Thornbury Wayfinders

9 Ridges and Wrinkles about 13K or 8.4 miles

This walk explores the Severn Ridges Landscape as defined by the South Gloucestershire planners Landscape Character Assessment. It is dominated by the M5 and the A38, but the views serve to compensate for this.

This route was originally planned to use the 622 to the ASDA bus stop at Cribbs Causeway Shopping Centre. Nowadays, you will need to book a West Link minibus to get to the start. On the other hand you could use Walk 10 from the T1 stop at Aztec West roundabout to the Banana Bridge. The two routes cross at various points.

There is a potential lunch stop at the Old Fox at Inner Down Old Down.

Head along the front of the store. At the end turn left and make your way through the car park to some steps leading to a footpath in the far  corner. (The tempting path along the end of the building leads to a steep grassy bank so keep to the car park.)

Go over a footbridge  and turn right through the remains of a kissing gate into a narrow field.

This is known as the Eagle Field because of the Roman remains found here when they were building the motorway.

Follow the stony track until it bends to the right, when you need to follow the fainter footpath straight on through the trees. Make your way through a kissing gate and up some steps onto the embankment, which is supposed to protect the houses on the right from traffic noise. 

You will have to put up with the traffic noise, but you should be compensated by the views across Avonmouth and the Severn on the left.

At the end of the berm or embankment, descend to access the footbridge over the motorway.

 This used to be the site of the Banana Bridge. It was replaced when the M5 was widened and is no longer shaped like the eponymous fruit.

Over the footbridge, turn right alongside the edge of the wood.

The actual course of the right of way along the edge of the wood is actually obstructed, but you have a common law right to walk around obstructions. Different people may interpret this in different ways. I prefer to avoid the obstruction by walking through the wood. But it has to be said that trees do fall down, and if there is no definitive path, no-one has a duty to clear it. Others prefer to keep to the field.

In any case, the various versions of the route come together after the end of the wood, where there are views towards the River Severn, which are partially obstructed by the old Almondsbury hill fort, which is now occupied by private housing.

You should come out above a bungalow. There is an obstructed stile just above the bungalow, but most people use a gap in the hedge instead. Through this, the path heads around to the right towards the North Bristol Rugby Club’s practice pitches.

There is an enclosed path on the left which is designed to discourage walkers and their dogs from encroaching on the pitches. (The enclosed path is blocked by a fallen tree at present.)

If you use this you will come out next to a gap which leads into an open space belonging to Almondsbury Garden Centre.

Follow the path to the right along the rim of the basin that has the garden centre in it. At the end you should find a kissing gate that leads to a path between the houses down to Over Lane.

Cross the lane into the trees opposite. Turn right on a path that shadows Over Lane. Enjoy the views over to the left. When you come to a tarmac path, cross it onto a narrower path, (You may want to jink up to the right to avoid a steep drop.) The path goes past a disused quarry before coming out onto the grass. Keep left alongside the brambles to come out on Hollow Lane.

Turn left and then right on an enclosed path that comes out on The Scop. Turn left. Go past Glebe Field on the left and Church Road, which leads to the Bowl Inn. Past Chestermaster Close on the left look for a kissing gate on the right.

Through the kissing gate, you come out in an extensive commercial orchard. Follow the main diagonal track through the orchard. When the track nears a hedge on the left, turn left and follow the hedge until you come to a kissing gate over a bridge on the right.

In the next field, follow the hedge on the left around to a stile next to a gate in the far left hand corner. Ignore the track on the left and go straight through a pedestrian gate next to a field gate and then a stile. Follow the hedge on the left past some farm buildings and a house. 

Torn left over a stile and down some steps into an enclosed path that will take you to a kissing gate into a rough field. Follow a path through to the diagonally opposite corner of the field, where you come out through a gap next to a gate into Tockington Lane.

