Page contents
About
Gallery
Instagram reel showing here
Parking
Poo bins?
Self-guided walk
About
Hornecourt Wood is an ancient Wealden beech woodland on the National Trust’s Harewoods Estate in Outwood.
The Harewoods Estate was created over a number of years by the Victorian London stockbroker, Alfred Howard Lloyd, and forms a large part of the countryside in and around the picturesque village of Outwood. It was donated to the National Trust in the middle of the last century.
The coppiced hornbeams that you see on entering Hornecourt Wood probably gave the wood its name. In early spring, the woodland floor is carpeted in places with the delicate white flowers of wood anemones. Later in spring, the carpet changes colour as large areas of bluebells come into flower and pastel yellow primroses punctuate the sea of blue. As spring progresses into summer, foxgloves shoot up.
Hornecourt Wood’s topography hides some interesting and alternative evidence of former times. A classic Wealden gill tumbles through the steep-sided valley within the wood, and low-key plank bridges provide pedestrian access. Apparently the wood was once managed for pheasant rearing. Pheasants are not lovers of draughty copses and this sheltered woodland was managed to appeal to them.
This page houses a walk around Hornecourt Wood from one of the smaller car parks in the area – Hornecourt Hill. This website also has a walk from the largest car park on the estate, which goes around the main Outwood Common.
An alternative – and shorter – Hornecourt Wood walk has been set out by the National Trust. At 2 mile/3.2km long, it starts at the larger Outwood Common car park and doesn’t include any of the fields on my route (below).
Gallery: What’s it like here?
Instagram reel showing this place
Parking
Park in the small free Hornecourt Hill car park. There is space for around six cars.
=Poo bins?
None, please take waste home.
Self-guided walk
Here is a Footpath app route from Hornecourt Hill car park, which takes you across the lane and through the field to Hornecourt Wood, then through the field behind it and down Wilmot’s Lane. You then loop back through fields behind the farmhouse and return through Hornecourt Wood.
Length: approximately 2.5 miles/4.1 km
Terrain: Fields and woodland, all of which can be really muddy at certain times of year. A fair few slopes but nothing too step, some steps and a number of small bridges, all of which are sturdy. There is one kissing gate. Two crossings of the lane and a very short section along Wilmot’s Lane before it turns into a dirt track.
Stiles/kissing gates? No stiles, one kissing gate
Taking care because of the possibility of traffic, exit Hornecourt Hill car park through its entrance onto the lane and turn left to walk a few steps, before crossing the road and going through a gap in the hedge on the right.
Turn left and walk along the edge of the field, following the hedgerow round to the right at the corner. After a short distance, the path leaves the field via a plank bridge and heads into Hornecourt Wood. Go across a second plank bridge and turn right on a main path.
At the fork, stay on the main path to the left, unless it’s really muddy, in which case the fork on the right might be less so – it loops round to join the main path anyway. At the junction where there are two massive logs to the right of the path, turn left – you have two paths to choose from here, take the one on the right, which heads downslope. When it comes to a fork by a small marker post, follow the path round to the right. Cross a plank bridge.
At the next marker post, follow the path round to the left and then immediately to the right and head down the steps. Go over the bridge and back up the other side.
At the fork at the top, take the path on the right and follow it as it curves around to the left. Continue straight until you come to a marker post on the left opposite a gap into the fields on the right.
Turn right here and walk along the edge of the field until you reach another marker post where the footpath goes left and diagonally across the field. Pass through the kissing gate on the other side of the field and turn left to walk down Wilmot’s Lane. Keep left and continue ahead onto the track next to a drive off to the right with a gate across it.
Continue straight, ignoring the little bridge off to the left – although if you want to cut your walk short, that path takes you back to Hornecourt Wood. It’s straight ahead again when you reach a finger post pointing right to a stile into a field. Just after this, if you look to your left, you’ll see a pond.
Pass the gates of Wilmot Farm and walk along the hedge until you reach its end, where you turn left through a gap into a field (ignoring a finger post and path to the right).
Walk along the left field boundary, passing a metal water trough and going into the next field, again keeping the hedge on your left. At the third field, the path goes straight through the middle so continue ahead.
Pass into the fourth field and turn immediately left at the big tree and walk along with the hedge on your left. Keep to the hedge as it curves around to the left and then around to the right. Then go straight across the field and between the trees and continue ahead so the hedge is now on your right. Cross the little concrete bridge and head towards the woods ahead.
At the corner, you’ll see a gap in the shrubs. Go through this into the woods and take the middle path right in front of you.
This path goes up and down and comes to a fork, where you go right and down to the bridge. Cross this and then follow either of the two paths up the hill with the field on your right (the paths come together after a short way). Go over another bridge and then continue up the hill, ignoring the path that goes off to the left.
At the top of the slope, keep going straight ahead, ignoring another path off to the left. The path you’re on will shortly come to the end of the wood, where it bends to the left and rises uphill again.
Continue straight past a marker post and a bench on the right, which are opposite a path off to the left. When you reach the plank bridge on the right, turn right and cross it then walk ahead and over the next bridge into the field.
Return to the car park the way you came – by walking along the edge of the field, through the gap in the hedge and crossing the road.
Walks with Rena 