Flamstead & Beechwood Park

Start & finish: Flamstead Church

(S/E) Our walk starts from Flamstead church (enter the churchyard by the gate leaving the Spotted Dog pub to your left). From the church tower, take the path to the South West corner of the churchyard (if you have any doubts about which way is SW, look up at the weather vane on the spire - that shows N, S, E and W). Leave the churchyard by the wooden gate and take the footpath across the road on the right, signposted FP32 Pietley Hill.

Initially the path runs between gardens, but you soon emerge on the edge of an open field. Keep straight on across the field. When you come to a road turn right and follow it as it winds gently uphill. After a road joins from the right you come to a crossroads. Keep straight on as you join 'Friendless Lane'. Look out for a footpath to the left 350m after the crossroads.

(1) Turn left on the path running diagonally through Friendless Wood. At the far side of the wood turn right along the field edge. Continue in the same direction across several fields, always to the left of a hedge or woodland until you come to an open field.

(2) Follow the path across a field, through a gate and continue to the right of the tree lined hedge. Follow the hedge round to the right at the end of the field and, shortly after, turn left through a gate. The path runs along the left hand edge of the next few fields. Finally you pass through a gate back onto Friendless Lane.

Turn left on the lane to a T-junction. Cross the road and turn right, signposted to Markyate.

(3) After 100m take the footpath to the left of the road, signposted FP19 Roe End. Cross the first field and turn left after passing through a hedge. Follow the path as it winds along to the right of a hedge. After about 600m you pass a bench and the path bears left through the hedge and continues with the hedge to the left. At the end of the field you pass through a hedge and join a lane. Turn right here and continue on for some distance past the drive to Roe End Farm.

(4) After about 200m the tarmac on the lane ends. Take the track to your left (FP47 Baldwin’s Wood) which has a sign saying 'Private Beechwood Home Farm'. Continue for some way to a major crossroads by the sign for "Beechwood Home Farm".

(5) Turn left on a footpath down a broad stony track. You immediately pass to the left of a house (Kennels Lodge). You are now walking through the remains of the parkland around (B) Beechwood Park (now a school).

Pass in front of the school and continue along the drive as it swings left and starts to descend. Look out for a footpath to the right (the signpost has a Hertfordshire Way sign and is, confusingly, on the left of the road).

(6) Take the footpath right from the road. It broadly runs along the left hand edge of the playing fields. Keep close to the hedge/trees. After about 250 metres from the road you will come to a kissing gate. Turn left through it on the footpath heading downhill directly away from the school. Cross the road at the bottom and continue on the Byway opposite signposted 57 Gaddesden Row.

After 1 km, ignore the footpath sign to the left, 50m beyond that, when the main track swings to the right, leave it on the footpath half-left.

(7) Take the footpath half-left, keeping the woody hedge on your right-hand side.

When you come to a road, turn right and after 70m turn left onto a bridleway (Bridleway 29 Stags End). When you reach Upper Wood Farm, the bridleway veers left and almost immediately right, continuing to the left of a hedge.

750m after the farm, look out for a crossing footpath indicated by a wooden finger post on the right-hand side of the path.

(8) At a crossroads of paths, take the footpath left. The path runs along the left hand side of a copse before crossing a field and descending to the edge of a wood. Turn right along the edge of the wood.

Turn left around the end of the wood and climb along the side of the wood then beside a hedge. When this hedge turns left you continue across the field, bearing slightly right, to a narrow gap in the hedge opposite.

Turn immediately right beyond the gap onto a broad track. Follow it as it swings left past a house and takes you to a road.

(9) Turn left on the road. This climbs a little before swinging right. Where the road bends sharply left, leave it and continue straight ahead on a bridleway (signposted Delmerend Lane).

Follow the bridleway for 800m, ignoring footpaths to the left and right until it twists right and meets Footpath 7 Redbourn Common on the right.

(10) Turn left and left again after 60m at the next path junction, taking the track heading downhill between hedges. Ignore the fork off to the right and continue descending.

When you near a road, take the bridleway left (marked to Trowley Bottom) and after 20m take the footpath half-right across a field (FP26 marked to St Leonards Church). Turn half-right again across the second field, climbing uphill towards a hedge line. Continue in the same direction with the hedge on your left. When you reach a house fence, walk along the fence of the first house before turning left between garden fences.

When you come out to a road after 30m turn right and follow the road to a T-junction where you turn left. This road soon turns right and brings you to the East end of the Churchyard, a short walk from your starting point.(S/E)

"We hope you have enjoyed your walk. Please remember to rate the walk and add comments. We are interested in how we could improve the instructions or the route and would like to hear about any issues with paths on the walk."

TERRAIN: Good footpaths, bridleways and tracks and quiet country roads.

Start & finish: Flamstead Church

FOOD & DRINK: The village centre pubs in Flamstead (Spotted Dog and Three Blackbirds) are planned to close. There is the Rose and Crown at Trowley Bottom and a good Village shop.

PARKING: On street near church

LOCAL TRANSPORT: Centrebus: 34, 35 Dunstable/St Albans, 46 Luton/Hemel Hempstead

(A) FLAMSTEAD: Flamstead is an ancient community first mentioned in a Charter granted by King Ethelred to the Abbot of St Albans in 1006. Eighty years later Domesday shows it as being held by Ralph de Todeni having been granted to his father, Roger, for services at the Battle of Hastings.

The Church of St Leonard, a very a beautiful old building, is the focal point of the village. There was a place of worship on the site in Saxon times, but the earliest part of the present structure, the tower, dates from 1140. Visitors should note the Medieval wall paintings and the Saunders Memorial of 1670.

Also of considerable interest are the Almshouses opposite the Three Blackbirds, which are dated 1669 and the Three Blackbirds pub itself, the western wing of which is sixteenth century.

(B) Beechwood Park: Once the home of the Saunders Sebright family it lies on the ancient site of the Nunnery of St Giles in the Wood, founded c.1120. After its closure in 1537, the property passed through several hands until it was acquired in 1628 by Thomas Saunders of Long Marston. The imposing main façade was completed in 1702. The parkland in front of the main house was designed by Capability-Brown in 1753.

The Sebrights fell on hard times after World War I and in the Second World War the house was requisitioned by the government and an airfield was built in the grounds to land damaged and obsolete planes. At the end of the war the house became a girls' school, closed in 1961 due to lack of funds. The current school was opened in 1964.