Marnhull in Blackmoor Vale

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Walk directions

With the village hall on your right, and keeping the playground on your left, cross the recreation ground to two kissing gates in the far left corner. Go through and head right to another gate onto a lane. Turn left. Soon cross a stile buried in a hedge on your right and cross a field to a field gate and an overgrown stile in the hedge. Bear right across the field to a stile and walk past the Ashley Farm barn conversion and down the drive to the lane.

Turn right and look out for a stile on the left, just past a house and garden. Cross this and head diagonally right uphill to reach a gate. Do not go through but turn left here, cross a stile and head straight on to a fence. Turn left along the fence, then right – still following the fence – to cross two stiles and emerge onto Crown Road. Walk along, taking care to keep to the pavement (where one exists), until you reach the Crown Inn. Pass the pub and head towards the crossroads, with the church ahead.

Cross the road, keeping the church on your right, and follow residential New Street for approximately 0.75 miles (1.2km), taking the fourth right turning, with a fingerpost to Stour Valley Way, into Kentisworth Road.

At the road end bear right to go through a kissing gate, then follow the left fence to another kissing gate. Continue along the left edge of the field then, at the hedge end, head diagonally left and downhill to go through another kissing gate. Cross a plank bridge to head towards a new barn. Keep left of this and head through three gates in quick succession. In a few paces, pass some derelict farm buildings and take the gate to your left, then a field gate immediately afterwards. Walk along the ridge to go through two kissing gates. Walk along the top of the field then bear left between two bungalows into Ham Lane.

Turn left, past Dinhay, and take second right into Ham Meadows. Walk down here, ignoring a road on the left, and turn right and take the path between two bungalows, following this over a plank bridge and through a gate onto a grassy path. Go through the gate at the top and cross the road into Burges Close. Keep to the right to the end and take the path to the right between two houses, which leads to a stile. After the stile turn left, with a hedge on your right and open views to your left, and cross the next stile. Head right along the field edge to go through a kissing gate in the hedge into a narrow lane.

Turn left for about 200yds (180m), ignoring a waymark sign, and look out for steps up on the right leading over a low stile and into a field. Head diagonally right gently downhill towards the houses to reach the rear fence of the last house. Turn right by this, go through the field gate, turn left and take the first left (signposted Village Hall) to return to your car.

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Location

Nearest postcode:

Additional information

Terrain - Village roads, farm tracks, footpaths

Landscape - Green vale, with distant views to low hills

Dog friendliness - On lead on some sections of village roads. There are a lot of stiles

Parking - Free car park at Marnhull village hall, off Burton Street

Toilets en route - None on route

Walks in Dorset Dog-friendly walks in Dorset

About the walk

In winter the fields of the broad Blackmoor Vale gleam and glint with standing water. The dampness and the soft, sweet air make for lush green meadows and, where there’s rich pasture like this, there are dairy cattle. In Blackmoor Vale, there are thousands of mainly black and white... Holstein-Friesians. In spring and summer they graze their way slowly through the fields on a regular routine. In late autumn, when the ground becomes too churned up, they are herded into byres, from where they stare out at passing walkers. Any doubts that dairying is big business are soon dispelled in this part of Dorset, where a strong whiff of slurry often taints the wind. In recent years, dairy farming has faced some harsh economic realities, and some herds have been sold. One former dairy farm at Marnhull sold up and is now a maize producer – growing fodder for cattle elsewhere. Until the development of refrigeration and pasteurisation, milk was a highly perishable commodity. Dairy herds were kept on the fringes of towns to minimise the delay between milking and getting the milk to the consumer. Furthermore, prior to mechanisation, milking was a laborious, manual job and the risk of bacterial infection and contamination was much higher. Tess’s experiences as a milkmaid in Thomas Hardy’s novel Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1861) give a good picture of this way of rural life. Everything changed with the advent of mass refrigeration, to slow the bacteria, and pasteurisation to kill them off. The cows are milked by vacuum suction pumps on the farm, and the efficiency is such that one cow can produce up to 1,320 gallons (6,000 litres) of milk in a year. Refrigerated road tankers transfer it to a central dairy where it is checked for bacteria before being pasteurised, processed and sent out, with an extended shop shelf-life. There are downsides to the success story, as with any industrial production or intensive farming, not least of which are concerns about livestock welfare. High levels of fertiliser and overflowing slurry pits contribute to around a quarter of water pollution incidents. Ruminating cattle produce vast amounts of methane gas, adding steadily to global warming. Yet it is estimated that we drink around four times as much of the white stuff as our predecessors.

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Been on this walk?

Send us photos or a comment about this route. Or recommend a route of your own.

Find out more

Walking in Safety

Read our tips to look after yourself and the environment when following this walk.

Learn more

Get an AA guide

Explore our range of ‘50 Walks in’ guides - they’re the ideal companion for a ramble.

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About the area

Dorset is made up of rugged coastlines, high chalk downlands and a chain of picturesque villages and seaside towns that make up Britain’s Jurassic Coast, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, noted for its layers of shale and numerous fossils embedded in the rock. Hidden gems of Dorset can be found down winding, country lanes that lead to snug villages hidden from view.