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Kemble Circular via Thames Head and Cirencester walk

Past the Thames Head and along a disused canal, then up through woods to the Severn/Thames watershed and back through the magnificent Cirencester Park and Town

Circular Gloucestershire Long

History

This is a list of previous times this walk has been done by the club (since Jan 2010). For more recent events (since April 2015), full details are shown.

Date Option Post # Weather
Sat, 25-Mar-23 Saturday Walk - Thames Head, Bathurst Estate, Cirencester Park (with Horse Trials) and Cirencester: Kemble Circular with 4 different lengths 9 sunny then cloudy
Sun, 14-Aug-16 A new SWC expedition to unexplored territory - the source of the River Thames 7
Thomas G

Walk recently fully revised. Several options added. All but the Ultra Short Walk now lead through Cirencester Park and Town. For Medium, Short and Ultra Short Walks see the webpage or the pdf.

Main Walk:
Length: 27.8 km/17.3 mi
Ascent/Descent: 208m
Net Walking Time: ca. 6 hours
Toughness: 5 out of 10
Take the 09.28 Cheltenham Spa train from Paddington (09.53 Reading), arriving Kemble at 10.39.
Return trains: xx.49 to 20.49, then 21.52 and 22.15.
Splitting the ticket is the cheapest option if travelling on a Network Railcard (buy separate London – Didcot Parkway [with Network RC discount] and Didcot - Kemble [without a discount] returns).
This Gloucestershire walk at the southern edge of the Cotswolds AONB explores the springs and wells forming the source of the River Thames and a longer stretch of the upper river, as well as some of the woods of the large Bathurst Estate and Cirencester Park and Town, the ‘Capital of the Cotswolds’.
After passing an assortment of springs and wells that constitute the start of the Thames and an Iron Age hillfort site right by the highest of the springs, you follow the disused Thames & Severn Canal to the Sapperton Canal Tunnel, before rising through Hailey Wood up to the watershed to the Severn Catchment Area and to Sapperton village, on the edge of the Golden Valley and with a splendid old church.
Climb over the highest point of the walk and enter the magnificent Cirencester Park, one of the greatest privately owned parks of the 18th century, with its splendid vistas, romantic follies, statues and woods. On into Cirencester for tea (or lunch on the short options of the route), once one of the most substantial cities of Roman-era Britain, now a bustling market town and considered the Capital of the Cotswolds, with its many independent shops, beautiful Georgian and Victorian buildings, alleyways and courtyards as well as some Roman ruins, most interestingly the Amphitheatre (at the time the second largest in Britain and now one of the best preserved).
The short return to Kemble leads through quiet fields, along woods and through the picturesque village of Ewen, before another stretch along the Upper Thames.Three principle shorter versions are described and buses add additional options to cut bits of the route. See the webpage or the pdf for details.
Notes: The Upper Thames is a winterbourne river, only fed from aquifers and without tributaries in the area walked. In long dry periods it can be completely dry. Cirencester Park is open to the walking public daily 08.00-17.00 (sharp!), but today should be open to 18.00 due to the Cirencester Park Horse Trials.
Lunch: The Bell at Sapperton. (food to 16.00, 9.1 km (5.7 mi) into the main walk, booking recommended at weekends!).
On the Medium and Short Walks, all Cirencester Tea Stops become Lunch Stops, from 13.1 km and 10.2 km into the walk respectively.
Tea: Hot drinks and snacks in Cirencester Park, plus plenty of options in Cirencester, for details check the pdf.
The Tavern Inn in Kemble. Located just past the station. An Arkell’s of Swindon pub.
For route map, gpx/kml file, photos and pdf directions click here. T=swc.256
  • 25-Mar-23

    9 off a very busy train in bright sunshine with some fluffy clouds. We were lucky on the "will there be water in the Thames?"-front, as there was a good flow in the initial stretch, most of which came impressively gushing out of Lyd Well. I had also seen water coming down the culvert from the upper meadows, so was full of hope we'd see the highest spring in action as well, but to no avail: the water in the culvert came from some small seepages in the meadow south of the Fosse Way, but there was no flow higher up, in Trewsbury Meadow. Never mind, seeing that most of the time there is next to no flow, we had picked a good day.

    Trewsbury Camp's flanks were practically all bluebell shoots, so that should be a good sight soon. On along the canal (beyond the stop-planks very full with crystal clear water from the springs in Sapperton Tunnel) and through Hailey Wood up to the watershed to the Severn. More primroses here than celadines than anenomes, but all vastly outnumbered by bluebells again.

    There were plenty of birds of prey in the air, I think I heard a lark at one point and one or two of us spotted butterflies and loads of other animals, but they can report separately.

    6 had lunch at The Bell at Sapperton, and we stayed for an hour and 3/4. 1 picnicker understandably moved on, but the other 2 waited outside, at a bench in the sun with a drink.

    A quick sojourn to the church then with its memorials, and a peek into the Golden Valley, then up and back over the watershed and into Cirencester Park.

