Stonor – Turville Park Farm – Christmas Common – Hollandridge Lane – Whitehill Shaw - Pishill

14 Apr 2006

• Total distance: 6.5 miles.
• Start point: On the roadside opposite Stonor Park gates, SU 737886.
• Weather: Sunny and pleasantly warm, after a wet morning.
• Temperature at start: 14C.
• Muddiness rating: ** (*=dry, *****=awful) You’ll have to tiptoe through some stuff of dubious animal origin around Turville Park Farm but hey, this is the countryside.
• People passed: One farmer, two rumbustious collies, three chatty walkers, four mountain bikers and a partridge in a beech tree.
• Step counter: 12,605.
• Camera: Olympus C-5060W. Images taken before deletions = 140.

There are many signs of spring but I bet the one that really clinches it for most people these days is the arrival of the Masters from Augusta on the telly. Its irresistible combination of slanting sunshine, fresh green sward, magnolia blossom and hooting birds reminds us just how dandy our springs used to be, back in more primitive times.

But here’s a surprise – the UK versions are still happening. Outside, our springs are still unrolling, with buds bursting and lambs gambolling, just like they used to. It's just that we don’t notice them, because we’re at home, waiting for the golf to start. This whole walk could have been done to the background of Peter Alliss, “Yep, ooh, breaking left, well now, where’s that going, ay ay, oh dear, Larry Mize country, and - well, it’s a cruel old game sir. Alex.” Has anyone got a clue what he’s on about?

I left the car opposite Stonor’s gates, a place I’ve often parked. Touch wood I’ve never had any problem there – or anywhere else in the Chilterns for that matter - although I’ve encountered the odd grumpy git who felt the countryside should be out of bounds to anyone who wasn’t born there or rich enough to buy a slice of it. I headed north, leaving the road after Whitepond Farm and following a good bridleway past Turville Park Farm and into Longhill Hanging Woods. Like most of the attractive forests in this area the trees coalesce, by chance or design, into areas dominated by one species – firs, larches, ash, beech and oak. The path passes through Fire Wood, Queen’s Wood and Prior’s Grove.

I take lots more pictures when I’m carrying my digital camera than I do when I’m using film. Partly it’s because there’s no cost involved, but it’s also because I’m less sure that the images will be up to scratch. In particular I’m suspicious of my camera’s auto-focus logic and its willingness to focus on what I think is important. The monitor on the back isn’t really bright enough to let me assess what’s sharp in bright daylight, and in any case the procedure for calling up the recorded images and zooming in on the relevant area is a bit fiddly. I think I’ll get a digital SLR before long, but I hesitate because the benefit of being able to see what’s really in focus seems to be at the expense of not having a histogram on permanent display – and after spending decades worrying about shadow detail and response curves I find the information in the histogram invaluable. It seems obvious to me that what we need is a histogram that we can see through the SLR viewfinder, in addition to the normal view through the lens. Can any cameras do this? (I’ll probably get hundreds of people telling me it’s been a standard feature for years on the Hokicoki 3000, and it’ll just show how far behind the times I am).

By the time I got to Christmas Common I was sweating buckets, and sat on a tree stump to cool down. A look at the map showed that the path had insidiously climbed 150 meters since I’d left Stonor. The good news was that it would be downhill on the way back.

To be brutally honest Christmas Common hasn’t got a lot to recommend it, apart from a nice radio mast and the Fox and Hounds pub, which I was once dissuaded from entering about twenty years ago but which nowadays gets good reviews for its beer, food and service. I’ll give it another chance soon - the photo of me behind the bar'll be unrecognisable by now, I reckon.

The path back to Stonor couldn’t be simpler or more enjoyable. Hollandridge Lane at its northern end is a bit puddly and often sunken as it makes its way through mature beech woods, but at Hollandridge Farm the surface firms up and from then on it’s a lovely, easy walk down the brow of the hill, along a road untroubled by traffic. There are stunning views on either side which, on a warm, quiet evening in April made me think there wasn’t anywhere else I’d rather have been. Not even Augusta. Not even Larry Mize country.

Click here for map > StonorXmascommonmap

Choose another walk > TheWalks

Pub review > http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/49/4978/Fox_and_Hounds/Christmas_Common

-- RodBird - 16 Apr 2006