Start: We begin our walk from St James the Great church in the picturesque village of Claydon. Postcode : OX17 1EZ. Grid Ref: SP457 500. You can also start this walk in Upper Boddington opposite The Plough and start at waypoint (6).
(S/E) With your back to St James the Great church (at the East gate) go left (North) down the road, through the village and take the footpath on your right by a road sign hidden in the bush, signed to Lower Boddington (opposite the junction with Fenny Compton Road).
(1) Go past the wooden bollard & house called The Brambles. Walk down a narrow passage with a brick wall on your right to take a stile to the field. Go ahead for 60 paces and take a fence stile right into the field and go left keeping the hedge left to stay along the edge of the field.
Go over a new single stile then double stile and keep ahead along the left field edge to take further stile to the next field. Keep ahead with the hedge left to the corner of the field, through two large metal gates.
(2) Then across a canal bridge and ahead down the track to go over corner stile to eventually take the footbridge over a small stream to next field.
Go ahead over the dismantled railway line and take a stile into the next field to go 1/4 right across the field and take a double stile and footbridge just to the left of farm buildings by a large lone oak tree.
(3) Stay ahead under power lines with the hedge and farm buildings right. After 200 yards take the gate right, crossing the scrub to take further stile into the next field. Go left along the edge of the field to take stile in the top left corner.
Go diagonally 1/4 right across the centre of the field (or around right hand perimeter if heavily cropped) towards the far right corner, through the gate and wooden fenced corridor to take the gate to lane (this may be a crossing point for HS2 so please follow any diversions). Turn left and stay along the lane to enter Lower Boddington at cross roads with the sometimes closed Carpenters Arms ahead of you.
(4) Go ahead over the crossroads and with Carpenter's Arms right, walk through Lower Boddington. Continue steeply uphill, ignoring the first bridleway right (opposite The Manor House) and a little further up the hill where the road swings left, take the bridleway right to Cleveland Farm.
(5) Go up the track and at the top, opposite the large barn, take the metal gate left to the field. Go right with the hedge right to the field end and exit by the gate to the road. Go left on the tree lined road and after some 1/2 mile come to the crossroads.
(6) Go left into Upper Boddington. Pass The Plough Inn on left (restricted opening times) and, after 70 paces, take short road left to find T junction (here you join The Millennium Way). At this T junction go left up the quiet Villages Church Road to pass a post box left and the school right and leave Upper Boddington (a slight detour on your left, to visit St. John the Baptist Church, is worthwhile).
Continue on the undulating lane with panoramic views right and after 1/2 mile road swings right as you enter Lower Boddington. (5) Go past the bridleway left which you took on the outward route then opposite the first house on right (Sears Farmhouse) take the bridleway left, which becomes a lane and goes down to the road.
(7) Cross the road and go ahead on the track past Cleve House left. After 100 paces, before Paradise Farm, turn right through a wooden kissing gate into a field. Turn 1/2 left for 100 paces to fence corner of small paddock and bear left to take another wooden kissing gate.
Go with the fence right to the small field corner and take the large metal gate left to cross the low bridge.
(8) You now encounter HS2 works and the footpath has been diverted, so go right along a new path enclosed by fencing which takes you to the road running from Lower Boddington to Claydon.
On reaching the road turn left towards Claydon. Follow the road and after half a mile it will turn sharp left and then sharp right.
(9) At this latter bend leave the road by going straight ahead along a track. At the next farm gate bear right along the wooden fence to a small waymarked metal gate and there turn right to go South, straight across a large field to find and take a narrow well waymarked mid hedge gap
(you may need to cross crops in this field as the path is not obvious and the crops may obscure the waymarked gap so *alternatively go with hedge right to the corner of the field then turn left in the same field still keeping hedge & trees right to find the narrow waymarked gap).
(10) Go through this gap across a very old railway line coppice to take another waymarked gap, then go directly across the field to reach the corner hedge & trees. Keep hedge left to reach the far corner of the field. Take the large corner gap to the road, then turn right.
(11) Continue up to the road junction then go left, signed Claydon and where the road turns sharp right go left through the wide gap then along the bridleway. Go ahead across the field to take a gap and continue with the hedge right.
Go through a small gap ahead and then cross the field past two well-separated oak trees to mid hedge gap (if this field is heavily cropped with an indistinct path just go left around the field edge to reach gap on the far side). Take the gap and cross the field towards the next mid-hedge gap (here we leave the Millennium Way).
(12) Do NOT take the gap but go right along the field edge keeping the hedge left. Go through corner gaps of the next two fields keeping the hedge left and keep a sharp look out for a concealed waymarked footbridge on left just before the corner of the field. Take the footbridge into the field continuing 1/2 right across to the far corner stile and metal gate by the canal bridge.
(13) Go over a stile to the road, then over canal bridge continuing gently up the road for some while to reach a junction. Turn right at the junction, which will bring you back into the peaceful village of Claydon and your starting point near St James the Great church. (S/E)
