"A modest Cotswold market town is home to a pair of diverse attractions."
Walk directions
From Northleach Market Place, with the church behind you, turn left and walk along the main street to the traffic lights at the A429. Cross the road with care, keep left of The Old Prison and, immediately after passing the centre, turn right through a gate into a field. Go half right to cross a stream by a field corner and walk on into the next field.
Aiming for a church tower, go diagonally right up the field to a gate. Pass through this into the next field and, keeping fairly close to the field’s right-hand margin, head for a kissing gate on the far side. Pass into the next field and walk around the right-hand perimeter in the general direction of St George’s Church in Hampnett. This will bring you to a kissing gate at a road.
Turn left and almost immediately come to a concrete track on your left. To visit the church walk ahead and then return to this track. Otherwise, turn left down the track and follow it as it descends to pass farm buildings. Where the track begins to bear right, turn left to climb a track towards a gate. Go through it and continue to follow the track, eventually striking a road. Cross this to walk along another track (Monarch’s Way) all the way to another road by a reservoir.
At this road turn left and walk until you reach the A429. Cross with great care to a gap in the hedge at a marker post and then walk along a grassy track until you come to a farmyard. Walk through the yard and out the other side along a track to another road.
Cross to a track and follow this for about 330yds (300m). Turn left through a gate to enter a field and follow the left margin with a stone wall to your left. Northleach is ahead of you. Where the field comes to an end, go through a kissing gate and go straight down the field to a kissing gate beside a playground.
Go through and, bearing right, walk between the tennis courts and the playground to cross a stream. Walk the length of an alley and, at the top, turn left to return to the starting point.
Northleach as a settlement dates back to approximately 1200 ad, its fine church was built and subsequently restored with money gained from the wool trade of the late Middle Ages. More recently, the House of Correction opened in the last few years of the 1700s, but only lasted for 60 years before... closure. An important wool town in the Middle Ages, Northleach still just about manages to take you back to that period. The atmosphere of antiquity comes from the fact that one of the finest wool churches in the Cotswolds overlooks the market square. This mighty fine example of the English Perpendicular style dates from the 15th century – its magnificent south porch is one of the finest in the country. The interior is quite stark, but beautifully proportioned. The church contains the grandest collection of monumental brasses in the Cotswolds, commemorating the medieval wool merchants who brought prosperity to Northleach and passed some of it along to the church. To the west of Northleach, at a corner of a Fosse Way crossroads, lies the Old Prison café. It is housed in an 18th-century house of correction, built by the prison reformer and wealthy philanthropist Sir Onesipherous Paul. He was a descendant of a family of successful clothiers from Woodchester, near Stroud, who were also responsible for the construction of what is now the King’s house at Highgrove. Paul’s intentions were surely good, but conditions in the prison were still harsh and the treadmill was still considered effective as the unrelenting instrument of slow punishment. As well as a restored 18th-century cell block, you’ll find the Lloyd-Baker Rural Life Collection, an interesting collection of agricultural implements and machinery which displays plenty of fascinating photographs showing what rural life in the Cotswolds was once like. Northleach itself, like Cirencester and Chipping Campden, was one of the key medieval wool trading centres of the Cotswolds. Though once on a crossroads of the A40 and the Fosse Way, neither now passes through the town, the completion of the A40 bypass in the mid-1980s left the town centre a quiet and very attractive place to visit. The main street is lined with houses, some half-timbered, dating from the 16th to 19th centuries. Many of these retain their ancient ‘burgage’ rear plots that would have served as market gardens. Above the market square is a tiny maze of narrow lanes, overlooked by the Church of St Peter and St Paul, the town’s impressive 15th-century Perpendicular ‘wool church’.
Gloucestershire is home to a variety of landscapes, including the Cotswolds, a region of gentle hills, valleys and gem-like villages that roll through the county. To their west is the Severn Plain, watered by Britain’s longest river and characterised by orchards and farms marked out by hedgerows that blaze with mayflower in the spring; beyond the Severn are the Forest of Dean and the Wye Valley.
"A modest Cotswold market town is home to a pair of diverse attractions."
