National Grade: Moderate  Distance: 11 mi / 17.7km  Leader: Barbara  Mac. Date: Sun Mar 29th 2026

With the promise of not too muddy paths, Barbara attracted a decent turnout of 8 for her 11 mile walk from Prestwood Nature Reserve. Despite several of us having to turn around and hunt down the start point due to incorrect grid and what3words references, we all managed to arrive before Barbara who cut it very fine indeed arriving at just 3 minutes to 10.00.

The first outing of the year for me, Martin and Mike, we were joined by the lovely Jane who had recently moved out of London to live in Marlow to be closer to her grandchildren. With only 4 weeks till the Exmoor holiday this was a good training walk for those of us booked on that holiday.

Setting off we soon climbed up towards woods, indeed that was the order of the day - a mix of flat, woods and inclines.

The morning break was in Speen where Barbara had identified the general store come Post Office had a coffee machine. Such was the delay in delivering 4 cups of coffee it emerged from chatting with the owner that he actually lived in Eastcote, not far from Denise and Rob, and drives to and fro every day to run the store.

Despite the clocks going forward and the start of British Summer Time, the wind chill made it one of the coldest days in recent weeks, with most of us keeping our hats and gloves on most of the day and no sunshine all day.

After circling Naphill Common we ate lunch on the benches outside the cafe at Naphill Village Hall, a frequent starting place for several Hillingdon walks. We didn’t dally as it was bitterly cold and rain forecast in the afternoon. Unfortunately the rain started just after 2pm but luckily it was quite light.

Passing a kissing gate with a dedication to Bubbles on it, Denise recounted how she had been intrigued to find out who Bubbles was assuming it to be a dog. In fact she advised it was a dedication to the wife of a local who had passed away and shortly after we passed a large house called Bubbles.

After a final steep hill and another wood we wound our way back to the car park all having fared well with this first test of 2026 of our stamina. We all thanked Barbara for leading today and Jane said she had enjoyed the walk and meeting a fast walking group. Some of us may have had a couple of months off walking but clearly our fitness hadn’t been impacted!

Report by:  Caroline Wise