Walking in England
A green and pleasant land
Wednesday, 19 November 2025This past September I spent some time walking in the English countryside and seaside near London. It was a lot of fun! I followed two routes from the Saturday Walkers Club: Tring Circular in the Buckinghamshire Chilterns, and Seaford to Eastbourne over the Seven Sisters chalk cliffs. In this post I’ll talk about what it was like and share some of my photos.
Background
I always liked the idea of walking in the English countryside. I visited once as a kid, and I’ve seen it in countless British movies and shows. I also like hiking in general, but I don’t do it often since I don’t have a car. So on my latest work trip to London, I was happy to discover the Saturday Walkers Club, a free resource with hundreds of walks accessible from London by train.
It was an adventure with little planning. Both times I got my train ticket just before leaving. I brought hiking shoes, a raincoat, and a small backpack for my water bottle and sunscreen. I had rain pants but forgot to bring them on the day it rained the most. I hadn’t realized at first that the walks are just written directions, no maps, at least none online. But that actually made it a lot more interesting! I felt lost many times, but I always managed to find the next landmark. There were only a couple times where I had to backtrack.
Tring to Berkhamsted
- Length: 20.6 km
- Toughness: 4 out of 10
- Access: London Euston to Tring (£13)
- Return: Berkhamsted to London Euston (£12)
Like most of the club’s walks, this one has several options to make it longer or shorter. I went with the longer option, (b) Extension to Berkhamsted. Near the beginning I passed by a few other people, and some on horseback, but in general it wasn’t busy at all. I would often go 30 minutes or an hour without encountering anyone. It was raining most of the afternoon, so that probably kept people inside. I got pretty soaked but I didn’t mind that much.
Many parts of the walk were on “right of way” paths, a concept I hadn’t heard of before. These are legally protected routes through private land that the public is allowed to use. Sometimes it’s not even a marked path: there were a few times where the directions had me climbing over a stile and walking through someone’s field, past their animals.
Most of the directions were easy to follow, but some were almost comically detailed, like step 92 heading 130° into the trees:
In 250 metres a path (more evident in summer than winter) merges from the right, and 50 metres beyond this, the ways divide. The more obvious route is slightly left, due east, but your onward route is the right fork, heading into the trees, your direction 130 degrees.
Enough words, here are the best photos I took:
Seaford to Eastbourne
- Length: 21.9 km
- Toughness: 9 out of 10
- Access: London Bridge to Seaford via Lewes (£37)
- Return: Eastbourne to London Bridge (£44)
This walk was very different from the other one. The views were less varied but more breathtaking. There was a lot of climbing but I think the toughness score of 9 exaggerates it. I hardly had to look at the directions most of the time because they just followed the coastline. The only exception was the detour around the Cuckmere River, of which they say:
Note that tempting though it looks just to wade the river, the Cuckmere River is deeper than it looks and surprisingly fast flowing even when it fans out across the beach at low tide. Trying to cross it is NOT recommended.
There were way more other people this time; I was never alone except near the end. At one point I was stuck behind a group of 50 or so students on a narrow path. The weather was better this time, with only a bit of light rain.
Here are my favorite photos from this walk:
Conclusion
I was impressed by how quick and seamless it was making these day trips from London. Overall I liked Tring to Berkhamsted a bit more than Seaford to Eastbourne but I’d still highly recommend both. I look forward to trying some other ones next time I’m in England.