NEWMARKET INN ON A27 TO DEVIL'S DYKE

Philip,Suzanne,me,Jo and Gabrielle(taking photo)



Hard going up this hill towards Ditchling




Ditchling Beacon




Most difficult climb to get here!




Devil's Dyke - end of day!

 Monday 2nd May 2011:  Another beautiful sunny day, but extremely windy and gusty. Made the climbing of the hills more difficult. We all met at Devil's Dyke, to drive one car back to Newmarket Inn to start our walk. We were not quite sure where the SDW started, so after making an error or two and having to back track, we decided to cross the main A27 at a designated crossing area, to find the path more easily on the other side, rather than walk to the bridge crossing. Once there (and it took us about half an hour to get to it!), we found the climb quite steep and long. It levelled out to a more sloping climb after about 20 minutes. There was some relief from both the strong wind and the upward trend when we reached a tree plantation and started to go down. After that, the climb obviously went up again, and up and up, till we reached Ditchling Beacon.

Unfortunately for us, it continued to go up, on a more gentle continuous but long slope, and levelled off at the Jack and Jill windmills, before going down towards Clayton Tunnel and the A273, which we crossed to get to the SDW path to Pyecombe. A welcome break at The Plough, for a cold drink and snack before the inevitable neverending climb up to Devil's Dyke! On this last push, I wondered what I had let myself in for and wished I had planned the stop at The Plough! (But if we did that, it would have put out tomorrow's mileage, and we still would have had that climb to do!). The whole day took longer than planned, as the many hills slowed our speed down to about 2 mph. I was quite elated to reach Devil's Dyke and get a cold drink before setting off home.

Tomorrow, I meet Dolly and Liz at the Frankland Arms, Washington,  at about 9.30+, before setting off to Devil's Dyke, picking up June at Upper Beeding on the way. The walk is about 11 miles from Devil's Dyke to Washington..