There are steep steps down the embankment behind the White Hart.
There are steep steps down the embankment behind the White Hart.
Go up Leather Lane. Shortly beyond where Butlers Way branches off on the right, there is a length of hedge on the right followed by an opening with a garage.
Cross over by the concrete footpath sign and go up the path which is to the left of the garage. It is a narrow path between trees on each side. Follow the path ahead as far as you can ignoring unofficial branches off to the right into the next field. The path then goes right leaves and continues on the field side of the hedge for a very short distance to a footbridge.
Cross the footbridge and turn right. Follow the farm track with the hedge on your right. Follow the track where the boundary first turns left ignoring the gap on the right, follow it as it bends right and left again before going through a gap on the right to a farm road with a concrete slab on the left, and then with hedges on both sides. Follow this short, straight track to a gate at the end.
At the gate go through the kissing gate and follow Spaynes Hall Drive to the main road. Go left until you are opposite the further end of the picket fence outside the White Hart. Cross over and go through the small gate (which is not very easy to pick out from the rest of the fence) it is level with a concrete footpath sign on the opposite side of the road, and just short of the 40 mph sign.
Go ahead across the lawn to the left of the White Hart and up the slope at the far end onto the abandoned railway embankment. If there is an event being held in the White Hart garden you have make your way between the guests. Descend by the steps on the far side, cross the lane and go through two gates on the other side into a meadow.
Continue into the meadow, known as Cobblands, with the fence on your left.
When you come to a gate in a fence, go through the gate, turn right, and follow the fence to Toppesfield Road.
Follow the Toppesfield Road away from Great Yeldham as far as an access road on your right to some houses including Scotney Farm. This is Scotney Lane. Follow the green lane along the side of the field with the hedge on your right. This is a good spot for butterflies when it catches the afternoon sun in summer.
Leave the field at the far right corner, over a bridge into Scotney Lane. This lane can be very muddy in winter. You will pass one house on the right shortly before turning right by a way-marker post, through a gap into a field.
This is Kitley Field. Follow the field margin with the hedge and ditch on your right.
At the corner cross a plank bridge into Brickyard Field. Go left and along the field boundary with the hedge on your left. Ignore the path joining on the left from the landing strip.
At the far side of the field go through a gap, go left for a few yards then right along a narrow uncultivated strip across the field and through the gap opposite. Go ahead, ignore the unofficial path joining from along the old railway track on the right. Continue with a field on the left and houses on the right.
Join Great Yeldham High Street from down the concrete steps beside the Police Station. (To avoid the steps go through the gap on the right side to Whitlock Drive, down onto the High Street, left, then right to the Village Green.)
Cross the road to return to the village green.
5 Apr 2013