Stansted Mountfitchet to Sawbridgeworth - Around Essex (14)

Wow! Walking 2 days in a row! Thought those days were over until I get the new knees!

Short walk yesterday & not much longer today but quite tricky to stick close to the county boundary - would have been much easier, though less accurate, simply to march through the centre of Bishop's Stortford!

Bedevilled again by persistent mist & that's likely to be a problem until the cold weather comes - still ridiculously mild for November; by the time I stopped for lunch I was back to shorts & tee-shirt!

Stansted Hall

The original Stansted Hall was built of stone from the destroyed Mountfitchet Castle but it went through many incarnations & many owners before it became the Arthur Findlay College  & home of the Spiritualist National Union in the 1960s

It was William de Montfitchet, great-grandfather of the young knight who took on King John, who built Stansted's Church of St Mary the Virgin in parkland where Stansted Hall now stands

It was William who assumed the new family surname &, busy man, he was also responsible for founding the Cistercian Abbey of Stratford Langthorne in West Ham..... in the days when West Ham was in Essex!

The church is now largely redundant though it remains consecrated & is used for occasional services

Unlikely that Birchanger will mean much to you other than as a service station on the M11 and stepping-off point at the infamous Junction 8 for Stansted Airport... all of which does make this a bit of a noisy spot!
And yet part of the wood that gave the village its medieval name still survives, now under a preservation order





Interesting Footnote: Birchanger featured on the front page of The Daily Mirror on Boxing Day 1913 after Father Christmas arrived here by aeroplane!
It was to be another 30 years before  the airfield was opened & a further 26 before the first terminal appeared

Think this is the first time I've ever posted pictures of a pub I didn't visit! I tried but they weren't opening for another 20 minutes & I was impatient to be tackling the motorway!









So I 'collected' the pub signs rather than the pub & its beer!

Now..... if the beer is as good.......!

Highlight of the Day: negotiating the M11 & its slip roads, the A120 spurs, London Stansted Airport & ending up on the old Braintree to Bishop's Stortford railway line at Start Hill overlooking the complexities of Junction 8!

Wasn't really sure how this was all going to work out, even while I was walking it!
2 bridges, 2 tunnels & new perspectives on roads I've often driven. All this with 'planes roaring overhead almost within touching distance!
Clever stuff!

Birchanger to Little Hallingbury  in an hour & a half without having to pause for a single vehicle!

Here I am above the M11 yet again!
Beats driving along it!

'The George', Little Hallingbury
Enjoyed a beer here in their garden before but, until today, I'd never stopped for lunch

A 17th century inn which was originally known as 'The Shoulder of Mutton' & then the 'King's Head' before becoming 'The George' c1769
In those days it stood on the 18th century equivalent of the M11: the drovers' route to Chelmsford Market & the main cross-country coach route from Bishop's Stortford

Quite busy today, too!
Excellent steak, onion & mushroom Guinness pie!

Beer of the Day: very good 'Eagle' IPA from Wells & Young's; a hoppy, amber coloured beer with a refreshingly bitter bite

At last! Back by water again!
The River Stort Navigation serves as the county boundary with Hertfordshire for much of this stretch southwards from Spellbrook Lock to its confluence with the River Lea
Good to be working with something definite rather than a vague, imaginary line across a field!

The Stort Navigation runs for 14 miles from Rye House on the Lea to Bishop's Stortford; it was opened in 1769
A branch to Saffron Walden was surveyed in 1788 & an extension to link Bishop's Stortford to Cambridge approved in 1814 but neither were built
Now that would have been a good walk!

Approaching Tednambury Lock - lovely spot!

This is land once owned by the Benedictine monks of Bury St Edmunds.... hence the name

Little Hallingbury
          Mill
Built in 1874 & operational until 1952, it is now a popular hotel & restaurant - last time I was there was for Hugh's retirement meal, former headteacher at Alec Hunter, many years ago!

Interesting Footnote: the original mill on this site was called Tednam Mill

Memorial to 17-year-old Scott Clark from Sawbridgeworth who drowned here in November 2004 after a night out with friends

Just about all that remains of what was a huge mill & maltings complex, devastated in 1929 by what is still regarded as Sawbridgeworth's biggest ever fire

Reached Sawbridgeworth, inconveniently, about half-way between trains so popped into 'The Railway Hotel' for a quick pint
Always looks slightly grubby & a bit neglected to me but the people are very friendly!

Glad I made the diversion, witnessing part of the most phenomenol day's play in Test Cricket history! South Africa bowled out for 96; Australia bowled out for 47..... I couldn't believe the highlights they were showing me!
Unique statistic? The only time in the history of Tests that both sides have had a player dismissed twice on the same day!

It was almost enough to send me back to 'The Three Willows' on my way home so that I could finish the day in a real Cricket Pub!