Walks Near Bloxham

Archive for the ‘Length: 3 – 5 miles’ Category

• Start: within Bloxham – Courtington Lane
• Length of walk: 4.3 miles (6.9km)
• Steep hill- Can avoid by starting along Ells lane instead of up Hobb Hill.
• Dog hostile – stiles from Ells Lane to Broughton impossible for large dogs.

Introduction

Hobb Hill offers a panoramic view of Bloxham. In the snow it is a mass of slithering humanity utilising gravity assisted motion on sleds, trays and polythene bags!
Broughton is the site of Broughton Castle but this is not directly on the route.
There are historical references to Robert de Wykeham, mill owner, around 1218. The Mill would have been powered by the waters of the Sor Brook.
More recently the Wykham Mill Buildings has been the site of manufacture of the Jaguar XJ220 and then subsequently the Aston Martin DB7 from 1994 – 2004.

GPS Data and Route

Google Map

Click here for a Google satellite view of this walk.

Ordnance survey maps

You need OS Map 191
You can get an online OS map here.

• Start: On Northern edge of  Bloxham in Grove Road
• Length of walk:  3.3 miles  (5.3 km )
• Mildly undulating – one steep hill
• dog friendly

The following is taken from British History online.
Much of the manor’s land, however, was sold in the 17th century. In 1601 Richard Fiennes (d. 1613) sold the 2 manor-houses of Bloxham Beauchamp and Bloxham Fiennes with 16 yardlands and 2 mills to Sir Thomas Garway, merchant of the Staple. In 1612 this property, together with the new dwelling-house built by Sir Thomas Garway, was sold to John Griffith, a descendant of William Griffith, Chamberlain of North Wales. On John’s death in 1632 the property probably passed to his brother Richard (d. 1636) and to Richard’s son John (d. 1662). (fn. 144) John conveyed the property to Ambrose Thelwell in 1653. The conveyance, however, may have been a mortgage, for Mrs. Margaret Griffith, probably John’s relict, was assessed for tax on the new house in 1665. Before 1667, however, the house and various closes passed to John Cartwright of Aynho, and was absorbed in his other property in the parish. (fn. 145)

GPS Data

Route Description

Bloxham to Bodicote along Bloxham Grove Road

1. Start – park in the lay-by and head East down Bloxham Grove Road
2. Just B4 a cowshed turn right through a kissing gate. Walk along the a strip of land bordering a playing field and through a second kissing gate
3. The gate is around 20m from the corner of the field. Pass through gate and directly along the side of the field.
4. Find another gate in the corner.
5. Cut diagonally (NE) across the middle of this next field.
6. Go through a gate.
7. After which follow the edge of the field through another gate to eventually arrive at a private farm road.At the farm road head diagonally across the field opposite passing over a stile about 1/3 of the way.
8. You re-hit the Road and see a white windmill a few hundred yards right (East).
9. Diagonally cross the road and head onto the footpath.
10. Cross a small double gated bridge over a brook.
11. Arrive near what was once a water mill and turn right to head up the hill on a gated road.
12. Arrive at top of hill in a farmyard.Here is the Windmill. It makes a nice photograph! Now head straight back down the road to the starting point.

Google map

Click here to get a Google satellite view of ther walk in a new window.

Ordnance survey maps

You need OS Map 191
You can get an online OS map here.

• Start: 21 miles from Bloxham
• Length of walk: 4.12 miles ( 6.6 km)
• Vey flat
• Dog friendly

The starting point is Eynsham (or Egonesham) which is mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon chronicles. About 1005 a Benedictine Abbey was founded there and parish boundaries defined.
Part of the walk is along the Thames Path which is is a National Trail that follows the river from the Cotswolds to the Thames Barrier.
The manual beam pound lock at Pinkhill was built in 1791. Whilst it looks pretty much as it would have in the 18C merchant’s barges are replaced by pleasure craft. The stone lock keeper’s house dates from 1932.
We leave the Thames Path at the Swinford Toll Bridge which was built under a
special Act of Parliament and opened in 1769 to replace an dangerous ferry system in which several people had lost their lives.