Cross the road carefully into the bridleway opposite.  Follow the bridleway, which can be muddy and wet around a couple of bends to emerge on Moor Lane past Chihuahua World. 

I am pretty sure that the sound I mistook for an unusual bird was actually a chihuahua. There were also French bulldogs and a young chestnut coloured mastiff adding to the welcome!

When you come out onto Moor Lane, turn right and follow it under the motorway (M4). 

Past the entrance to a sewage works on the left look for a kissing gate. Go through this and the pedestrian gate that follows and follow the fence on your right to stile.

On the other side of a grassy track cross a gated footbridge over Tockington Mill Rhine. Go through a kissing gate and head straight up the field to a kissing gate onto a road. 

On the other side, climb over a stile and follow the fence on your right up the field. There is a stile next to the field gate, which was tied open when I was there last. Continue up the hill to a pedestrian gate into an enclosed path.

Turn right to a stile into a muddy lane. Continue down the lane over a stile next to a gate. At the bottom, when the lane bends to the right go into the field ahead over a stile.

In the field, take the path diagonally to the left to a kissing gate in the far corner. Head up the right hand fence to a similar kissing gate onto a road.

Turn right and follow the footway into Tockington. 

When you come to a green on the right, turn left into a lane between the houses. When this resolves itself into a footpath, follow it to a stile into a field. 

Turn right and follow the path to a kissing gate onto the road. Cross the road and turn left.

Follow the footway until you come to a kissing gate. Follow the enclosed path up onto Tockington Hill. Follow the footpath along the hedge on the right and across the Old Down Cricket Clubs Pitch. (Act sensitively!)

On the other side, continue to follow the left hand hedge to a kissing gate at the far end onto Merryhole Lane. Turn left.

Turn right on a road called the Down, then right again into Inner Down. 

This is an opportunity to visit the Fox Inn.

Continue past the pub and follow Inner Down until you emerge on Hazel Lane. Turn right. After the end of the houses and a wood on the right, Look for a stile after a gate on the left.

This is Strode Common. Follow the path along the top of the ridge until you come to a pair of stone gateposts ahead.

Go through the gateway and descend the slope to a gate at the bottom of the hill. Go through the gate and turn right. Keep right when the path forks and follow the path past an archaeological dig.

Continue past the dig to join a bridleway that descends to a gate onto a road.

Turn left and keep straight ahead up Greenhill Lane. Continue until you emerge in the Green Hill area of Alveston. On the road, turn right and then left through a kissing gate onto the playing field.

Head left handed around the cricket pitch if there is a game on to find another kissing gate in the diagonally opposite corner (between the row of detached houses opposite and the skate park)

Turn left alongside the A38 and follow the footway until you can see a stile on the far side of the road.  (It is after a driveway and before the large signpost to Thornbury.)

Cross the road carefully and go over the stile into the field

In the field bear left up the field to a pedestrian gate in the diagonally opposite corner of the field. Go up the driveway to a kissing gate onto The Street.

Go across The Street to a concealed kissing gate on the footpath opposite. Go straight ahead to another kissing gate and stile among brambles in the hedge opposite. (If the white electric paddock fencing is in place use the insulated handle to disconnect it and put it back afterwards.) Continue straight ahead to a gap into the next field and turn left. Head for a stile in the corner of the field. 

Cross the A38 carefully and look for an enclosed path beside the grounds of the Premier Inn. At the end cross the Old Gloucester Road into another enclosed path and follow it until you come out over a stile into a field.

Head straight across the field on a path that leads to a kissing gate.

Admire the view. 

Head down the field to a gap next to a stile. Bear right across the next field to a gap in the corner. 

Through the gap, turn left alongside the Leisure Centre Car Park.

Go past the skate park and continue straight ahead between Vilner Wood and the industrial estate. Continue past the Tesco Car park and go under an old railway tunnel into Streamleaze.

Turn left and then right to emerge in Rock Street. Turn right to return to the bus stop where you started.