    In the core part, the horse trials were still in full flow (on since 8 in the morning), although the dressage was already finished, so just the showjumping and the eventing to ogle at. The roped-off course necessitated a few small diversions from the walk route, but in exchange we got close-up sight of some fast horses jumping over some quite impressive obstacles.

    After a 'tourist route' through town, a stop at The Bear in Cirencester was squeezed in, before moving on to the Roman Amphitheatre and then back across to Kemble, including another stretch along the Thames, here a proper chalk stream with some pacey flow, with gravel beds etc. The afternoon had been cloudier than the morning, and by now it was dark-ish, but we were 'between trains', so there was no need to rush.

    In the end, 25 minutes were left for The Tavern Inn before catching the 19.49 train.

    Everybody seemed to think that time and money were well spent on this trip.

    sunny then cloudy

  • 26-Mar-23

    Larks throughout the walk. Six brimstone butterflies.

  • E
    26-Mar-23

    Plus: nuthatches, chiffchaff and lots of blackbirds; orange-red tailed bumblebees; mature hedgerows and trees (including yews at St Kenelm's Church and a couple of sequoias in the woods). Also, lichen and thick moss lining trees, banks and stone walls along the way.

  • 31-Mar-23

    Great walk plus after some solitary plus silent walks a welcome opportunity to practice walking and talking.

PeteB
SWC 256 Kemble circular – the source of the Thames
Wanted: a goodly number of stout-hearted men and women for SWC expedition to seek and discover the source of the river Thames.
Distance 16km (10m). Toughness – off the scale (oh alright then 2/10 ).

Note: Although an easy walk in terms of general terrain some paths will be overgrown.
Trains:
09.30 London Paddington – Swindon 10.38 (Platform 1); 10.47 Swindon (Platform 4) – Kemble 11.01.
Assemble Kemble station exit with full kit and provisions for departure at 11.10 prompt.
Return trains from Kemble to London
16.20 – direct; 17.17- change Swindon; 18.23 direct; 20.16 change Swindon; 20.50 direct.
Victuals: Tunnel House Inn – just 5km into the walk. Top quality pub with an attractive garden and outdoor seating and a wide range of foods. Check it out here . The Wild Duck pub in Ewen is 3km from the end of the walk and a fine stop for refreshments. There is also the Tavern Inn adjacent to Kemble station for any final refreshments whilst waiting for your train..
Walk options
If you have a map you could divert to Cirencester for further exploration - see walk instructions
Walk information, map, gps and briefing material can be found here. Click on the pdf for full instructions and further details about the walk
  • Anonymous
    07-Jul-16

    Just got two single tickets £7.60 each on Southern Rail website. Departing 9.30.

    Returning at 18.23 I've got senior railcard plus 60+ Oyster card, so bought from West Drayton to Kimble.

  • Anonymous
    10-Jul-16

    presumably, with senior railcard, you get 1/3 off for the entire journey, whilst with network card, only 1/3 off up to Reading. It is pity that no Swindon trains stop at Didcot on Sundays, otherwise, 1/3 off up to Didcot would be possible.

  • 09-Aug-16

    Got a super off peak return for £22.85 today using a senior railcard and London Freedom pass. May be better deals available on the web.

  • 15-Aug-16

    7 "stouthearts" on the inaugural SWC expedition to discover the source of the Thames despite the best efforts of FGW who because of engineering over-running meant we almost missed our connecting train from Swindon. But for good measure they decided to cancel the 18.24 direct train back to London!! The weather w= was fine-with-sunny-periods.

    We set off through the fields beyond Kemble station to find the source only to discover another expeditionary group had beaten us to it! They were possibly Norwegian. We ambled along the overgrown canal towpath for lunch at the Tunnel Pub which had a roast carvery (the SWC roast inspector may be commenting separately on this.) Food was served reasonably quickly. One of our group stayed in the pub having arranged to meet two friends.

    After lunch some paths I feared would be very overgrown were not too bad but I/we inadvertently started to take a short-cut on the walk and so to complete the loop we had to do a bit of backtracking. Two pressed on to make the 16.24 direct train whilst 4 of us took it more slowly to enjoy the countryside and have a tea at the Wild Duck in Ewen before the final 3km mainly along the Thames path back to Kemble where we caught the 17.18 train after a short detour to look at the village.

    The dreamy Cotswolds countryside looked splendid, particularly the silvery fields of barley but it was quite melancholy seeing the reaped fields reminding us that autumn is approaching.

    For Saturday walkers - as opposed to Sundays- it may be good to extend the walk to visit the Roman town of Cirencester. There's a lot of lovely countryside in the area but few rights of way to get you back to Kemble station. An excellent day out.

    Finally this walk should not really be done after September. Once the rains start the Thames source becomes a flood plain and en route to the Wild Duck in Ewen you go along a narrow bridleway and one 15m stretch was muddy even with the recent dry weather.After rains it would be a morass!