King Arthur’s Cave

Start: The Royal Lodge, Symonds Yat East, South Herefordshire HR9 6JL

(S/E) Turn right out of the car park of The Royal Lodge and walk to the Saracens Head. Take the hand ferry (A) across the River Wye. Once across, climb the steps and turn left. Beyond a white-painted cottage on the right, and opposite Wyeside Cottage on the left, turn right up a narrow path signposted through the hedge. This steep stony path cuts a corner in the road.

(1) When you regain the lane, turn right. Opposite a turning place on the right, turn left into a narrow path beside a telegraph pole. This path winds uphill between premises to meet a larger path in front of a cliff face, with a Woodland Trust sign at its left-hand end.

(2) Turn left and follow the path as it bears right. At a path junction where the path ahead starts to descend, turn right (uphill). Pass between a partly fenced-off cliff face with a cave on the right, and a rocky pinnacle on the left.

(3) Again, before the path starts to descend, turn sharp right, to the right of a fenced-off pit. At a further Woodland Trust sign, bear left, keeping the fence on your left. Pass a small stone ruin on your right and then a mineshaft within a circular fence on your left. Follow a generally level track along the top of the wood, with gardens and properties to your right. At a junction of tracks, go straight ahead along a driveway to reach a house called Woodview. Follow the metalled lane beyond.

(4) When you meet a junction of byways with a small car park and interpretation panel to your left, turn right. At a road junction just beyond the entrance to Doward Park Campsite, turn left. After about 100 yards, turn sharp left onto a signposted public footpath that cuts back downhill. Pass the remains of various small quarry buildings. When you emerge in a disused quarry, bear right back into the trees. Pass a shallow cave with a rock pillar and continue past further cliffs and caves until you reach the larger King Arthur’s Cave (B), with its mound of spoil in front of the entrances. Keep right and pick up a path along the woodland edge.

(5) At the bottom corner of the field on your right, follow the path to a Highmeadow Trail waymark where you turn left (marked “Forest Footpath”). This path descends into what becomes a rocky V-shaped notch in the wooded hillside, which you follow steeply downhill. Towards the bottom, the path becomes rather indistinct, but if you continue to pick your way down you will inevitably meet the obvious riverside path.

(6) Turn left (upstream). Follow the path for a few hundred yards until you enter the Biblins campsite.

(7) Cross the campsite then turn right to cross the River Wye via the suspension footbridge at Biblins (C). On the opposite bank, turn left and follow the river for a little over a mile back to Symonds Yat East, using either of the main tracks or the path closer to the river. Continue until you reach The Royal Lodge. (S/E)

Start: The Royal Lodge, Symonds Yat East, South Herefordshire HR9 6JL
Tel: 01600 890238
Email: info@rhhotels.co.uk

Notes: Uses the Saracens Arms hand ferry (fee payable) across the Wye on the outward journey, and the mildly unnerving Biblins footbridge on the return. Some steep ground in the first half.

Find more information on Walks From the Door.

(A) The hand Ferry at Symonds Yat, near The Royal Lodge, is operated on request by staff at the Saracens Head. In 1800 there were 25 similar hand ferries between Ross and Chepstow.

(B) King Arthur's Cave is also linked in legend with King Vortigen, a native Birtish King who fought against the invading Anglo Saxons. More convincingly, the cave is known from archaeological excavations to have housed Stone Age people who left flint tools and mammoth bones behind. Material removed during the dig is still visible as a mound in front of the entrance.

(C)The footbridge at Biblins was built in the 1950s by the Forestry Commission, and refurbished in the 1990s. A sign advises that no more than six people should cross at once.