Arreton

After a lazy summer my hiking buddy and I decided to get back out into the countryside again today. We drove up to Robin Hill to drop her family at Bestival (after we'd driven back to collect the tickets), then pootled down the road to Arreton Barns. We had no map, obviously, but thought we remembered the route of a nice walk. We were mostly right.

We walked through the barns site, past the duckpond and St George's church, and came out on the main road. Here we crossed over the road and entered a cabbage field. We walked all the way up the track to find a wire fence with no way through, so retraced our steps to find a path through the cabbages on our right. This also led to a fence, but we were able to hop over it to an obvious path on the other side. This led in due course over a couple of stiles and brought us onto the main Newport to Sandown cycle path. We headed towards Sandown, and shortly after found a path on our left leading to Haseley Manor; this mostly consisted of boardwalks as the path was rather muddy, and came out right next to the Manor House. Last time we were here the path was closed so it was nice to see the work that had been done.

From Haseley, we walked away from the road, past the outbuildings, and towards the downs. The path led us to a lake, rather low on water after the summer sunshine, and we walked round it, scaring the waterfowl, until we met back up with the main path. From here we continued up the hill on a farm track thinking that if we got to the top we would be able to get a glimpse of Bestival. However. It was a hot day, we were tired and unfit, so when we got to a gateway by the woods we sat down and talked ourselves out of it. Turns out we wouldn't have seen anything anyway! Back down the hill to the lake, turned right and followed the path back to Arreton Barns. Here we made a few purchases at Farmer Jacks farm shop and then had a drink on the terrace at the Dairyman's Daughter, and listened to a trio of musicians who were jolly good. Lovely afternoon!

Hasely Manor

Teasels

View from the gate

St George

Arreton Church