On the road again - 11 - The South Downs, part 3 - Ashford Hangers

After a couple of days, I needed to stock up on groceries. With that in mind, I made my way back down to the village, back to the main A3 road northbound, then off at the next exit to pick up the B2070 road into Petersfield. There, I quickly found a supermarket.

A friend, after spotting my photos published on my Facebook page messaged, asking me if I had ever been to Ashford Hangars. I hadn’t. He recommended that I should visit and sent me directions for somewhere that he called secret where I could park.

Stocked up, I continued on to the the main road that cuts through the town. I turned left. We crossed the level crossing by the railway station and at a mini roundabout, took the right hand road back over the main A3 road. We climbed through a village called Steep, just before the road enters dense woodland as it climbs steeply. Very steeply, the road winds it’s way up through the woods. Then, too the right, almost out of site for the trees, a lane appears. We were crawling, anyway, so it was easy enough to indicate and turn without causing anymore chaos than the queue behind.

I followed the lane to the end, from where, a track continued. It was very slow going. The track was narrow and full of ruts and generally uneven. Eventually, the track opens up at a point where another track goes off to the left. I had reached the destination. I pulled into the left hand track and reversed back into the direction I was heading. I then positioned the combo tight up to the edge of the track.

The next day, I went for an explore. The woods are dense, but I managed to find a rudimentary footpath that led to another, clearer one. I came to a little gateway, another path led out to a very steep drop and a beautiful view. I sat there for hours. Later, I met a ranger. We had a bit of a chat. I told him about the fact that the rangers back on Butser had ignored me.* He assured me that the South Downs rangers where quite chilled and as long as I wasn’t blocking accesses there wouldn’t be a problem.

Eventually, after having checked out the footpath that descended into the valley a bit, I decided that it was too steep for my knees (I have some awful pains in my knees, these days), I climbed back up. I then strolled the footpath through the woods. The footpath comes out onto the track at some point about half a mile away, as it turned out, from where I was parked.

*see entry On the road again - 11 … … 2 - Butser Hill