Today was a proper autumn morning: a chill, mist in the valley, the sun squinting through every tiny chink in the clouds. The overall colour is still green, though, with the occasional dash of yellow, orange and red as some trees, usually the sycamores and hawthorns, can't wait any longer for the change of season.
I set off from Whitestreet Green and headed down Homey Bridge lane. The trees still appear to be in full summer mode here, although the stony path is strewn with discarded yellow leaves (and, bizarrely, with one discarded car tyre, within which someone had lovingly placed a tied-up doggy-poo bag). A light rain of acorns fell around me, dislodged from the trees on this windless morning only by the weight of their own ripeness.
I turned left after the footbridge over the ford and followed the road round to the footpath on the right, leading up to Steps Farm. The sky was doing strange things, constantly changing the light, to remind me that this is no longer a summer walk.
At the Stoke road, I turned left and then right, past the houses of Goldenlond (a name to ponder - it must have a history), then left again at the footpath sign. This path leads along the side of a field with an extensive view over the valley. Right again at the end, I followed the track down the hill towards Poplars Farm, an even wider vista across the Stour Valley opening up on my left.
There is a kind of wilderness at the bottom of the hill. It used to be a plantation of poplars, but these were felled a few years ago and the saplings-in-waiting have taken over. Young chestnut trees have established, with their strangely exotic, jungly foliage and mysterious little bundles of spiny fruit. By contrast, a huge walnut tree nearby was already completely denuded and ready for winter, leaves cast off, nuts stolen by squirrels.
The track here is part of both the Stour Valley Path and the St Edmund Way. It leads to the road towards Nayland, then straight on along a surfaced track running alongside part of the golf course. Until recently, this was a narrow, muddy and uneven path, almost entirely enclosed by branches and undergrowth. A passing walker would suddenly hear sounds and catch occasional glimpses of golf-course activity, just the other side of the hedge (convivial chattering - warning cry - bum-wiggle - thwack - hand shading eyes - resigned sigh). They seem less incongruous now that the track is wide, trimmed and accessible to vehicles.
The track leads past a footpath sign on the left, which takes the Stour Valley Path and the St Edmund Way off towards Nayland, then up a hill among the trees, eventually meeting up with a small driveway on the left, towards Spring Farm. The driveway leads to a signposted path on the right. This is a lovely spot, with some beautiful specimen trees, in full autumn colour and a large, leaf-strewn pond to the left of the path, which simply oozes wildlife. This is private land, so walkers need to be discreet.
A single large orange leaf was dancing, all alone, almost on the ground, but not falling. It wavered up, then down, then round and round, following some invisible lead. I wondered at it for a moment, then realised that it was attached to the branch above by the finest thread of spider silk, too minute to see, but too strong to break, even under the weight of the leaf in the growing breeze. This had sprung up without me noticing, turning the rain of acorns into a hailstorm.
The path comes to a junction with a path to the right, through a gate. I took this path, through another gate, then over a track to a kissing-gate with a footpath sign and a less-than-welcoming warning to "Beware of the bull". He wasn't around (and how, exactly, was I supposed to "beware" of him if he had been?), so I crossed the field to a stile and into the semi-industrial fruit-production area of Honey Tye. These fields are covered in the huge, plastic-netting-clad structures which are creeping gradually around this area, including in the designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and which are about to blight the Box Valley. As I passed by, I saw two blackbirds, trapped inside the netting and frantically throwing themselves against it in an attempt to escape. I couldn't do anything for them, but try to take a photo to record their fate and hope that they eventually found a way out.
I crossed the A1071, turned left past the row of newly built houses, then first right , then took the first footpath on the right, just after Rose Hill Farm, leading towards Leavenheath. The path leads along the side of a sloping field, then right, across another field, through a small wood and into Edie's Lane in Leavenheath. I followed the road to the junction with Leavenheath High Road, then right a nd first left, through the estate to a path on the right marked "Royston Wood". A bright flotilla of pre-school children and their nursury teachers, all in hi-viz jackets, was working its way along the path from the wood. One teacher was trying to pull an enormous trolley full of equipment, assisted keenly, but not very usefully, by two tiny helpers pulling on handles with all their might, but in the opposite direction.
I crossed the A1071 again, turned left, then first right into the long, straight march down Plough Lane. A kestrel was hovering over the fallow field to the right, wings and tail almost coiled to maintain its position over some morsel of great interest. It dropped like a stone and did not fly up again, so the morning probably did not end well for some small mammal which had thought it was safe among the dead grasses and nettles. A little further on, a brown flash caught my eye and a stoat briefly appeared beside the hedge, running with its slippery, wavy-liquid gait, like a caterpillar on extra-fast-forward.
Further on, an unruly gathering of adolescent crows had been left by their parents to get on with the autumn ritual of acquiring crow life skills. They have many things to learn if they are to survive and breed, but the most fun lesson in the crow curriculum seems to be the art of buzzard-baiting. You get above the circling predator, buzz it a couple of times with a flutter of wings and a good screech, then claws out...altogether now...divebomb! This year's young buzzards usually scream in terror and try to get away, pursued by much cackling, but the older birds shrug off the young thugs, knowing that they will not really risk a strike from a buzzard beak.
I followed Plough Lane past the golf course on the left, past Keeper's Lane, then on down the hill with the golf course on both sides and back up the surprisingly steep hill to the Stoke road. Here, I turned first left and followed the Stoke Tye road back down to the ford at Homey Bridge and up the track towards Whitestreet Green.
By now the sun had gone and low cloud was threatening rain. Well, it is autumn after all. Good walking weather might be getting rarer, but we still have the best of the autumn colours to come, so let’s get out there anyway!
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