KINGLEY VALE WALK

Cheers to her Majesty for doing such a grand job over the past 70 years and for allowing us plebs to have an extra day off work.  God save the Queen!

 

God Save The Queen 

If you’re not into all that royal malarkey then a walk on the wild side may be just what the doctor ordered. There’s only so much Union Jack bunting or trooping of colour you can take before your brain is reduced to a porridge-like mush.  Kingley Vale in the South Downs National Park is wild enough to prevent this from happening.

 

Kingley Vale circular walk

There’s a circular walk of several miles we did a few weeks back that begins from a small car park at West Stoke.  Due to the popularity of this trail, you need to get to the car park before 9 am to be sure of finding a parking space. 

Remember to turn left and walk clockwise

We’re fairly hardy walkers but there are parts of this trail that were definitely not for the faint hearted and should not be attempted by anyone who isn’t relatively fit or is unsteady on their feet.  We’ll come to the reason why later on. 

Starting at the West Stoke car park there is a good wide and flat track bordered by lush fields that leads almost to the edge of the ancient Yew Forest for which Kingley Vale is famous. 

 

Lush green fields 

Nice flat path leading out from the car park

So peaceful early in the morning

Entering the Yew tree grove, I was instantly transported to the Forest of Fangorn that most magical woodland featured in the epic Tolkien tale ‘Lord of The Rings’. 

Entering the 'Forest of Fangorn'

'I almost felt I liked the place' - The Lord of The Rings

Are these really yew trees or Ents?  

They might reach out and grab you

Ancient yew trees all gnarly and twisty

Hundreds of years old

And still standing after all that time

The yew kraken awakes!

That one over there definitely looks like a Treebeard to me.

 

“The world is changing: I feel it in the water, I feel it in the earth, and I smell it in the air.” - Treebeard from The Lord of The Rings

You could easily spend hours wandering under the canopy admiring all the grotesquely twisted tree limbs, chasing stray sunlight filtering through the dense foliage whilst breathing in that lovely earthy smell of damp, decaying wood.  There certainly is a strange magic about this place.

 

Weird woody magic

Leaving the yew tree grove, the trail eventually begins a steady ascent opening outwards into a wide expanse of green hilly terrain and this is where you begin to realise that you’re not as young as you once were and that you should maybe stop snaffling Pringles whilst watching telly.

 

Steady uphill climb

Are we nearly there yet?

Not another person in sight

Eventually you reach a very steep staircase set into the hillside and it’s at this point when it dawns on you that you should have turned left before entering the forest.  

We should have turned left

Anyone with an ounce of sense would have turned away now but not us, we huffed and we puffed like that big bad wolf all the way to the top.  There’s a lot of stairs and this is the reason why you need to be fairly fit to do this part of the walk.

 

Climbing the staircase is very hard work but worth the views

From the top of the staircase, you can see for miles in every direction and it’s not long before your eyes are drawn to a couple of green boob shaped mounds rising from the grass known as The Devil’s Humps. 

 

You can see for miles

View from the top of the staircase

The Devil's Humps

There’s a lot of folklore surrounding these ‘Humps’ which according to local legend are supposed to be the graves of Viking kings defeated by the brave men of Chichester, warrior kings that allegedly haunt the woods at night.  Creepy!  But here in the bright sunlight these burial mounds are about as ghostly as a green jelly although believe me, jellies can be quite scary with all that ghoulish wibble, wobble going on.

 

It's all downhill from here

The walk is downhill from now onwards but the track is flinty, rutted and uneven so a good pair of walking shoes/boots is recommended unless you want to end up with a badly twisted ankle.

 

Fields and wild flowers

In almost a blink of an eye, you’re back at the car park and all that nasty hilly climb stuff is long forgotten though a twinge or two in the old knees might serve as a reminder later on.  Well worth a day out.

Lots of wild thistles everywhere

Nature finds a way

EXPLORING CHIDHAM

Confirmation received from the builders that work is due to begin on 6 June so this is our last mess free week before construction of our extension finally gets off the ground.  Hurrah! 

To kill time, a jolly walk in the surrounding countryside exploring one of the many peninsulas off Chichester Harbour in an area called Chidham. 

For the super fit, there’s a 5 mile circular walk around the entire area of Chidham and for oldies like us, there’s the ‘lets see how far you can walk before your legs drop off’ option where you can turn round at any point.

 

Circular walk around Chidham

The public footpath from the very small almost-drove-past-it car park, leads out to Chichester’s harbour designated an area of outstanding natural beauty with spectacular views across the water of Bosham.

 

Good footpaths

View across the harbour of Bosham

There’s plenty to see and photograph en route so you don’t realise how far you’ve walked until you start looking at a map.  We got as far as the beach section before New Barn.

 

Where's the sun gone?

We were lucky to catch sight of lots of wild birds, animals and flowers on our travels who like us, were also out enjoying the occasional glorious sunshine.

 

Snowy Egret

We saw a number of egrets

So cute

Oyster Catcher

Just look at this foxy fella having a sunbathe

Pink stripey wild flowers

Dandelion clock

I loved the two toned foliage of this plant

And the wispy cobwebs on this thistle head

It’s little wonder this area has been designated one of outstanding natural beauty because it truly is lovely.

Plenty of yachts to see

View from a bridge

Tide's out exposing the mudflats

Flinty beach full of unusual tree trunks

Possibly the remains of an old jetty?

Definitely an area of outstanding natural beauty

FUN IN FUNTINGTON

 It’s fun in Funtington where it appears pigs outnumber village residents. 

 

Pigs as far as the eye can see

Funtington the pork capital of West Sussex

There’s crap all on telly so we’ve driven out to Funtington for an evening walk to socialise with the local porker population who are too busy snuffling in the dirt, wallowing in hay or catching zeds to be bothered with grockle paparazzi like us.

 

Oink!  Keep it down, we're trying to sleep here

There's only room for two

Dinner is served

Is that a truffle?

Pigs are not only delicious when sandwiched between a couple of slices of brown bread slathered in ketchup but they are incredibly cute too. 

 

I love you Sausage

It almost makes me want to go vegan but then again imagine a life without real bacon or sausages?  I mean some of the vegetarian ones are like eating those cardboard tubes from the middle of loo rolls! 

 

Three amigos

Sorry piggies, there’s some things that just can’t change and for me, giving up bacon butties is one of them.

Four legs good, two legs bad