Beaconsfield - Loudwater (Rayners Avenue) - High Wycombe

As far as Forty Green much of the route goes past gardens on one side with woodland or open fields on the other. From there onwards it is rural and fairly hilly (though none of the climbs are very long or steep) until the outskirts of Loudwater, from where we go across the extensive recreation grounds along the valley floor.

Minor route change 2008

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Distances

Travel

Beaconsfield and High Wycombe are both on the Chiltern line from Marylebone to Banbury and Birmingham.
There are frequent buses from Loudwater to High Wycombe and Beaconsfield (less frequent on Sundays).
Travel information for Buckinghamshire is available on www.buckscc.gov.uk/travelinfo or by telephoning 0871 200 22 33.

Ordnance Survey Map

The whole of this walk is on the Ordnance Survey Explorer map 172, Chiltern Hills East.

Refreshments

The Red Lion at Knotty Green,
The Royal Standard of England at Forty Green,
The General Havelock in Wycombe Marsh / Loudwater.
Please always be considerate about muddy boots in pubs etc; either take them off, or cover them up.
Never eat or drink your own provisions on pub premises (including the garden, if there is one).

Route

On leaving Beaconsfield station, go up the approach road, and turn right.
After the roundabout, turn right along Warwick Road (passing the model village on your left). On reaching a church, turn left and right, and continue ahead along Grenfell Road almost to the end.
Turn left to a splayed junction (Ledborough Lane).
Cross the road, take the enclosed footpath opposite and continue nearly half a mile (0.7 km) to a noticeboard and a fence corner on the left where gardens end and a prominent path (which you do not take) goes off to the left.
Continue in the same direction nearly 700 yards (keeping ahead at a waymark post after nearly 300 yards, and at another path crossing after a further 350 yards) to a path crossing with a fence on your right and a raised bank on your left.
Turn left and follow the bank. After nearly 300 yards keep left, along the top of the bank, to pass a fence corner on your left with housing beyond.
Continue in the same direction first on the top of the bank in the wood, then along an enclosed path, to a lane.
Bear right to an inconspicuous wooden barrier left of the gate of Wilconnel House, to join a path enclosed between hedges, which leads to a main road opposite the Red Lion pub.
Cross with care and turn right. Where the footway ends take the rough road bearing left.
After nearly 200 yards, with a large house on your left, turn right on to a tarmac road which bends right, then left, then right again at Whichert Close, back towards the main road.
Shortly after this final bend turn sharp back to the left up a path with a hand rail.
Continue ahead as the path goes downhill and into a wood. About 70 yards after entering the wood, turn sharp left along another enclosed path.
Follow this nearly half a mile (0.7 km) at first downhill, then over a hill and down the other side to where the path forks, with the left fork (which you do not take) going between houses.
Bear right along the left-hand field edge down into the valley, up the other side and then down again, into a nature reserve with gates on to a track on the left, just past a house.
Go through the pedestrian gate and turn right, to follow the track to a road junction, with the Royal Standard of England pub on your right.

This claims to be the oldest free house pub in the country, and has character. See the back of the menu for its claims to fame.

Continue ahead down the road, to a stile by a gate into a wood on your left.
Go over the stile and turn sharp left, ignoring another path parallel with the road.
After 300 yards, at a field corner, bear half right across a brackeny area and continue in more woodland, then across fields (ignoring a path to the right) down into a valley and up the other side to join a track.
Turn right and go along the track for 120 yards, then, where the track bears right towards a farm yard full of machinery, take the stile ahead and continue to the road in front of the farm buildings.
Turn right for 80 yards to cross a stile on the left.
Continue ahead to the left-hand corner of a wood.
Cross a stile, turn left along the edge of two fields and continue in the same direction down into the bottom of the valley.
Cross the valley-bottom track and go up the path just inside the edge of the wood ahead.
At the top of the wood, with the golf course ahead, turn left and after 60 yards turn right to go alongside a fence 200 yards to a path junction.
Go ahead, passing the 15th tee on your left, and follow a broken asphalt path slightly downhill for 100 yards, to a bridleway junction.
Turn left, and follow the gravel track downhill as it curves right and left, and becomes a tarmac path, to a crossing (with the club house ahead).
Turn left, and at the next junction (with the car park behind you to the right) take the bridleway ahead, alongside and immediately to the right of the approach road. The bridleway becomes a tarmac road, which you follow past the golf course entrance to a road junction (shortly before the railway bridge).
Here take the bridleway slightly to the right, which you follow under the railway and down to the A40.
Turn left to the traffic lights.