Walk details
1hr 45min
Difficulty:
Easy
Gradient:
Gentle
Distance:
4 miles (6.4kms)
Ascent:
165ft (50m)
Walk directions
From Northleach Market Place, with the church behind you, turn left and walk along the main street to the traffic lights at the A429. Cross the road with care, keep left of The Old Prison and, immediately after passing the centre, turn right through a gate into a field. Go half right to cross a stream by a field corner and walk on into the next field.
1 of 6
Aiming for a church tower, go diagonally right up the field to a gate. Pass through this into the next field and, keeping fairly close to the field’s right-hand margin, head for a kissing gate on the far side. Pass into the next field and walk around the right-hand perimeter in the general direction of St George’s Church in Hampnett. This will bring you to a kissing gate at a road.
2 of 6
Turn left and almost immediately come to a concrete track on your left. To visit the church walk ahead and then return to this track. Otherwise, turn left down the track and follow it as it descends to pass farm buildings. Where the track begins to bear right, turn left to climb a track towards a gate. Go through it and continue to follow the track, eventually striking a road. Cross this to walk along another track (Monarch’s Way) all the way to another road by a reservoir.
3 of 6
At this road turn left and walk until you reach the A429. Cross with great care to a gap in the hedge at a marker post and then walk along a grassy track until you come to a farmyard. Walk through the yard and out the other side along a track to another road.
4 of 6
Cross to a track and follow this for about 330yds (300m). Turn left through a gate to enter a field and follow the left margin with a stone wall to your left. Northleach is ahead of you. Where the field comes to an end, go through a kissing gate and go straight down the field to a kissing gate beside a playground.
5 of 6
Go through and, bearing right, walk between the tennis courts and the playground to cross a stream. Walk the length of an alley and, at the top, turn left to return to the starting point.
Northleach as a settlement dates back to approximately 1200 ad, its fine church was built and subsequently restored with money gained from the wool trade of the late Middle Ages. More recently, the House of Correction opened in the last few years of the 1700s, but only lasted for 60 years before... closure. An important wool town in the Middle Ages, Northleach still just about manages to take you back to that period. The atmosphere of antiquity comes from the fact that one of the finest wool churches in the Cotswolds overlooks the market square. This mighty fine example of the English Perpendicular style dates from the 15th century – its magnificent south porch is one of the finest in the country. The interior is quite stark, but beautifully proportioned. The church contains the grandest collection of monumental brasses in the Cotswolds, commemorating the medieval wool merchants who brought prosperity to Northleach and passed some of it along to the church. To the west of Northleach, at a corner of a Fosse Way crossroads, lies the Old Prison café. It is housed in an 18th-century house of correction, built by the prison reformer and wealthy philanthropist Sir Onesipherous Paul. He was a descendant of a family of successful clothiers from Woodchester, near Stroud, who were also responsible for the construction of what is now the King’s house at Highgrove. Paul’s intentions were surely good, but conditions in the prison were still harsh and the treadmill was still considered effective as the unrelenting instrument of slow punishment. As well as a restored 18th-century cell block, you’ll find the Lloyd-Baker Rural Life Collection, an interesting collection of agricultural implements and machinery which displays plenty of fascinating photographs showing what rural life in the Cotswolds was once like. Northleach itself, like Cirencester and Chipping Campden, was one of the key medieval wool trading centres of the Cotswolds. Though once on a crossroads of the A40 and the Fosse Way, neither now passes through the town, the completion of the A40 bypass in the mid-1980s left the town centre a quiet and very attractive place to visit. The main street is lined with houses, some half-timbered, dating from the 16th to 19th centuries. Many of these retain their ancient ‘burgage’ rear plots that would have served as market gardens. Above the market square is a tiny maze of narrow lanes, overlooked by the Church of St Peter and St Paul, the town’s impressive 15th-century Perpendicular ‘wool church’.
Gloucestershire is home to a variety of landscapes, including the Cotswolds, a region of gentle hills, valleys and gem-like villages that roll through the county. To their west is the Severn Plain, watered by Britain’s longest river and characterised by orchards and farms marked out by hedgerows that blaze with mayflower in the spring; beyond the Severn are the Forest of Dean and the Wye Valley.
