Date: Location: Distance: Parking: Lunch: | 15 February 2018 Janesmoor Pond, New Forest 5.1 miles Car Park just before the large one at the pond The Green Dragon ★★★★☆ |
On 5 February we had a short, 4 mile, walk around Arne. This is a lovely area run by RSPB so there is a car park charge of £5 for the day unless you have a member with you and they have their membership card to display on the car. There is also a cafe with reasonably priced food and drink. We had a good walk on a beautiful day and the paths are easy to follow as well as being good underfoot.
There have been many wet days recently so for today’s walk we opted for the cycle tracks in the New Forest yet again. This time we planned to start at Janesmoor Pond but actually parked in a car park just off the road as the Janesmoor CP had some pretty deep potholes on the approach.
Another lovely day which was amazing given how absolutely dreary yesterday had been. We enjoyed the variety of woodland in this area much of it being made up of Beech and Oak as well as areas of the ever present pines. We had seen a lot of large expanses of water besides the roads as we drove to Janesmoor so were not surprised to find that most of the “off piste” tracks were waterlogged. We stuck religiously to the cycle tracks!
We thought we would go to The Sir Walter Tyrell for lunch but a long wait without even being asked what we would like to drink and the wailing of a young child changed our thinking.
We stopped at the Green Dragon at Brook. Here we had a very different welcome, excellent service from very pleasant staff and a really good steak and ale pie. The pie a proper pie full to the brim with really tender meat. The only drawback was the somewhat higher price. Nevertheless it was a good end to a great day.
It is possible to turn left off the A31 at Stoney Cross to reach Janesmoor Pond but there is no right turn.