Moulton Walk

This walk is the first documented walk with our 2 new additions to the family Honey and Rudy who are both Cavalier King Charles Spaniels and they are 4 & 2 years old and have been with us around 3 months. Well that's enough about the dogs I am sure you will hear and see a lot more of them in the future, on to the walk then.

Details of Walk

• Date of Walk: 27/07/2014

• Distance: 6.7 Miles

• History:

• Car Park: Village Hall CB8 8SP

• Refreshments: The Pack Horse Inn , Affleck Arms

• Photos Taken on Walk

This walk is set in rolling downland on the Cambridge/Suffolk border and some of the walk is along the Icknield way on a route known locally as the Three Churches Walk as there is three villages to walk through and you can not have a village without a church. We started the walk at the village hall in Moulton and walked down past the Kings Head to the ford which was totally dry not even a drop of water but it must get high at sometime. The Packhorse Bridge which was built about 1446 and formed part of the trade route from Bury St Edmunds to Cambridge, made of flint as are many buildings in Suffolk and of cause we had to go over it even though there was no water. From here we followed the river Kennett through part of the village to St Peters church and then in to the church yard and over a stile at the back to go up between trees to emerge on to a corn field that had already been harvested.

The views from here were wonderful you could see all the way round with a blue sky in among the clouds, I don't no why but the clouds always look better the higher you are perhaps because you are looking at them from a different angle. We then carried along till we came into the out skirts of Gazeley and walked past the stud where we could not see any horses as the hedge was to high. When we got to All saints church where we walked around the rear to emerge by the village sign and the Cheques pub, there was a real old building in the center of the village and I am not sure what it is was. it might have been the blacksmiths. To carry on with the walk you have to walk down Higham Rd and from where we were standing we could see the sign but could not make out what the road was called, so I took a picture and then zoomed in on it , lazy hey but it done the trick. We continued on the walk and at one stage following the directions we had we felt we had gone wrong as they did not mention two stiles we had to climb over and they normally due, so trusting our notion we carried on and yes we were still on the right route. As we came across the wood that had been mentioned in the directions and this was the first wood of three we had to walk through or should I say right on the edge of all of them.  This certainly added to the walk and the dogs had a chance to cool down a bit from the shade of the trees. After leaving the woods we had to climb up to the final church St Mary's which has Dalham Hall right behind it. You quite often find a church right near or on the grounds of Manor houses and Halls. After climbing up it was all downhill through a avenue of chestnut trees to Dalham village, I said at the time they must have put them in so the congregation kept cool walking up or a little bit dryer if it was raining.

You can only hope that this was the idea behind planting them but I reckon it was just for landscaping. Entering the village the first thing you see is the large conical red-brick malt kiln standing beside the road dating back to 1820 and also there is some lovely  thatched houses. If you fill you need refreshments at this stage of the walk you can carry on up the road to the Affleck Arms. We carried on  across the white painted bridge with the river Kennett running underneath or should I say not running as it was as dry as a bone but apparently during summer it is always like this. Once over the bridge we followed the path alongside the River Kennett reaching a road where we turned right and across Catford bridge then we turned left on to a wide bridleway which brought us back to St Peters Church. Just past the church we turned left over The Old Flint Bridge and across the green which had cows in it to bring us to Dalham Road where we climbed over the last Stile, turned right until we reached a gate opposite the post office which took us into the recreation ground at the back of the village hall.