprisingly damp even though it had been a warm week, and as we started to drop lower, the pathway soon became a small watercourse although thankfully not flowing much at all. With John leading the way through the more boggy areas near the bottom we we pleased to escape the muddy track and come out by the small ford.

This little area is one of my personal favourites in the whole of the Stourhead woods, and just standing on the wooden bridge in the almost silence listening to the River Stour trickling beneath, is enough to calm anyone and feel at one with their surroundings. Albus took a brief paddle in the water as we checked out the recent works on the side ditches to enable the heavier waters of winter to get to the river more easily.

After a few minutes of standing around by the waters edge we set off again up the ‘private’ lane and then took a left by the sign for the Stour Valley Way. This long distance walk starts at Stourton and follows the river as it flows out of Wiltshire and into Somerset for a short period, (in the very area we were walking) before entering into Dorset where it then flows to join the sea at Christchurch harbour, between Hengistbury Head and Mudford, a distance of 64 miles.

Our path took us along by the banks of the river for a couple of hundred meters to a small wooden bridge, where we turn right and headed uphill away from the water. This area has always been troubled with damp boggy ground and although there have been many attempts to make it easier to cross in the past, the addition of a new metal bridge over a small re-entrant has changed the route totally. As we passed underneath the thatched cottage of the land owner, who also has one of the five motte and Bailey castles in Stourhead woods on his private land, another wet area was crossed by means of large concrete stepping stones, made to look like sections of fallen trees. As we exited the wood into Combe Bottom we stopped to take this weeks group photo at the other of my favourite locations in these woods. The view up the Coombe never fails to delight whatever time of year we come here.

Albus was quick to spot the small stream running through the bottom of the Coombe and happily stood in it for a while cooling off his feet before we all managed to carefully step across the rearranged stones of a child made dam constructed recently by kids enjoying the summer weather (haven’t we all done it)?

At the top of the slope Albus passed through the unusual dog flap whilst the rest of us climbed the stile into the small lane. We paused for a few moments to look at the Silk family memorial stones on a wall by the group of properties known as Castle Orchard, before heading back into the woods.

As we climbed through the shade of the woods we had to negotiate our way around the edge of some of the pits that this area of Pen Pits is named after. It appears that during the 19th century that there was quite a debate about the origins of the pits including that by the inspector of ancient monuments going by the name of Pitt-Rivers. A more recent investigation by South Somerset Archaeological Research Group provides a much better description of their formation and use as well as other historical information about the area and some historical finds.

We continued winding through the woods, climbed a large flights of steps and passed close to the former home of composer and conductor, Sir Arthur Bliss, and then out through a farm which is certainly being extended and enlarged a little bit more each time we pass this way. A familiar sign indicated that we were on a section of the Macmillan Way at this point. We then followed the road back round towards our starting point, pausing briefly to look at the village war memorial and also the new play park opposite. I have done some basic research on the men listed on the memorial and interestingly Joseph Hazzard who lost his life in 1917 at just 20 years old, formerly lived at the previously visited Orchard Cottage. We completed this weeks walk of just 2.6 miles in ninety minutes.

We had debated all the way around about where to go for breakfast, Hillbrush, Kimbers or the Angel Corner but in the end decided to head closer to home and managed to get an outside seat at the River Cale cafe, where we all had a good breakfast and a lengthy natter with other well known residents of the town out enjoying the morning sunshine.

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