Hello, and thank you for visiting my Cotswolds Walks Website.

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The Cotswolds is a beautiful part of England, indeed it is a National Landscape (formally known as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty). It has the added benefit of having over 5,000 km of Public Rights of Way, a sufficient number to be able to design many circular walks. For more information on the Public Rights of Way through the Cotswolds and elsewhere, rowmaps.com is a good starting point. The site provides links to the Public Rights of Way for many counties, including Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire.

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I love walking though the rolling Cotswolds landscape and have designed a number of circular walks that have taken me though this wonderful countryside. As I do the walks I shall add them to this website.

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I would advise you not to be fooled by the benign looking landscape of the Cotswolds. It may not have the rugged and steep hills of Scotland, North Wales or the Lakes nor the unpredictable weather, but my walks have taken me to some pretty remote places, so make sure you go properly prepared; as you should on any walk in the British countryside.

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I do not give blow by blow accounts of the walks and although the maps do give a good indication of the routes, I would very strongly recommend that you make sure you take a good, reliable map with you that shows the detailed Public Rights of Way. It is not uncommon for the way markers to be obscured or even completely missing. I have had to retrace my steps on a number of occasions after having taken a wrong turn, even when using a 1:25,000 scale Ordnance Survey map.

 

The walks I have devised are generally easy going, but it is still possible to get lost. I would also recommend having proper paper maps to hand. It is not uncommon for mobile signals to be lost in the Cotswolds, as the number of perplexed walkers I have come across will testify.

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Before you embark on a walk in the Cotswolds make sure you take all the usual and sensible precautions for any remote walk in the British countryside. And finally, the Cotswolds is a working landscape, so please respect those who make their living by managing this wonderful landscape and follow the Countryside Code. 

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As well as the walks given on this website, I plan to write guides on specific walks. The first is a guide to a 48.5 mile (77.5km) walk I devised from the Source of the River Windrush to its confluence with the River Thames. Further details can be found HERE.