GPS Data

Route Description

1. Leave car park into Clover Place. Left down Wastie Lane to Acre End Street.
2. Turn eft in Acre End Street and then Right into Station Rd.
3. After about 300m turn left onto a footpath and follow the brook into a playing field. Carry straight on, following field edge to a bridge.
4. Into a playing field and along hedge to the road.
5. Cross the road and go through kissing gate and SE along field.
6. Cross the field to a bridge in the left corner.
7. Cross the next field on a diagonal footpath
7a And similarly the next.
8. Through kissing gate into Pinkhill lane.
8a Turn left over an iron bridge and then right diagonally to corner of field
9. Left (E) onto field edge path. A stile leads into a narrow meadow and on through a gateway.
10. Head east towards the bridge.
10a Cross stream then turn right and follow stream to kissing gate. Cross field to bridge over Pinkhill weir.
11. Cross bridge over Pinkhill Weir
12. At the road turn left and head along it for a short distance.
13. –
14. Left again to the Caribbean Marina.Turn right and follow the Thames back to the bridge.
15. Over another stream before heading up to the road at the toll bridge. Turn right and head NW over the toll bridge and back to Eynsham continuing NW over the roundabout.

Google map

Click here for a Google satellite map of the walk.

Ordnance Survey map

You need OS Map 180 SP435095.
You can get an on-line copy here

• Start 5.4 miles from Bloxham
• Length of walk: 4.6 miles  (7.4 k)
• no steep gradients
• dog friendly

This information is mainly drawn from Wikipedia:(See also the walk – Great Tew Circular 1)
Evidence of early settlement include a Bronze Age barrow south and Roman mosaic floors from the 3C.
The village was founded in Anglo-Saxon times and its ownership was linked to St Albans Abbey
Unlike neighbouring Lttle Tew it had its own church and in Old English Cyrictiwa means “Church Tew
William the Conqueror granted the manor to his step-brother and it is recorded amongst Odo’s estates in the Domesday Book. The present parish church dates back to Norman times but has been substantially rebuilt since then.
The cottages and houses, mostly thatched, date back to the 17C and are built from the local ironstone from the Great Tew quarry. Look out for canework figures in the old school yard.
In the late 1700s the estate was bought by George Stratton, who had made a fortune in the East India Company. He had the dilapidated manor house demolished and engaged garden designer John Loudon who contributed much to the delightful appearance of the village and of Great Tew Park.
In 1815-1816 the son of the Birmingham manufacturer Matthew Boulton bought the Great Tew estate. Innovations in the middle of the 19C included a saw-mill powered by a beam engine of which the engine house and tall chimney still survive.
In 1914 the family died without heirs and for fifty years its properties became unoccupied and derelict.
In 1962 Major Eustace Robb inherited the estate and declared he would restore its prosperity but little improvement was seen but its subsequent owners, the Johnson family, have worked hard to restore the village.

GPS Data

Route Description

1. Start from car park. Head down to the village pub and head to the end of New Road.
2. Head onto a footpath more or less opposite the end of New Road heading South
3. Arrive near Tracey Barn Farm and take a left turn (South-East)
4. Hit a farm road and head East onto a road opposite Lady Grove. Turn left (North) here.
5. Arrive near Tracey Barn Farm and take a left turn (South-East)
6. On the right is a turning to Beaconsfield farm. This is where mosaic floors from a is a Roman Villa were found.
7. Back North along the lane until you hit the Little Tew to Ledwell Road. Turn right (East) towards Ledwell.
8. Arrive at a footpath on the left across Great Tew Park. Take this North
9. The footpath intersects with a bridleway. Turn left onto the bridleway heading West.
10. Keep heading West
11. Arrive back in Great Tew and head for the car park.

Google Map

Click here to see a Google satellite map of this walk.

Ordnance survey maps

You need OS Map 191
You can get an online OS map here.

• Start: 21 miles from Bloxham
• Length of walk: 3.4 miles (5.5 km )
• pretty flat
• dog friendly

Circular walk halfway between Oxford and Bicester – easy but potentially muddy.
About 5.5 km
The name derives from Anglo-Saxon Otta’s Fen. The partial draining of these marshes led to civil disturbances known as the Otmoor Riots of 1829 to 1830.
St. Mary the Virgin Church of Charlton on Otmoor was Built in 1250 AD and is considered one of the best 1000 churches in the UK.
Otmoor is a nature reserve of wet meadows and reedbeds. In winter there are thousands of ducks and in spring and summer wading birds, such as lapwings and redshanks.
It includes a stretch across a military firing range so best to stay alert!
The walk includes an old Roman Road that ran between between Bicester and Dorchester-on-Thames.
It twice crosses the unusually straight New River Ray which is where the river has been diverted.

