The Devil's HighwayA moderate length local walk for a warm Sunday. This 5.75 mile walk starts just near Stratfield Mortimer, like another walk I did there recently. You pass the church, and head south along the Foudry Brook and across fields until you reach the Devil's Highway. This is the old Roman road from Silchester to London and somewhere along the way has acquired this fanciful and rather meaningless name.
A Google search produced no insights, but it did reveal that the US has a Devil's Highway too - Route 491. This has a slightly more convincing story: it used to be Route 666 and 666 is, according to the Book of Revelation, the number of the beast. This plus a high level of fatalities led to the nickname. The number was changed because this notoriety led to people stealing the 666 sign.
You walk for a mile and a half along what is now a quiet track, with glimpses of fields through the hedgerow. You then turn left along a lane and then right up a green lane to reach Beech Hill.
Slightly off the route of the walk is the very pretty church of St Mary.
This dates from 1867 and is the work of William Butterfield, who was also responsible for Keble College Oxford, and the hidden gem of All Saints, Margaret Street, just near Oxford Circus in London.
From Beech Hill you walk across farmland, with some nice views of open country, back to the start.
From: Rambling for pleasure around Reading (second series) by David Bounds for the East Berkshire Ramblers
Map: Explorer 159 (Reading, Wokingham and Pangbourne)
Rating: three and a half stars.
Sightings
Another good day for butterflies, with 11 species: Meadow Brown, Ringlet, Small Heath, Small Skipper, Large White, Small White, Green-veined White, Comma, Gatekeeper and lone, battered, examples of Painted Lady and Speckled Wood.
As we approached Beech Hill there was still no sign of a Kite - but one flew low overhead and the new natural order was restored.
Flower of the day
Just once we came on this striking blue Viper's Bugloss.
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