(If you are finishing the walk here, continue ahead to bus stops, on this side of the road for Beaconsfield or across the road for High Wycombe.)

To continue the walk, turn right at the lights and go over the bridge.

This is the River Wye, which rises near West Wycombe and flows into the Thames at Bourne End,

(If you are starting the walk here, from the bus stop (Rayners Avenue / Frederick Place) walk towards High Wycombe, and turn left over the bridge.)

Take the footpath to the right, which takes you to King's Mead recreation ground.
Continue ahead on the path close to the river, and then aim for the far left corner of the field, beyond the netball courts and to the left of the netball centre building.
(We have generally found the toilets at the netball centre to be open.)
Go across a footbridge and up a short road to a T-junction.
Turn right, passing The General Havelock pub, and ignoring Beech Road with its ford to the right, continue 500 yards, to a junction.
Take the minor road ahead (a cycleway), cross a footbridge and continue 200 yards to an overgrown wall on the right (the remains of an old railway bridge) opposite Willow Court on the left.

This was the line from Bourne End, the first railway into High Wycombe, constructed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

Go up the path on the right shortly after the brickwork, then along the embankment to cross a bridge with a large pool on the right.
Go down the steps on the right, loop back under the bridge and go along the road (noting the spring in the stream beside you, 25 yards beyond the bridge) to extensive recreation grounds comprising Marsh Green, Holywell Mead and The Rye.
We are aiming eventually for the church with two towers, near the far right-hand corner of the recreation grounds. A pleasant route is to go round the left-hand edge, at first along a stream. Between the waterfall and the tennis courts take a path up to the raised Dyke (boating lake).

The Dyke was formerly part of the grounds of Wycombe Abbey, and before that was the route of the main road into Wycombe.

Cross to the other side of the Dyke and turn right along a tarmac path through trees.
(Alternatively stay on the near side of the Dyke to pass the Environmental Centre, or go diagonally across the field to where there may be an ice-cream van.)

The Environmental Centre (currently open till 4.00 on Mondays, Fridays and Saturdays and 4.30 on Sundays, and possibly at other times during school holidays) and swimming bath are on the site of a Roman building, thought to have been used in conjunction with the holy well (of which all that remains is a small hollow near the path across the grounds.)
There are toilets by the carpark and a café at the swimming pool (open from the end of May to early September, but with limited choice during term time).

To the right of the far right-hand corner of the recreation ground is Busy Bees nursery and 200 yards to the right of that is Pann Mill.

Pann Mill was allowed to become derelict but the local Society persuaded the Council to retain the wheel and some of the machinery. Subsequently, a local architect was persuaded to design a small demonstration mill over the wheel and this was built using money provided by Marks and Spencer to celebrate their centenary. Volunteers have now filled the building up with machinery recovered from other derelict mills, and now run the mill twice or three times a year and sell the flour so produced for Wycombe Society funds.

Leave the recreation ground by the path to the right of Pann Mill.
Cross the busy A40, turn right and then left up the path beside the church, and continue ahead up Saffron Road to a T-junction (Station Road).
From here the shortest way on to the station platforms, especially for London-bound trains, is through the tunnel ahead and turn left. The ticket office at this entrance may not always be open, but there is a ticket machine (and you probably have a return ticket anyway).
Alternatively turn left along Station Road and continue on the footpath to the next road, then turn right for the station, or left and then right for the town centre and bus station.