Fenny Compton Walk

Readers will realise that after leaving Oxford we have been slowly heading north with each lock taking us slightly higher.  The Claydon Flight of five locks has raised us to the summit pound and from this point we will start descending.

Today’s Jan’s camera was desperate for a walk around the local area and being kind hearted I took it for a long one.  The objective was to reach some high ground and get an idea of the ‘lay of the land’.  The camera and I headed back south down the towpath and then west along various public footpaths.  Most of the crops are ripe and the harvesting has begun. 

The first part of the walk was through fields of ripe barley as we headed north west towards Fenny Compton Village. From there is was possible to see high ground to the south west.

  That hill on the skyline looked promising.  The route took me through the southern edge of Fenny Compton where I happened to notice a small brick building adjacent to the village primary school.  The sign by the front door read “The Old School”.

There must have been only one classroom!

You can see some of the route on the following map.

The canal on the right and Burton Dassett Country Park is the green patch on the left.  I hadn’t realised my objective was a country park.  Burton Dassett Country Park is owned by Warwickshire County Council and is 666ft above sea level.  The area was once quarried for ironstone.  The top is so broken up I thought it might have been the site of a ancient hill fortress.

In this next photo you can see the broken ground in the foreground and in the distance a line of hill to the east.

Looking in the opposite direction it is possible to see a line of hills running to the west.

The Warwickshire plains stretch away to the north.

In the middle of the above photo is Bonfire Hill.  One of five knolls on top of the feature.  Looking south the Norman tower of the 12th century Burton Dassett parish church can be seen in the distance.

The most prominent of the knolls at the top is Windmill Hill which has a circular stone tower with a conical top.

It’s possible to obtain a good insight about the local geography from Windmill Hill.  The ground has been gradually rising since we left Oxford and from this point it is possible to see a line of hills running from east to west.  The canal (and railway) has managed to find a slightly lower route through a valley but is still approximately 300ft above sea level.  The canal will descend another 60ft to reach the beginning of the Warwickshire Plains.

The route from the country park then took me north back through the small village of Northend.  To my surprise, north of the village I came upon a rail line running east-west.

I was rather intrigued with the state of the track.  It had timber sleepers which might mean it was old.  But the track was secured to the sleepers by ties which suggested it was modern.  The rail head was rusty which suggested it was rarely used.  A little mystery which I solved once back at Waiouru.

The track is a siding to MoD Kineton.  The siding joins the main line at Fenny Compton and then runs to a large rail terminal inside the Ministry of Defence base. 

you can see in the above map that the base is very large (red arrow).  There is an extensive rail network around the base.  According to Wikipedia the base was established as an ammunition depot in 1941.  It is here the British Army trains Ammunition Technicians (ATs) and Ammunition Technical Officers (ATOs).  The Defence School here trains personnel in the removal or neutralising of IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices).

We must have driven along the adjacent M40 motorway on a number of occasions without realising this large base existed.