Freeland - Barnard Gate (The Boot Inn) - Freeland

Distance 4.9 miles

This walk starts and ends at the Village Hall.

Leaving the Village Hall car park turn right and head north along Wroslyn Road then left into Broadmarsh Lane.

The cottage on your left, called Upper Farm was the northern most of the tree farms associated with Freeland House. Middle farm was at the western end of what is now Freeland Nursery and Lower Farm has completely disappeared but was in the field to the north west of the Wroslyn Road, Cuckoo Lane junction.

Continue straight on into the woods at the point where Broadmarsh Lane turns sharp right. Then immediately turn right and go behind the houses heading north until you see the waymark post, at which point turn left deeper into the woods. This is footpath FP-7.

The path is clearly marked but after a couple of hundred metres the official route becomes overgrown and so the path moves to the right and continues along the edge of a conifer plantation. Eventually you will see Cuckoo Lane ahead of you.

At this point you can simply exit the woods to Cuckoo Lane, but rather better is to turn left just before the exit point and take the woodland path parallel with Cuckoo Lane going south, exiting the wood a little later.

At the T junction on Cuckoo Lane we go straight on towards Barnard Gate. This is a pleasant stretch of quiet lane gently sloping downwards. At the point that the road makes a sharp right turn, you will find a ‘Restricted Byway’ sign pointing into the undergrowth towards the left (this is actually Eynsham CRB 21 which leads to Freeland Bridleway BR-1). Rather than fight your way through this, we suggest you hop over the large log in front of you and turn left along the wide field headland.

Ahead of you is Castles Copse and when you reach it you can dogleg left and right to rejoin the Bridleway which is now passable.

Soon you come to a stile and, ahead of you beyond some oak trees, is Bowles Farm.

The farm derives it’s name not from the Bowles family but has a much earlier derivation. There is a record that in 1390 the abbot (of Eynsham) was storing tithe hay at “le Bolde” for his own use. The names Bold Croft and Bold Close were later recorded at the location of Bowles Farm. The significance of this is that a ’bold’ could indicate the remains of a stone building and somewhere near Bowles Farm is believed to be the site of the village of Tilgarsley which was abandoned in 1350 after most of it’s inhabitants died of the plague. At the time Tilgarsley was bigger than Eynsham.

Cross the field towards Bowles Farm and at the third oak tree turn sharp right and head down to the corner of the field. After passing through into the next field you should head south west keeping Castles Copse on your right (this is Freeland footpath FP-9 which links up with Eynsham FP14). A stile leads into a long narrow field leading eventually to Barnard Gate and you emerge at the side of The Boot Inn. http://www.theboot-inn.com/about.html

The Boot was acquired by Adelaide- born Chef, Craig Foster in 2003 and is definitely a rather superior pub. However the atmosphere is friendly and the menu interesting and affordable, a good place to take a break before continuing the walk.

Fortified by good food you will now be able to face the least pleasant part of the walk. Turn left on leaving the Boot and shortly the lane (which used to be the main road) joins the busy A40. However there is a wide footpath/cycleway and in 300 metres you are able to leave the road behind and turn left onto what is officially a bridleway (Eynsham BR13) though this was not obvious at the time of writing. You will need to pass through or over a rather overgrown gate to gain the field and then proceed north keeping to the hedge on the left.

The field is long and expect to find cattle grazing so any dogs must be very firmly controlled. In the centre of the field are the ruins of an old red-brick barn and around it (in July) teasels were in flower.

At the top of the field a tall iron gate possibly padlocked must be climbed to reach the next field. Again expect to find cattle, possibly accompanied by an apparently mild tempered bull. Keep to the left by a ditch and double fence and at the far end of the field you will find a gate giving access to Cuckoo Lane.

Turn left along the wide verge until you see the start of the bridleway after a few metres on the opposite side. Carefully cross the road and proceed through a (somewhat overgrown) gate to a track (Eynsham BR-20) leading to a blue metal gate. Then head north alongside a small field to a matching gate beyond which is the track leading to Cuckoo Wood Farm.

As you near the entrance to the farm, turn left into the field and go north alongside a small wood.

Soon the trees end but you continue north along the headland until at the far end there is a gap where you can turn right and left to continue with the hedge now on your left.

In a short while at the corner of the field you will find the bridleway (BR-2), sometimes rather boggy at first, passing between old hedge banks. This section of the bridleway has recently been cleared and the chippings from the clearance work greatly improve the surface underfoot.

The way now climbs gently up through the western edge of Vincents Wood, thick with bluebells in the spring, until emerging at the village green.

From here it is a short walk north on Wroslyn Road back to the Village Hall.

Refreshment can be found in ‘The Oxfordshire Yeoman’ pub, opposite the Hall.