Central England: British Camp, Worcestershire
Distance: 13km/8 miles
Time: 5hrs
Type: Hill
Where: Linear ridge-top walk from Great Malvern, over the Malvern Hills to Herefordshire Beacon, aka ‘British Camp’.
Start: Great Malvern Priory (SO776458).
End: British Camp car park (SO764404).
Terrain: Initial steep ascent through woods and across open heathland, gives way to more gentle gradients – all via clear paths.
Maps: OS Explorer 190.
This classic walking route, popular since the spa boom of Victorian times, is the traverse between the two highest summits: Worcestershire Beacon (425m) in the north, and Herefordshire Beacon, aka ‘British Camp’ (383m), in the south. Lined for most of its length with an Iron Age earthwork, the ridge path crosses five named peaks, where outcrops of Pre-Cambrian gneiss – a kind of volcanic rock otherwise found only in the far northwest of Scotland – fall away to steep, grassy slopes carpeted in bracken, gorse and red banks of sorrel. Spellbinding views accompany the entire walk and, thanks to the walker-friendly Hopper Bus service that loops around the hills on weekends, you can make it a linear trip, staying high all day and avoiding the long trudge back around the Malvern’s wooded flanks.
Click here to download a pdf route card
Click here to download the GPS data for this route as an Anquet file
Click here to download the GPS data for this route as a GPX file
Click below to see a route profile and view the route on an Ordnance Survey map
Click to enlarge
Please note: The image of the route overlay on the Ordnance Survey map was published incorrectly in the Spring 09 issue of walk magazine. The route was shown in reverse from end point to start point. This has been corrected on the route map and PDF route card shown above.
- This entry was posted on: Thursday, February 26th, 2009 at 11:11 am
- Filed under: Latest Walks, Walks
- Tags: Central England
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