We are on a visit to Poole and found this interesting walk north of Wimborne Minster in one of our numerous walk books. We parked opposite the pub and headed along the away from the Horton Inn to the north west. We turned left after crossing a bridge ...
... and followed a farm track which led us to the delightful Crichel Mill.
We continued south along a field edge with a narrow waterway on our right.
At the end of the field edge we crossed a couple of bridges, bearing right and entering some woodland. We admired a fine display of Snowdrops.
We passed through a white kissing gate and could soon make out Crichel House through the trees and across Crichel Lake.
The handsome House is largely 18th century in appearance, the original Tudor house having been largely burned down in the 17th century. Various additions have been made since.
We reached the drive of Crichel House and turned left along the road to reach the rather fine Gatehouse.
We now turned sharp left and walked past the houses of this small village. I liked the delicate date stone on the gable end of one the houses.
We then skirted a newish housing development (foreshadowed in our walk book) on either side of a watercourse.
We followed a track to reach the B3078 road. At this point we were feeling a bit weary (we had gone off the planned route a few times - a consequence of the very sketchy sketch map). We decided to walk along the road back to Horton Cross. Before long we realised that this road was rather busy and dangerous, so we turned right off it and headed up a lane towards Chalbury. At the top we turned left (by chance rejoining the walk route) heading towards Chalbury Farm.
Quite soon we spotted, on the right, the wonderful Horton Tower which we had last encountered in 2011. Here is a link.
After passing the farmhouse we walked across two massive fields - mercifully with marked-out paths. This brought us back to the Horton Inn.
Source: Pub Walks in Dorset by Mike Power, 1997 (!), but not much seems to have changed.
Map: Shaftesbury & Cranborne Chase, Explorer 118.
Conditions: bright and sunny, though rather cool.
Distance: about 5 miles.
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