GPS Data

Route Description

1. Keep the church on the right and walk through the village of Charlton-on-Otmoor.
2. At Oddington branch left by a telephone box, and follow a footpath towards Horton-cum-Studley. Cross a concrete bridge.
3. At the next junction avoid the gates and follow the parallel bridleway between ditches and hedges. Reach the signs for Otmoor’s military firing range. If permitted go ahead until you reach a gate on the left and several gates on the right.
4. You can go through the gate on the left cutting back across the fields. Instead we turn left onto a broad old Roman road north.
5. Turn left when you reach a junction and head back west .
6. Turn right (NNW) at the corrugated barns and head back to the Charlton. The church tower is clearly visible now. Cross the New River Ray and climb the slope to the junction. Turn left by the Crown and return to the church in the centre of the Village.

Google Map

Click here to see a Google satellite view of Otmoor in a new window

Ordnance Survey map

You need OS Map 180
You can get an on-line copy here

• Start: 4.1 miles from Bloxham
• Length of walk: 3.5 miles  (5.6km )
• gentle to moderate gradients
• dog friendly

A walk starting from Nether Worton, heading up Raven Hill and just skirting Great Tew on the homeward journey. The walk is mainly on broad tracks through the countryside and so far as I am unaware there are few points of historical interest

GPS Data

Route Description

1. Set off from little “roundabout by Nether Worton House. Head West along the road to Sandford
2. Just past the bend head into a field and along the edge – still heading west.
3. Just B4 a new field follow a footpath sign NW across a field.
4. Next head basically north towards a copse.
5. Follow around the edge of the copse (Raven Hill) and then head in the general direction of Lower Grove Ash farm on the left.
6. Skirt the farm and follow the farm road up the hill to the B4031.
7. Walk along the B4031 until you get to the main farm road to Hill farm.
8. At this point cross the road and head down a wide farm road.
9. Keep going straight. You pass a neat farm with a small lake.
10. Turn left (east) into another wide track. There are supposedly some lakes on the right at the start of this track but they may be in a died-up state
11. Just keep going
12. Eventually you see the copse on Raven Hill that you passed on the outward journey.
13. Retrace the outward route back to the starting point

Google Map

Click here for a Google satellite map of this walk.

Ordnance survey maps

You need OS Map 191
You can get an online OS map here.

• Start: 5.7 miles from Bloxham
• Length of walk:  3.25 miles  (5.2 km)
• a few mild-moderate gradients
• dog friendly

A fairly easy 5.2 km circular walk from Wroxton to North Newington and back.  It starts on a footpath adjacent to Wroxton primary school.

The Wroxton Dovecote is an octagonal tower and a Gothic style folly, sometimes called  Wroxton Castle that you see at the very start of the walk.

The outward walk is mostly just countryside but on the route back from North Newington there are several points of interest.
The Wroxton or Drayton Arch, is a real eye catcher of a folly dating from the mid-late 1700s.

The Wroxton obelisk was commissioned by Francis North the Earl of Guildford, to commemorate avisit by the Prince of Wales, Frederick of Hanover in 1739.

Wroxton has a 14C church and a Jacobean house, known as Wroxton Abbey, that is now Fairleigh Dickinson University’s English campus. You can visit the grounds of the “Abbey” if you so wish – no dogs!

There is also an ironstone quarry (not on this walk) northwest of the village that was worked from in 1917 to 1967 and had its own railway, the Oxfordshire Ironstone Railway, that linked the quarry to the mainline network.

GPS Data

Route description

Here is a description of the route as per the GPS waypoints given above

1. Start – Village Pond
2. Go up past the left of the primary school
3. Go past the barns / sheds and head off across the fields. Don’t follow the signs pointing to your left.
4. Keep heading directly South along the footpath
5. From here the Village of North Newington is just ahead.
6. Basically turn left at the village road and head to the end of school lane. Don’t head back North yet. Go East across fields to get to a bridge over a stream.
7. The Drayton Archway will come into view on the right.Shortly after you will see ther Wroxton Obelisk
8. Re-cross the stream at the bridge and head diagonally left (NorthWest) uphill towards the obelisk
9. You are now heading down towards a lake in the direction of Wroxton Abbey
10. You are now heading back past another folly towards the farm buildings near the school. If you prefer there is a pathway alongside Wroxton Abbey leading back to the duck-pond.

Google Map

Click here to view Circular Wroxton walk in a Googlemap.

Ordnance Survey Map

You need Map 191
You can get an online OS Map here.